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Salient. An Organ of Student Opinion at Victoria College, Wellington, N.Z. Vol. 4, No. 3. April 09, 1941

[Introduction]

Being a shy and retiring violet, I have been forcibly dragged by the Editor from my collection of dried flowers and told to write this article P.D.Q., or else ... As the . . . er . . . Official Chaperone, apparently it is considered that I should have had plenty of experience in ferretting out traps and snares for young Tournament players, Secondly, in the capacity of the Oldest Inhabitant of the Village, it is also considered that by now I should have absorbed enough in my ceaseless thirst for knowledge to give some guidance as to the correct behaviour for novices. Those who have attended one Tourney or more will need no further advice and are hereby absolved from reading the rest of the article.

Ah, me! How well I remember my first nervousness as to correct behaviour and procedure at my first Tournament in Dunedin in 1935, and how badly I fell from the Accepted Standards for want of a guide and counsellor. Being but a callow youth, not long left school, I was lured on to the Primrose Path by Evil Companions and soon initiated into the wiles and snares which beset headstrong youths and maidens. Five months' training broke down in a great and glorious binge and I'm sorry to say that I was actually induced to quaff a glass of ale—neat. Still worse, I actually enjoyed it. Since then I have never looked back.

So, as a partial expiation of my sins, I have accepted the difficult and onerous job of Official Chaperone at every succeeding Tournament. This [unclear: involved] a great deal of work in endeavouring to get impetuous youth (especially the female of the species) to stick to the ways of law and order. Nevertheless, I have done my duly as I saw it—so far as I was capable.

The last five years of Tourney have been far more arduous than the first one, inasmuch as I've been engaged on good works full-time—one really needs to go into training for these social jobs about six months ahead as the strain of getting one's charges to bed in good time is something terrific.