LISTENINGS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 3, Issue 73, 15 November 1940, Page 16

LISTENINGS

Perpetrated and illustrated by

KEN

ALEXANDER

YOUNG BILL AGAIN

HIS is the second talk in the series "Young Bill Speaks" in which Private William Legrope from Waiwaitamo observes the English scene, "Hullo-a-lo, mum and dad! Hullo, all you blokes in Waiwaitamo! ’Lo, New Zealand! I’m feeling dandy and itching for a chance to dehorn that cow Hitler,

"We're doing all right here; they’ve given us everything except the Oxford accent. But even that sort of grows on a fellow. I often say ‘strewf’ and ‘lumme’ without noticing it. I’ve just got back from leave in London. London’s a bosker settlement but-crikey! -TI don’t know how people find their way about without getting bushed. I tried blazing the lamp-posts with my bayonet, but a cop said, ‘Lock ’ere, young feller-me-lad, you cawn’t do that there ‘ere, a’choppin’ of lamp-posts dahn.’ But when I asked him where the pub was he said he would let me off, seeing that I was kind of new to the place. | "Some people growl about the blackout. But I said they ought to try and find their way down to the corner of our back paddock at night and then they would know what a black-out is. "It’s kind of quiet in London at night, You can’t hear a morepork or a cow or a dog or anything-only the traffic and . —

the bombs going off. At first I missed the noise of Waiwaitamo but I soon got used to the quiet. The night raids do kind of break your sleep though. It’s like the time dad and I had to get up every two hours to poultice the strawberry heifer, only it’s not as interesting. This fellow Hitler must be a nasty cow the way he is blowing things about. He reminds me of the time Drunken Duncan put a charge of blasting powder under his whare because the door stuck. We went to Madame Tussaud’s, It beats me how she got all the bodies. I must say they have kept very well and look better than the stuffed fivelegged lamb in Doogan’s bar. "I was disappointed in Lambeth. They just walk natural and the only time I heard ‘Oy!’ was when I knocked over a winkle stall. But could that bloke say ‘Oy!’? I was disappointed in Petticoat Lane, too. "The cockneys are nice when you get to know their language which is kind of dull after hearing dad when a cow treads on his corn. The cockneys repeat themselves dreadful.

"We are camped in a paddock in the country. The scenery is nice what with the elms with their spreading arms. They have land girls here who are the same. "Well, so-long, Waiwaitamo! I haven’t seen a swallow yet but the corporal says there are a whole lot down at the Purple Pig. I’m going to find out!" —