DUNEDIN D.L.F. LITERARY AND DEBATING CLUB.

Otago Witness, Issue 2840, 19 August 1908, Page 88

DUNEDIN D.L.F. LITERARY AND DEBATING CLUB.

i Motto: "Union is Strength." The usual weekly meeting of the abov« club was held on Tuesday evening (Angus* 11), when Indian Chief presided over a meeting of 12 members, including Bluette, Corporal 111, Juanita, and Ivanhoe, to whom th© usual cordial- welcome was extended. An apology was received from A Mother's Lass, expressing her regret at not being able to attend on account of a very severe cold from which she was suffering. Kippiehoe offered apologies for A. W. D. F., who was also ivaable to be present on account of her aunt's death. The olub expressed its sympathy towards A. W. D. F. in 'her bereavement. The evening was a special subject on©, the subject bedng, '"How Should 1 We Celebrate Empire Day?" The papers that were contributed contained excellent ideas, and were listened to in oat attentively. Tli-e following are brief extracts: — "Seeing that Empire Day 'is the day to commemorate the reign of our late Queen Victoria, I would- make it one of the great days of the year. She was m. good and great Queen, and iher memory ought never to be allowed to die out. Tihe 'rising generation should be given the privilege of knowing what a woman can do. and, wliat a glorious life she can lead even, as a queen. I should! spare neither time nor money on this object, and would employ a man well known as anorganiser to arrange and cany out tableaux repres&mtiag the most interesting events in our lat^ Queen's r«dgn. I would, however, make it a children's day, as they represent the rising generation. I would have pictures, figures, statues, or what you will, of grea* heroes, with a brief outline of their lives under each placed all through the city. Tb^ children would gather at these certain spots and salute these statues. This would, or course, be in the morning. In the afternoon I would have tableaux arranged on af very large scale. All the boys would be dressed up in the fashion then prevailing! to represent Lord Nelson-, Wellington, andl so forth. The girls would also take part. One girl would represent Florence Nightingale, another Lady Burdett-Coutts, etc. Miniature battles would be fought represent-/ ing the battle of Waterloo, and so on; and! Florence Nigh ting a-le, with the Crimean soldiers, attending the wounded and dying. Of course, all -the events that Etppenedl during Queen Victoria's Teign could not be carried out in one day; so year after year the programme might be varied. This I consider would be a very enthusiastic way of celebrating Empire Day." — Areta. j "My ide* is that Empire Day should be observed as a close (holiday, so as to give th» whole of the com-munity a chance of taking part in th© celebrations. I would suggest that tb« day ba passed in the following manner: — In the morning a- parade of aH navals, volunteers, cadets, etc.. should be held and speeches delivered from the Queen's statue, and at all public -chooJs. after which the flag be saluted and the monument raised in memory of our la<<; Queen be decorated •with flowers. In the afternoon military sporte or some other amusement should be held. Then in the evening a dinner might bs given for the poor, «nd a parade in the main, streets. So tve could pass *, pleasant day, both old and young rich and poor." — Averal. "Tke 24th of May. now known as Emrpira Day, is the anniversary of the birth of our lat« Qu,sen Victoria. The whole of the. British Empire knows the worth of this Queen's reign, and knows that England never prospered so much under the supervision ol any sovereign -as under that of Queen Victoria. The most brilliant battles were foughi and won during her xe-ign. On Empire Day

