WATER IS HIS ELEMENT

New Zealand Listener, Volume 15, Issue 367, 5 July 1946, Page 12

WATER IS HIS ELEMENT

HEN it came to finding a \X/ glass-sided tank big enough for Professor Allen to enter and demonstrate his "Pose and Mien, taken after the World’s Greatest Masters of Painting and Sculptural Attainments," we were up against a special difficulty. The Professor has often thought of having one made so that he can do his Unique Act to the best advantage, but es it has to be watertight, it can hardly be portable, and so he has never had one made. "That’s the trouble, you see," he said, tapping his hand on the table. "There’s nothing big enough anywhere, and I can’t carry one round with me." We discussed the possibility of finding anything anywhere that would be big enough to enable photographs to be taken of the Professor imitating the poses of works by Michaelgngelo, R.A., Carnel Vane, Lady Scott, Adolf Hitler, etc., and it may safely be said that we tried everything. We rang the waterworks, and found that the Thorndon baths are empty for the winter-the Te Aro baths are too dark. One or two school baths have been emptied for the winter; someone suggested that the Milk Department had recently replaced some vast glass vats-that was true, but the old ones, though big enough for the purpose, had steel cases; an amateur

breeder of tropical fish had nothing big enough; finally it narrowed down to the elephant bath at the Newtown Zoo, which the Curator, Mr. Cutler, was generous enough to offer to fill. Its only disadvantage was that we would have to take the photograph from above. Our photographer volunteered to be held over the pool in the trunk of the elephant; but he was relieved of that necessity by the fact that the elephant died some months ago. % a * "NEW ZEALAND," The Professor told me, "is a showman’s graveyard." He feels nowadays, when he is at the very highest peak of his art, that he must leave the Dominion. At last, after an unspecified number of years (his age is still a secret) he is caught in the current of a trend that affects all of his kind in New Zealand. He must go abroad if he is to make the most of his abilities. He has made some effort, I gathered, to impress some of his ideas upon the natives here. He has told "them" this, that and the other thing. (When he divulges one of his original ideas or inventions, he talks always of some shadowy "they," by which you understand the general body of Philistines, the unbelieving.)

‘T’ve been in touch with the woollen mills-woollen swimming costumes are no good. Four ounces dry, they might be, but wet, they weigh as many pounds as ounces. A man or a boy or a girl is dragging three or four pounds through the water. I told them, we must get nylon or silk. All those girls out there on the beach, on the diving _ board, they’re proud. Some of these girls have beautiful figures, all eyes are upon them, they’re the censure of all eyes! I explained to them, all clothes worn by the human race can be made at home by wives and mothers-except stockings and the swimsuit. The mills have them beat here-so the mills must find something that will cut the resistance OUR. F5The Professor explained that he once trained a boy to break a record time, swimming in the nude, which he could not break in a suit. Swimming, in New Zealand, he says, is going back and back, and giving boys and girls a wrong outlook on life altogether. He has told "them" this. "And another thing-there’s no racing turn in New Zealand. You watch the shark, the dolphin, the eel, the trouthe doesn’t touch the shore when he turns round. He CURLS. I maintain, a swimmer should not touch the end of the bath. Touching is an inducement to rest." .

Professor Allen slapped a hand on the table, then he snapped his fingers and closed his eyes, and waved it all away. * * * T our second meeting, the Professor allowed me to ask him for his life history. He was born in Wellington, he told me. His mother came from County Wexford in the West of Ireland, and his father from Barbadoes, where he was a native judge. He had five brothers and six sisters. "Not one of us ever drank or smoke, Wasn’t that extraordinary? Amazing! My mother was a singer as a young girl, She was an old woman when I was born, The Irish have their children very young and very old... * i "Excuse me, Professor," I said, "but did you say you don’t smoke?" "Only under water," he said. He went on with his life story. "I started to swim when I was 12. We went to live at Waiwera and I started to swim there. As a boy I sent to Japan for books on pearl diving." ‘ The Professor. talked quickly and vaguely, looking at his hands on the table and tending his nails, which have big pink-tinted halfmoons on them. "I have studied international law, science, biology, character reading, pearl ‘diving. .. ." (continued on next page)

Professor Allen Submerges For "Listener" Readers

(continued from previous page) Suddenly he looked up and into my eyes. ; "You ‘know, an interesting thing happened to me once," he said. "I was diving near some rocks, and I must have swum into a cave. It was quite dark. Suddenly I saw before me two great red eyes, glowing. Strange, wasn’t it? It must have been some monster that was living in there. .. ." He had begun to talk again of the monsters of the deep. He was gazing into the distance once more, his eyes wrinkled, nearly. closed. "Biologists tell us," he said, "that all things that are above the surface of the waters are represented below — kings, queens, horses, lions, the moonfish, the starfish, the hawkfish, the devil fisheven the godshrimp — sea-urchins, the bridal fish (Ihave seen that in Lake Taupo), the angel fish... ." Remembering that uncompleted life. story, I asked The Professor how old be is. "Over ten and under a hundred," he said. "Age is nothing to do with it. It's a side issue. Another thing people are always asking me is ‘How long can you stay under water, Professor?’ I will never tell them, not even Royalty, nor pressmen, nor photographers. No, I learned that from Melba: ‘Never tell the world at large any secret of your life.’ She said: ‘I told them in Italy what was the

