Globe Trotter Speaks

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 142, 18 June 1938, Page 10 (Supplement)

Globe Trotter Speaks

AMONG the books of travel recently published is Sir Montague Burton's second volume of "Globe Girdling" (Petty and Sons, Leeds. England). It is a handsomely-bound book comprising nearly 600 pages, and is profusely illustrated. Tliis volume is an account, in liarv form, of Sir Montague's travels over the greater part of the globe during the years 1035 and 1936, and of his impressions of the countries he visited, among them New Zealand, and of the prominent people he met and talked with. Many readers will remember his visit to the Dominion two years ago as one of th« delegates to the Fourteenth Congress of the Chambers of Commerce of the British Empire. He modestly describes the book as the impressions of an amateur observer, but none of the travelogues that have been published, certainly of late years, •;ompares with it, either in the variety awl comprehensiveness of its contents or in the light it throws on present-day

geography, political economy and history. Acutely observant, tireles-sly interested in what he sees and hears, and shrewd and balanced in his judgment of both places and personalities, he also has tWe gift of making what he has to say 60 fresh and vivid that there is not a dull page in the book. Sir Montague touches on the unwillingness of certain of the Dominions to admit outsiders more freely into their country on the ground that many of their own people are unemployed, and calls it a short-sighted policy. If. jk> remarks, America had adopted the ianie attitude she would never have become the great world Power she is to-day. He devotes more than 80 pages t-> Russia, of which he saw a good deal, and, with the exception of what he says about Palestine and, j>erhaj>s, the United States, they are the most interesting and illuminating pages in the book. He stuns tip what can bo said in admiration of the Soviet experiment and what can be said against it. To Xew Zealand he devotes over 40 page*. Arriving at Auckland from Suva by the Aorangi, he was greeted with a rainfall that was "tropical in intensity

and Arctic in temperature." He wits struck with the fact that the building were mostly of wood, and with the high building costs, as well as with the deurni'ss of many of the commodities sold. Of the Auckland Press and the Press generally he speaks in high terms, He calls the newspapers a fine group, exercising a steadying and moderating influence. The War Memorial Museum impressed him as ail imposing structure, hut meagre in its exhibit*. Of the se\era I speeches he listened to, both in an 1 out of the House of Representatives, the one that struck him as distinctly a hie was given by Mr. Downie Stewart. He admired the glowworm caves, and thought of our best scenery as "combining the grandeur and splendour of Scotland, Wales and Switzerland." All through he is kindly and appreciative but without the exaggeration that is characteristic of some of our overseas visitors, and he left our shores reluctantly and grateful for the kindness and friendliness lie everywhere met with. Hut he considers the term "(iod's Own Country" is more applicable to Sou Mi Africa than to anywhere else in the world.