After Dinner Gossip AND Echoes of Week

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXV, Issue 14, 7 October 1905, Page 17

After Dinner Gossip AND Echoes of Week

The Cause of the Orphan. The cause of the orphans, rendered homeless by the disastrous lire which recently destroyed the buildings housing them at Parnell, Auckland, is one which will, or should, appeal strongly to a far larger circle than can in the nature of things be reached by the advertisements soliciting help in the local dailies. The privilege', and indeed the duty, of assisting such a cause as this is not confined to any particular quarter of the colony, and the fact that the institution, which has suffered swell grievous less, is -situated in the Northern capital, frees no one who can make even the smallest sacrifice from the moral obligation of so doing. There are. in our language, several proverbs or sayings, which, while they contain truth and wisdom are often used to cover a vast amount of meanness, or even worse. As the writer has remarked before in this column, more rascality has been apologised for under the cant phrase, “business is business,” than should people Tophet thrice over: and under the sister saying. “Charity tiegins at home,” thousands of persons who never have, and never would, place their hands in their pockets for their fellow creatures, have excused themselves for their meanness and lack of charity. The snjiport and the upbringing of children rendered orphans, and deprived of knowledge of parental love and affection, is a duty, on which it is not necessary to enlarge now, for it strikes at the very roots of humanity, and must appeal to the hearts and consciences of all who do not wilfully harden or stifle them. Il is all very well to say the State should look after them, but it is one of the greatest faults of our colonial life that we are altogether too prone to shuffle out of responsibilities placed on us all by the < rentor, and lightly place our burdens on the State. We shall, if we persist in never attempting to help ourselves and ■ ach other, soon become unable to stir hand or foot without bleat\ig for help from the Government. The pound for pound subsidy, given to almost every conceivable object nowadays, and asked for with the most amazing effrontery even more often than it is granted, serves a good purpose in many instances, but it Is altogether too much depended on to la- wholesome. Since. 1885 the Orphan Home, Parnell, has received no Government subsidy, and is dependent therefore <n past and present donations. Over eighty children are at present in what was the home, and to replace the destroyed buildings some £7OOO is required, and of this it is estimated some £5OOO must lie raised. It is with much pleasure “Tile Graphic” recommends the object to the generous sensibilities of its readers, wherever they may live. The children are, it must be explained, brought up in the faith of the Church of England; but it is desired to emphasize the point that no child has ever been refused on account of its parents’ form of religion, or want of religion, and upwards of 550 children have liecn eared for in the home, many of whom now hold good positions as citizens of New Zealand. 4? J? *s• Is Live Pigeon Shooting Cruel? The majority of our readers will, v it limit doubt. regard the query expressed in the above heading as superfluous, and one certainly believes and trusts that ninety-nine persons in the hundred in this colony would answer in the affirmative. The shooting of live pigeons is. in fact, so entirely discredited a sport —if one can use a noble word in such a, connection in the Old Country, where, mainly owing to the influence of the Queen, even ' the great pigeon-shooting tliib'lit Huringham lias entirely tabooed live birds, that one had not imagined there was a question to be answered.

