THE TIES OF KINSHIP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18772, 28 July 1924, Page 10

THE TIES OF KINSHIP.

EM GLAND AS " HOME."

WHAT AN OTAGO CHILD SAID.

Interesting impressions of the love of New Zealanders for the " Old Country" are conveyed in an article in the London Daily Chronicle by Mr. Fenton Macpherson, who visited the Dominion as special commissioner for that paper a few months

ago. " It was' when I was in the heart of Central Otago," says Mr. Macpherson, " that suddenly there flashed across my mind the special significance of the words ' At Home' when used by one born and bred in the Dominion,, It was in a smaill wooden hut which was being used as a temporary school-house in a public works construction camp at Chatto Creek, that. 1. first really grasped the double meaning which the word ' At Home' has for those oi British origin now domiciled overseas. I had been invited to have a chat with the assembled pupils. They werea handful of sturdy small beys and girls who had probably seen me earlier in the day as I passed their tiny school on my way to inspect a ferro-concrete water-race built recently for 'purposes of irrigation." Thinking to test their knowledge of tha locality, the visitor began with the question, When? have I just come from?" " Home,. siir," came the electrifying answer piped out by a boxmie wee lass, born in New Zealand, who had almost certainly ne£,er been out of the country. One of the boys, who quite rightly guessed that Mr. Macpherson was somewhat nonplussed, politely amplified the small girl's reply by stating, "She means England. - .' Mr. Macpherson continues :—"To travel over 12,000 miles from London to a tiny little hamlet in the heart of New Zealand anil there heat an infant lisp of England as ' Home' is enough tc make any lover of his country thinll with pride. The Empire is in no immediate danger of dissolution whije our outpost nations never cease to use $he word 1 Home,' both for tha cradle of [jjhe race and for the hearth and fireside of. the family. "The little tines have learned from their elders the double application of the word ' Home.' And how strong a hold tho memory of tha Home Land had on the early migrants, and still on their descendants, the public and private art collections of the Dominion bear witness to-day. "In these collections pictures abound of British scenery and country life painted for the naost part by well-known artists who have chosen their subjects from all parts of the Britsh Isles. In some galleries English scenery preponder ates: in othesrs, the mountains and tarns of the Scottish Highlands and the surgebeaten chores of the Western Isles. . Two canvases stand out in mv momory. They hang side by 'ride in the Public Art Galfery at Dunedin. They are both labelled: 'The Birth Place of the Donor.' Both ar® finely painted pictures of Perth, showing the Fair Cty as it stands on tha banks of the Tay."