TEA ROOMS AND LIBRARY.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13979, 14 August 1909, Page 7

TEA ROOMS AND LIBRARY.

AN ANGRY PROTEST.

To the Editor of the "Timaru Herald."

Sir, —Judging by the way Mr Craigie ignores the wants of women and children, one would take him to be a disciple of Mahomet —or worse. Mahomet allowed women earthly comforts, though he denied them the right to share his heavenly paradise. It seems Mr Craigie is doing his best to deprive careworn mothers and their little children of the right to purchase a clip of tea on Caroline Bay on Sundays. It is a matter of indifference to the majority of the men who frequent Caroline Bay whether the tea-rooms are open or shut. It is the women nnd children of Timaru and suburbs who want the rooms open, and for that reason I ask the thousands of citizens who did not sign the petition to assert their rights and see that the tea-rooms be opened for the purchase of refresh--jnents on Sundays, that is, if they can legally do so. When parsons and lay-preacliers go into the country on Sundays for ttie purpose of preaching the Gospel they think nothing of breaking the Sabbath by accepting refreshments from generous housewives, and. yet these same men are doing their best to deprive those honsewives of the right to purchase a cup of tea on a Sunday should they visit the Bay. Should the first Sabbath-breaker —that glorious interpreter of the old land —visit earth today, TV'ell might He exclaim: •"-Ye hypocrites!" Turning to the so-called free library, here again Mr Craigie ignores .the wants of women. .Evidently in his/estimation they are not worth considering. Can any sane person expect the majority of women to take out- the books the library committee are going to till the shelves with. Just fancy a woman after the cares of a wearying day reading a book on science, or Scottish history, or a religious book telling about heaven and the way to enter it according to the parochial views of the writer. If ,Mr Craigie is not going' to cater for women, 1 would advise him to get instead of an assistant, an up-to-date lounge for the present- librarian, reclining on wbicli he ca'n doze away the weary hours. —1 am, etc.,

COUNTRV WOMAN. [We excise a paragraph foreign to the subject in hand. —Ed. T.H.J