Untitled

New Zealand Herald, Volume XIX, Issue 6483, 28 August 1882, Page 5

.The present winter, owing" to its"severity,| has thinned out--a' number of the old{ identities." Amongaway during the past week Oia ve . been Mra. Brown (wife of Mr. Samuel Brown, Victona< street), Mrs. Head (wife of Mr. Head, of the Market), and Mr. Alexander Martin. Mrs, Brown's funeral was postponed till yesterday in order to permit of one of her sons coming from Wellington by the Southern steamer. Her death was improved yesterday by Mr. Spurzeon at the Wcllesley-street Baptist Church (as she was a member of ~ that communion), the text being " Jesus wept, and from which he deduced the lessons which the passage suggested.;; A yery large number of the membera_. of the congregation followed . her remains to the grave, where the burial service was conducted by Mr. Spurgeon in an impressive manner. It is worthy of note that the deceased lady attended upon, the poet Montgomery during his last illness, and was at his bedside at the closing scene. Mr. Alexander Martin, whoso decease wa record, was a very old resident, having been over fortv years in Auckland. He was a law clerk bv occupation, and a man of more than ordinary ability and attainments. In the early davs of Provincialism, he was Clerk of the Auckland Provincial Council. He had reached the advanced age of 05, aud wa3 the son of the late Captain' Alex. -Martin,K.N. Mrs. fiend's funeral took place terdiy, and a number of old settlers 'who had known her and her husband (who served in the Royal Kugiueers iu the early days of the colony) followed her remains to tho grave. A funeral which took place on Saturday) was a perfect satire on the wealth and taste of the colony. It appears that a poor family ! named Crowe resides in a by-street somewhere ori' Symonds-street, in tho neighbourhood of the Ciioral Hall. One member of. the family, the eldest sou, a' grown youth.j died, and his funeral took place on Saturday,; and this was the order : A dirty dray, coc-f timing a rough wocaen shell, followed tq the cemetery by the boy's father and mother and a little girl, a sister of the deceased. Hood's pocim struck forcibly on the minds of those v.' . suv the little procession— "Rattle his boae;- 1 over the stones, he's only a pauper whom nobody owns." The only mark of decency or respect to the dead was that a sheet naa thrown over the shell. The outward observance was harrowing enough, and were it not with a hope to .prevent a recurrence of such scenes again we should not enter further into the details of an unpleasant subject. Inquiry, however, intensifies these feelings. The family was in a state of pauperism, and application was made to the Relieving Officer for a coffi.i. The request was granted, but. how ? The wretched father had to proceed) to Mount EJen for tho shell, and carry it? home to his own house on his shoulders. No doubt the adjustment of the in the coffin wa3 carried' out by the sorrowings parents, and. as already stated, the melancholy procession consisted of the partially concealed shell, in a dirty dray, followed by three mourners, the father, mother, and sister of the deceased. There is one redeeming feature in the whole proceedings which shows that charity is not altogether dead. The sexton declined to make any charge for digging the grave, and the Rev. C. M. Nelson attended aud read the burial service of the Church of England as impressively as if the funeral had been one of the magnates of the land. We have one especial purpose in calling attention to this matter, and thatis that there is in thisinstance a family requiring immediate relief, and it is the duty of some charitable institution, or charitable individuals;, to see to their immediate requirements.

The Rev. Dr. McLeod, of Devonporfc, conducted a Gaelic service yesterday afternoon at 3 o'clock in St. James' Presbyterian Church, Wellington-street. 3?here were fully 200 present. The rev. gentleman preached an excellent discourse from Isaiah, chap, xxxv., v. S—lo. The subject -was illustrated in an interesting way by Dr. McLeod by ineident3 from his recent travels, and tiie discourse was highly appreciated by the audience, many of whom were delighted to hear again the much-loved accents of their native tongue. The Psalms of David were sung. It is to be hoped that Dr. McLsod will favour the Gaelic-speaking portion of the community with a similar service more frequently. The incident shows the tenacity with which the Highlander clings to the traditions and language of his mountain home, even when he has settled across the Atlantic in Nova Scotia, and emigrated thence after a generation to this southern hemisphere. These services will keep green in their memories a language which Highlandmen fondly believe was first spoken in Paradise. The institution of a Celtic chair at Edinburgh, through the exertions of Professor Blackie, who succeeded in getting it endowed with £12,000, collected from the son 3 of Caledonia in all parts of the British empire, „• has given a great stimulus to the study .of Gaelic literature. New Zealand contributed handsomely to that fund, and there is now a Gaelic Association in Otago; and Gaelic is being taught in some of the Dunedin schools. There is another Presbyterian squabble, this time in Wanganui, but it is not likely to end in arson. The disputants on either side are the Rev. James Treadwell, of St..Paul's Presbyterian Church, and Moderator of Session, and Mr. Gilbert Carson, formerly of Auckland, but now of Wanganui, and proprietor of the Wanganui Chronicle. Both parties have rushed into print, and the result is a very pretty quarrel. It appears that Mr. Carson, who is a member of the Baptist denomination, but who attended the. Wanganui Presbyterian Church in the absence of the exi3tencc of one of his o*.vn creed, had been for seven or eight years superintendent of St. Paul's Presbyterian Sunday-school, During his absence from Wanganui oil a visit to i&nckland a few weeks ago, a resolution was car.-ied by the Kirk Session, " That no teacher should be appointed to the school, or continued in it, who cannot teach the doctrines of the Pres<byterian body, as the3e are contained and exhibited in the Westminster Shorter Catechism." The result was lli.it Mr. Carson, and his co-religionists, who had no objection to the catechism, save on the one distinctive article of faith, and who indeed taught it with that one exception to their own children, had to retire from the school. A side issue crops up as to one teacher in tlie school having inadvertently taught conditional immortality, but as the offending teacher retired when an o!'j<:ction was made, and Mr. Carson concurred in the necessity for that retirement, that incident could scarcely have been the* basis of the resolution passed by the Kirk Session. Mr. Carson concludes a lengthy letter by saying :— "The minister and Kirk Session of St. Paul's, Wanganui, have given a new phase to my experience of Church work. There is no obligation on either side in such work. If there were, metliinks it would Le on the side of the sect which first invites members of other denominations to labour in it 3 interest, and then repays the obligation by laming them out without so much as ' thank you ' for their services. Certain I am that no other Church, and indeed no other section of the Presbyterian Church, would so have acted." - The weather again changed for the worse yesterday evening, after the spell of a few days' fine weather which we had enjoyed duiing the pa3t week. On Saturday, a3 night drew on, the air was quite frosty, bat the rain which fell last eveaing again loweired the smperature.