DINNER WITHOUT GRACE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17218, 8 December 1923, Page 8

DINNER WITHOUT GRACE.

SURPRISES A SCOTSMAN. “ Well/’ said a -horrified" Scotsman, “ that is the first time 1 have attended a public banquet where grace has not been said!” lie was at the dinner given to the delegates to the recent Chamber of Commerce Conference, in Auckland, and it was his first experience of the kind in rhia country, says the Auckland “ Star-” He went on to explain that in the Old Country “ a blessing was always asked ” before the guests sat down to dinner. As a rule a minister was asked to say the grace, but when none was present then the duty fell .on the chairman. But parson or no parson, the duty was never omitted, and to one brought up in that practice the New Zealand custom of going straight ahead with the good tilings on the board almost savoured of paganism. When you come to think of it, there would be something of a sensation at any public gathering (not connected with a church) when; food is consumed if the chairman did get up and invoke a blessing. Many people have never heard a grace. “ For what we are about to receive, make us truly thankful. ” “ Bless these Thy mercies to our use. and us to Thy service.” And so they vary even down to the brief—almost irreverent in its brevity—- “ Thank God. amen.” An uncommon one is “ Supply the wants of others, O Lord, and give us thankful hearts,” and that was the grace of a Unitarian. WHERE IT STILL EXISTS. Most of us remember the long grace that the parson used to say at the tea-table of the annual Sunday school feast—“ swarry ” it used to be called in those days. - And church and Sunday school gatherings are now about the only instances where the once general practice of grace before meat is kept up. But in spite of that there are many children who do not know what grace is, oven in this public mannw. for there are hundreds of them that Vievet see the inside of either a church or a Sunday schoolThe late Bishop Neligan, who used to live in Auckland, raised a storm of indignation when, during some remarks he mode in London, he spoke abofit the “ pagan ” tendencies he found in the coloqy. He probably overstated the. case, but it must be admitted that to anyone brought up in the old-fashioned ideas of decorum and reverence, some of our off-hand ways must be rather surprising at tin es. Many of us will, no doubt, be astonished to hear of the Scotsman’s paihed surprise at the Chamber of Commerce dinner. We have got so used to graceless meals that some people are quite embarrassed on those rare occasions when they sit down to a meal where gra#e is saic!-

“ IN THE OLD PEOPLE’S TIME.” Just out of curiosity an Auckland ‘‘Star” reporter asked five people at random whether they said grace in their households. After a rather Scotch way of answering one question by asking another, and putting the same query to the questioner, they all confessed that either grace never had been said, or that it had dropped into disuse “We used to say it in the old people’s time at our place,” said ono man, “but I don’t think you will find many young pc-cplo saying grace nowadays.” One of the quintet said grace was still said at his grantfather’s table, and be knew *'f one other instance, but that was all that he could call to n.ird in ell his long list of acquaintances. Another man suggested that one reader why the saying of grace was falling into desuetude was the growing habit of taking meals in hotels, restaurants, and other eating houses. Grace was never said openly in such places, and the saiiie lack had gradually crept in at home. Whatever the reason, tjie fact that we are “far from grace ” is undmihird. but it is only when one meet*: a Scotsman or some other newcomer of the kind, brought up in different, surroundings, that we realise that some'of the most firmlyrooted habits of the house of our youth are shorn ns? away.