OUR LONDON LETTER

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1626, 29 April 1903, Page 56

OUR LONDON LETTER

PERSONAL AND GENERAL NOTES. (From Our Special Correspondent.) LONDON, March 13. Dr. Neligan, the new Anglican Bishop of Auckland, was good enough to grant me a farewell’interview yesterday for ho sails on the 2bth instant by tltao Papaaui. I found him in the dismantled vicarage of St. Stephen’s, Paddington, hard at work on a multitude of letters and messages, but as iresh and as cheerful as if he were enjoying a holiday in Switzerland. So completely did he conceal the pain he. must naturally be feeling at leaving the' old country, old friends and all the surroundings of a hfe-timo, that X could not help asking whether lie was going to join friends or relatives already settled in New Zealand. “No,” was the prompt answer, “I know no one there. Mrs Neligan certainly has an uncle in the colony, but has never seen him. I know nothing of the country or the people and 1 go with an open mind and shall learn the conditions of life when X get there. I gave the new Bishop an instance of two of the up-country journeys that his episcopal brethren and predecessors in the colony have so constantly haci to make in all weather, and I inquired if be had any experience of country life even of 'the easy English kind. “None at all,” was the candid answer. “All my life has been in towns and then to give me an idea of what sort of towns and what parts of those towns ho had lived in, the Bishop tom me that his first curacy was for two years in a huge river-side parish in Hull; nothing but slums, eighteen thousand people, dockers and such-iiice, ail poor. The work was so great that the young curate broke down in two years and had to travel abroad for twelve months before he was fit for work again. Then came a quiet year’s curacy at Dereham in the middle cf Norfolk. In 1890 he was back in town again, this time a very wealthy London parish, to wit Lancaster Gate, on the north side of Hyde Park —with no slums at all. After four and a-half years of that experience he took the great parish he is now leaving, St. Stephen’s, Paddington, and greatly lias he enjoyed his work there, everyone working together so cheerfully and energetically. A great number of the inhabitants are professional men —not the very wealthy ones, but men beyond daily anxiety as to their livelihood —the sort of temperate zone” that is- the best and most active everywhere. The laity managed all secular affairs and in nine years collected and expended close on £OO,OOO in connection with churches, schools, missions and hospitals. In spite of all his activity and unceasing work Dr. Neligan belies the evil reputation that London lias for men who work hard in such unclean air as a. Londoner must breathe “year in, year out.” He looks as fresh and young and strong as an athletic curate in the healthiest- parish in the whole Kingdom. He fears neither heat nor cold, and I prophesy will thrive (oi* hard work anywhere in New Zealand. When I reported a fortnight ago that Bishop Neligan was taking with him to Auckland two members of the “J.C.M.A.” I Avas unable to explain the mystery of those initials. The Bishop soon satisfied mo that there AA'as nothing mystic about them; J.C.M.A. means ‘‘Junior Clergy Missionary Associations” and nothing more. These associations wero first formed by Dr. Neligan and Mr Ellison, Vicar of Windsor, some ten years ago. The originators long ago realised that there was a strong feeling all over the Avorld that the mission of the British Empire Avas a Christian mission as Avell as a mere commercial organisation. 'they found, at the same time, that the difficulty Avas to induce clergy settled down in the old country to think of undertaking a term of service abroad —anywhere Avliere they might he Avanted. In many cases they found young clergy keen to go anyAvhere and do anything for their religion, but yet tied down to" the old country either by parent or Avife or family or other considerations. These associations Avere therefore started to find men and give help to the Council for Service Abroad of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, and they have proved dis"tinctly effective. Certainly to the average lay .mind that is eager to have the'union of - the Avhole British Commonwealth kept firmly together in the service of civilisation and judicious progress the idea of getting young men of all classes, lay or clerical,, to take a few “wander-years” in Brit’Sih possessions oversea is a fine idea—almost identical with Avhat was present m Cec-il Rhodes’s mind when he made his famous will. When telling me that Mrs Neligan was looking forward to their neAV mode of life, Dr. Neligan mentioned that her father Avas Mr Edmund Macrory, K.C., a Avell-known man at the Bar. Mrs Macrory Avas a daughter of _ome of the English Judges, Mr Justice Manisty, one of whose sons —and therefore Mrs Meligan’s uncle —is living at Wooclvillc in Hawke’s Bay. After half-an-hour’s talk with me Dr. Neligan had to go across to the church, and at the door of that fine building of last century’s “sixties” I bade him farewell and a safe voyage*-

