LADY HEWART'S DEFENCE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22489, 5 August 1936, Page 5

LADY HEWART'S DEFENCE

NO TIME FOR HUMBUG [from our crwx correspondent] By Air Mail LONDON, July 11 Lady Hewart has written to the Times expressing her pleasure at reading Mr. Alan Mtilgan's reply to an English tourist -who criticised the culture of New Zealanders. Lady Hewart pointed out the necessity for a traveller to spend a considerable time in the country before he can appreciate the character of the New Zealanders. "They are essentially shy, and perhaps their modesty is responsible for their care to avoid any pose which might earn for them the terms 'pedantic' or 'cultured,' " she writes. "Their standard of education is equal to any in the world, and some of the finest types of youth are to be found in their universities. The average New Zealander has not much time to pursue fantastic sociabilities, and has not much glib conversation upon subjects about which he has only a superficial knowledge. If. he does not know a Gainsborough from a Reynolds, he says so; if he does not know the difference between Homer and Horace, he admits it. He reads what he likes, usually thoroughly. He forms his own opinions and is not concerned to join the flock who follow like shoep the Lord Tomnoddy of the moment in the world of literary criticism. "The tourist unfortunately missed the chief asset of the New Zealand man. He is essentially sincere and has 110 time whatever for humbug."