highest note I could sing; it was a mistake; when the world knows, they’re no longer interested. The novelty must never die. They must always be more _ interested in you, Professor, than you are in them.’ "No, I wouldn't tell my Doctor. My Doctor says ‘You're a funny chap, Professor.’ But I wouldn’t even tell the King!" %* % % P ROFESS OR ALLEN’S Smoking Underwater against Every Internal and External Pressure is done in this fashion: a cigarette is lighted and placed in a holder fixed in a long decorated’ glass tube. He fills the tube with smoke, then goes down, draws the smoke, and then blows out the blue bubble. Then he tells them that they’ve often seen water steam but now they've seen it smoke. The purpose of the glass is to ensure that the public knows it is not being deceived. "Mind you," he. says, "it makes me _ sick. I’m not a smoker at all, and it’s very painful sometimes." He mixes a lot with scientists to get ideas. From. them he has learned that there is a

purpose in the _ slow movements of the octopus, the eel, the Javanese death crab, and shellfish. They must not move fast, because fast movements would damage their bodies. Moderation and.temperance are essential to the Subaquatic Scientist. "T could never take to drink. It would slow up my breathing, you see. I’ve led a very clean life, Of course any ordinary swimmer will be a great champion for a time, but then he’ll say ‘But of course I've taken to drink now .. .’ A boxer could go into the ring drunk, but it is not so in swimming. You know, a professor in Dunedin once told me (I always go to the scientific men, I have no truck With the hobbledehoys. and people on the street corners), he told me it’s amazing that I can walk on the floor of the sea. I can, you know. And I once swam a length at Khandallah with my legs tied . . ." Somehow we got back to the lifestory. The Professor has sung and danced on the stage. He did radio work in. Auckland-sang the Quarrelsome Scene from La Tosca over Station 1YA. His mother taught him to cook, so he has cooked in different hotels, and private houses, has been valet to different gentlemen, sergeant-at-arms . But the life-story gave way. again when we talked of music. Professor Allen is not fond of men singers. "A man sings with terrible effortthese Italian tenors ... (he stood on the chair and gave O Sole Mio with much

motion in the arms), but a womanGalli Curci-is like a bird. (He sang like Galli Curci.) Women are DIVINE. It is like (he paused, and. had to search for the phrase), like gold being poured down a diamond path. "T met Paderewski. He said: ‘No woman will ever play the piano like a man.’ I asked him why. He said ‘There’s so much flesh in the breast. Great men pianists, they can get fat, but it’s all down here, where it doesn’t matterthere have been great men _ pianists, Frontemay, Darcia, Marango, very fat, but great pianists.’ Paderewski is right. I only take notice of great men." I a HE Professor carried with him a sheaf of quarto pages held in two bulldog clips. They contain 2,000 questions. The Professor is very proud of them, because he car® answer them all. They appear to have been handed up to The Professor on the stage by the groundlings, and have been transcribed just as they were written: "What can Don Bradman do well besides play cricket? Is nudism a financial investment? What is the difference between an inquest and an autopsy? Does the Pope of Rome go to confession? What. does Erin Go Bragh mean? What relation is Queen Victoria to the exKaiser? What does it feel like to be a celebrity, Professor Allen? Are all titles bought? What is the best way to cook dried peas? Do pigeons mate for life? Why do you not marry, Professor Allen? What is the cause of bow-legged people?" I put one of them to him: "Can a female crab turn into a male?" When a female and male crab are. fighting, he explained, the female can turn into a male at will, instantly. "Tt’s remarkable, isn’t it? And there’s an electric eel that can sting you without touching at all-an awful sensation. Another extraordinary thing is the giant octopus. He is blind but, do you. know, he can take hold with his suckers and draw. blood through the sleeve of your coat and no stain will be left." On the last page of the 2,000 questions was this one: "What does the Professor do in the case of finding it difficult to get the tiny shoes to fit the newborn?" I put it to him. "Everyone," he said, "makes the same mistake. They try to get them too small. A baby should grow into shoes, not out of them." * * % "HOUGH modesty prohibits my quoting the 55-line ode which I received through the mail (with its marginal aids to the reader, such as "Rhyme here changes" and "Rhyme, go back to start’), I cannot leave my friend Professor Allen without placing it upon record that he sent me a pot of honey (he practically lives on honey, he told me, and also sleeps naked, so that the air shall circulate and stimulate the pores), with an inscription typed on green card which I have interpreted as an injunction to a journalist about to report an interview with a fellow-man. It said: "Harness not the imagination of ‘your neighbour for- with honour to him and truth to yourself you cannot be false to no man and much will be your bounty.

-Saint-Saens."

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