According to the “Pall Mall Gazdtte,” the Admiralty has promised to give favourable consideration to the proposition for placing one of the vessels of the Australian squadron as a training ship for New Zealand boys._ Vice-Ad-mirals Sir Lewis Beaumont and Fanshawo and Commandant Noel are said to bo interesting themseives in the movement. Miss Annie Taylor Black is going to have a slioav of her pictures at the Continental Galleries in Bond street for a fortnight from the 24th June. At the present time Miss Black has pictures being exhibited at the Leeds Art Gallery," Oldham Corporation Gallery and the GlasgoAV Royal Institute . of Fine Arts, and she has been invited to send pictures for exhibition, at the Municipal Galleries at Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, and York. Just noiv Miss Black is at Avork on a portrait of a boy, the eldest son of a Colonel MacdoAvell. Miss Christine Smith (Wellington) sails for Colombo by the Orient liner “Orita,” which sails from London on the Bth May. After paying a visit to friends in Ceylon. Miss Smith then goes on to New Zealand. Mr Robert Heaton Rhodes, M.H.R., is still in toivn, at Bailey’s Hotel, but will return to New Zealand in time for the opening of the session. Mr Frank A. Maurice, Avho AA'as, I understand, associated with the press in New Zealand, has now blossomed forth in London as a teacher of music and a tenor vocalist. His latest venture is the organisation of “The Maurice Grand Concert” to bo gi\ T en in the small Queen’s Hall on April 28th, “under the distinguished patronage'’ of the Hon. W. P. Reeves and four other Agent s-General. His talent for the evening includes two of his own piano pupils, sundry vocalists of more or less renown, the Roumanian violinist Weinberger, and, I am sorry to see, one of those inflictions, a child reciter. The youngest son of Mr Walter Kcnnaway. O.M.G-, the Secretary ait the NeAV Zealand Agency, was married on the 7th instat Bombay, to his cousin. Miss Marjory Kennaway, daughter of Mr Wm. Kennaway, of Tiverton, Devon. Mis 9 Constance Randall',-Johnson, second daughter of the Hon. George Randall-Johnson, formerly of Wellington. and uoav living in the West of England, is engaged to Captain Deiye« Broughton, R.A., and is to be married in October. Miss 8011, artist and sculptor, Avho was in Wellington last year and came back to London lately, is engaged-to be married to a Mr rtee. Geoffrey Sunderland, a son of Mr Sulnderl'and, of Gisborne, has passed tho Cambridge Local Preliminary Examination held at Petersfield and got third-class honours; his brother Marmadulco passed the Junior Examination at the same time Mr Norman Why to (Auckland), for merly on the Waihi Mine, lias accepted an appointment m the Nile Valley Company, near Assouan. Mr Kenneth Thomson (Gisborne') has settled in London for the next three years so as to go through the course of electrical engineering at. the City and Guilds Central Technical College at South Kensington. Mrs F. W. King, of Auckland, and Miss Gifford Cooper, are in London, just back from Oxford, and are soon off to the Continent, returning at Easter to Devonshire, and leave England about Mav or June. Miss Cooper remains behind in England. Miss Lena, Raphael, of Christchurch, is leaving for the colony next month after a year’s enjoyable holiday in Europe. Tile protracted rlulness in Australasian mining affairs has apparently- persuaded a number of the “Kangaroo” contingent of the mining market to look for “corn in Egypt” and among the directors of a concern called the “Nile Valley Block E. Limited.” I note the name of the Hon. J. B. Whyte. The boards of the Nile Development Syndicate and the Egyptian and Soudan Minerals Company are also leavened with men who have been intimately associated with Australasian mining affairs. Among the members of the Royal Colonial Institute elected at last Tuesday’s Council meeting X note the names of Messrs John Reid Burt and E. Fondi Wright, of New Zealand. The only arrivals from the colony wdio have registered their names at tho Agent-General’s office during the past Aveek are Mr Richard Whittinghain, of Gore, Avho is residing temporarily at Lumsdale House, Highbury New' Park; My J. F. Keene, late Sergt.Major in the N.Z.D.F., vho has gone north to Gateshead-on-Tyne; Mr John Warner, of Christchurch, whoso temporary quarters are at 183, Old Kent road; Mr F. L. Armxtage, of Auckland, whoso headquarters in London are at 47, Duko street, St. James’s. Among the cal lens who could not be described as “visitors” was Colonel Pearce, erstwhile of Wellington, who is now’ residing at “Lygarie,” Cheltenham, and appears to find our peculiar climate agree very well with his health. At the* Agricultural Hall this week the NeAV Zealand bred stallion Gold Medallist, now the property of John Wynford Phillips, M.P., was awarded one of the 28 King’s premiums of £l5O offered for the best animals shown at the show belld by the Hunters’ Improvement Society in conjunction with tho Royal Commission on Horse-breed-

mg. For the purpose of apportioning theso premiums the Commission divided Great Britain (excepting Ireland) into tAvelve parts, and for each of these districts from one to four equal premiums of £l5O are offered, the conditions on AA'hich these are aAvarded being that the winning stallions shall each servo not loss than fifty lialf-bred mares if required during 1903, and shali stand or travel, as the Commissioners may direct, in tho district for which ho is exhibited, at a fee not exceeding forty shillings for each mare and tivo shillings and sixpence for the groom. Mr Douglas Gifford Moore, whose family lived for many years at Timaru, and subsequently in Sydney, is now settled at Johannesburg as a commission agent, in partnership Avith a Mr Colborne. Last month, Mrs Moore, Avho has been seriously ill for a long AA'hile, Avas gradually recoA r ering. Writing in February to an old New Zealand friend, Mr Moore strongly ad-A-jc.es a mining engineer not to venture thither., unless Avith enough money to spare to keep himself for three months at least at the rate of £l2 a month for food and lodging alone. Assayers only got about £25 a month. The secretary of one cf the greatest groups of mines had assured him that very few mining appointments AA’erc made on the spot, but almost all of them in London. This latter statement, I may remark, is a direct contradiction of Avhat one is told in London. For. as I Avas saying a week or two ago, one is told on all sides in the city that only the most ilmportamt appointments for South Africa are made from London but all the lesser ones “on the spot.”