CONTRAST IN MEMOIRS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20656, 30 August 1930, Page 8 (Supplement)

CONTRAST IN MEMOIRS.

THE FIT AND THE MISFIT. Misfit," an Autobiography by Captain J. R. White. (Cape.) " Reminiscences IR4I-1930," by Arthur Dudley Dobson (Whitcombo and Tombs). " Jack, you're a very decent fellow, but there are three ways in which you make things very difficult for yourself and your friends. You want to change tho whole world; you want to do it at once; and you want to do it all by yourself." Tersely expressed by Lord Cushendun, this estimate of tho character of Captain J. 11. White, author of " Misfit," is admitted by tho subject of it to bo substantially true. Tho pages of this autobiography

indeed teem with illustrations of the speakers sound judgment. John Robert White, son of General Sir George White, tho hero of tho seigo of Ladysmith and afterward a British Field Marshal, has evidently been all his life a rebel. Rules and regulations are to liini anathema. Beginning in his school days at Winchester, ho grew bored with the scholastic atmosphere, and though treated with amazing leniency by tho Head, practically insisted on being sent away from tho school. The army suited him no better, and possessing both wit and humour, ho shows how such a " misfit" as himself could never fit into an organisation in which one inspection regulation directs that the bristles of tho soldier's toothbrush shall face the back of the cover of his Bible. Always looking for difficulties, Captain White, an Ulster Protestant, fell in love with tho daughter of a strict Roman Catholic family and married her despite, or perhaps or. account of, all the obstacles that were put in his way. Though an Ulster Protestant again, ho ardently cxpoused tho cause of Irish freedom, became an intimate friend of Roger Casement, Jim Larkin and indeed of all the elements which were subversive of the settled order of things. Whito's comment upon the war throws light upon the topsy-turvy processes of his mind. "It is remarkable how thoroughly the winnowing fan of the war sifted the chaff from the wheat among human souls. I write of course from tho standpoint that only those who held aloof from the war entirely can bo reckoned as wheat." Yet there is beauty and wisdom to be found in this strange hotch-potch of action and psychology. Tho writer in a striking passage, compares himself and his feelings to a master with his hounds. " Warrior, Rover and Rebel havo given tonguo, but wo have done little more than whip in to the line. It takes a good few casts. There are the scurrying rabbits and the timid hares. There are, illusory beauty, false romance, partial deceptive ideals. I am reminded of the words of the old huntsman in Punch —' 'Ow can 'ounds 'unt with all them stinkin' flowers?'" The end of the hunt is not yet, but for such a turbulent soul, it can hardly be peaceful. # ♦ # * »

To turn from this strange and disturbing medley to the " Reminiscences" of Mr. Arthur Dudley Dobson, is to pass from tho turmoil of a whirlpool into the placid waters of a safe harbour. Mr. Dobson came to New Zealand with his parents in 1850. Following his father's profession he became a surveyor and engineer and by his strenuous labours in wilds helped considerably in the development of Canterbury and the West Coast. Possibly, few people who visit or speak of Arthur's Pass know that it was discovered by Mr. Dobson. His brother George—later to become a victim of the Burgess-Kelly-Levy-Sullivan gang of bushrangers— who was sent by the Government to examine ewy available pass between the watershed of the Teremakau. Waimakariri ajid Hurunui, reported that " Arthur's Pass " was by the far the most suitable for a direct road to the coast. Hence the name by which it has been known ever since.

In the course of a strenuous and adventurous life Mr. Dobson has known the ups and downs of fortune. The bank failures in Australia in 1890 sent him back to New Zealand crippled in resources. He later became city engineer in Christchurch, a position which he held for twenty years. He was a member of the Auckland water supply commission in more recent years. No reader of these plain records of difficulties sturdily tackled, and dangers boldly met, can fail to discern in Arthur Dudley Dobson. now aged 88 and still " going strong," the type of hardy pioneer to which the New Zealanders of to-day owe a debt hard to repay.