ISLANE GLAMOUR.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 800, 25 April 1910, Page 8

ISLANE GLAMOUR.

j FACT AND ROMANCE. !.. AN ISLE OF SUPERLATIVES. (By J.Q.X.) . The advertisement is wonderfully: i alj luring. ;"For Sale ' (Freehold),' 350 r: acres, . Most Beautiful and Fertile Is- | land,' wifhin 3J miles of.' the Main; Land." 'i '..-V. f : I-think I could be content with that }: Its-area'.would be sufficient,, its [.distance' from the" mainland convenient. a:'.lts .beauty" (for it is "Most Beautiful") j.. would' satisfy- one half of...human riaits^'fertility; the other. "En-

j joying'the Finest Climate" —finest, rio [J/ddubt, .whether ; for, making poetry, ot i running sheep. "Regarded as ' the ;> Most , Romantic Spot, in New Zealand : (Waters;"- (How this descriptive artist ' floes .. capitalise his superlatives 1). : "£IOOO per annum, or more, should be r.'made off; thislcland." c The.same happy I combination again! Romance for your .day-dreams, and pounds sterling for !• foirr bank-book I

f. j Sir George Grey was not eccentric : in making his home on Kawau. We : are all as amorous of islands as Sancho i, (Eanza. . Ercry . boy whoso imagination :Ss properly nourished has bean cast ■ ashore with Crusoe. I have seen piccickers of: maturer ago enjoying Somes [ Island-as they could never have en-

; joyed, precisely similar paddocks and i buildings in the Wairarapa. It was ': ■ merely a member of Parliament who ; bewailed that the authorities had made i » leper station of "Canterbury's only i. island." Few people can be quite insensible '"to the poetry . of the blue - and gold inscription on: the bows of the Kitanekai;.-. "Islands 'of New; Zealand.". - There are legends of the Blessed t< Isles, but.' every unspoilt isle is blessed, i Lowell's Appledore seems to have had I nothing very-distinctive ahout. it, no j historical or poetical associations:S "A common island,.you will soy; fcßut stay; a inoment: only- climb, tUR to.the- highest rock of the isle, - !; Stand thore alone for a little while, i |Arid'- with' gentle approaches it. -grows ? sublime,' , ; j: :::■- [-Dilating..slowly, as you*win ■ ' sense .from, the'6ilence to take it in." j,.',-.'it ;is , only to the little islands, the .Visibly insular, that sublimity belongs. magic can make us'for i : a moment; see ■ England as a precious I etone-' cut :in- the silver sea, but usuk illy' we .are rather of - the mind of that SVSsMim - who, uniastructed of ' poets i or geographers, traveled' from ..Milford v Hayen to Pembroke, and remarked that r-iif4 there .was as -.'much on".the further' las upon - the ■ nearer 1 side of his county, town, .' then the world was- certainly a | .very big-placfr;; Large masses of land, I, though surrounded by any; amount of | water, are not islarids .at -all. ' Nobody v' agpliea the '.word to the linked pontin- !■ ents of. Europe, Asia, and Africa, or • to tho two Americas taken ; together. , lAustralia is-over spacious, the two , halves of New Zealand are-hardly small I enough for a glamorous-,name.

f - An jsland, in ■ the true sense,; -is •- taio infinite seen together— | :/ earth and boundless ;■ l oceanKj|To take; it into the mind is to j sense of one's relation {!;rto: and that is; translate the ago and the'inLjdivjcfijal, mto'.f songs or revelations. "(Jlep'n, the poet," we are told by comi" Smeritatore.-ia 'fictitious, but his . { ! [■;v'-y/. '■■■ "Sprinkled isles, i :J>ily . on lily, that o'crlace the sea, !And laugh their pndo when the light waTe.Jisps 'Greece,'' .Shad their Homer and their 'John the ■ Shvine. ->It' was . rightly upon an island ; ?tliat'.'lShabespeare sot his Proapero to j.-.rtell: us that, though we are such stuff .fas dreams are made on, love and fair l ldeeds are*real enough to overpay the i-Boss of- magio empery. ' , [•v Islands have been in all ages places t/for defence and? refuge. It was" to i '-"tho island-valley /of Avilion" that f: iirfchur .went' when all- his wars were i i done. If, in these less violent days, one i floes not seek the fortresses ,of nature i ■ for security. ■ from armed forces, - one ! . nay value them aa being comparatively v . inaccessible to many people whose cpmt" pany one ; can' very well do without; ; Te Ranparaha on Kapiti a out-oWate, but not Stevenson ,at Valima. One

