6

It was going to be such a modest party!

E were having "a few

people in."

It was a "must." Friends are 90 friendly, particularly at this time of year, and there comes a time when something has to be done about it. It is lonacy, I know; but that must be ac cepted these days,

The absurd extravaganer we knew we were embarking upon meant no more than a gestare of equality. We all live our lives at a certain standard and always we try to better that. standard..

Sometimes it is hard.

น ★

Whenever this happens my wife sets off on what she colls Operation

She Squirrel Nuts for the granary. goes to Saha, and this time I went along to, to carry the muts

Now when you have a few friens in for a quiet game of poker (a) you know them well enough for the any fe he fairly post- paastox les. (h) yon kadiw them well chongti not to be too absurdly lavish in their ta sip, entertainment. Something: something to moke, something t

Before

we thought we would Now fry the locals. the dear fady who keeps ruled off-licence is

Just fru

CHAP

woked aft

for

through and through by

an implacably British sense of fair play, Fair shares

in her holy slogan.

from the

When first came home

two and word.

ago, she ex-

half

alf years

plained to

21<

patiently

that Regulur Customers

must be Served First. agreed.

Anyway, we bought one of whisky,

one of sina South African brandy nt £2 10. a rum at £2 25. and a hottle of claret nt 12s. 6d. (The last two lest it should be cold and our and friends feel like a hot punch with Hinen floating in (L.) That came to £12 178.

J

Next we went to a Bttle tobacconist used to know in the blitz, and he three actually-petually--soli| me boxes of matchi for 3d., which brought up our spirits and also our custs to £12 174, 3d.

Thre Bmes (64. each), brend- crumbs (Gd.). 11. tangerines (25.). four packets polato crisps (19.), stuffed olives (2s. 3d.). black olives (s. 3d.), plckled gherkins (39. 4d.), kept the price down pretty well, bid then we saw one small jar of pate with truffles.(?) (4s. Bd.), and the rut set

A Hundred cigarettes (196, 44.) and one small box of crystallized

(25) (1

quickest why feults i know to a woman's heart), nat Operation Squirrel was done.

at home www hought three white Blor (75. Od.). pray mim (39. Gd.), and pussy wilny (20 4. dery

(in. Ad.), Brazil and two siphons soda nuts (65. 6d.). (7 And now we were prepared to bollte tu cominence,

My wife sule;

by

For two and a half years I have been waiting and waiting to become a Regular Customer.

fur

It is somewhat like waitirat the older members In die before you can join a riuh for which you have been proposed reconded and voted in A green winter, they say, helpe

I am still not a Regular Customer, and so i still lack my spirits quota at the controlled peler, though the beer and wine staation las cased quite considerably, And sometimes lady wil when I go in the whisper

Canary is singing," of hard and that means a költle stuff all wrapped up in a newspaper under the beer bottles.

dear

Krocer

But this morning the canary wasn't singing. Nor

the formidable and upright man seem

the ittel 10 have shay

pate delicatessen was right out of

aract erram

1114

and cocktail cheese, and the pub lain't a packet S off wTT of crisps in the place.

want.

Crisp Dine Whip cream cheme (9.) with top off milk.

Sprinkle cropipesĒ. raw onion, chopped gher- kin, ehooped pimento or tomato. Paprika. f'ut in

Forge Davi flanked by crisps. Dip in your crispsi.

-

Kromeskles 1E Oyster: Tin of oysters (4s 6d.). Itot! warh oyster in thy strip of bacon, serap of Benon essence and vayente, Prilter batter. Dip and fry.

Anchovs Brazling Fry stellty Brazil musta in 2025. margarine with anelinvy essence (hree ten-sporins). Denin when golden brown.

Supreme de volallie Jeanette Conferith version): Lieben #hisure sprent with pate. Cover this with turkey ends. Pour white

see over. Make ample, pour this over med fet it set. (or Fourse, it should be hickory ham, pate de fole gras, breast of poussin.)

