NEW ZEALAND DINNER IN OXFORD

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 36, 11 August 1923, Page 6

NEW ZEALAND DINNER IN OXFORD

AN INTERESTING REUNION.

(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT^

n vi ,c 28th June. xTOa | nday"15th June, 1923, the Oxford New Zealanders held a dinner in Magdalen College. Among the guests were: Sir James Allen (High Commissioner), tho Key. J. LI. Dove (late headmaster of Wanganui Collegiate School), and some members, of the, Cambridge Heitiki Club ■ After the. toast of "The King" had been proposed by Mr.. A. K. Warren, Mr. IS. .Richmond proposed the toast of "New Zealand," coupled- with the name of Sir James Allen. He dwelt on the difficulties of a young man choosing a career. The tact of it being a dinner of Oxford and Cambridge: men turned his thoughts to the University of New Zealand. What was there that we could do for New Zealand? " v ■ "

In reply, Sir James Allen remarked -that ■ though the. Expeditionary' Force Scholarship scheme had not worked out quite as he had hoped, yet New Zealand was.badly needing university men in tho 1 church, in politics, in tho professions, and m business—-university men both from its own University and from the older- uriivereities in the Mother Country. ' New Zealand, though a young, country, had no i mean tradition. Those of the Maoris must not be fonfotten. The. foundation which tho. pioneers had laid was for tha younger ~enera'tion to build upon, is a Cambridge man he enjoyed' coming to Oxford, and he hoped that, this .dinner would be the forerunner of many more, and so keep up the interchange of hospitality" between New Zealanders in Oxford and Cambridge. ■ .

Th© health of the guests was proposed by Mr. A. ; K. Warron, and replied to by Mr. P. do B. Brandon, chairman of the Cambridge Heitiki Club. The Rev. J. LI. Dove, speaking as a man who had' known New Zealand under very different conditions than existed today, recounted somo interesting anecdotes of the early days. -How Bishop' Hadfield had onco crossed Cook Straits in a Maori canoo just in. time to persuade Rau-. paraha not to attack the white people, settling in Wellington. He spoke of \VW.. nganui College ana what "that great man, Walter Empson," had done for it. How then handicapped by' poor wooden build-' ings, it had blossomed forth now into a more lasting form of brick and mortar. He hoped that the vision that had guided those fine men of the early days would be the guilding light of the younger gen-' eration. ■" -

There were present: Sir James Allen, the Roy. J. LI. Dove. Cambridge: Messrs. P. de B. Brandon, C. T. Chambers, H. S. H. Gilmor, N. Williams (gucsta from Cambridge). The Oxford New Zca.landers were: Messrs W. T. G. Airey, G. G.-Aitken, E. J. Baldwin, G. O. Bayloy W. Pitts-Brown, K. R. Buohanau,' j M'Ll. Buckley, E. D. Elworthy, R. F. HiU 'J. Nelson, N. M. Richmond, H. J. Ryburn, D. F. Connell, F. A. Taylor, A. K. Warren.