AIR FOSTER FRASER.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 14651, 11 October 1909, Page 2

AIR FOSTER FRASER.

FAREWELL TO DUIs'EDIN. " WOMEN OF MANY LANDS." Tlio basis of anthropography is & icalisalioii of tlie inliuencc ot climate, soil, ami the'physical coiiiliuuti of jNatuie upon the development of the dilfeieut branches ut iho limiiaii family. Looking at the peoples of the world, there is at least nil excuse, so great is the diver.iity in plnsical frame, physiognomoiiical chaiaelerisucs, and stanmints of imcllect anil morality, lor the onetime frequently, niailo error of assuming that these ilillerences Here, inherent anil fundamental, lint this easy solution of the difficulty does not incut with scientilie lavour, tor J. ,S. Mill lias characterised this assumption of inherent ijilt'crenccs as the most vulgar of all vulgar modes of escaping from the consideration, of social and moral influences on tho human mind." Kurther to this point, the scientific generalisation has been made by iiuckle and etliors thai, ot the racial (liD'eienccs at present obtaining, natural forces are, primarily, the cause. Mr Foster Fraser'a illustrated lecture 011 Saturday afternoon in Burns Hall on the subject of " Women of Many Lands" was a series of concrete e.\t'lllplos of flit result of this operation of the forces of Nature m producing diversities iu type. It was a hop, skip, and jump over, the world in seateii of contrasts. Of the womanhood of practically all the lands ha lias visited he showed pictures, and, in pis explanatory remarks, ■ indicated the ptiysieal and social causes—the character of the climate ami the necessity or non-neces->ivy of hard manual labour, —which had operated to produce Ihe particular type depicted. "Wnoro the climate is salubrious there nre tlw good-looking girls; where the ehyiate is harsh and the work severe, there The inTei-ence is plain. To point the rotn-nk were shown broad, Inuljher faced damsels of Arctic America; it! contrast,, liquid-eyed, olive-cheeked Mexicans, creamy-complexioned, mobile-lipnecl, perfect-featured Algerian Jewesses. Anil from Alaociras right around the Mediterranean shores the pictures went, showing Lgyptian girls with covered faces, Turkish ladies-religious in inverse ratio to beauty, —l.ji'eeiuiis, Georgians, Syrians, Ateniaik and .subsidiary peoples with all their individual racial dmrauleristics and the special IjQvantiafi type evolved from the itdmixturo of the blood of the.se races. Then followed AlabiatlS- upon whoso forbears Persian writers in hcary antiquity bestowed the appellation of "a band of naked lizardeaters"; Jewish women nailing heartbrokenly upon the old wall of the Citv of Hand because of the curse of Jehovah; types—glorious women and jealous niwi; Spaniards—dignity and courtesy persouthed; Polish women—jmle intellectual creatures allied to nmsculim uncoulimess' t « extremes 0 f Jiwsian types of womondrudgery and butterfly gorgeousnoss iJun-ganans-tho admixturt of' tho West end tlio iLasi, ana in ilie s;uno country tho gipsy descendants odoriferously repelknt'; ohiv women, Tyrol women, Sweet Viennese uonicn—-and than a jump fo India and the ]'.!ist. And hero it continues, too. A galaxy of conditions, a riot in colour, n call to sympathj, every picture attractive and of moment Kortii India contains ' a . interest, for there is shown '110111fcis of <1 tube \\ hich e.xisU in the condition Shoved by scientists to have formed the crigm of tho human family-woman in tlio ascendant, man in subjection . woman adminis ermg property, man a more husband and slave. Readers of "Kim" will recollect that woman of this tribo and tho part played in that drama of spies in that little house amongst the giacicrs of the Pima«yus. Leaving the East, a final run is " "'rough the civilised countries of Lurope .before winding up in England with •he depiction of varicns'phases of up-to-date ,?■ "j 1 quaint survivals of customs and attire rom ,orr,ier days. Tho lecturer captivated his audience at the statt in his usua confidential manner, and held it iu Uuullthrcmghout llis humour was light t'L 1 t o " ( i e ■' . ocoasi °n served lie de-tine-ted the wooing customs of other peoples, and made slight comparisons and suggestions. 'In barbarous cotmtvies," bcasually remarked, "tho men clias- th« women.' Then came a fine instance of humorous iiuerence Ly suppiession. Mo continued: ' Whereas, in more i-iullsoi lands— A ripole of swelling laughter indicated the ladies' appreciation of the !'°'J Mu P k lK harm! by travel: much : MW.vT'r 1' ol,S(,1 ' vlll w»; no absolute 1 ' t-ustoni: conditions cerfainlv i y.irjins with circumstance, costume ehan"mg with climate-that is the lecture p n f thnTr" in tlle P rodnct of I tion and environment. 1