i tHnk iiat all places of business etotild Jba closed, »nd tfee wfec-1* day gfven to ©elebraiaomsof ToyftHy in Toemmj of our 3ate Queen. All public school scholars ought to assemble to salute the flag. Some *or.t of entertainment ought to be held afterwards, so ■as it© children will enter witih zest into their history lessons."— A, W. D. F. "The celebration of Empire; Day keeps green in the memory o£ the school, children the good deeds and actions done during Queen Victoria's reign. All the children should! assemble at the different schools to salute the flag, etc. Fromi all pjublio and private poles flags -should be "flown-. and, from all the steamers in h-arbour likewise. Empire Day ougUf throughout the British Empire to be observed as a close holiday.?' — Indian Chief. "T&« anniversary of our late Queen Vio>to!ria'g birthday has always been observed in honour of her noble life. Her reign was in. many ways a reoord one. It is onjy fitting that we should observe Empire Day as $| close holiday, and help to keep her memory green." — Hooliban. [The remainder of Hoalibaa/s paper Is on th-e same lines of those already extracted from, so it is needless to publish any more.] "I consider that as a matter of sentiment -alone we should keep Empire Day, Why? Because it -would tend to keep green the memory of Queen Vic«B.a. under whose gracious reign England progressed leaps and bounds. "We all remember the ■well-known distich learned in our school days: "Twenty-fourth of May,. Queen's Birthday!" Few of we in tihose days but looked forwasrd with eagerness to that holiday: what though it did come in winter? The Queen -could not help that, and besides, we could' look forward" to the glorious fun of snowballing, making snow men,, etc Now let its consider- the beat means- of celebrating lEmpire Day. At present the echool clul- . .djren all assemble to «aJute the flag, and li'pten to pt>eedies from their teachers. I *m of opinion that this flag-saluting and speeehifyiag is a mistake. What do the youngsters say to themselves about the day? r They consider that the holiday is null and vpid. and that this speechifying is all nonsense. Why should the children not all get a trip in the railways from one school to another and salute a flag they "have never Been before? Their own flag tihey see unfurled* on ©very occasion, great or small ; but if & r«al>w«y -trip -were craunted some Dunedim wlioolb to, say, Milton, or vice versa, «nd two or three country schools to each Dunedjn school, tfoen the diay would be worth nemembering. The speechifying would be done by »tr*ngpeTß, tva.3 the children could spend fcbe . rest of the clay «s «ua ordinary picnic, and. thoroughly enjoy themselves. I •m not aware whefcner such a echetne would flic feasible, but it i» my opinion of how Umpire Day should be spent by the school children. As for the elders, conditions can remain %b they are. — Harry. This is the conclusion of the papers. The c(uestion box was brought forward to fill in the remaining few minutes. The questions gave rise <bo arguments between the members, and Cycle, being tihe leader had a few happy anoments "before h* retired after the meeting. On the whole a most enjoyable evening ■was spent. In next week's debate, "Country Zc£e v. Town Hf«i" Indian Chief leads for the former and Kippiehoe for the latter. In the absence of A Mother's Lass the undereigned ©aimed out the duties of secretary for the evening. KIPPIEHOE, Acting Secretary. SO THE MEMBEBS OF THE DUNEDIN . D.L.F. UTERAHy AND DEBATING ' CLUB. "Dear OamTCutes,— l a.m eorry that my letter cf this week will not reach Dunodin in time for Tuesday, July 28, but. perhaps, as Mr Toots, in " Dombey and Son," was in the habit of saying, " it's of no consequence," «xl-&i I dtoresay it will suffer no injury by etanding ov«r until the following week. You ccc, cihums, we a<ne only enabled to comxnunioate with Dannevirke omce a week, and -as that, of aIQ days, is Sunday, you will ■understand the difficulties we some-wines experience with regard to the posting of letters. We are in rather an isolated siftuarfaon> just such a place as would suit Pateireon's ""Come By Chlance." "And there isn't any hurry, nor the slightest csuu-se for worry, "When the telegraph don't reach us, nor the railways run to town, And one's lettens and exchanges com*» by chance across th/e ranges, When, a wiry young Australian leads a packhorse once a week, And the. good news girows by keeping, and we're .spared the pain of wespmc » Over bad news -when the mailman drops the letters in the creek." But I promised to tell you something about IMJa-tamau iand our life there. We were there for a little over six weeks, and we lived in «. tent in the bush. We- were foirf/unate in eecuiing a gcod site for our camp, <uid we !b*d very comtfiortable quarters there. I wish you could have seen the camp tins vre lad. -Our position there might be d&acnbed 3>y quoting a verse, from Whittier's poem, " *" The Lumbermen " : — *' Make ■we here our camp at winter, and through sleet and enow Bushy knot and pine- tree splinter on our hearths shall glow. Here with mirth to lighten duty we shall lack alone TToman'B smile and girlhood's beauty, childhood's lisping tone." ~We were forming" a road through the bush, •nd opening up sele-otioas reoently acquired by settLeirs. When it was too wet to work we used to put on huge fires fund re«d. "We bad th» works of Burns, Scott, Tennyson, end Milton in the oanrp, so we had no 'lack of reading material Amongst all the men with vs — and a-t one time there weare 80 — we only found one who had read widely. The greia.t majority of the men thought it strange that we, who were just commonplace workmen, should prefer reading to oaird playing, and I think, on this account, we lowered ourselves in their estimation. However, that didn't trouble us in the slightest. Only the other day one of the man here gave it as his opinion that Shakespeare was a confirmed lunatic, and he wouldn't give much for Che roentaA condition of a man iviho could read his works. It is annoying to hear a man talk lake that, but after all it is amusing. Our world is a. wid/©r one than theirs, and we can afford to laugh at thorn. There is « beautiful little river called the Hongs tawainui, which flows amongst the nil's about two miles from where w© ware oampsd at Ma-tama-u. Twaoe we visited it — once on a Sunday afternoon, and subsequently on a Sunday morning. Upon the latter occasion the day was beautifully fine. We left the camp about 10 a.m., and followed tbe railway line until we- came to the bridge which spans the little river, and then wo descended into the deep glen or ravine though which the etTeam flows. On our first visit we took the left bank and proceeded up stream. TMe time we look the opposite bank, and followed tße river down-wards. The scene was of rorpju&sing beauty. The river, o^ar as crystal, flowed rapidly" between banks covered with thick native bush. Sometimes A was shallow ant 3 broad, anon deep and

parrow; eome-tinies pelting and splashing over a stony bottom, again gliding quietly but swiftly along- a smooth bed. We saw a great njany trput. Sometimes itihey lay parfeotly still and quiet umd&r the bank, each fish with iif» head to the current. Sometdineß, alarmed at the noise of our approachiiig footstep 3, they would dlart with the velocity of lightning from beneath the bank, ana conceal themselves in tlbe deep waiter in the middle of the river. In the fishing season this little riv«r with the big name must be sal anglers' pamddse, asnd I think I should enjoy nothing more than to pitch my tent upon its baaiks and spend a, summer week there.

There axe a. number of birds here that I do njfrt remember seeing- in Ofcago. The minah, a.t one *im-e to be found about Dranedin, but now extinct there, abounds here. Quails «.nd pheasants are also plentiful here, The pretty little yellowh&miner. at one >oimo !o be found in the gorse hedges at Oorstorphine, above Oayersbiam, but now geme from theire, is also to be found up here. Banitails pare very nTan«roTi«, but they sore all of thet pied species, the black ones being conspicuous by their absence. Tomtits are plentiful. Occasionally we see a kingfisher', and to-day, while we were having dinner, a 'm-orepork came out of the bush near us. One day recently I unearthed a large green frog. The creature had evidently embedded itself in the earth, to sleep until the warm weather comes again. Believe me, dear comrades, yours sincerely,

BLACK WATCH.