STAY AT HOME

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume I, Issue 245, 3 October 1911, Page 4

STAY AT HOME

ServKiNn to his congregation at Ballindaggin, Ireland, recently, a certain Father Prendergast mimed a st roi>j% indictment against c ew Zealand'. He addressed his audience on the question of immigration and in the name of* God exhorted them lo ‘‘stay at home in the land where vour mother bore you. and where the ashes of your father may . be lai<i.” After an absence of thirty years the Rev. Father has returned >o Ireland, living visited many countries, and that is the message he had to deliver*-’‘Stay at home. We do not wish to question the wisdom of the reverend gentleman’s advice to his people. He could not have travelled for thirty years without broadening his outlook and learning much by the way, but it seems to us that his knowledge of New Zealand must be very cursory, or culled from prejudiced sources. He is reported to have said, speaking of Australia and New Zealand : "In these countries the social conditions are somewhat similar to those we leave behind, and there is a somewhat better prospect. Not that I would advise you to go there. For what is the life of the young man who ventures thither ! Fie works hard from early morning until late at night. He has to make his own bed and sweep in's own room, if he lias one. At the appointed hour of the morning he must be at his work, or he is told that he must, at risk of losing his job. If he is sick he is quickly dispensed with, to make the best he can of it. In summer he labours under a broiling sun. helped on by the urging curse of some heartless steward or overseer, in winter lie is engaged in cutting and hewing wood for firing and fencing. Can he hope to get a farm .’ He has no means. Does he get a farm, he has not the wherewith to stock it. Does he manage to stock, a dry summer may leave him a beggar. Hence he remains a hewer of wood and a drawer of water, and becoming discontented with his unhappy lot he forgets himself and his friends at Home. All that is good leaves him, and God knows what, in the end becomes of him. Sm-h is the sad fate of most of our poor Irish emigrants. M hen you leave this country you may give up | all idea of social enjoyment. You won’t hear the times you have played bv your hands this evening. You j won't find people interested in Home Rule. Your next floor neighbour may be twenty miles away. , You are awav from neighbour, school and church. See the extent of Australia and its population. Including Tasmania and New Zealand, there are but about live millions of people, or something more than you have in Ireland." The picture which the reverend Father points is certainly a strange one to the people of this country and fits in badly with the ideas we have been accustomed to

hold alioiit our prosperity and happiness. The illustration of the poor I j -ish immigrant toiling under broiling suns ami winter snows until lie disappears in an unknown end will he rather amusing to many of I lie prosperous Irishmen who claim New Zealand citizenship. We do not blame Father Prendergast for endeavouring to keep his people at home, but his word pictures of life in New Zealand could with fairness be toned down considerably. The Dominion may not be the Elysium we represent it, but. certainly it is siv no means as bad as he puts it.