CHRISTCHURCH.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume IX, Issue 452, 9 December 1881, Page 17

CHRISTCHURCH.

(From our own correspondent.) I have lately read a very admirable letter given by Mr Buckmaster, of the Science and Art Department, South Kensington (London), entitled "Science and Ait in their application to houses, furniture, dress, food and cookery,' 1 of which I should like to give a brief resunie in the hope of interesting your readers, and also because the results aimed at by the lecturer are equally to be desired in this young colony, where schools of science and art have not as yet sprung into existence. Here, as at home, there is a want of general elevation and improvement in the '• art tastes and feelings" of the whole people. We need a deeper sense of love and desire for '-the thing that is truthful, the thing that is beautiful, the thing that is good." After reviewing the the progress of architecture from its first rude beginning, the lecturer spoke of the custom of people going to a man and calling him an upholsterer, who often had a miscellaneous collection of articles which " ought to be collected in some convenient spot, and burnt for the public good." He was a man learned in all matters of modern art, and had somewhere discovered there was a fashionable color for each room ; the room in which one dines should be a sort of sage green, that in which one sleeps a kind of French grey, the library a sort of warm chocolate brown, in fact a real " brown study." The colors once settled, everything is ordered to match, the articles being always more ornamental than useful, and the chairs generally of a kind that •• no man with either weight of body or character would trust himself to sit upon." They forgot that the true function of art was the decoration of useful things ; latter-day fashions being to furnish houses with utter disregard to the most elementary principles of art. They did not want everything to toatch, for there is a beauty and harmony in variety. He considered that the matter of furnishing houses in conformity with the principles of art was of much greater consequence in the education oi children than they were aware, for the education of each one of us goes on through the material influences by which we are surrounded. Passing on to the subject of dress, the lecturer's observations were in exact accordance with those of the " Rational Dress Association" and kindred reformers, whose ppinions I have before recapitulated in your columns. I need, therefore, add only a few of bis very wise words on the necessity of being " honest and truthful in dress as well as other things." He hopes that the time will soon arrive when this will be the characteristic of our countrywomen. Things should never appear to be what

THE APPLICATIONS OF SCIENCE AND ART.

they are not ; disregard for truthfulness in dress and ornament lowers the morals and standard of a people. His remarks on cookery, though perhaps not particularly new, nor strikingly put, are yet admirable. He thinks that " the best mode of proper cooking of food fhould be a part of the education of every woman," and he would like to see it form a part of the routine of every elementary school for girls. If he could have bis way, no one s-hould be allowed to marry without fii>t producing a certificate of having passed through a course of instruction in cooking, which he regarded as the first domestic duty of a wife around which almost every other duty revolved. Ob, wise and admirable Mr Buckmaster 1 How cordially will a vast majority of the '• lords of creation" echo your practical and truly benevolent sentiments. An Arcadian vista truly — no more tepid greasy soups, sodden fish, over and underdone joints, leathern pastry, and the rest of it ; almost too good to dream of, much less realise. And yet is it not somewhat remarkable that but a few of our otherwise acute womankind have discovered the one weak point in the coDbtitution of their lord and master, and how a daintily cooked dinner, with suitable appointments, has an almost magical effect in sweetening his temper, and loosing his purse-strings— however, I forgot, lam exceeding the bounds of prudence, and will hasten to endorse the concluding remarks of our lecturer. "Itis a common thing to hear people express a belief that we live in an age when a good servant is a curiosity — that fact is that we shall never return to the age of good servants until those who employ them understand how their duties should be performed. There is nothing low or menial in a -woman being able to do that, if the motive which prompts her be the right one to make her husband happy, her children noble and happy ; then the motive is dignified into a virtue of the highest kind." I would add that a woman need never fear lest the acquisition of this kind of knowledge should vulgarise or tend to deteriorate her character ; on the contrary, that true refinement and cultivation of mind which all so truly admire will not desert her, but render the attainment of practical domestic skill, and efficiency, however novel a study, a comparatively easy matter. May we not ■ also conjecture that in it may be found at least a partial remedy for much of the disappointment, discontent, and apparent aimlessness of many of the lives which surround us ? The extraordinary epistle with which you have " ONLY A BOY." been favoured by your correspondent " Only a Boy," &c, inspired so much doubt in my mind as to its genuineness that I at first determined to let it pass without comment. On second thoughts, however, I think it best to make some reply, lest my not too wise critic should assume that his arguments (?) are so unanswerable as to compel me to take refuge in silence. I therefore take it for granted that he is actually what he represents himself to be—" only a boy," writing in good faith, and though, he has obviously exposed himself to a somewhat severe handling, were I so disposed, I will let him off easily, with only a friendly hint that a careful study of the rules of English grammar and composition would be useful to him. The greater part of his second paragraph is wholly unintelligible, but after mature consideration I am inclined to think that he fancies I mean to deny that Protestants worship our Divine Lord at all in their churches. On no other supposition can I account for his use of the words " defamatory," "irreligious," and "malicious," which are entirely misplaced and truly ridiculous. In writing of " the beautiful building where Jesus was not," I was addressing Catholics, to whom the meaning of my words would be at once apparent. I will, however, crave their indulgence, as well as your own, while I say a few words in explanation of the doctrine of the Beal Presence, of which your correspondent is evidently in complete ignorance. When our Divine Lord, in instituting the Blepsed Eucharist, the night before His Passion, took bTead, saying, " This is my Body," and taking the chalice, said, " This is my Blood," and further Baid to His Apostles and their successors, " Do this in commemoration of me," we believe that He meant exactly what He said, and that, therefore, after the words of consecration are said by the priest, His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity are truly, really, and substantially present under the appearances of bread and wine. More than this, we believe that when He said to His Apostles " I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world," He spoke no merely figurative language, and that consequently He remains on our altars night and day, in the consecrated Host, and it is our duty as well as our happiness to visit Him there, to offer Him our adoration, our homage, our love, our devotion, and our gratitude. Your correspondent must admit that no Protestant body even pretends to hold this doctrine of the Real Presence, and his "love of justice and truth " should therefore lead him candidly to admit that he has been mistaken in applying such terms as " defamatory " to my statement of a plain fact. The love of those very virtues of which he thinks me incapable led me to give as laudatory a notice as I conscientiously could of the externals of the Cathedral ; more than this was impossible. I. nevertheless, willingly pardon his hard words, in consideration for the zeal (however mistaken) which prompted his letter, only beseeching him, as he values his salvation, to allow his " love of justice and truth " to lead him to a thorough investigation of the claims of the Catholic Church to be believed and accepted by all men, let them be ever so ignorant of the fact, or unwilling to admit it. [The letter referred to by our correspondent being anonymous, was not inserted by us. We, howevev, forwarded it to our correspondent with the request that it might be dealt with at discretion.— Ed. I N.Z. Tablet.]

Mb. G. Gow has commenced business as a blacksmith and wheelwright in Princes street south, Dunedin. Mr Gow hopes, by uniting with his acknowledged skill attention to orders and promptness, to secure a fair share of public patronage. The Little Dust Pan, George street, Dunedin. offeTS to families an immense stock of almost all their household requirements at unprecedentedly low prices.