People and Their Doings.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20361, 19 July 1934, Page 8

People and Their Doings .

Sydney Thompson Recalls Two of his Meetings with Terrick Williams Mr Bromley Impressed with West Coast Goldminers’ Pioneering Spirit : A Socialist at Court. % '

JN “ A Frenchman’s London,” the author, Mr Paul Morand, tells a good story on the authority of Mr 11. G. Wells. One day in his youth, Mr Wells said, he went to Victoria station to meet Mr Ramsay MacDonald. an active Socialist like himself, to accompany him to a public meeting. As they passed Buckingham Palace, Mr MacDonald looked up at the striking edifice before which the Guards were parading, and stated emphatically, “ All thus must go.” The years passed by, and “ the other day,” Mr Wells concluded philosophically, “ I was passing the Palace again; there was a reception; the guard presented arms to a gentleman arriving in Court dress; it was none other than Ramsay MacDonald.” 1? and fascination are often weaved around pioneering life with all its primitive makeshifts and drawbacks. This was emphasised a day or two ago when Mr W. Bromley, deputy-chairman of the Unemployment Board, said that he had been much impressed with the way the goldmining workers on the West Coast had emulated the old pioneers in making homes by cutting down trees and making comfortable huts for themselves and families. He had been entertained in one of these places and had an excellent tea where a sponge cake had been made in a camp oven, which had cooked it to perfection. There are degrees of pioneering, and pioneering in 1934 with its wireless and telephones is not the pioneering of the very early days or even forty or fifty years ago, for this is clearly shown in the account given last week of the death in Taranaki of a bush pioneer, Mr W. F. Ludlow', at the 2ge of nearly four score vears. <* JN ISSS Mr Ludlow r acquired a bush' section on the southern slopes of Mount Egmont, his nearest neighbour being three miles away. He had to carry all his be-

longings a long distance into his future home. His first night tfcere it poured with rain and his only shelter was two sheets of iron fixed tentwise. He soon built himself a wharc, and commenced to fell the bush after taking in three months’ supply of food. All that three'months he pegged away, living a lonely life, and never speaking to a soul the whole time, his only companion being a dog. Then he went into civilisation again to earn some more money to help him to increase his clearings. Others took up land in isolated places in the same district, and with characteristic grit, after years of toil, saw their holdings slowly transformed into fertile dairy farms, and by bartering their produce with the stores for provisions, hung on till the dairy factories started, when most of them reaped a good reward and many of them became independent. VJIXTY YEARS AGO (from the “Star” of July 19, 1874) The Domain.—A copy of the petition to the House of Representatives against the passing of the bill to amend the Canterbury Domain Act, so that a portion of the Domain shall be alienated for the purpose of a college site, was circulated in Kaiapoi yesterday, and numerously signed. Native Claims.—The New Zealand Times cf Frida\', July 17. says: A petition was presented to the House of Representatives by Mr Taiaroa last night, from Natives of the Middle Island, praying for the establishment of a Native Council in that island. A petition was also presented by the same lion member for a Maori in the Middle Island, in connection with claims arising out of the sale c f lands some years ago in that part of the colony. This petition probably relates to those extraordinary claims to which Maoris resident about Otago Heads have lately been putting forward.

VITHEN Mr Sydney Thompson was speaking to the Federation of University Women last night he mentioned a choice example of the American collector in Concarneau. He and Mr Terrick Williams, :ne of whose pictures of Concarneau hangs in the Robert McDougall Art Gallery, dined one evening with an American woman who owned tin mines somewhere in the States, but her great ambition at that moment was to take away from Brittany as many carved bits of wood and stone as she possibly could. She eventually left with three truck loads of wood and stone, and these contained many historic relics thus lost for ever to Brittany. The two artists, incidentally, met again later at the R. 0.1. when Terrick Williams was selecting paintings for the Chantrey Bequest which forms part of the Tate Gallery collection. SENSATION was caused in boxing circles in England when it was announced that Mr John Buckmaster, the son of Miss Gladys Cooper (Lady Pearson) intended to tight as a professional. Mr Buckmaster, who left Eton two years ago and is now 19, said that his decision was a gesture of protest against the “ unnecessarily strict ” rules of the Amateur Boxing Association. He has been coached by an ex-champion, Johnny Summers. Mr Buckmaster, a welter-weight, fights under his own name and gives all the proceeds to charity. “ A firm stand in this matter may have the effect of relaxing some of the superfluous rules of the A.8.A.,” he said. “ One tpf my principal objections is that no amateur is allowed to box for charity if he appears on the same pr; gramme as a professional. My mother has always taken a great interest in my boxing, and I am sure she will approve the step I have taken when she returns from America shortly.” Johnny Summers is convinced that John Buckmaster is a champion in the making.