We drank zeven of us: One bottle whisky, Three-quarters bottle Kin tmostly with ver-mouth, although to wimen cared for gin and toninto francesa ng glass with ker). We hart a little brandy with coffee, but

a punch; it was too warm. were 14 cigarettes left out of 100, not come were sanking their own. Two vigars were smoked, were rather dry,

Thert!

They

what

When things had been cleared

we sat down to fut up

I left her alone for

Come hours, aut dra du covered 1. quoted down all the prices montaged almen. The total care to

First we wend to a wine ssp. It looks like a jolly dungeon Grest steel bars_guard the windows, and nestling up to the bars there are bottles of creme de menthe and gay bol

There was a last item which read, brandy mivocaat and curaeno.

Lost at bottles of newlat pathetically: There

are also many

brands of whisky toker, 22, 6, the proprietary

of a trey something 1 was in 来 and gin, openly shown to the thirsty

to the down traveller. These work out at 44 for mend that I settled

of sending of New Your business whisky and £3 12s. 6d. for gin.

university

It

the rent, at my son's Ives and g

is obviously all quite legal, for there

is no attempt at concealment.

ON THE GLACIER

TRAIL FOR DIAMONDS

(From Our Own Correspondent)

find the diamond-bearing rock OTTAWA, Jan. 11.

entail on of the most minute searches ever attempted in HE fabulously rich diamond is other to THE

lode embedded in the pre- the northland.

volcanic rock ice age

SOUR- Toph seramate outeropping of black where east of James Bay, in volcante rock will be tested for the Canada's vast northland, in theon of a diamond

vein through which the genus run.

CHIEF DRAWBACK

"pipe"-the

of

target for a group of interna- tional geologists who are plan- During the search hundreds ning a trek next summer, in reuare miles will be covered by the search of the hoard.

guty, which expects to remain in the area until the freeze-up.

One of the

drawbacks to chief

The there is prospecting

To gel to the icote area in the northwest corner of Quebec Province they will have to travel by airplane, canoe, and one foot.

At the end of the trail they hope to locate what prospectors for years have been unsuccessful in finding one of the greatest undistuvers sources of raw diamonds in the wartet.

Prospectors bave suspected

!!:ייוי:

with nets ant

}

THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH, SATURDAY, JANUARY 31, 1948.

Mantle

"FEAR NOT, I WILL

DELIVER YOU – JUST AS SOON AS THE STEED CETS HIS FEET ON THE GROUND *

TION

GALLANT SIR TRUMAN AND THE MAIDEN IN DISTRESS

Political

Copyright On

POLITICS AND PERSONALITIES

By "CROSS-BENCHER"

THE Government ends the year more firmly in the saddle than at one time seomed possible. The, Opposition is looking a little depressed.

In the autumn, as the jumping season approached, they were fairly confident that the Socialists would take a nasty spill before they were half-way round the course.

Now the picture has changed, Aided by a mild winter so far, a repetition of last year's fuel crisis seems unlikely,

The coal situation is sufficiently cheerful to 'justify Mr Gaitskell having at least a tepid bath.

Some small-scale trading in the Empire has permitted a modest increase in rations, well timed by Mr Strachey for the Christmas season, Labour disputes are negligible. wages are reasonably high, and still not a by-election has beon lost.

Mr Herbert Morrison, the party boss, has reason to congratulate himself.

Professional

ANOTHER source of satisfaction to the Social- ists during the past year has been the high standard of the party organisation. Under Mr Morgan Phillips, Transport House is a really efficient political machine,

THE STORY OF A

VERY BRAVE MAN

Endured more than any other man wounded in the war

tool the Japanese six years to kill Flight-Ser- geant Albert William James Beagley, air gunner, of Ports- mouth.

SIDNEY by

RODIN

they

He was in the rear lurret of but as he became stronger the leading plane of a squadron allowed him home more frequent- of three Blenheimns which had 15. sighted Japanese

They started on him with 20 Zero fighters in the Malayan skies on December 8, 1941, the landing troops. morning after the bombing of

Pearl Harbour.

They finished him off in a

London hospital a few days ago, when the gay heart. the irrepressible heart of Flight Sergeant Beagley at last suc- cumbed to. poison from the wounds caused by a machine- gun bullet in aerial combat.