But evidently this is still not the ease in Canterbury, for at its annual meeting last week the local society felt it incumbent on itself, in its annual report, to implore members to do their utmost to stamp out so degrading hnd cruel a sport. Moreover, in moving the adoption of the said report for the year, Sir John Hall, strange to say, deprecated any strong or immediate move in this direction, and expressed the opinion that “the society should be very careful anti not go further into the matter of pigeon-shooting until it was thoroughly well assured it would carry public opinion with it.” The above pronouncement, coming from so humane a man, and so excellent a friend of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, will assuredly- amaze all wiio have at heart, or even take an interest in, the work of this admirable society in various parts of the world. .Surely Sir John does not think there can be any question of the fact that live pigeon-shooting is unnecessary and cruel to the last degree. Assuredly he need have no qualms of going against public opinion. Public opinion has settled the matter long since by an overwhelming majority. When the example is set by so famous if pigeon-shooting club as Hurlingham, it is certainly not necessary to ask which way the wind blows in such an affair. It has been quite conclusively proved that with niodern improvements the inanimate pigeon provides infinitely better sport to shooting men. from the . fact that the mechanical contrivance can furnish forth an infinitely 7 greater variety of “shots” and so improve shooting far more than can the unfortunate live bird, which, if it escaped death at. the hands of the competitors, is <nre of being either blown to bits, or. worse still, mangled by' those congregated outsida the boundary. But that Sir John should be so behind the time in estimating the direction of publie opinion on live birdshooting in matches is less wonderful really- than his dictum that the society' should follow public opinion and not lead if. Surely this is not the spirit in which this, or any society, with line objects and ideals, should set out! Surely' in such affairs we must mould, not follow, public opinion. How many reforms would have been carried out in the world, how many evils ameliorated, if reformers had always waited to be sure of public opinion before moving? It is to be hoped this will be the opinion of the majority- of members of the Canterbury branch of the S.P.C.A., and that individually and collectively the effort to stamp out such pigeon-shooting as does exist in the province will not cease until the object has been fully accomplished. <• + •*• Lo, the Poor Maori. The aboriginal of this fair colony- is at the present moment a person of considerable interest to his pakeha neighbours. Some seek his welfare, his uplifting; some seek his wlienua momona —his “fat lands.” Without wishing to appear hard-hearted, one is compelled to confess that the second lot of seekers are likely to meet with the larger measure of success. It is sad, but horribly true, that where two races of the relative strength of European ami Maori come into contact the result is inevitable —the weaker goes to the wall, and in this instance the native race draws the blank. History is full of such instances, and the ending lias always been the same. The Maori is one of Nature’s noblemen, and one is loth to think of the time when his only' traces will be housed in our museums, or embalmed in such books as "Old New Zealand.” Nature is, however, stronger than sentiment, and the end must eome. Not for a moment let it be thought that one would suggest that this melancholy fact re-

lieves the pakeha of all responsibility for his dusky brothers* welfare. We have “opened up*’ (delightfully euphemistic phrase) most of his lauds, and now we are clamouring for the •‘unlocking” of the balance. “A tie! Kua mutu!” croons the ancient, sunning himself in front of the whare ruiianga. And well he might! What the pakeha has to do is to see that he allows nothing that will hasten on the effacement of the Maori. Attention has lately been drawn again to the evil influence of the tangi, and I really think this is an instance where we should step in and exercise a veto. In the old days the tangi was nothing more than a ceremonious “blow-out," and a sort of glorified picnic, but nowadays, in the altered conditions of life, a tangi very often means a debit ueb for all hands, and a very lengthened period of short commons, bordering on starvation, for the unfortunate hosts. Thc_\Yajpiro has. of course, added a most deplorable and degrading factor to the tangi. Strong drink always spells death to a native race, and our duty in keeping it out of the reach of the Maori can never be too much emphasised. Another very important matter is the mode of living adopted by the native of to-day. Aforetime grim necessity made him build his village on high commanding ground, where he could fortify himself in the event of an attack, but nowadays he haunts the low-lying, swampy ground, where, water is handy, and this, added to bad ventilation, explains the regrettable prevalence of pulmonary complaints. We hear a good deal about the higher education of the Maori, and brilliant examples are pointed out to show what a polish he can take. It is a chimera, gentle reader, and the sooner we realise that the kindest thing we can do is not to try and make a pakeha mind grow in a Maori body, but to adapt him to altered surroundings, the better it will be for both people. We have a big duty towards oi<r dark brother, and I think it begins in removing from his path pakeha temptations. and kindly but firmly hunting him out of his swamps on to higher ground. Don’t worry him over much with the white man’s learning it does not look well in a brown binding.