MORE OF CHRISTCHURCH.

Otago Witness, Issue 2719, 25 April 1906, Page 82

MORE OF CHRISTCHURCH.

I ' Bz T: P.

•- One Frank Morton— to -whom be benedictine and -good Australian port, as much 'as: his sour desires— -writes,-. on, < page '81. of ,the Witness, for- "March. 2£ concerning -CHmtchurcb. .The "firstf eenten.ee of ,his disarm^ criticism fey/ explaining thesame to be .the, product of ' a four-days' visit -merely/;;, so all., the; occasion: gives is ; <the.-- opportunity of^brief-'.mofaiisihg -oh the of ""a rapid ..first impressiop."- Let ■so-, much. W permitted' as part of a gratefuL duty owed to' the bonny town of f Dunedin, whose fair, name Mr Morton has nojfc" iipHelcL' with all" the. chivalry he might -have employed. ' , t • For' the salse of argument' bo it admitted that "there is, to, start' with, the- weather." Aftec a- spring; and ; summer of ■ rain and' tears and- sunspots; ««p deserted' swimming and* swampy cricket pitches, there came to Cliristcfiurch two weeks of St. •Martin's summer, very- sweet on- the tussoclcs of the Cashmere Hills, four miles away ; but less> enjoyable- where the* nagging consumptive winds, far different from the healthy gales- of Wellington, raise thedust of seven Saharas not* half an hour after the big patent water-carts and the long watering-cars of the- Tramway Board have made the streets an unlovely chain of puddles. (It is in fine weather in Christchurch that a man fits mudguards to his bicycle). It is not safe to say more about the weather. The city's one redeeming, feature is the river ; but did- Mr Morton never note the jam-tins under every city bridge, the strident smell, o> the "duplex" sewers, pride of the Drainage Boaijd., that pour into the lower reaches a mingled flood of storm ; water- t and — other matters? Did he never I step, . as he thought, -out of the boat on • "the bank, and sink to his knees in ,Avon./ ( mud, on" account of jwhose cdour he was made to sit behind the stern-thwart with ' his legs overboard all the \ray home? Truly, we have heard that love 'is blind .- ' it would also .seem that his olfactory nerves are- atrophied. ' Chrisfcchurc-h is best seen, like Melroge, 'in the fair moonlight — on a warm Saturday evening, from the Cashmere Hills, when there is a half-moon not to dim the shop-lights, and the street lamps are not turned out. Then, indeed, 6he lies beautifully, like a jewel, between the breasts of the great plain, or a magnified bank of glow-worms shining before bad weathev — the streets outlined with twinkling fire, and the lit trams running to and fro like the glow-worms on root fibres. But all this is as nothing to Dunedin at a similar time, seen, not far off, but from the brow that nestles close above it, v/ith water reflections, and hill lights beyond, the Jate j express swinging from the north — and a Dunedin lassie forbye. I Which last detail points to the fact that towns, after all. are more or lass alike : it is their inhabitants that give character lo them. Partly the town makes the people, but largely the people make the town. To exemplify — office boys are rarse ayes anywhere, but in Chrislehurcb ; rariores : one is srettmir to use office .airle. i The reason, put logically,, 5s this : Christ- ; church is flat ; nine men- out of every ten therefore suffer from liver complaints and from superinduced ba<3 temper. In busi- '■ ness firms the accumulated spleen breaks i on the head of the office boy. till the office < boy gonericalJv refuses to exist. An office « gh'l can hardly be trented in the same way, n *mrl therefore willinplv takes his place, i iatdixuz as ggcure as a blight -proof potato;. 1

and- another walk in- lffe is labelled "No thoroughfare--' to the despised seXy And whafr flatness does- not bring- abotit, unhappy origins are- to^answer for. Christchurch is England with her lorgnettes up-; while Dunedin, or so it has seemed to me, is Glenlivet with- tlte cork drawn. Of course there are exceptions : the Christchurch sub-editor, 0 Morton, was a good sort? Naturally. It is only when they az - e promoted to the room next dc-or ana! the revolving chair that -the tastes develop. But Christchurch is chiefly concerned with, imitation of an adamantine middle-class English respsctability : the sales of Tennyson's poems must be immense. The idea of it leading an aesthetic revival is especially hopeless. This is that city where some yellow books, being discovered on the shelves of the Public Library, were immediately removed and decently buried near the Plague Hospital.'foy the governing body, which, being a corporation, has- no sou], but fills the gap with a highly-developed moral sense. The character of the newest buildings in the town, ther work- of popular arcliitects, is enough- to ruin Christchurch asstlietically for the". next. 'hundred years. Intellectually, compare the quality of the booksellers'- stocks in- Christshurch and Bunedin, or - read through together the Weekly- Press Shd the* .Witness — this:, 'last' comparison- is: instructive, and- cute;" both" ways. - Even that one cours& .of' rational conduct' uponv-jvehich GhristcKurclife.prkled = herself- over alUfhe cities of New 'Zealand; is to,. be” pract3Ka^n6*;longe"ivr,"fr6int-:mid--wiriter next, tke\days are/short andfoggy and .the • nights arp: foggv^hnd 1 loiiii every hotel* will- close at* jLO' o r c\ock.> " Of" Gourse, fhei^^wiirstiU'-be 1 the-.Yiveiv.' ,:, , Finally, to "turn to the 6ubiect which' has been calling for the last dozen paragraphs, how can. Christchurch^-6r anywhere else for that matter — be compared' ■with Dunetlin- while there remain the Dnnedin lassies? It- woucd: be indiscreet here to discuse Christchurch girls. They ara as charming as any ordinary giiT can he ; they do their best- io fulfil their destiny of being a deligHt uoon the- earth. Andequally is it impossible, /within the bounds of human speech, to describee the Dunedin girls. Only,^ as the old-poet would nave said had. he the chance: 'Twixt Rome and Cadiz many a maid is,- j II ny a bon> bsc qu& d' — piago!" j