THE TIES OF KINSHIP.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19240, 2 August 1924, Page 22

THE TIES OF KINSHIP.

ENGLAND AS “ HOME.” Interesting impressions of the love of New Zealanders for the Old Country are conveyed m an article in the London Daily Chronicle by Mr Fenton Macpherson, who visited the dominion as special commissioner for that paper a few months ago. It was when I was in the heart of Central Otago.” says Mr Macpher.on, " that suddenly there (lashed across my mind the special significjuice of the words l At Home,’ when used by one born and bred in the dominion. It was in a small wooden hut which was being used as a temporary sehoolhouso in a public works

construction oamp at Chatto Creek, that I first really grasped the double meaning which tho word “At Homo ’ lias for those of British origin now domiciled overseas. I had been invited to have a chat with tho assembled pupils. They were a handful of sturdv small boys and girls who had probably seen me earlier in the day as I passed their tiny school on my way to inspect the ferro-concreto water race built recently for purposes of irrigation.” Thinking to test their knowledge of the locality, the visitor began with the question “Whore have I just come from?” “Horae, sir,” came tho electrifying answer, piped out by a bonnie wee lass,

born in Now Zealand, who had almost certainly never been out of the country. One of Ihe boys, who quite rightly "110850(1 that Mr Macpherson was somewhat nonplussed, politely amplified the small girl's reply by staling, “She means England.” . Mr Macpherson continues; — io travel over 12,000 miles from London to a tiny little hamlet in the heart of New Zealand and there hear an infant lisp of England as ‘Home’ is enough to make any lover of his country thrill with pride. The Empire, is in no immediate danger of dissolution while our outpost nations never cease to use the word ‘Home,’ both for the cradle of the race and for the hearth and fireside of the family. “ The little ones have learned from their elders the double application of the word

' Hinie,’ And how strong a hold the memory of the Homo Land had on the early migrants, and still has on their descendants, the public and private art collections of the dominion bear witness todav. . “In these collections pictures abound of

British scenery and country life painted for the most, part by well-known artists who have chosen their subjects from all parts of the British Isles. In some galleries English scenery preponderates; in others, the mountains and tarns of the Scottish Highlands and the surge-beaten shores of the Western Isles. Two canvases stand out in mv memory. They hang side by side in the‘Public Art Gallery at Dunedin. They are both labelled : ‘ The Birth Place of the Donor.’ , Both are finely painted pictures of Perth', showing the Fair City as it stands on the banks of the Tay. ’