Perhaps his enemies may think he was an unconscionable time a-dying.

Through the years in

underwent hospitals he

porations to cheat them.

seven 61

11e is believed by the most famous plastic surgeon of the Inte war to have undergone operations than any man in the British Forces.

lie even married his nurse between spells on the surgeon's table, and planned to raise family of adopted children-his wound denied him fatherhood.

NEVER FEARED

He longed to fly After about 50 operations he asked the Ministry of Educa- tion to allow him to train as a school-teacher.

But the Japanese won- although before his mind faded at the very end. this tall, sien- der Hampshire lad, who enjoy- ed every moment of life, nover for one moment of it thought he was going to die.

be

Albert Beagley came to Stinging files by millions Intest the one of the first British airmen for humans to smite the Japanese because. remon and nuke bie

able, so the party will no well as a child at school, he lunged equipped

and-By

to fly. outments

When the geulogists to in they well make an advance "appointment" existence of the gem deposit with the bush pilot who takes them years, ever stuce the people of the to pick them up again in four months northern United States began uding time before lee prevents the plane high-grade diamonds on their famus jnding on the lake..

picked up, their the are

His father, his grandfather and his great-grandfather were the Royal all sergeants in Marine Artillery.

and in their backyards around 100nd colleagues "outside"1 "New weapons.are for us young

years ago..

They still find them today, ofthough won't know whether they have been successful in tracing the diamonds to thear sattice.

In smaller quantities.

GEOLOGISTS' BELIEF

By geological reasoning

As early as 1898, the Bureau of

determined that the diamonds were special investigator and referring to

carried down from the northlands ** by the great five-and six-mile thick glaciers which miched over this lot between 25,000 and 200,000

wumented:

But Albert chose the RAF-

men," he argued.

He was an apprentice at 15, it was Mines' official report, written by a flying at 16, and was sent over seas to join a North-West Fron- tier squadron at 19,

When he landed at Bombay so he was war had started, rushed to Burma, helped to build an airfield, and was s001 flying as an air gunner patrol- ling the Indian Ocean.

where "In conditions like these, nrbonnerous sintes have been sub- ted to the Influence of molten rock. think we ought to look for diamonds Through a compitented process or und expect to find them there.

KEEPING IT SECRET

I

transports

his His great fun at home was doctor's instruction: "Drink eight day, beer if you

Zeros peeled off into sixes to pints of liquid a dive at each bomber as it made a low-level attack.

Beagley shot the first down in fumes.

Ole!

A few seconds later a bullet

from another ricocheted off the turret and pierced his groin with the effect of a dum-dum.

He became paralysed from the waist down' but remained conscious.

prefer it."

So off to his old local with his. 73-year-old father to take what the doctor ordered.

He drank and played darts with them

yards to his home, where he changed every hour to walk the hundred

old friends, at times leaving

his dressings.

Albert Beagley

Lord Woolton has done well in the opposite camp, but the Conser- vative Party jealously guards Its jumateur. status.

This has its attractious, but It gives them little chance against the professionals.

Modern war neeils

these

modern wea-

pons. The Tories learned this in the municipal elections.

They won

because they adopted their opponents methods. And in potideal campaigning, money talks. The Soelátist Party is for the richer of the two.

Lord Woolton will have to spend

a part of the coming year in de-. vising Imaginative ways of spending million-pound fighting fund.

his

One good idea would be to use it for lighting.

THE

Fair question

THE Tories have got to make up their minds over this question of controls.

Gravesend brought the matter to- a head, and the Socialists have ex- ploited the position to the full.

Taking the note from their leader's Set the People Free" motit, come Conservative M.Ps have been wildly crying out to abolish controls.

But they had not pondered it in detail. Immediately the retort eame back: What controls?"

Fine tribute

FEW good party men have received such a compliment as Mr Hop- kin Morris, Liberal M.P. for Car- marthen. He was the only condi date at the General Election to un- sent a sitting Socialist member.

