AT THE ASSEMBLY

Evening Star, Issue 17824, 22 November 1921, Page 6

AT THE ASSEMBLY

AN AFTERNOON OFF. [By A.A.B.] Saturday, day honored by all good sports, is not despised by tho Assembly. Its afternoon is the time of recreation. Unhappily, a few ministers and elders through exigencies of time and work are confined to the necessity of stretching their limbs under committee tables, but tho majority are on pleasure bent. So last Saturday afternoon tho Rattray street car was hoarded by members of Assembly. Ex-Moderators, Doctors ■of Divinity, conveners of committee, and such dignitaries were crowded within. The rest of us clung to standing points of vantage without. Tho trollyman’s face boro a look of chastened responsibility, even of anxiety, as if be gravely doubted whether tho business would start. But it did go at last, creaking on tho rails, and with the guard performing wonderful feats of agility and acrobatic skill collecting fares on tho footboard.

Up the hill we went —cr rather were borne—far better or easier the one than the other, to tho wonder and joy of the passers-by, who rejoiced to sec ministers and elders taking their pleasures not sadly. Only a few faces seemed not to beam, as if their noses smelt a bad smell; but it may have been the brewery. Up still it was, tho little car creaking round curves and groaning when it came to tho full stretch of a straight circuit. But the occasion seemed to demand such protest. Never before possibly had this car had placed on it such weight of theological acumen and financial substantiality : wo had ciders among us. But at last it gave up. It stopped, and wo were transferred to another car. It was a delightful change from the switchback to tho merry-go-round. Round and round we were swirled, catching ever varying views of green Hillsides glorified with clumps _of golden-yellow gorse, red-roofed villas shimmering in the sun, far-off vistas of trees and heavenward-stretching lulls. But pleasures pass. That tram trip ended. Yet were we as boys who won’t grow up as wo left tho whirley-ma-jig to seek the John M'Glashan College, and wo were hungry. Wo found a kind welooms, and lunch was spread for us. No waiting. Clearly this was a holiday. 1 remarked this to a friend ; but he asked me to be douce and look facts fair in the face ; he reminded me we were late in arriving. It was a good lunch, followed by tine speeches, because we had not to make them ourselves. The chairman or tho Board of Governors told us of the work the college was out to do. Xo such work could bo maintained without means, and so funds were wanted in view of recent extensions —boys to fill the extended rooms, boys with pre-paying parents, the said boys and fees coming, of course, without their parents. W r o had speeches, too, from educational authorities, making plain that there was no vexing question of Bible in schools at M’Glashan College. Tho Book of books was established m tho college, with others which owed the liberty and enlightenment they inculcated largely to the truth it held.

After expression of our appreciation and thanks by the Moderator, off wo set to view the buildings. There were stairs and corridors, class rooms and dormitories. But where were the boys? Beyond a- dear wee chap who acted as cicerone and guide at the main entrance door, we saw no boys. Traces of them, however, were abundant. They were, off on holiday apparently, and rightly so; for what can gladden the heart of a schoolboy as a holiday can? So will tho boys of M'Glashan learn to associate tho visits of fathers and brethren with gladsomeness. When you who mnv road this visit the college, got upon the roof. It is not gabled but fiat; and what a view-! What a. blow I Health and beauty suggested there by old Mother Nature herself. Delectation for tho eyo in one of the most expansive and fine city view? surely to be obtained about Dunedin. Only, look out for your hat 1 The wind, not necessarily always, but certainly at the time of our visit, was tremendous. Wellington was not in it. at least for tho time.

I began a dispute with ono of the elders as to tho rival merits of Dunedin and Auckland with respect to climate; but he beat mo, or rather tho wind did. I had kredecamp through its violence, and onr argument remains unfinished. But little has been gained or lost thereby, for the wind does not always blow at M'Glashan’s. No; it blows where it wills.