ROUND THE WORLD ON A BICYCLE. You have been good enough to come to hear me »ive an account of'a little trip 1 once took on a bicycle—round the world " in" ,i oster Fraser as he walked on to the! staKc on Saturday night._ .Then, •Mth his keen humour and line sense of proportion, he told the story He started from Lom.on, which is, of course, next to Dunedin, the centre of all things!" Antwerp he mentioned as a setting to an interview with King Leopold, wherein his idea of royalty enthioru'd—" a sort of brass Dutch cheese in on.j liand, and a kind of gilt poker in the other"—was dissipated The roads were good through Germany, Austria, Hungary, Tight into lloumania, (ill (there were two others) they reached Russia. The Russian police were good fellows indeed, and they sometimes used <o sieep in th« police stations—from choice. I?-" 1 Hmtttrh tho best language in tho

There was, for 'nuance, (ho word "/.uafta." Ho cn torts J t!ii inn and ordered chicken, and tlia landlord lcplictt " ziiufta," and went, "into the yard. Mr Foster Frascr waited it hungry hour, and remonstrated, only to be tola "zaaiva." Ho \yaitcd four hour?, and, thinking ihi? too long a wait for dinner, vyeu in Russia, vent into ttio .wd and siid tiling to the proprietor, \v»k> stomed surprised. Tliou, think»i£ he would look tho word "zaafta" up hi the uietionarv. he found it meant "iomorrow/' At louse null' tho allotted "pock f " as V alc " f i";<vcr-siiithe sand of _ Sum H Russia, on tho way down lo I lie U'lmea. wlinr:' ai ].!al;icl;n"a thoy uncovered tit the faille to Hritish nold'ior.s taking tmit nj (:i;,c historic charge. Across ilic Straits of Azov they had an aliray with CoHsaoksj, \yltd stabbel (ho slill Ijoro Iho niin'lis), ami the Kuglish Ii red in to tlio nil", noil hsr side having Iho remotest idea of what lii'.'V ,'uuglit for. Finally, Warning their opponents' nationality, the Cossacks rode olt in one direction and the iryclisls in another. Of itin ueople» of tho Caucasus they had heard that v.hich led them to think that they might slice oil their ears and send them in by way of extracting ransom. 'J'hey also expected bad roads; hut the people were kindness itself, and tneve was a b?autifu! military road right across, out. in places through solid rock, 'lh? lecturer described the- continuous uphill ride for 54 miles, initl then down from the snowline into the sylvan vales of Georgia. ti distance of 86 inil-,-, coasting nearly all the way. l!y Mount Ararat lis was shown a plank "from the Ark," and drank wine made from a. vino descended from the_ oiiginal planted by Noah. Mr I'oslor Krascr had drunk bettor at Is a bottle, though ho was impressed with the pedigree. . On the way to Persia they crossed one of the original Gardens of Eden. There was no accommodation for cyclists and no roads. lie considered the Garden of J' v 'm to be a vastly overrated place. In the land of the Lion and the Sun, ami awful roads, tliey had usually lo carry their bicycles, ami here, having ex hausted the lining of his coat. Mr Foster Kraser tool; to repairing ''a certain part of ;t certain garment" with canvas mid glue. and .sitting down iill it dried. The result, was not. picturesque, but it was serviceable, and he letii mI from the presence of ladies backwards. Me referred to bridges across perfectly dry 'ami. These bridges were built to lw trussed, and so t hoy crossed thoni. About a mile or so further on Hicy would come lo Hie river and would nave to wads across that. Tins was one of the little ways Persian rivers had of changing their cousro. Fur from being as described iu Lalla Kookh, Persia was half desert covered with salt, and half desert without any csalt at all. At Teheran there was an audience with Ihe Shall, with the I'oacock Throne (the size of a, four-poster bedstead) tind chairs of gold. There woro pictures, chandeliers, and advertisements. Some pictures, said to have been painted by the Shah, were not bad— for a Shaii They rather reminded one of what aro called "Turners." The painter throw the paint on to his canvas, sat on it, turned himself round, got up, and said, "This is a sunset." At Kuni, where Fatitiu is buried, they were attacked by tribesmen, and bent a hasty retreat. Ispahan, and the ruins d Persepobs, where Alexander in his cups ordered the great burning, were visited. In the Hall of An Hundred Columns only 17 remained standing, and out of a "population of 600,000 liona remained. Very sombre was (he description of their crossing "The Shoulder of Death." At an altitude of 9000 ft their guide lost, bis way and deserted tliem. Finding tho lino of telegraph posts, they fought, their way through the snow, eacli taking his tarn at. going lirst to make legholes for tho others. Then out of tha blackness came lights, and they made, to tliem, falling over rocks, to seo them as mysteriously disappear. At dawn they again found the lino of posts, and horsemen who had come with ropes to recover their corpses. Providentially they also brought; " corpse-revivers." Tho way to Bushire was marked by boulders and bears, They mot 11 bears, but on account of the religious atmosphere of Dunedin, and the fact of its being the eve of tho Sabbath, the lecturer thought that perhaps the number «'as not quite 11. At anyrate there woro two.