Conserva- Now the Carmarthen

back the tives

are prepared to He joked that he was keeping the Liberals next time, on one condition. he

and that is that he is the candidate back, school waiting "up there." Gome But regularly

is ne tribute. Mr ngain. This stamling on one leg and raising the

too weak he When he became

to Hopkin Morris deserves it. other stifly behind him so that

a crack a joke, he would wink at the The observer came aft to give emuld bend forward to plek up

hated nurses. the floor-le

Two days before nis"deathrow him morphia, Before the Blen- dart from

people to know he was disabled. He he bought a tube of Brylcreem. He politan police court magistrate, and heims reached base at Rangoon hated to trouble anyone, fle always loved to think himself, still a "Bryl-subsequently B.B.C. regional direc-

for for Wales. his own bomber had sunk on insisted on dressing his wounds of the transports.

PATIENCE

Through suffering

In hospital for the first time in his life. Beagley was found 1n have tultiple wounds.

He was moved from hospital

himself."

creem boy."

Member for Cardigan for ten years to 1832, he became a Metro-

ite has a clear and lonical brain.

tic attime record for lost deposits.

So gamely id he play the part-of-The gay_heart_of__Flight-Sergeant It is a pity that he belongs to

On party which-ins-no future except. strangers Beagley stopped at 03.45 hours a leisurely civilian that seeing him lounging sideways at full January 2. He was a few days away perhaps, the chance of establishing length in the bar armchair some from his 28th birthday.

remarked: "Look ot that

He had only two regrets in He ought to be in the times young man.

short life. Services."

Wrong-headed

his COME of the members of the com- mittee which considered the Dalton indiscretion favour the mak- lug of rutes to prevent a lobby cor- respondent again making use of such information. record

That amused him. To his father The ral was that the Japanese to hospital as the war came and two sisters he wanted it to ap- had put him out of the war so soon. pear that his operations amused him, too.

nearer,

from Kuala Lipis to Singapore, to Karachi. South Africa, and then Britain in February 1943,

After his torn flesh and bones had bealed there began the series of plastic operations to graft skin in minite quantities arm to inside his from his left body through a wound always. kept partially open.

Beagley lay flat on his back between operations, showing a monumental patience.

He ampked a pipe and read endless books-mostly of nd venture, of ald battles of mar tial deeds of Empire.

And he drank beer and jake and wrote a poem with another Int fight-sergeant, similarly not so grievously wounded:---

"Our

story unfolds as often before.

A story of holttes and bottles

galore,

It started in 20 when we were

quite young,

Perhaps it will finish, before

51.

for

The second was that the

Before reporting back to hopital papers telling of his exploit got lust he would say: "I'm going out in the chaos after the fall of Singa- the count ngala, but one more to pore and he was denied the chance chalk up on the wall. It's number to add a sixth to the five ribbons he 53 this time."

MARRIED NURSE

had won.

This is a wrong-headed appproach.

Because a system which has worked well for generations breaks down once. It does not mean that ad hoe Socialists have a sinister suspicion rules have to be rushed forward. of the Press and are ever ready to five His dad had

decorations, hedge it about. starting with the Ashanti me:fal

with a huge joke It was He married Nurse Jean Farley in fourth sergeant of the Beagleys that January 1945. Desulle his bride's he had really got more medals than fresh and the bulk of parliamentary and "mily's protests he insisted on all the rest. kneeling for the service.

Despite Protests

his

He took rooms In Portchester, near Portsmouth, and ved on full disability pension of £2 13s. 6d. a week plus family allowance.

When the Ministry of Education him for training a 71 rejected Teacher "because of the nature of his wounds," he applied for a post as RAF civilian instructor.

When that failed, he planned open a radio repair shop.

But last summer. the poison from his, wounds began to work on his

I

Little more will be heard of this Incident. Mr Dulton has fairly the taken the blame.

The inquiry brought out nothing opinion is to leave the matter there.