« jvould Kko; to -fchink' that, the defensive ! ■ iwav-OE - would keep back , enemies, - and friends into the welcoming bays, f It is written that, "many waters can- • not quench lovo, neither can the seas, i- idrownit." Mokoia: may have been a f pfawng refuge from hostile tribes, but {Hmerooa swam out to her Tutanckai. 1 !: I think ithat even Sanchp Panza, who j. ihad never seen an - island, and could;not i; bead a book,, felt dimly and' indirectly i .jsomething of the glamour, that the very. !. yord had gained from poetry, saintship, ' .and peaoelul refuge. Don Quixote, .of I course, is Romance, . and Saacho is jj [Matter of Fact, but no man is'wholly I- devoid of romance, just as no man who J ( is not mad is unmindful of fact. -,Therein £oro, 4 when "Don; Quixote,, among many r other, bhmgs, bad him .to. dispose him- • self -to depart with him, for !. now and tnen such an adventure might - [present itself , that, in as. short, a time as one could take up a couple of straws, • -an island inight .be won, and he be left as governor thereof,''. Sancho. was .won : . over without more ado, and afte/ each indventuro that wore any, likeness of : isuccess,'he would pray the knight not, jto forget his' promise. I, less , lucky than-Sancho, can hardly , inspect any playful : duke to give me j?#nat.paraaise'of the advertisement, that .Uslo of Capitalised Superlatives; and as fit will .doubtless, be sold before I have saved money enough to buy.it, the only, r alternative is to philosophise on the ad-' i rvantages of doing without-it. . Sanoho's

-experience again is much to the pur- , :®ose. Eight days of governorship' in f parstaria were enough for him, and : ithen—

"Ho took the way to the stable, i everybody present following him: ; ■ ' then going to Dapple, he embraced i' him, , gave him a kiss of peace on . the forehead, and not without tears in his eyes, said, 'Come hither, my :. companion, my friend and partner •in my fatigues and miseries. When I consorted with thee, no other j cares troubled mo than to mind thy [ . furniture • and feed thy little carK i..; case. Happy then were my hours, '. days, and years; but since I left VX thee and mounted upon the towers ambition .and pride, a . .thousand, ;. ai, thousand toils,' four disquiets have entered my «•.' soiii." -

p? /Perhaps, after a little brief authority in the "Most Romantic Spot," I should .'.be. ready o say with Sancho, "Give, me ?■: loom,; sirs, and leave to return ,to my x former liberty.'.' •' St. llekiis is. not tho only isle that has_been a prison. Not the least pleasant characteristic i : flf. Sancho's Barataria is . that it was

not.really an island at all. He had but /.4o,;_saddle his ass and ride aivay. 'Yet v. k®. : ;boasts V reminiscently:—"Such an ''island as you/will scarce meet with the |''Ekc,. some / two leagues off." The ' "better-instructed Ricote checks him: 5 "Prytheo do not tali so; islands lie a f,\ ; great way off in the sea ; , there are none j• of thorn in the mainland." To which unanswerably, "Whynot?" Is;;/-Aid 'why . not, indeed?; "Purple jjy.'iWand," that allnringly-named, but (as p'V3% am ; .given to understand) rather poein of old ■ Phineas Fletcher, teis lalwut notning but individual. man. J -'JBut, if I were to say more, I should [. .moralise.