HOW WE LIVE IN SUBURBAN CHRISTCHURCH.

Otago Witness, Issue 2059, 10 August 1893, Page 40

HOW WE LIVE IN SUBURBAN CHRISTCHURCH.

Thuß idly busy rolls their world away. You know Ohristchurch by report well enough, so even do our friends and relatives inhabiting the other side of the globe. At the first afternoon tea after your arrival, you know exactly what to say when the hostess asks what you think of Cbristchurch. It is " so English," it is clerical, it is collegiate, it is our " Cathedral City." It is— though thesß facts are not so often commented upon — a town of mud and drizzle and frost and fog, but .also of divine nor'-west days, coming heedlessly alike in the middle of summer or of winter— soft, and yet splendid with colour and light and balm. As for its being English, there can be little doubt about that, since a characteristic description or picture of some rural English village could be easily passed off as a representation of Christchurch, with but one great difference— that here all things are new and fresh. Wonderful after all— though an often repeated wonder— that the idea of a small band of men some half a century ago could take such form and visible shape— a triumph of mind over matter. • They meant to have an English town, these few pioneers, though in th&t wilderness of sandhills and bogs the odds might seem tremendously against them. But now here stands that realised idea. The sandhills have vanished, and in their place are public buildings and streets where thousands congregate. Where the flax and- the fern grew by the creeks there are toy villas and trim gardens, and slopes oE smooth clipped grass along the side of river and rivulet where the willows overarch the winding avenues of water. Scarcely a vestige is left of that other scene which still survives in the memory of older settlers a flax bush left to grace a modern garden, or a hardy fern springing up in some neglected spot, that is all that is left of nature. In digging you may find sand, or the debris of old roots and fibres of a former vegetation, and perhaps pause a little listening to the notes of blackbird or finch in the poplars and sycamores, arid even while you watch the wind making the daffodils nod their heads and the Isaowflakes waver and droop, your mind may go baok to some 20 or 30 years ago, when the wild swan rose from its nest in the coarse grasses, and the reeds and the spring breesse bent only the feathery plumes of the toi-toi. Wei', all the wild ways of nature are tamed now. If there is anything we do pride ourselves on, it is our culture. We are the most civilised people in Australasia— the mo3t learned, the most literary, the moat superfine. If ws ha<i only lived half a century ago, I should have added the most "elegant" and ••genteel;"ibut that we are in every way the reverse of old-fashioned. We get the latest books from Home; we adopt the latest fashions in dress and dining —that is, within quite a short period after they have become obsolete in England. Of course Ido not refer to the town— a vulgar place to live ir>, and only tolerable when one drives down in the afternoon for shopping, or at night to theatre or concert, where we crowd to hear the latest antiquated stars who give us the benefit of their failing renown. From this latter performance we disperse to our suburban homes well pleased at the assuiance that our own local artißts are incomparably better. Except that troublesome and conceited section who have " been to Europe," we icc\ine to think that we are rather in advance of England ; though gracefully waiving our superiority, we submit to study its books. It is a quiet and a simple life that wo live here, each in the seclusion of our gardens and their tree- 0 , retired spots where a dreamer might Under the shade of melancholy boughs Lose and neglect the creeping hours of time— only that so few polonials ever are dreamers. Jn fact this Httle world is full of active interests. Suburban ladies, in spite, or perhaps in consequence, of the laments over the deflay of domestic arts, are noted housekeepers—except, indeed, tbevery fashionable. Autumn especially finds them busy with the storing o! fruit and making of picklea and,

| preserves and sauces, for most of the pretty cottages and villas have ample ground around them for orchards of apple and plum (blackI birds are fast making cherries a dream) and for herbs and beds of asparagus, to say nothing of lawns and gardens of spring bulbs, and roses for the summer and chrysanthemums for autumn — for suburban folk are great gardeners, as even a stranger might observe when the coach passengers usher in spring with their bouquets of the earliest snowdrops, and the pleasant appearance of primrose bariks and rarest single daffodils. Here in hothouse and greenhouse are the homes of many of the prize plants of our season's flower shows. ! We are proud, too, of our poultry— our Wyandottes ani well-flavoured Plymouth Rocks, our Andalusians, and our graceful Leghorns (primebirds for laying), our Aylesbury and Rouen ducks. Horses, of course, are the fancy of only the richest. Most, indeed, keep some sort of horse, but he is more for use than for ornament, and his chief " point " is the placidity of his temper. ' Some of us even indulge in a cow ; so we have many rural interests. But we are a social, even more than a domestic, community. However, it must be confessed there is a lack of colonial freedom and cordiality in Christchurch society. Owing to the distances between house and house, even friends rarely meet except by special invitation or at definite timea. Whether it be this, or whether the fog and the flatness affect our temperament, or whether the cause be solely our imitation of English manners — for some reason or other we are disposed to substitute for warmth a certain chilly sweetness and sedate aloofness. Social distinctions are kept up more artificially in Christchuroh than in any other New Zealand town. What elements really do constitute our aristocracy "hard is it to say, harder to hit." As Andrew Lang remarks of American distinctions, no one but a native could appreciate them. Class and clique prevail. Still among ourselves we are incessantly visiting. We like to do thinga in first-claes style — to have the finest of china and the richest of cream on Sunday afternoons ; to give the most perfect of little dinners and suppers. Charitable duties we delegate to a special class. As a community we do not come into contact with the poor. Our neighbours are of three classes — the wealthy owners of " family mansions," the residents oE> villas (mostly the tamilies of professionals, business men, or retired tradespeople), and the small dairy farmers and gardeners; and the last class are as free from actual poverty as the first. Do not suppose we are frivolous, though we are so fond of tennis and progressive euchre parties. We are an intellectual people, and chatter over Bjornsen's latest novels, Socialism, hydropathy, hypnotism, dress reform, and the latest move of our adorable bishop. We have home-reading clubs for the afternoon, and exclaim over geological specimens with well-bred rapture. At night we have all manner of debating societies, philosophical institutes, dialectics, scientific associations, and so on. Then the town people give us plenty to talk over by their latest craze. Fashionable, or even respectable, Christchurch is Anglican and conservative; but there is a very large class who perhaps by reaction are wildly radical with the reakless radicalism of students, or the (theoretically) "oppressed" working class. So it happens that the best soil for the latest extravagance is this very conservative city, as you may judge from the fallen idol Sullivan and the dubious prophet Worthing ton, who could not take root elsewhere. Do not imagine that subur* ban Ohristchurch soils itself this way. Only these topics afford gently stimulating conversation. . E. S.G.