ABBOTT'S PRIZE POEM.

Observer, Volume 4, Issue 89, 27 May 1882, Page 163

ABBOTT'S PRIZE POEM.

Sinclair's" carrying off the five guineas for the prize poem has astonished even his most intimate friends. No one had ever- suspected him of Vpossesßing even a scintillation of the divine afflatus. Some people are still sceptical about it, ■until they know the name of the author who in- : spired him, while others think the "pome" a mere rehash of Bkckman's address on the opening of the Theatre Eoyal. Apropos of Sinclair's critical knowledge of the classics there is a good story extant. He was employed on the staff of a daily newspaper, and was sent as a special xeporter with a kind of Pickwickian expedition to - certain caves. This was when the members of the Auckland Institute dubbed themselves the Philosophical Society. Amongst the savants who made this celebrated peregrination in the cause of science were the present Judge Gillies, then practising at the bar, and Dr Purchas. Sinclair put himself on his mettle, and launched out into a minute description of the exploration. Among the wonderful discoveries made in the cave he •enumerated a specimen of the musca domesiicus. The erudite sub-editor to whom the report was submitted before publication thought some prehistoric monster like the megalosaurus or plesiosaurus had been discovered, and sent the boss reporter to examine and describe it at full length. The whole staff, Sinclair included, were horrified •when the paper came out on being informed by a ■printer's devil who had learned the rudiments of Latin that musca ftomesticus meant the common house fly. It appeared that a fly had lodged on the back of one of the savants, who had played off & practical joke on Sinclair.