FROM THE WATCH TOWER

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 956, 26 April 1930, Page 10

FROM THE WATCH TOWER

THE FAVOURITE

I’ve got it on the brain, , I know each merry note— That popular refrain On which my neighbours gloat. Not once or twice a day (At that I'd take the risk) But scores of times they play That syncopated disc. Suppose I try to don My thinking cap and work, They promptly clap it on. It’s driving me berserk. March on, you Grenadiers, While I, beneath the strain. Dissolve myself in tears. They’re playing it again! THE LOST LEGION No doubt it was the spirit of Anzac which, led a number of children to detach themselves from their parents in the course of the ceremony at the Cenotaph yesterday. The result was another demonstration of the value of the loud-speaker. As at the air pageant, distracted parents separated from their offspring were informed through the megaphones that half a dozen unattached mites awaited claimants on the steps of the museum. This sort of thing is becoming so common that soon it will no doubt become the custom to add: “If not claimed will be sold to defray expenses.” * * * POPPY DAY s After a stroll through Queen Street on the afternoon of Poppy Day one concludes that it would be better for the brightness of the general scheme if the custom of wearing buttonholes were more prevalent. The red badge creating a splash of colour on the sombre lapels of gent.'s autumn suitings converted slovenly young men into cavaliers, gave the middle-aged an air of youthful friskiness, and surrounded the senile with an aura of venerable gallantry. Few were observed without the appropriate garland. Poppy sellers were everywhere, and nobody was immune from their attentions. Even motor-cars wore the emblem of Flanders fields. Their poppies were as large as sunflowers. PILLARS OF STATE Proposals to dispense with the Poet Laureate may direct attention to several other offices which survive in England more through custom than necessity. Many of these queer survivals decorate his Majesty’s Household. There are three Gold Sticks, of whom Viscount Allenby is one. Comptrollers, Chamberlains, Almoners and Keepers of the Archives abound. There is a Gentleman Usher to the Sword of State, along with a Keeper of the Jewel House, Groom of the Robes, Surveyor of the King's pictures, Surveyor of the Works of Art, Clerk of the Wine Cellars and Master of the King’s Music. Among the members of the Royal Household in Scotland are an Hereditary Carver and Hereditary Armour-Bearer. A Bargemaster, Keeper of the Swans, Examiner of Plays, Keeper of Virginia Water (who is an admiral), Master of the Buck Hounds and several Guardians of the Showers of State lend additional lustre to the imposing list of sinecures. * + * COMMUNISTS A GAIN Belief in the international infallibility of the Boy Scout is shaken by the report that a prize-giving ceremony at Nanking, China, was marred by a riot in which 300 scouts participated. If these things are regulated by any sort of scale of misdeeds, the mischief, thus charged up to individual scouts will take a good while to expiate at the orthodox rate of one good deed a day. However, it is heartening to read that the scouts were not wholly to blame. They had been the victims of Communist propaganda, that sinister influence which these days may contaminate even babes in arms. To suggest that the riot was started by non-prize winners would have given the impression that the Nanking scouts were not well grounded in the principles of the code. As it is, the explanation that they were debauched from Moscow shows that their leaders, at any rate, do not lack the resource so essential to successful scouting. HISTORIC NIBS “Versailles” writes: Your reference yesterday to the plain penholder used by Mr. T. M. Wilford at the signing of the London naval pact and its contrast with the black and gold fountain pen with which the late Mr. Massey signed the Versailles Treaty of Peace recalls the answer given by Mr. William Morris Hughes to an Australian journalist at the Paris congress. Mr. Keith Murdoch (the man who said he would rather write three columns for the “War Cry” for nothing than give a speech at a gathering of brotherjournalists), wanted to know if

"Billy” intended to give or bequeath his special fountain pen to the Australian war museum. “Mm,” replied the fiery statesman reflectively. ‘I can see that museum a hundred years hence. A wet day in Melbourne and a man in from the Mallee with nothing better than a museum to entertain him. He looks at the Versailles relics, takes up the fountain pen, goes over to a dusty window for better vision, and exclaims: ‘And it was with this the little blighter did it!’ ”