AUSTRALIAN VISITORS

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 126, 23 November 1935, Page 13

AUSTRALIAN VISITORS

FIRST TRIP TO DOMINION

A BOER WAR VETERAN

Two -South Australian visitorSi to Wellington are Mr. and Mrs. G. E. H. Noblett. Both are on holiday bent, but each has a special interest—Mr. Noblett in making the acquaintance of South African War veterans, for he is one himself and is the president of the South Australian War Soldiers' Association, and for Mrs. Noblett the special attraction is the beauty of the scenery, the flowers, and trie trees, of which during her short stay in Wellington she has become enamoured, indeed thrilled, she said, this morning. This is the first visit of Mr. and Mrs. Noblett to New Zealand, and they indicated today that they have no complaints; on the contrary, they are enjoying themselves immensely and are keenly looking forward to their visit to the South Island, and, after that, to other centres in the North Island. New Zealand, according to them, is better known in Australia than they think, perhaps, Australia is known in New Zealand. Mrs. Noblett spoke most enthusiastically of the hills surrounding Wellington, the houses on the hillsides, the flowers, and also of the leafy walks in the Botanical Gardens. "Fancy haying wallflowers on the hills','•' she commented. "I am trying to grow a ! little plant in a pot home in Adelaide, , and I don't know how I am going to ' look at it after having seen the beautiful flowers on the plants here. And < the perfume of them! Ours have no ; perfume. Hydrangeas I have seen ; here —well, they are simply mari vellous." After the Boer War, Mr. Noblett remained in Africa for twenty-eight years. He was in the Govern- [ ment service there and was a founda^ , tion member of the railway institute t in Pretoria. Naturally, now that he is I the president of the South African Soldiers' Association in Adelaide, he is keen to make contact with the various \ branches in New Zealand. Already t he has met members of the executive j of the Wellington Association, and at t a gathering they had together many j events of the past were revived, t The railway institute in Pretoria s when Mr. Noblett was first associated j with it was a tin shanty. Now, he. s said, the institute had wonderful club r rooms and the best playing fields in y- Pretoria. t. Mr. Noblett was one of a party of g twenty-five from South Australia who [_ went to London for the jubilee of s Queen Victoria in 1897. He said he r . thought New Zealand sent fifty mount!t ed and infantry men, and if any of t that party were still in the Dominion ohe would like to meet them. He Jy . said he understood that one of the {. contingent was a prominent racing man."

Reference was also made by Mr. Noblett to the celebration in Adelaide next year of South Australia's centenary. From March 20 to May 16 a centennial exhibition was to be held. A special hall with a frontage of 300 ft and covering an area of two and a half acres was to be built for the occasion.