FROM THE WATCH TOWER

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1080, 18 September 1930, Page 8

FROM THE WATCH TOWER

By “THE LOOK-CUT MAN.” SONG OF THE COAL WAR Sing a song of recent quotes, Fuel prices falling; Magnates at each other’s throats— Isn’t it appalling? Normally this news would bring Joy to dad and “mumma,” But why lift our hats and sing, On the eve of summer? Trumpets sound a warlike blast; Coal kings, getting keener; Price lists of their product cast Into the arena. But amid the battle’s din, We just deem it cruel. Summer is “icumen In”— What’s the use of fuel? Let the gladiators fling Challenges about them. Soon the welcome fires of spring Will conspire to flout them. Let us chirp a glad refrain While we may, in clover, Knowing coal will rise again Ere the summer’s over. DIOGENES. UNANIMOUS * * If that oyster and fisheries petition mentioned by Mr. Makitanara comes off, it should have a fair prospect of success. Thirty-four thousand Maoris can’t be wrong. PREMATURE It is sad that Shamrock V. should so far have made ail unimpressive showing, but it is sadder that her designer and one or two others should, frith two races gone, have started to whine already about the handicap of the Atlantic crossing. Everybody knows the handicap exists. They themselves, and Sir Thomas Lipton, who remains tactfully silent, were aware of it before the races ever started. Now that Enterprise has made such a brilliant start, it is hardly consistent with the traditions of British sportsmanship to whimper with the result still in the balance. It is a long time since the original America first took the cup from Britain, but she had to cross the Atlantic to do it. KING COTTON Tom Thumb golf originated with an enterprising innkeeper of Chattanooga, U S.A., who noticed that the putting green outside his temperance tavern was always more densely populated than the adjoining golf course. He made a fortune out of the discovery, but a bigger fortune still awaited the owner of patent rights over a method of constructing greens from the hulls of the cotton seed. Such was the demand for cotton, seed hulls, when the craze was sweeping America, that it even affected the prices on the New Orleans cotton market. Meanwhile the owner of the patent just sat back, smiled expansively, and collected by the hatful 1. He is living on the fad of the land. WHEN WOMEN RULE The unusual behaviour of Councillor Alice Basten at a special meeting of the City Council yesterday is one of the penalties the Mayor and corporation must pay for the privilege of having women members to lighten their weary labours. A male councillor who changed his mind as Miss Basten did would lay himself open to a serious charge of inconsistency, but in Miss Basten’s case’ she was merely exercising a womanly prerogative. It is unusual for a Mayor to have to plead that a councillor remain in the Chamber. More often it is the sad task of a Mayor to order a refractory councillor’s removal. That draws attention to the delicate problem which would arise if a woman councillor got so fractious as to incur the penalty of dismissal. Would Mr. Baildon follow the dictates of his chivalrous intincts, or the usual course of calling a policeman, followed by the ejection of the offending councillor in a whirl of screams and skirts? NAMES, NAMES, NAMES!

Tiwakawaka: You will be thoroughly bored, E.0.M., by, the time you have heard the last of this place-name business. But “St. Stephen” should not have questioned my remarks. He says the mispronunciation of Maori names is a case against the use of Polynesian nomenclature. Why? If the Education Department did its duty by providing proper instruction in pronouncing Maori, the objectionable versions would be stamped out quickly. . Further, l can tell ‘‘St. Stephen” at least four grotesque European names in the South Island to every one of that class in the North. Kingseat, the name of the new mental . hospital near Papakura, is the name of a similar institution in Scot-, land, where one of our Health Department officials received his training. Why does “St. Stephen” object to Diggers’ Valley, Bulls, and Bell Block? The former name tells us that some of our New Zealand “Diggers” have settled there, and it should be honoured. Bulls should be spelt Bull’s. It is Ihe name of a man who lived at a stopping-place on an old stage-coach route. Bell Block perpetuates the name of an eminently worthy Taranaki settler. There is repugnant in Cross Creek or Glorit, but, with “St. Stephen,” I do dislike Coatesville and Bunnythorpe. “St. Stephen,” I suspect, is not a New Zealander, because he does not know much about Aotearoa—a marvellous name, don’t you think?