A FAREWELL MESSAGE

Evening Post, Volume XCIX, Issue 121, 22 May 1920, Page 9

A FAREWELL MESSAGE

IMPRESSIONS OF NEW ZEALAND ' A GREAT MONUMENT OP BRITISH CIVILISATION. til TEU.CRA?!!.—PKESI ASSOCIATION.) CHRISTCHURCH, 21st May. The following farewell message was handed to the Prime Minister by the Prince of Wales to-night on, bowel H.M.S. Renown :— "To the Government and People of New Zealand, — "My delightful visit to New Zealand ha* come to an end, and I cannot sail to-morrow morning without sending a message of affectionate farewell to the people of the Dominion. "When I spoke in Wellington I tried to express the great pleasure which my travels through the North Island, rapid as they were, had- given me, and I said that I looked forward to having just as good a time in the South, and the event has exceeded my expectations, high though they were. I can say now that not a day has passed since I landed on 24th April which has not added to the pleasure and value of my tour 1. I have been most deeply touched by the wonderful welcomes which have met me everywhere, and I shall never think of the people of New Zealand without affection and gratitude. "I should like to renew the thanks which I have expressed before to the Government ofthe Dominion, and to all the authorities throughout New Zealand who have been at such pains to make my journey punctual and comfortable. The excellence of all the arrangements has enhanced the pleasure of my travels, both by road and by rail, and I am particularly glad to have seen even a very little of the magnificent scenery of mountain, river, and lake for which the Dominion is ' famous throughout the ■world. "I have only one regret: that my visit has been too short to enable me to see all that I should like to have seen. I have stayed nowhere without wishing that my stay.could be prolonged, and,l feel that I nave missed ■ a great deal. I am particularly sorry that, owing to the shortness of the time at my disposal, I could not travel a little through the less settled districts and see for myself something of up-country life. "I have seen enough of town and country, however, to realise that a splendid future* awaits the Dominion. Your achievement since the country was annexed to-the British Crown only 80 years ago justifies the almost visionary confidence of your pioneers and constitutes an amazing monument to the grit and enterprise of those who have so rapidly civilised and developed the land. . ; , "Two things have particularly impressed me here. In the first place, New Zealand is a land not merely of opportunity for some but of equal opportunity for all. I have never seen well-being and happiness more uniformly throughout the population of country and town. In the second place, . this Dominion is a living example of the fact that a European race may take over a new country without injustice to its original inhabitants, and that both may advance, in mutual confidence and understanding, on the common path. Both races of New Zealand—pakeha and Maori—are an essential element in the life ]of the Dominion, and I have been deeply gratified to see what progress the Maori people are making, hand in hand •with their British fellow-subjects. "New Zealand is one of the greatest monuments of British civilisation in. the world, and I have felt, from end to end of the Dominion, that there is nowhere the British people are moTe set in British traditions or more true to British form. I have found the strength oi your loyalty to the Empire and its Sovereign as keen and bracing as mountain air, and I know that you will never weaken in your devotion to British unity and British ideals. '. . . "The spirit of New Zealand was shown most signally by the splendid troops which she sent to the front in the great war, and also by.the way in which the whole country threw itself without hesitation or reserve into the Empire's cause. It has been a special pleasure to me to meet again so i many of. your returned men, and I should like to thank them once more for turning out in such large numbers to meet me wherever I have been. I regard them always as my old comrades-in-arms, and I ani happy to see that they are maintaining the close ties of comradeship which bound them together in the field. New Zealand need fear nothing of the future if her'manhood preserves the spirit in which this generation fought and endured for freedom and right. "In its permanent forces the Dominion possesses a very valuable ' nucleus of trained officers and men. I have been struck by their smart and soldierly appearance on parade, and have also been impressed by your territorials and cadets, who have turned out in large numbers and always looked very well. You have reason to be proud of the results which your system of training has achieved.. "Your confidence in the future has another solid ground. No one realises more keenly than I how heroic was the part which the women of the Empire played in the prolonged and terrible ordeal of war. I should like to take this opportunity of congratulating again the women of New Zealand on their great services and brave endurance during the last five years, and also of offering my heartfelt sympathy to those whose gallant men will not return. New .Zealand women have proved themselves indeed ah invaluable counterpart of their husbands> brothers, and sons. "Both men and women, moreover, ha.ye created noble traditions for . the new generation which is growing up today. I have been greatly impressed by the gatherings of school children which' have been organised for me everywhere, and I have never seen a more robust, good-mannered, and promising race. I always -felt when seeing them, that they were 1 very lucky children to have been born in such surroundings. and amid such promise, and they made me confident that they would be a credit to their country and their King. "I must end this message now, but I shall not say good-bye. I feel myself a true New Zealander in heart. I look upon you, the people of New Zealand,, as my own kith and kin, and I trust that you, on your part, will always regard mo as one of yourselves who be]ongs to you as much as to the Old Country or any other of the King's Dominions. "There is a good part of the world for me to traverse still before I can say that I have seen the British Empire as a. whole, and I do not know how long it. may be before I can pay you another visit here; but thi3 at least I can say, that I shall be drawn to New Zealand by very happy and affectionate memories, and that when an opportunity arises of returning here again, I shall take it with delight and without delay. Kia. Ora! "EDWARD P."