LOOKING BACK.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 224, 21 September 1935, Page 14

LOOKING BACK.

NOTABLE EVENTS. NEXT WEEK'S ANNIVERSARIES NO. 10 DOWNING STREET. (I'.y M.r.W.) An intensely interesting anniversary heads tliis week's list. To-morrow, Xo. 10, Downing Street, perhaps the most famous house in the world, will celebrate its two hundredth birthday jis an oflicial residence. Thirty-one different tenants have occupied the house since Sir Robert Walpole first set foot in it as its master. Hack in the gay days of Charles 11. a brewery stood 011 the site. Tho land was secured by Sir George Downing, and, in 1077, a house, the nucleus of the present Xo. 10, was built there for the Earl and Countess of Lichfield. At a later stage in its existence the house came into the possession of tho Crown, and, ia 1731, George 11. offered it to his Friuie Minister. Walpolo demurred and said that he would accept it only on the understanding that it should bccomo the perquisite of every First Lord of the Treasury. This circumstance lias rarely had any practical effect because the Prime Minister and the First Lord of the Treasury arc nearly always the same person. They have not always been the same, .however. Sir Stafford Xorthcoto and Mr. W. 11. Smith wore among the many tenants of Xo. 10, though neither was Prime Minister. Since 1825 the Chancellor of the Exchequer has ceased to have any claim on Xo. 10, because he has been allotted Xo. 11 as an official residence.

In 1736 Xo. 10 was given a gardenthat garden in which, at times of political change or when a big conference is hold in London, statesmen of the Empire aro photographed. For 2S years after Walpole reluctantly left Xo. 10 it was occupied by relations of the Prime Minister who were not even politicians, and after Lord Grey quitted it ill 1831 no Minister lived in it again until 1577. Even then Disraeli would not have gone there but for the fact that the stairs of his own house in Whitehall Gardens were too much for his asthma. Gladstone followed Disraeli's example and Xo. 10 has been occupicd since either by the Prime Minister or the First Lord of the Treasury. Fashoda Incident. The little Sudan post of Fashoda has lent its name to an incident occupying an important place in history, the anniversary of which will fall 011 Tuesday. It was in 1808 that the French Government formed tho project of seizing tho Upper Xilc Valley and uniting her possessions in' West Africa with those in the Red Sea. With this object a small force under Major Marehand was sent from the French Congo with instructions to occupy Fashoda 011 the Xilc. A FrancoAbyssinian expedition was dispatched from the eastward to join hands with Major Marehand. The force from the Congo reached its destination, and a body of Abyssinian troops, accompanied by French officers, appeared for a short time a littlo higher up the river. The grand political scheme was frustrated by the victorious advance of an AngloEgyptian force under Lord Kitchener. Major Marehand had to retire from Fashoda after a period of intense friction between England and France. By a subsequent agreement the French were excluded from the basin of the Xilc and the sphere of the two countries defined. Dominion Day. Although Monday will bo celebrated as Dominion Day, the actual change in status from a Colony to a Dominion was made on September 26, 1907. Although the change in status might be lightly passed over as of 110 material advantage to Xew Zealand, it was a significant event. It meant that Xew Zealand had become a democracy in her own right; a political entity of worth and importance, a sister among sister Dominions, and 110 longer in danger of being considered a minor, a granddaughter of the Mother Country and a niece of the larger British possessions.

Before May 3, 18-11, New Zealand was a dependency of Xew South Wales, but 011 that date the little band of colonists, incensed by the injustices of Sir George Gipps, Governor of Xew South Wales, obtained a charter of their own, "erecting a colony of Xew Zealand," as the document put it, "and establishing a legislative and executive council and naming the islands Xew Ulster, New Munster and New Leinster. These names aro almost totally forgotten now, and probably ninety-nine out of a hundred New Zealanders do not know that these names were ever applied to their country. In 1841 the overseas trade of the colony was not worth £100,000. In 66 years it had grown to £33,000,000. In the lifetime of a man Xew Zealand had grown to nationhood. In this brief time moro had been accomplished in the development of tho country than most of the nations famous in history accomplished in several centuries.

Two Schooners Wrecked. September 23, 1886, olf Bluff Harbour, was a black night with mounting seas driven by a howling easterly gale. It was a perilous time for shipping, and the following morning found two vessels wrecked 011. that rocky coast. They were the schooners Maid of Otago and Kekeno.

The Maid of Otago was bound to Riverton with general cargo from Dunedin. The gale forced her to run to Bluff for shelter. The captain hugged Sterling Point too closely,- and the Maid of Otago struck the remains of tho wrccked steamer Pclham. The plight of the vessel was seen by the harbour board's nightwatchman, and the crew were taken off by tho pilot boat. By morning the Maid of Otago had broken up and entirely disappeared. The crew owed their lives to tlie alert lookout kept by the watchman, who, strangely enough, was under notice to leave, the harbour board having decided that a nightwatchman was an unnecessary luxury. It was the same roaring gale that snapped the anchor cables of the Government schooner Kekcr.o and drove her ashore. The Kokeno was returning to Bluff after a cruise of three months among the outlying islands when disaster overtook her. The crow experienced a trying nigli't, but were taken off at daybreak by tho lug Awarua. j