THE MICROCOSM OF RURAL LIFE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23517, 4 June 1938, Page 4

THE MICROCOSM OF RURAL LIFE

STUDIES OF THE FABRIC OF NEW ZEALAND “Littledene: a New Zealand Rural Community.” By H. C. D. Somerset. Illustrated. Wellington: New Zealand Council for Educational Research. 4s, _ "An Ulster Plantation: the Story of the Kati Kati Settlement.” Illustrated. Dunedin: A. A. W. Reed.

“ Littledene ” To-day

Mr H. C. D. Somerset is an observant guide to “Littledene,” a New Zealand rural community. He takes his readers straight into the homes of its people:

man for the creation of a closer liaison between town and country, between the producers of New Zealand and the shopkeepers, than at present exists. While it possesses, from the comparatively restricted scope of the examination, very definite limitations to its authority, it is a most valuable contribution to the contemporary social scene in this Dominion.

The older small farmhouses are . built with two front rooms on each side of a passage which leads from the front door to a “ lean-to ” kitchen built at the back. The “ frontroom” and the best bedroom are on either hand on entering the front door; the two used bedrooms are behind them. The kitchen, long and narrow, with walls of painted wood, its windows heavily curtained, its floor covered with pattern-worn linoleum, is furnished with a large table scrubbed white and chairs mostly rickety and awry. The stove, in the darkest corner, requires the suppleness of a contortionist to get a glimpse of the oven. The dresser holds the crockery above, the cakes and other quick-afternoon-tea edibles below. Behind the door are two hooks for hanging coats and hats, on the wall near by, a rack for newspapers and a shelf for schoolbooks.

Kati Kati Yesterday Exceptions underline the rule, and with no knowledge of Kati Kati other than is made available in Mr Gray's history of this East Coast settlement, one might conclude that this individualistic district wall not fit comfortably into the pattern of Littledene. Perhaps because the settlers who made Kati Kati their home hailed from Ireland, where everybody boasts a distinct personality, or perhaps because they were led by a very remarkable man, one divines from this book that they were an exceptional people. Or perhaps it is only the loving care and fidelity with which Mr Gray has put the history of this little corner of the Dominion on paper that gives the trials and adventures of the Ulstermen of Kati Kati a special significance. One thing at least about Kati Kati is surely worthy of remark. The men of this district established their roots deep there, and neither depressions nor land booms have torn them out. Of the original families which took up land at Kati Kati in the seventies, the majority have retained their connection with the district. There seems, further, to exist an unusual bond between the considerable number of men who have made a name outside Kati Kati and their early home surroundings, which Mr Alan Mulgan expresses gracefully in the introduction to this book. Kati Kati was one of the last of the special settlements which have contributed to the wealth of New Zealand. It originated in the mind of George Vesey Stewart, who had evolved the conception of a community of Ulstermen in which he would rule “in the patriarchal fashion of a Highland chief.” And no sooner had the ambitious plan occurred to him than he proceeded to put it intp effect. Like the stories of the foundation of most of the other settlements, that of Kati Kati is one of trials overcome. That these were often of Stewart’s making is apparent. He was sanguine in the extreme. The assurance of the New Zealand Government agent in Belfast that his project would be approved was to him as good as an official notification, though many difficulties and some opposition had yet to be faced. However, he eventually persuaded the Government to give him the 10,000 acres he had chosen, in spite of not unreasonable opposition in Auckland, where it was maintained that the sons of earlier settlers should be served first. It was not until the eve of departure of the settlers from Belfast that, as he put it, “ I began to realise fully in my own mind the responsibility that rested on my. shoulders at having induced so many to leave their homes, their friends, and their native land.” Those responsibilities were to make themselves felt often enough in the following years, and the story of Kati Kati from this point, which might otherwise have been unexceptional. obtains interest from the strident personality of the founder. Vesey Stewart had not the gift of winning devotion, and neither with the people of Kati Kati nor those of other colonising ventures which followed, did he maintain harmonious relations. It is with some pleasure that we learn that, just as Kati Kati overcame its growing pains, so the founder was able to outlive his unpopularity and see .his hopes for the settlement fulfilled. Mr Gray has made his record of the growth of Kati Kati interesting, even to those readers with no special concern in ‘he settlement. Such unassuming historical studies as this have a definite worth alike to the districts they celebrate and to New Zealanders as a whole. They provide the material for the future historian, gathered while it is still fresh, and illustrate the quality in will, in courage, and in industry that the Dominion builds upon. J. M.