Landing at Karachi, by reaaoit of the soft earn), they rode for ECO miles over railway sleepers to Lahore. Mr Foster Eraser thrilled his largo audience with his description of Delhi, Uawrpore, and the battered Residency at Lncknow. He spots of tho splendours of the Holy City, and of the reception accorded him at Calcutta, where thoy even got up an earthquake in his honour, blew tho froirt out of the offices of a newspaper, and destroyed a post ollica. Altogether it was a great entertainment. In India they cycled at night, and hearing an aninial pounding along in the jungle, believed they were leally to have an adventure with a Bengal tiger. Thy followed it up slowly. In fact, lie might say, very slowly indeed. After ait hour of this stalking, the beast rushed out 011 the road just in front of them, and :it was a poor little jacka?s belonging to some villager. Said tho lecturer: ' Nearly everyono who has been to India, ami especially to Bengal, has had air adventure with a, tiger. Ladies and gentlemen, that's mine." At ltangoon lie was impressed with tho sagacity ot the elephants that pile teak, "just as intelligently as though working under an award." He was received by the Burmese Archbishop, a personago of the Yellow Kobe. The only thing he had against this archbishop was that he chewed. The lecturer did irot like archbishops who chawed. At Mandalav there was no kitig now, and where tyrants were wont to drink hot blood, sat British ollireis drinking Scotch whisky. Then came the 151 days over the jungle hills of Western China. The Chinese gods were horrible. Even now he would wake up demanding that they should ha taken awuy. lie even did so the other night at Invercargill so his memory must alone i;s responsible for such visitations. The Evil One in China

was represented with ;t red beard, and as his own board was that colour his audicnca co-akl imagine the timo ho had. llis visit to the forbidden Manehu city was the occasion of a general shaking of hands instead of massacre and beatings. lie really never could come across adventures, (joing aor.'n tha Yang-tec-kiang through an anti-foreign province they we.ro chased by a mob with sticks and stones, but escaped by persuading (with a revolver) a boatman to cut hi ( s painter. From Shanghai they went to Japan, a delightful place. where the i>:ople had a very good opinion of themselves! He was asked, " Have you got railways in England yet'!" l-li, replied that wo were getting on in (hat direction, and were copying Japan and watching the evolution of her up-to-date methods.

From San Francisco across the Rockies, and so to Chicago, he had his ideal of the Jted Indian shattered at Nevada, saw BrigIniin Young's 200 and odd children at Salt Laira City, and had the only accident experienced ou the journey Then caine New York, the Atlantic, and the rido London wards from Southampton. As he said, the birds seem to siirg sweeter in England, and the flowers to possess a sweeter perfume, than in ;li iy other country. And how little London had altered Jt had be<2 raining when thev left, and it was stiti raining now Ulat they had returned And so at St. Pancras Church they dismounted oil the spot whence they had started <25 mouths bsfovo ojj n journey of 19,237 miles. He had been one of the first to bicycle round the world, but when in danger of swelled head ho renieyiboreii an o.d Chinaman, to whom lie was' introduced with an account of his travels piled on I'i'etiy thick.' The- old Chinaman listened attentively, and then said, "WhalFor ho do it-?" "For love of adventure,'' explained their mutual acquaintance 1 . The aged Celestial looked the lecturer over with those little buttonhole eyes of his, and exclaimed, "110 too niuohee lam fool. '

In concluding, Mr I'ostcr Eraser said this would be the last time lie would have the pleasure of addrtsing a Dunedin audience. Might lie thank thorn and previous audjneees for havi'ir* listened to him so kindly.