FOUNDER'S CENTENARY

Evening Post, Volume CXXI, Issue 115, 16 May 1936, Page 7

FOUNDER'S CENTENARY

HOME OF COMPASSION

STREET DAY ARRANGED

; Many friends and supporters of the ; Homes of Compassion- will be intes.estej . in the street day for the funds of the homes, which will take place next 77ec- . nesday. All arrangements hays teen t made for a successful, day, and those [ who realise that this splendid undei nominational work reaches the poorest ; and most distressed .in all quarters i of the district of Wellington,- will be [ glad of an opportunity to give as gen- ; erously as their means will allow. It i is not given to all to realise how much . suffering there is among people of all ; ages—from the smallest infants to the 1 very oldest men and women. It may . well be said that this work has to be 1 seen to be • believed; it embraces an : ideal Christianity, and is worthy of 1 the most sympathetic respect. ; MOTHERiIML-.J. AUBERT'S CENE ~, . • ■." TENARY. f ,This'is a year that would, had she 1 lived, have seen Mother Aubert reach her century, states a correspondent. This kinswoman of two Presidents of ■ France gave up home and country to r tend the stricken, the' aged, and the fatherless. She was" a figure that all ■ Wellington knew and loved, the '-'little ■ old woman in blue" who shunned all • honours. Towards the end her eyes : were affected, and she had to pick her 1 steps more carefully, but she had her wish, for she kept her faculties to the ■ last. - One afternoon at the home they : opened her room to visitors. It was ". just as she had left it, and in a little j cardboard box were their relics •of [ her, an old- blackened watch, a pen, a measuring tape, trifles more precious • in the sight of those who knew her than a casket of jewels. Had she never ' had in her veins the distinguished • blood of the Periers she would have ! made.her mark.by her own gifts, for she was a scientist of no mean ability, and an expert ;on herbs; as for her accomplishments she could versify in _ French, .English, and Maori, and she was in her youth the pupil of a world- ' famous composer. ; [ The fighting spirit in.her that raised . her great foundations on'faith alone came perhaps from her maternal ancestors who fought under St. Louis, the.F.rench King,-in the Crusades. ; Her- uncle was sur-geon-general in L the French Forces, and she heard, through his- influence, university lee- " tures on medicine from a secluded por- \ tion of the lecture room, for women • were not then- admitted. She- nursed \ in the Crimean War and later in the , Great War. A fuller- life.than hers is r seldom heard of even in these stirring ; times when startling biographies are 1 almost commonplaces. ' ■ ■;.•-. She is dead, .but her. w.ork lives. It has been written "of her and of those ' v^om she still succours: : ■ She- saw- in each of'these a Christ .grown old, ' ' | A Christ with" broken soles, and . " ragged sleeves, .... ■ . A.Christ -with .withered, hands,, a . . crippled: Christ, '■■'.'•' \ A Christ. the heedless world vrejects or grieves. . . . . She had so little to begin with that she-had to make her first oven with . her,own hands out of clay, and stones like -a Nazarene bake-oven, and her . novices, with true, .colonial' adaptability, nailed board to board for tables -, and chairs. ..That small foundation on the Wanganui River has fostered the present foundations wherein' infante, ; the-aged, the destitute sick, and the ; incurables are sheltered. It mattered L not a jot to Mother Aubert who or , what the sufferer was, and it-matter's i not-to her nuns today;: for, steeped . in : her broad tradition, they carry on the i work as if in her iittle tower-room ,- she. still held the reins. If- anyone thinks that this account-is exaggerated let him see for himself—sight is the ; best teacher. The -street. day. of the Home pi Compassion is, as was. said t before, on Wednesday next, arid her , helpers know that, they can' reply as . she relied oil the charity of their countrymen. - -.-■."• . . • ■■