FROM ZION CITY.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 5734, 1 November 1905, Page 6

FROM ZION CITY.

TUB GREATEST DECEPTION OF THE AGE. PRESS ASSOC lATION. AUCKLAND. October 31. Mr and Airs Thomas Hood. Airs H. McGregor, and ALiss Halpin. Wellington emigrant*, returned from Zion City today full of wrathful condemnation of Dowie ami his methods. They report that a lace factory m the city lias closed, and other factories are working with reduced hands, and will probably close down shortly. Aloney is scarce, 'and wor kahnost impossible to get. The whole tiling is. they allege, the greatest deception of the age. Hundreds are leaving the city, and hundreds arc unable to leave for want of money. Nobody. according to the returned followers, prosper but Dowie and his few paid autocrats. The town has a neglected appearance—not up to a good New Zealand country town. , Dowie is endeavouring to raise twelve million dollars to get Zion City out of its financial difficulty, and start a new place in Mexico. Nobody dares air opin- | ions in Zion City, which is all right enough morally for people with plenty or money, but hopeless for the worker dependent on his earnings. W orkers are paid paper money, allegedly cashable, but in truth only convertible with the greatest difficulty. House property is purchasable at cheap rates, but rents are klgh ’ SAN FRANCISCO, October 31. A dispatch from Chicago, dated October sth, says*. Dispatches received here to-day indicate that the Alexicans are very hostile to the plans of John Alexander Dowie to establish a colony in Mexico, and their opposition has become so marked that troops have been ordered to protect the property of Elijah IT. It is said that a large consignment of stores sent ahead for the men who will erect temporary buildings has been burned, and tho Mexicans threaten to burn Dowie’s buildings as fast as they are erected. Reassured by the friendliness of President Diaz, Dowie will go ahead with his colonisation plans, but his followers in Mexico are reported to be greatly alarmed, despite the presence of a large detail of soldiers appointed to guard them. There wore rumours at Zion City to-day that if the opposition becomes too marked tho plantation idea may be abandoned. Dowieites say religious intolerance is responsible for the attacks upon them in Mexico, as it was in Chicago.