The Mataura Ensign GORE, FRIDAY, MARCH 2, 1883. MILNER STEPHEN.

Mataura Ensign, Volume V, Issue 234, 2 March 1883, Page 2

The Mataura Ensign GORE, FRIDAY, MARCH 2, 1883. MILNER STEPHEN.

The visit of Mr Milner Stephen to New Zealand, and the report of numerous and in some instances extraordinary cures he is said to have effected, has created so great an interest, and occupies so large a space in the files of our northern, papers, that we make no "apology for bringing the subject before our; readers. In doing •so we offer no opinion either on the means of cure adopted by Mr Stephen, or on the of those means. In our opinion {he charges of charlatanism made against him* have not been sustained, and he makes no pretence of possessing miracle-iwb^king-.power. If however the cures tie 'ib; said to have effected are really such; if 'they bear the test not only of present fair examination, but of j permaneticel which of course time only can supply, we mustyregard him as a great public benefactor; We would not hastily form a decided opinion in his favor; and it would be a narrow and unfair prejudice to denounce, or to decry his work as quackery and pretence. | Mr Stephen was not much ! known in .New: Zealand before his recent arrival; In Australia he had practised as a 1 barrister for several years, and occupied a respectable and' influential position. 'We are unacquainted with the cir.cumstances which turned the current of his life, and led niin into his .' present course. His new work appearshoyever to have been commenced in the neighborhood in which he was best known, and has been extended ;to '[ the other .colonies of. Australasia. : In his first- meeting in the c Acadamy of Music, in Ghristehufch, he distinctly disclaimed, all miraculous power.; He could not, cure an injured leg, for example, when bone substance ha<i been formed, but in. cases not opposed to natural laws he claimed to be generally

Tulcessful. We supply our reade rS Vitih a selection from the long list of Applicants, and the results as-'rppfqjc!fcedfs list Caße. —Neuralgia, about 5 veeks Better,- , : 2nd. — Young man, pains in liver and bjack, extending to. t be head, causing partial ' deaf--neys'.tvMuchbdtter. '•-,..- .; '•;' 3rd.— Lady in invalid chair, afflicted with paralysis 17 years ; use of limbs lost for four years : No perceptible improvement. 4th, — little girl, inmate of Deaf and Dumb Asylum at Sumner : So far- recovered as to hear the ticking of a watch, 5 tb.— Patient with sciatica : Much better/ , 6th.— Youth, aged 18., deaf, and blind with ono eje j could awt preYlviasly b«ar^k© report of a oannon ! Could hear clapping of hards. .7th.-r-Man lost one eye ; Bight of the other nearly gone : This case was declined as hope leap. Btb. — Ex-Police Sergeant John Maguire, side paralysed 6 years : supposed to have resulted from exposure at a fire ; singing sound in the ear, and sight defective : After treatment said that he could see as well as he could when he used to fire his rifle, and that his side was much better ; came forward and went through the extension motions, evidently greatly delighted, and amidst applause. As Maguire's case created special interest the reporter of the • Press ' waited on him at Lyttelton on the following day. The repoit of tho interview we copy from that paper : — Mr Maguire is well known throughout Canterbury. Ho partially lost the use of the whole of the left aide of bia body by a paralytic strokf , wbioh was said to have been caused by tne exposure to intense heat he boro while on duly at a fire at Oxford Bix years since. Mr Maguire says that_ ever sinco then he had a humming sound in his left ear, whioh ceased neither night or day ; his left eye was dimmed ; to look at print with it when the right eye was closed was to see a clouded innss of black figures ; he could not raise his left arm near horizontal with his shoulder, and then only by propping it up with his right hand ; and he could not walls any distance without the use of a stick. The people of Lyttelton are fully awara how genuinely serious Mr Maguire's paralysis was and as the report of his cure got about our repoiter was led to call upon him. Mr Maguire came to the door without the aid of a^ stick, and gave bis experience of his interview with Mr Stephen as follows : — He said that he was not completely cured, but that tiuce Saturday he had a moat peculiar feeling all down his left side, a feeling akin to what might be expected to be felt were bis muscles being unduly strained, and this he felt all the way down from his left; shoulder to his left foot. After leaving the hall on Saturday, he said the tram car had jußt passed on which he had depended to carry him to the railway station, and he was at a loss to know how to reach the train. He walked on and on, perfectly surprised at him self, and so kept on walking until he reached the station— a feat he might as well have tried as to fly the day before. He had also been out a good long walk without a stick jußt before our reporter saw him. Of the improvement made in his left eyesight, Mr Maguire demonstrated it by pointingjto two telegraph poles he could " distinctly see " at the top of the Port hills with only the left oye, the bad eye, open — sight which could not be called weak, certainly, nor dim. Mr Maguire said he had not been able to take off or put on his coat " since the stroke " but he could manage it now, and he proved to the satisfaction of our reporter that he could raise the lame arm considerably above the level of the shoulder by moving it up and down then and there. That he had benefited by the breathing in his ear, and the laying on of hands by Mr Stephen, was as plain as that he was alive. How it was done, and what caused that Btrange feeling in his body, he did not profeßsJto know, but ha " never was so much himself since the stroke," though he had spent weeks at the hot springs in the North Island. As before stated, he did not at all count himself cured. He had not had time on Saturday to wait for any of the magnetised oil and the red flannel, bo had virtually done nothing himself towards 'the improvement that he experienced, but he expressed the hope that after he had used the oil and flannel and after ho' has again been operated upon by Lbe generous healer he will no longer be, incapacitated from labor, as he hae been for the last six years. We give these reports as impartially as possible. Our readers must draw their own conclusions. We suppose Mr Stephen will come south when his engagements in Ohristchurch close.