LAND OF ILLUSIONS.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXIII, 18 December 1925, Page 10

LAND OF ILLUSIONS.

■: AUSTRALIA’S TOP-HEAVY ■L ■ CITIES - tributes to men ; . OUTBACK'.-v candid summary of his Australian is published in London by New Zealand and the Comniondescribes. Australia" as a ‘‘land illusions” and “a, f fool’s paradise,” ; \dfeolafes thhre is a splendid future mert who will go out back and worlo WAli thee. Socialist . wildcat schemes,” ■Pie': says,- (ichhfiet kill Australia.” Bv . Not sirice; Ehstei- Fraser’s visit have f Australia >’ and Australians been so pungently criticised as in Sir Percival */. -Phillips’s impressions in his recent tour idawith the Empire Press de’egation, aid which arc appearing in :ho Daily Mail j.sdtpclcr the heading, “A Land ,of JlhistJi ..Declaring that Do is aware that "the hfiifeiWcfest memories Australians retain, -a-jfvvf "visitors who come to lopk and g-listen and depart and-write things not yDfifcfef/f ;; . ’

altogether nice,” Sir Percival proceeds! to say: “Australians clgim .the solo proprietary rights irr ,thfe-.:. familiar phfase, ‘God’s Own Country” 'All vehemently attest Australia as tl’A soundest | and- most prosperous nation in the worjd; and acclaim it as the working marl's paradise. . " ->. PBerhaps nowhere is' -the worker so carefully guarded against over- exertfan, qiy so tenderly l shielded from his '&npl oyer’s brutal . exactions’, but there are flan's in the ’pifrtule pf Australia’s perfect , happiness' wlUcli -"tho , ardent native’ will not see:' Moreover, "lie reserlts any. other person "seeing them. r "A POOL’S, PAR.ADISE.’ • “A workman’s paradise .'.certainly exists, but it is a fool’s .paradise, Even Socialist theorists’ extreme -experiments and Labour officialdom's costlv bribes to rank and file cannot altogether ruin the country. It" isiso blessed bv Nature , that .prosperity has persisted, despite the heavy odds. Socialism seems to be blandly impervious to the fact that Australia’s increased prosperity is founded on tho shifting Sands of borrowed money. Sir Percival pays glowing tributes to the keen, practical, gat-d-working men in the Hackblocks; who, by their thrift and industry, are overcoming the wilderness." He describes Sydney and Melbourne ns over-grown, top-heavy cities, with pleasure-loving, workshV; .populations, subservient to the Labour machine,

which is relying for its “power on securing supporters by mcreasing the pay for decreasing work. SYDNEY’S RULING PASS LON "Australians,” lie continues, "are obsessed by a love of .sjiiort. In Sydney sport seems to be the ruling passiorj". In everyday jifo there is an atmosphere of luxury and devil-may-care gaiety, which observant- strangers find somewhat cloying. Hospitality is a pleasant virtue, earned almost to extremes. The< tendency to bard drinking and hard : playing impresses the -.tranger more than Abe love of hard work. "Sydney . amazes by its ability to keep active for 20 hours out of the 24, and then begin a fresh, round of the" clock with spirits undimmed by a night of feverish activity. It is a. city where life is hwift, strenuous, and exorbitantly expensive, and where extravagance rules. "OUR PRIDE AND CURSE.” "Light-heartedly -Australia plays in the sunshine, .seeuro in the belief that this is the best-.of all possible worlds, that it will" endiire for evermore, hut the more citizens already realise that a day of dis< illusionmeiit is inevitable. >. ■ “Yet there is a splendid future fpiy. men who will go into the wilderness and work. All tho Socialist wiltl-eat schemes cannot kill Australia, but to-: discover her one must go far from the cities, which simultaneously are her j pride and curse, and not slackness an/ hand-to-mouth prosperity taught therein-” "' "• ! : Sir Percival deplores the universal dislike of “Pommies,” Ayhiifth.-iie safys, is" partly, the 1 fittci'frScanJt, duel to .their"' oVor-pcafli their/ dis- 1 Approval oF new .eustdn'is.' This di«|j] pas . iiig' method-' soon •"greatis, h hostile atmosphere, • because the Australian j s fiercely proud of ovei'ythiijg Ati“4ralian and as intolerant of criticism ,' as 0 f opposition to his own way of doing things. j