A CONTRAST IN GENEROSITY.

Auckland Star, Volume L, Issue 183, 4 August 1919, Page 4

A CONTRAST IN GENEROSITY.

The magnificent gifts to Sydney and Brisbane Universities by the. late Sif Samuel McCaughey, one o£ Australia's greatest pastoraliste, suggests a comparison between gifte of this kind, in Australia and in New Zealand. The latest Year Book of the Commonwealth says that the totals of principal private 'benefactions to Australian Universities are as follows: —Sydney, £470,000; Melbourne, £182,000; Adelaide, £158,000; Queensland, f 16,000; and Tasmania, £3,280. These are exclusive of collections and gifte for prizee and scholarships to various colleges; for instance, the Hon. Francis Ormond's benefacfons to Ormond College, Melbourne, amounted to £108,000. Sir Samuel McCaughey has left £400,000 to Sydney University, and £200,000 to* Brisbane University, which with the exception of the "University of "West Australia, is the youngest in Australia. University education in New Zealand has not found co much favour in the eyes of wealthy men. Of the four centres Dunedin has much the best record; Otago University has deceived £123,000 in gits and bequests; Canterbury College was well endowed by the founders of the province, but it has received hardly anything from private sources. Victoria College, a much younger institution, has been treated more liberally by both the city and private citizens. It has received £24,000 in gifts and Dequests, and it had its site free from the City Council, a fact which we commend to the notice of our own City Council, and those peculiar people who have opposed the dedication of the Metropolitan Ground to University purposes, on the ground that it would be "'filching" land from the public. The Auckland City Council has done nothing to forward university education; it even fought in the Supreme Court the University Council's claim for compensation when the old buildings were removed to make room for city improvements. But this attitude is part of a general indifference. The Auckland Univereity College Tva3 founded nearly forty \ears ago, but its benefactions are nothing to be proud of. The truth is that the wealthy men of the Dominion as a class have ignored university education in disposing of their wealth. With a little trouble we could make a. long list of big estates left by New Zealandere during the last <3ozen years or 60, in which little or nothing has been left to education of any kind. Probably we have no one in New Zealand quite so wealthy as the late Sir Samuel MeCaughey; but we have a number of men who could well afford to give anything from ten to fifty thousand pounds or upwards to endow one of other of our University Colleges. We can only hope that Sir Samuel McCaughey'e bequests will poin£ out to them new paths of public service.