Mr Bracken's Lecture.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 6037, 20 September 1887, Page 3

Mr Bracken's Lecture.

Those who heard Mr Brackea'3 lecture on " Our Queen and Country" last night at the Oddfellows' Hall — and a goodly number of people were there— enjoyed an intellectual treat. Those who etui not— and they were too numerous — missed an evening's enjoyment of a "most entertaining and instructive nature. Mr Bracken, as the' warm reception accorded to him showed, is appreciated in Christchurch aB lecturer as well as poet and politician, and last evening he deepened the favourable impression made in days gone by. His subject, albeit one with which all loyal , subjects of Her Majesty, especially if they be good newspaper readers, are tolerably familiar in this Jubilee Year, was handled in such a manner as to amuse, interest, and even excite an audience not at first inclined to be dernqnatrafcive. Of its literary merit there is no occasion to speak, further than to cay that it was worthy of the lecturer's reputation. To report the discourse would be obviouely out of place, especially as Mr Bracken favoured the public with an admirable synopsis in "his announcements of the lecture. Suffice it to say that it was a caief ully prepared epitome of the history of the British people from the day, 50 years ago, when the Sailor King died in his palace at Windsor. An epitome it was, but not of the dry-as-dust order. The speaker's language— always impressive, frequently humorous, as often .pathetic, and not seldom eloquent — kept his audience's attention from first to last. The very apt ■ quotations with which the lecture was interspersed afforded Mr Bracken ample opportunity of displaying his pre-eminent ability as a reciter. "Barney M'Guire's account of the coronation " raised a ripple of laughter and applause, and put the audience in the most genial of humours. The bitter sarcasm, born of suffering, which marks the verses of Ernest Jones, the Chartist, " We're not too low the grain to grow, but too low the bread to eat," was expressed not only with the skill of an artist, but with the deep feeling of a man who sympathises with the unfortunates whose woes are set forth in the rugged lines. For dramatic power the speaker's recitation of the " Charge of the Light Brigade " verses, as immortal as the glory_ of those they celebrate, would be hard indeed to excel. In response to an enthusiastic encore he gave in style equally admirable " Barbara Frietehie," Whittier's splendid description of an incident which never happened. The recitations were not the only things in the lecture which drew hearty applause. The lecturer's sentiments, full of both loyalty and liberalism, were received with warm approbation. His reference to Mr Gladstone as the foremost among the political giants who have arisen in Her Majesty's reign, his testimony to the worth of Wellington, Daniel O'Conuell, and many another great man, were received with warm approval, as was his declaration that were the Irish people treated in the spirit of confidence and goodwill they would become the most peaceful and contented of Her Majesty's subjects. Aswas to be expected, a large number of Mr Bracken's countrymen were among his auditors, and his references to the Irish question called forth their enthusiastic applause. One son of Erin was almost boisterous in his manifestations, particularly at the fine recitation of the spirit-stirring "Who Feara to Speak of '98," a poem written, not by a Celt, but by a Protestant of Anglo-Saxon blood. Mr Bracken's fervent wißhes for the progress and prosperity of Her Majesty's Empire, and specially those portions of it which have grown up in her reign under the' Southern Cross, evidently found a responsive chord in the hearts of his audience, and the grand words of the poet, " Ring out the old, ring in the new," finely recited, closed the lecture, amid an enthusiastic round., of applause.