The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo. SATURDAY, JUNE 20, 1891.

Auckland Star, Volume XXII, Issue 145, 20 June 1891, Page 4

The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo.

SATURDAY, JUNE 20, 1891.

For tho canso that lacks asaictanco, For tho wrong that necflß rouiatanco, For the future in the distance, Ana the good that vtd can do.

The annual meeting of the Jubilee Kindergarten last night did not attrac t a numerous audience. Some thirty ladies and gentlemen, consisting chiefly

of the Committee and their personal friends, represented the public of Auckland. This is, perhaps, not much to be wondered at. The meetings o charitable institutions do not possess much attraction for persons outside the ranks of social reformers and ardent philanthropists. The general public are slow to turn out on a cold night to listen to an annual report, and have the sacred fire kindled afresh on the altar of their hearts by a few complimentary speeches. Still one feels inclined to think the parents of the children who are taught and fed at the Kindergarten might manifest sufficient interest in the welfare of their offspring to cause them once a year to muster up and show by their presence they are not ungrateful for the trouble and care bestowed by the ladies upon the little ones. If a benefit is received, it is surely worth such a simple acknowledgment. It would show appreciation on the part of parents, and encourage workers in a task which is not always congenial. We are glad to turn from this aspect of the case to a more positive evidence that the public feel interested in the Kindergarten operations. The proof of this we find in that part of the report which speaks of the increased liberality of business men in the town and settlers in the country. It is a sure sign of confidence in the work of an institution when gifts and offerings continue to pour in. The ladies then may take heart of grace, and brace themselves up afresh lor another year of teaching and feeding small images of sin and singing lullabies to fractious infants who make the creche vocal with their cries.

The Jubilee Kindergarten has now been long enough in operation not to require any apology for its existence. The system of teaching is so eminently adapted for training the infant mind that in the opinion of many experts it is the best that has ever been devised for the purpose for which it is designed. The observer, while admiring the system, can only regret that it presents itself to us as an accompaniment, or rather, an outgrowth of a social state of things which every true lover of his country must depiore. Institutions which combine instruction and free dinners, however excellent in other respects, must always serve to remind us of the growth and prevalence of poverty in our midst. The multiplication of institutions in the colonies which have for their object the providing for some at the expense of others, whether the money is supplied from the general revenue or by public subscriptions, cannot be viewed without a feeling of uneasiness. We have before dwelt upon the fact that the evidence taken before a Commission appointed for the purpose in a neighbouring colony proves that a large number of institutions set on foot by irresponsible persons, and maintained by private beneficence, have tended to create and foster a pauper class, who are not restrained by any feeling of self-respect from eating the bread of idleness and spending their days in ignominious loafing.

The increasing disposition shown by a certain class of parents to relieve themselves of their responsibilities, and to have children of tender years committed to industrial schools on the plea that they are beyond parental control, has frequently been alluded to by our magistrates. In this respect we are not, perhaps, worse than other places. Bishop Cowie last night commented upon the tendency of colonial children to larrikinism. This is a stockargument with public speakers, but upon examination we do not find much in it. It has become traditional to draw comparisons between the behaviour of English and colonial youngsters, greatly to the disadvantage of the Jatter. So far as the children of the middle classes are concerned, there is no doubt some truth in it. In England the children of well-tc-do people do not mingle so freely with their parents and elders at mealtime and in the eveniDg, and conventional restrictions are more observed. But with regard to children of the poorer classes in the two countries, there is not generally much difference, while the sharp precocity of the ordinary London street arab and the old-man cunning of the 'Whitecbapel "Artful Dodger" distance anything we can yet show in the colonies.

One thing is clear—however we may deplore the existence of a number of neglected children in the colonies, w.e cannot close our eyes to ihe fact. It exists in ail its naked deformity. It goes against the grain in a democratic community to acknowledge, for instance, the necessity for a truant school, but it is forced upon us by the stern logic of facts. In theory both our churches and public schools are alike for the rich and the poor, but no social theories and no amount of legislation can abolish social inequalities, or place everyone practically on an equal footing. The ragged, shoeless wanderer has as much right to worship in St.

Paul's or St. Andrew's as the man in broadcloth or the woman in silk and jewels, but a self-respect which we cannot altogether condemn makes him shrink from taking his place amongst well - dressed people. It is true, ragged men and tattered women in the colonies do not as a rule attend public worship at all, and the Sunday evening meetings in our cities got up for what are called "the people," on the pica that they are not well enough dressed to go to church —represented by a crowd oi men in excellent tweed suits, and women in all the glories of the latest fashion—are but caricatures of a very real state of things which exists in English cities ; but whenever we have to deal with the really ill-clad waifs and strays we find in full force an instinctive shrinking from the company of their well-dressed neighbours. This is the excuse invariably urged. The feeling is especially strong in colonial children. The child of the English labourer is taught from the beginning that he is an inferior being, and feels it no degradation to fawn and cringe to the well-clad son of the squire or parson ; but our system of education premises that all children meet together on a footing of equality. Human nature is too strong for it. The boy with patched knickerbockers instinctively shrinks from the criticism of the bey who is not patched and sports the regulation number of shoes and stockings. We may poohpooh this feeling as a trifle, but great events sometimes depend on "trifles light as air." It may be mere sentiment, but sentiment counts for a good deal in real life. The Truant Officers tell the same tale in the neighbouring colonies as cur own, that an increasing number of children roam the streets by day and sleep out at night. When parents are asked why their boys and girls are not sent to the district school, they reply they cannot provide them with suitable clothes and the children refuse to mix with others who are better dressed than themselves.

We are not. now couccrned with the causes that bring about such a state of things. To some extent they may be accounted for by unfavourable social conditions which may be modified by legislation. When the land in the country is in the hand of a few monopolists, the result is invariably a crowd of paupers in town. But the prevalence of intemperance and the want of thrift have far more to do with troops of ragged children than any other cause. We find on making inquiries ttiat a vast majority of boys who sleep out at night have wretched surroundings at home. It is in attending to neglected infancy that the Kindergarten finds a suitable sphere of operations. Children of two or three years old are taught the elementary principles of a moral life, and, what seems more important to the poor little waifs, they get one good, square meal a day. While, therefore, we should be glad of a little more backbone among the poorer classes, which would lead them to display a sturdy spirit of selfdependence, instead of throwing off their parental obligations upon others, we are constrained to admit the Kindergarten is a necessity of the times. We hope the view taken by Mrs Philson is correct,- that the lessening number of the children left at the creche is a sign that work is more plentiful for men, and women are free to attend to the duty of taking care of their own children. We congratulate the ladies on the success of the past year, and shall be glad if next year increasing prosperity enables every mother to stay at home and nurse her own baby.