BY THE WAY

by Beachcomber

не

new

take this he could tell a Gruaud-Larose-Sarget SHOULD like to

Faure of the same year at a distance opportunity of thanking the of, say, 27 from a Gruaud-Larose- six feet, blindfolded. Rulac's number of readers-too of to large

he would to nose was Chormous, and large, fortunately, for me

whenever a its tongue, write to each of them a per- shoot it out, as an antunter shoots He could tell smell approached. sonal letter, which I would not out dream of doing in any case. (let what they were cooking at the far them not flatter themselves) end of the rue de Sevres, and his Hospital in October for his 04th, who answered my appeal for wife used to say that when he snored Mrs Plaster fell from the celling. She was a jolly, fat woman from, the operation, and never enme home quantils to be sent to

the best Hubert Furnace for her Milk-oner und she made

heart.

He went into St Datholomew's

again.

Wandering voice

Then he found he could get up and walk carefully along Great pain, attacks of breathless-men's Rully at Lowestoft in Sea Cassoulet this side of Castelnaudary.

middle ness and sickness wasted his body Milk Week. the ward, with his

His vision, the pride of hir swathed in a 10-inch wide, away,

life, became blurred.

Aw, gee many-tailed bandage, and pad- ded with

a great expanse of cotton wool, with glass tubes inside his body and n bag strapped to his leg.

rubbor

His books lay unread now. The bottle of beer in the locker next to his bed remained unopened.

modern hotel

THE croaking vice which comes out

of every wall in CORRESPONDENT complains that "Your style of writing dates. does not get the attention it deserves. You never

seem to change it for Recently, as I was being pursued from room to room, it occurred to me that That's

Mrs. Win mild newer and Hveller_idloms."

the

request, Ilis wife and sisters went from O.K. by me, toots. Maybe it's because Gappleworth come to the telephone, shop to shop u London, Portches- I don't kinda go places. I must cul

ter.

Fareham and searching for lemonn. for snon

50

WENT HOME

Portsmouth myself a slice of life, and get hea to please?" cught to be accompanied by threat. A steel hand ought, to he the livvies on sockamaroo

street, 'First class' scat charting

conki drink nothing but leed lemon Slawng malay-walsy, it's blp well thoot out from the wall and reize the various areas where

water,

having yow know me, and I don't the nearest guest. "Mr. Gopple- diamonds have been found and by

The possibilty was also discussed

Then unexpectedly he made

veg utta be tree or worth, come to the telephone In- Even towards the end he did not man

stantly, or report to the Management observing scratches left on the rock at the recent 60th Annual Conven-

Yet real warfare for Flight the seven-hour train journey know he was danerously ill. He Milton split. De seein' yer, soaks.

[die who spill the bazootles 1 to explain your refusal.” UM Curth as they were carriett on in Ottawn of the Geological

have determined lety of merit, when scientists Sergeant Beagley lasted less home from hospital in Wales, delighted in inventing excuses alony, neotoples

Without comment that the largest diamonds came from em all over the continent agreed than half an hour.

with a bus ride from the that the sister woult the rugged, remoto aros crist of that the James Bay area is likely to

The deep-set. hazel eyes that - station.

family to visit him, although he was The note of Rujac Jusnes Bay,

so near his end that they could in Inhabited by only t

mend deposits,

Never uble to sit upright, fact come at any time. handful of

now for months had scanned air and Indians and Eskin103.

Manwhile, the geologists where fow white men have set foot. netting ready for their springtime ocean for the enemy narrowed booked a first-class seat and made

In that region, geologists believe, nurney into the wilderness refuse to:

on them at short range for the his homecoming stretched bodily to there is a great treasure of diamond- tive even as much as a hint of the bearing rock, which will yield raw et Incation of the rock they plan first time on that morning of

December 8.- to teal,

gems worth untold millions.

ho

allow his

man was fined half a crown for

N expert of some sort or other THE other day, says my paper, 'n has been saying that small standing still on the pavement. The There used to bo a poker school nose is more sensitive to smells than policeman told him he must not the floor.

among the sergeants in his long or large ono. That man never stond sill

on the pavement. The

have shid. "You Every three weeks or so he had to squadron. All of them except him-met ujac, who kept a cafe in the magistrate go-back on to the operating table, --selt hind died- during the war.

Boulevard Raopall, and boasted that right to stand sill on the pavement."

no

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