OTHER PEOPLE’S IDEAS
NO SHORTAGE OF DROVERS (To the Editor) Sir, —As a drover, resident in Masterton, who spends all his earnings in the town, and one who endeavours to respond to every call which good citizenship requires of him, it is not a little disconcerting to have to listen to the annual howl, which goes up at this time of the year from certain quarters for more drovers. Drovers who stay in the game throughout the year experience a very lean time during the winter and most of the summer months and look forward to pulling up a little in the busy time, which is usually from New Year or thereabouts to about March or maybe a little later. It is of course easy to understand how agreeable it would be for the stock firms (to whom the drovers look for most of their employment) to have an influx of drovers to the town at this time of the year, and this as a matter of fact has been accomplished in years gone past. It is only a few weeks ago that we read in your esteemed journal that once more the cry had gone forth—“shortage of drovers in Masterton.”
Now what are the facts? Take my own case first: I have a team of four dogs to feed and two horses to feed and keep shod. I have done three days’ droving during the last three weeks and have .nothing further in view. In conversation with two other drovers in Queen Street today, I twitted them with loafing about town, while there was such a shortage of drovers. I was promptly informed that they were in like case to myself, and had done practically nothing during the last month. They informed me further of several ither drovers who were similarly circumstanced, and I venture to say that it would be a fairly safe bet that no single drover in Masterton has worked full time (not including the holidays) for the last month. Be that as it may, there is quite definitely no shortage of drovers in Masterton, and no justification whatever for raising such a false alarm. —I am, etc., “ONE OF THE TRIBE.” Masterton, January 13.
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Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 January 1943, Page 2
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369OTHER PEOPLE’S IDEAS Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 January 1943, Page 2
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