FROM A HOLIDAY LETTER

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 971, 14 May 1930, Page 14

FROM A HOLIDAY LETTER

I am writing to you from the “top window bunk”; that means the most superior bunk with a window above it, which looks right out over the sea. There is always such splendour and beauty caught in the little square of window, and in the morning I wake so early that by leaning out I can watch a magic dawn. Just now from my window I see a blue sky. and such a blue! It is not hard like a winter’s sky, nor a glaring summer’s, but it is a tender, delicate blue, very faint and tremulous. Across the horizon march great white armies of clouds which make me think of Rupert Brooke’s poem:: I think they ride the calm midheaven, as these, In wise majestic melancholy train. Blue shadows are beginning to creep up over the hillside, and I must away for milk—over the cliff path between the flowering tea-tree, with the sea winds hustling me and even a few fragile blue-winged butterflies to fly out from under my feet. —Lone Dreamer. GLIMPSE Have you ever noticed hotv eerie and wonderful a street light looks viewed through a tramcar window?—just a misty glimpse, like a stray tramp whose eyes gleam hunger, and shadowv figures that scurry and run, hunched and indistinct. —Lone Singer. VISITORS The lettuce and cabbage seeds that I planted a week or so ago have pushed their little green heads into the world a.nd, huddled together, they peep shyly about. And all my sweet peas have suddenly popped their delicate green heads up to inquire how the world goes. —Lone Drifter. “KING'S BARBER” Out from the sands of Old Egypt where the Sphinx gazes with its eternal question into the distance, a great tomb is emerging. In some respects it is the greatest wonder of all the wonders of that storied land. The tomb, which has been discovered by excavators working under the direction of the Egyptian University, covers an area greater than that of any other tomb yet found in the land of the Pharaohs. From that estimate we must except the great Pyramid of Cheops, which, although a sepulchre, was almost a city of stone. The newly-discovered tomb is that of a mysterious person named Ra Ouer, who combined priestly offices with those of a Court functionary. He is described in the first place as High Priest of Xekheb, a goddess of Upper and Lower Egypt. He was, moreover in respect of earthly things, “Majordomo of the Palace, Master of the Royal Wardrobe, King’s Barber, Prince of the Pots, and Master of Ceremonies.” We know not whom he served; the remains of his royal master with his name and fame are one with the blown sands of the desert; but Ra Ouer. revealed after scores of centuries in his last earthly dwelling, suddenly finds immortality. DIATOMS Diatoms are microscopic plants covered with siliceous shells which float in fresh and salt water. They have no roots or leaves and they are in shells so that at first sight they might be thought to be tiny shell fish, but they contain chlorophyll, the green pigment of plants which proves that they are vegetable in nature. They occur in tremendous numbers and the ocean floor in many places is plastered deep with their shells. In a single quart of sea water there may be seven million diatoms. M hen the shells are crushed they make good metal polishes and toothpowders.

“THE COCOANUTS” AT GRAND

The big comedy at the Grand Theatre, “The Cocoanuts,” is an alltalking comedy, which serves to introduce to Antipodean audiences the four Marx Brothers, the most applauded and successful of all the comedians of New York. In “The Cocoanuts” they are surrounded by a cast of stage and screen favourites, and made theif film debut In the happiest manner. with these advantages is their own delightful brand of comedy* or, rather, four distinct brands of comedy. Mary Eaton and Oscar Shaw, two favourites of the musical comedy stage, figure in the romantic side of “The Cocoanuts,” two very pleasing young people, with a charming flair for song, dance and humour. The plot of this play is original and, to the lay mind, immensely promising. A real estate boom in Florida is he excuse for all the complications and errors and trickeries that arise and the dark secrets of the agents’ offices are now brought to light. All this with plenty of songs and ballets, and to the tune of the Marxian antics.