NEW ZEALANDERS AT HOME.

Press, Volume LV, Issue 10214, 9 December 1898, Page 5

NEW ZEALANDERS AT HOME.

[Fbom Ock Own CoMussroNDKNT] • LONDON, October 28.

This week the Rev. Leonard M. Isitt is campaigning in London. His crusade began on Sunday last, when, in the St. James s Hall, he addressed a large gathering, over which the Rev. Hugh Price Hughes presided. Following this meeting there was on Monday a reception at Exeter Hall, and, thenceforward, Mr Isitt spoke night after night, in different parts of the metropolis. At the opening function he said that the sights of drinking in London almost deprived him of words. But as he afterwards went on to tell his hearers that they were "a drink sodden peo-le," an observation said to have been "endorsed by sympathetic and outspoken comments," and proceeded to say that they were "fighting the vilest, the most unscrupulous, the most cruel, and the most gigantic evil that ever cursed a Christian country," the limitation of his usually vigorous vocabulary may be taken te have been very partial indeed. Mr Philip W. Mason, of Wellington, who arrived in this country some little while back, has now gone on to Edinburgh, where he purposes studvinc medicine. I learn that the Rev. T. H. Sprott, with Mrs R. Sprott and their daughter, left last week by the P. and O. s.s. Australia, on their return to New Zealand, via Australia. Mr Sprott arrived here only at the end of last August, but Mrs and Miss Sr>rott have been in this part of the world some six months.

An English M.P., Mr W. F. Galloway, who has' always taken a great interest in questions of friendly societies, left London on Wednesday for New Zealand, in order to study the effects of the Old Age Pensions Act on kindred societies in the colony. He expects to leave on his return journey about the end of January. A monograph of Edward Gibbon Wakefield, in Mr Fisher Unwin's "Builders of the Empire" series, will, it is stated, appear at once. It is by Dr. Garnett.

The death is announced as having occurred on the 2Qth inst. of Mr James Wren Carlile, of Napier, New Zealand. He was staying at the time with his cousin in London.

Mr Duncan Cameron, of Springfield, is in London. He was a guest at the Australasian Club dinner.

Yesterday I casually came aoross a quietly done act of charity, Mr J. C. Chaytor, of Marlborough, having presented thirty sheep to Dr. Barnardo's Home. It was not intended that this should be. known, but the friend who informed mc said that this was not by any means the first time Mr Chaytor had done similarly. Recent callers at the Agency-General include Mr George James, of Otaki; Mr G. F. Smith, of Wellington; Mr Duncan Cameron, of Canterbury, who is returning on the 2nd of November, joining the Himalaya at Port Said; Mr S. W. Riley, of Westport; Mr D. Reid, of Milton; Mr G. S. White, of Wellington; Miss A. Reston, of Wellington; and Mr D. Hi E. Jackson, who has gone to University College, Bristol.

This afternoon Mr Donald Reid, solicitor and farmer, of Milton, New Zealand, called to see mc. Since he left New Zealand, in July, with his mother, he and she spent two, months in the United States, and arrived at Liverpool about two weeks ago. At present Mrs Reid and her son are busy doing the London sights. Mr.Raid's object in coming to England was to undergo an operation, and he consulted the two famous specialists, Dr. Morris and Dr. Fenwick. As a result Mr Reid is to go to Dr. Fenwick's hospital in Hanover square to-morrow, where the operation -will be performed at the beginning of the week. He is very cheerful about it, and says that he hopes to be about again in the course of three or four weeks. Bishop Grimes, of (Christchurch, bos now, just about finished his engagements in this country, or at any rate in London, so far as his present visit is concerned. Last Sunday he preached twice; in the morning at St. John's Wood, where Mr Santlev, the well-known and famous baritone, assisted' at the musical part'of the service. In the evening the Bishop preached before a crowded congregation at the Redemptorist Church, at Olapham. He asked for the prayers of those at Home, and with regard to their alms he felt quite sure that his congregation that night would help him as liberally as they were able. In Christchurch ho had merely an old wooden building for a Cathedral, while close by there was a beautiful building which belonged to another sect; "however," concluded the Bishop, "although, as I said to the Sovereign Pontiff a few weeks, ago, I have a Cathedral of wood I .have priests and people of gold."