What Everybody Says.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2633, 16 June 1877, Page 3

What Everybody Says.

" In multitude o£ counsellors there is sa'cty." —OjD Proverb,

That melancholy termination of a game of football lias been the topic on everybody's tongue since Saturday last, aud under the sad influences of that event everybody votes football a dangerous game—an exhibition of brute force instead of a game requiring still and intelligence on the part of the players. No doubt, as often played, football is a game that involves more than ordinary risks, but who shall say that it is really more dangerous to life or limb than hunting, and what would be thought of the man Or woman who would propose to prohibit fox hunting because of its dangers ? Football involves rough work, and young men or boys who indulge in the game make up their minds to experience some " mauling." They go in to win—to excel in the game; and when some player more lucky j or more plucky than another makes a brilliant "charge" and gains an advantage for his side, lie receives the plaudits not only of the players, but the onlookers. As regards the onlookers, it is a well known saying that they see most or the best of the game, and everybody thinks that if football were to be divested of its <^harges " and "scrimmages," it would soon cease to possess the slightest interest for spectators; for, however they may regret a serious or fatal accident, they enter with zest into the spirit of the game when " spills" are frequent and the points are most hardly contested. Everybody may depend that an occasional casualty like that which occurred in Auckland will be powerless to put down football, however much it may be regretted, and the " noble game," as it is called, will continue to possess attractions for those who in their youthful vigor look only to the healthful excitement, not the dangers of the game.

That Thomas Walkei', the famous trance medium, should have been called " a humbug " in Dunedin, after his chequered career in Auckland, is only what everybody might have expected, but that Dr Carr, of phrenological and mesmeric celebrity, should have been the first to (denounce him looks very much like " the pot calling the kettle black," for everybody who has witnessed Dr Carr's "manifestations" must long since have come to the conclusion that the expressive term " humbug " would apply to his entertainment. He has humbugged the public for the last ten or twelve years, and he seems to be as successful now as he was at the beginning of his career. His title of "Dr " is as much a piece of humbug as Mr Walker's pretentions to spiritual inspiration. There are humbugs and humbugs, and " Dr " Carr is not the least amongst the brotherhood. The doctor is, moreover, troubled with a short memory. H.e told a Dunedin audience lately that lie never mesmerised ladies, and advised females never to submit to the influence. He found it convenient to forget that at the School of Arts in Sydney some ten years ago there wero several females amongst his " subjects " aightly, and that they were made to take part in a mournful spectacle of a soldier's execution and funeral, even to bending the knee and kissing the supposed dead,man. Dr Carr performed the delicate operation of extracting a young lady's tooth while under the influence of mesmerism o'\ a public stage before a mixed audience, and did many similar things. Are these not written in the chronicles of the Sydney journals ? Dr Carr had better refresh his memory, and then perhaps he will be more careful in making rash, assertions, or accusing a fellow adventurer with being a humbug.

The assumption of a pious feeling is sometimes successful in gulling people, but it seems too singularly out of place when put on by a debtor, who meets his creditors with an alarming deficit in his balance sheet. Everybody may not have heard of the case of one such, who proposed to open the meeting of his creditors with prayer, and was incontinently kicked out of the room by a creditor who had been victimised in a most barefaced manner. That debtor got his deserts, or a small portion of them, but his audacity has been almost equalled by a debtor in the Empire City, who informed his deluded creditors that "if Providence pleased to prosper him in the future he would make it a point to pay every farthing he owed;" As this pious gentleman commenced business with nothing, lived at the rate of something like two thousand a year for four years, made a decent settlement on his wife and went to the bad to the tune of twelve or fifteen thousand pounds, he must be blessed with a particularly sanguine temperament to expect that Providence or any other divinity will ever give him the same chance again of raising the wind. So the creditors seemed to think, and that if they ha' 3to trust to Providence for repayment they had better make the best of the estate. There is a story of a Presbyterian clergyman making a sea voyage on a lee shore. A storm came on, and the situation became desperate. The captain tried every means to save his vessel, and the case seemed hopeless.- The minister watted every fresh movement with the inte^st which a man in a novel and dangerous position would do; and after seeing the failure of some tactic which was only resorted to in extreme cases, he accosted the captain, and asked him what he would do now. The captain replied something to the effect, "Give her her head and trust to Providence." The minister then said : "If it's come to that its time to be looking out for one's self." The Wellington creditors were like the minister : they had no confidence in the ultimatum suggested by the debtor.

A reverend and esteemed visitor to the Thames has since his departure been committing his experience to paper, and he or the printer has been guilty of a " bull.' 1 Speaking of this district he says :—" The Thames was once a flourishing goldfield, but of late, owing to scarcity of precious metal, it has declined. However, a fair population still find employment in connection with the mines. The Catholic population at one time mustered several thousands : at present it does not exceed half that number." If anybody could arrive at the first number, "several thousands," with any degree of accuracy, it would not be difficult to say what half the number now is, but " several thousands " is so vague a term that the information would be comparatively valueless to a statist.

Everybody—not everybody exactly, but the few who saw the announcement — wants to know the meaning of the

" splcudid tar painting" inspection of which was invited "at the residence of a celebrated underground boss." There may be a joke attaching to the notice, but is so cleverly wrapped up and concoa'ed that ifc will require some furthi r explanation or a sledge hammer to make people see it. If there is anything in it, it is not fair to hide the joke.

Everybody will be surprised to learn that the newest fashions in ladies'apparel are to be introduced to the Thames. An auctioneer has announced for sale "Ladies' robes, trowsers and vests." Does it mean latest novelties from Paris, extreme tied-backs, or another species of bloomerism ?