The decorations attract his eye

Pictures are divided into two classes, “hand-painted" and others Hand-painted pictures, no ■ matter how crude, are looked upon as being of much greater value than prints. Of the latter, the old-fashioned steel engraving is held in some veneration, but the usual picture is the tradesman’s almanac that seemed “worth a frame." Even those who buy pictures look upon them as “garniture and household stuff.” A picture often encountered is a black-and-white depicting two horses frightened by lightning. “The Monarch of the Glen ” and “ Highland Cattle,” “ Our Boy,” “ Our Girl,” and “Wedded" were also noted.

In these surroundings the family has its being:

In [the farmer’s] kitchen the children were doing their homework, the mother sewing, the older boys and girls talking of their church clubs. The kitchen was too small to admit the representatives of so many diverse groups without reducing conversation and thinking to the least common denominator. What the people lack is a vital, personal, satisfying use of leisure. The art of conversation is a lost art even among the better-educated. “ What do people talk about? ” was asked of everyone interviewed. “About other people: about hard times; about the shortage of money: about the dry season.” These were the answers received. “But don’t people ever talk about things, about problems of world interest? ” “ No. If there is anything startling in the paper, of course we talk about it.”

But the people are not unsociable: Littledene loves meetings. It is the proud boast of the really important people that there is “always something on.” Meetings are carried on with parliamentary precision. with much proposing and seconding, with much rising to order. It is a point of honour to attend meetings. There is a tendency for the more enlightened youth of the place to be absorbed, and robbed of Ineir leisure, by a monstrous overorganisation. The young are advised to be up and doing, to get on committees, to belong to things. The undifferentiated community of the country districts demands that everyone shall be interested in everything. ... A successful dance in the Town Hal] will bring in 300 people—nearly half the dancing population of an area of 200 square miles. . . . Meetings of this kind are classified into balls, dances, socials, social evenings. . . A week never passes in the winter without one or more of these func-

tions. These excerpts, taken almost at random from Mr Somerset’s detailed study of “Littledene,” add up, when extended with similarly-informed observations upon the morality, the history the economic order, the education, and the standard of intelligence of the community, to’ a very interesting and surprisingly recognisable picture of a New Zealand country district. “ Littledene ” is in North Canterbury (and the curious may seek amusement in discovering its identity), but almost all its main characteristics are duplicated in a thousand rural communities in New Zealand, in which small farming is the preoccupation of the scattered population. The book makes two very considerable appeals to the mind of the New Zealand reader, the first diversional, the second social. There is entertainment and satisfaction to be had in learning from its pages how the average small farmer and his family live, and in recognising the basic truth in ones casual observations. But the greater value of the work is much more deep-seaterl. An examination of the microcosm of. the New Zealand country district reveals much that is disturbing, and a good deal that could be put right by social organisation. Mr Somerset provides some generalisations. less than adequately supported, which hold the attention. He concludes, for example, that the producers of the raw materials share little in the finished product—wool is sold, but blankets in the farmhouse are wearing out. He contends that the mortgage system has created so large an ab-sentee-partnership in the business of farming that “it is probable that the farm population of Littledene is struggling to support from its earnings a city population of equal size.” He shows that the capacity of the small farmer to till his land, and make it productive, is much greater than his ability to conduct it on foresighted commercial lines. While there are many hard-headed farmers, there are many who are extraordinarily ignorant and gullible. And his book demonstrates, in a practical way. that many old cliches concerning the lack of understanding between town and country. the comparative hardships and restricted interests of farm life, and the general far from elevated standards of education and cultural awareness in the rural areas, still make good sense. This is bad sense and bad reading for any who casually dismiss these matters from consideration with a reference to the manner in which radio and the motor car have levelled the barriers of isolation in the country districts. The book is an eloquent spokes-