SIR G. DUFFY AT BALLARAT.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume I, Issue 48, 28 March 1874, Page 11

SIR G. DUFFY AT BALLARAT.

Fkom Victorian papers to band, we learn that Sir Cliarle9 Gavan Duffy re-delivered his lecture on "Colonisation " recently at Ballarat. He had a very large and enthusiastic audience. Before leaving for Melbourne he was presented by a number of the citizens with a farewell address, and, in the course of his reply said : — " It is ttue as you suggest, that I have had a liberal' supply of enemies in this colony, but that is a trouble about which any reasonable man will scarcely ever complain, for it amounts almost to au axiom that the man who has not vehement enemies will scarcely ever have vehement friends. The one is the complement of the other, and £ may say I Uave hud my share, and far more than my share, of generous friends. When I was last in office, the democratic party in this colony, irrespective altogether of race or religion, gave me a warm and liberal support — a confidence which I endeavored to repay by promoting, as far as possible, and without distinction, the interests of all the industrious people in this extensive community. When you speak of a public man's enemies you are frequently apt to overlook some of the compensations be enjojs from time to time ; the friends made, for example, by the re-action in generous minds against unjust criticism. Had public engagements not brought me here, I should have been following to the grave to day the remain? of the Rev. Peter Menzies, who was one of several notable men in Victoria, who without necessarily adopting my political opinions, wrote spontaneously to me to express indignation and scorn at the methods employed to misrepresent me and my opinions. And assuredly, let me observe, the abuse of enemies only has increased the zeal of my countrymen in my behalf. Let me say with pride and thankfulness, however, that I have never asked them to do anything which was not first done to the bast of their ability. In my many elections there were always hundreds ol them who took far more trouble to gam them than I did myself. Mr Irollope in his book on Australia, among many other surprising statements, declares tkat whenever an Irishman is Chief Secretary, every ■other Irishman expects to get public employment. But I, who know them better than Mr Trollope, can affirm, that under such circumstances they exercise remaikable forbearance and moderation, in ordir not to embarrass their countrymen. I have never known or read of a trait of true gentlemanly feeling to exceed an experience I once had myself in Villiers and Heytesbury. I was doing something which, for onse, many of my countrymen did not like, and would gladly ha^e had altered. I went dowu to a general election, wh're I had a fierce contest to face While the battle w.is bei ig fought my best supporters did. not say one word oil the subject that was in their minds, but when inj election was won, aud they could not be supposed to be exercising any coercion, they told me for the first tune their wi-hes, (Hear, hear.) Could Sir Charles Grandison have ucted a more chivalrously ? I remember another incident in my first election meeting in that county, something like eighteen years ago, which i never can recall without pleasure. I was afe the time addressing a large meeting of men entirely unknown tome, and I had to answer the lidiculously untrue imputation that I had excited nliiious hostilities in Ireland. When I concluded my remarks a Presbyterian Minister whom I had never seen before arose and declared that he had been a member of the Tenant League in Dublin, in which R)tnan Catholic and Presbyterian Church clergymen fov the first time worked side by side, and that I had been one of its founders. Another gentleman with a long whip in his hand, and weaiing a cabbage tree hat, looking like a f.irmer, but who was a contractor, and whom I also saw for the first time, got up and spoke. He was the son, lie said, of an old Orange co-operator in Dublin, and he said that he hud been emancipated from the narrowness and bigotry of his class by being a reader of the ' Dublin Nation,' a newspaper vitli which, as you all know, I was for some time connected, and which he acknowledged had always advocated liberality and general sympathy with all classes of their countrymen. I never think of these two circumstances without- some satisfaction and innate pleasure, as they remind mo of a few of those re.yards which all public men may sometimes hike an honest pride in receiving. The remarks made by Mr M'Coy recall these facts to my recollection, and they also remind me that perhaps my early training brought about many of my convictions, which through a lengthened public career have remained with me intact. In uiy you f h my guardian was a Roman Catholic clergyman, and my schoolmaster, as Mr M'Coy has observed, was a Presbjteriau Church minister, and he had, no doubt, inculcated in my early education those principles which I hare always endeavored to foster, and which have never led mo into the position ot stimulating religious animosities amongst the various classes of the community. I can say with all truth, although it was the la*t statement I had to give utterance to in this world, that my training, ii. stead of leading me to ptomote religious animo s ity, has always led me in quite a contrary direction. 1 have never on any occasion asked more lor my own elergymau than for others of different denominations. I have only asked for tueir equality wish the rest, nothing more, only tor their equality. Your address seems to imply that I am about to leave Austialia finally, but I may state that I have not armed at that

determination. lam going home primarily for my health, which has been very much shattered, and aa I am not taking my family with me, i propose to return in eighteen months or two years, and beyond that period, I think yon will agree with me, it is scarcely safe for mortal man to pkn a future over which he has really so very little control. The chairman had stated that if nrore time had been available this address would have been accompanied by a proposal for a publio banquet, but I may state that I had an invitation Borne little time ago to come to a banquet on St. Patrick's Day, but I was glad to decline the invitation rather than undertake a task for which the state oi my health rendered me so unfit. In fact, it was only because a benevolent institution would have been affected that I was induced to deliver the lecture last evening, and which I am sorry to think must have failed in proving so interesting to my hearers as I would have wished it to have been. Having so briefly acknowledged your generous address, I again thank yon for your kindness, and whatever my future may be, I shall never forget this occasion. I owe to ray numerous friends in Ballarat many pleasing recollections of bygone days, which wiil long remain implanted in my memory. (Applause).