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New Zealand Tablet, Volume XII, Issue 5, 23 May 1884, Page 15

The Yen. Archdeacon Culeman will make a collection in aid of the Cathedral Building Fund at St. Patrick's Church, South Dunedin, on Sunday— and on Sunday, June 1, at North Dunedin. A special Mass will be celebrated on Saturday morning in the chapel of the Children of Mary, Dunedin, by His Lordship the Bishop. The Mass, which will ba attended by members of the sodality only, will ba offered on the pretty altar presented to the . Dominican Nuns by Mr. Dungan of Timaru. The usual fortnightly meeting of the Dunedin Catholic Literary Society took place on Friday last, the rev. President occupying the chair. Mr. Hayes recited " Mark Antony's Oration," Mr. Callan t? ad a part of Tennyson's ', Enoch Arden," promising to finish it on some future occasion, and the President read two selectious from Sheil's speeches, all of which were executed in a masterly manner, evoking a hearty vote of thanks. The next meeting will be held on Wednesday the 28th when the " Merchant of Venice " will be read by the several members.

The Napier D»Uy Telegraph, in alluding to the proposed establishment of a Trades and Labour Council, deprecates any association of it with political, affairs. " Adopt the political platform," says our contemporary, in conclusion, "and the council will simply be the place where frothy windbags will air their, eloquence and inflict preposterous theories on the suffering. members." — Our contemporary has evidently had some experience of the matter he deals with,— At any rate, as the saying is, he hits the nail on the head. On the morning of the 16th April, the large congregation assembled at St. Mary's Church Hokitika, witnessed two very beautiful and touching ceremonies in the Holy Profession of Sister M. Joseph Mandl, and the Reception of Sister M. Ita Cullinan. The formeryoung lady, being from Hokitika, and the first from the town .who wa, professed at St. Columbkille's, was the object of an unusual amount of interest. The young lady who had the happiness of being clothed With theh oly habit of the Order of Mercy had only come out fr,om Ireland lately, and was educated by the Sisters at Horn?. The ceremony of Profession came first in ordjr and during Mass. At the conclusion of the Holy Sacrifice the clothing took place, the Rev. Father Devoy S.M. officiating at both, assisted by Rev. Father Martin. There were als3 present Rev. Fathers Garew P.P., and Pcrtuis, Greymouth ; Rev. Father Walshe, Kumara ; and Rev. Father Ahem, Ross. Daring the ceremonies the choir rendered several beautiful and appropriate pieces of music in their- usual happy style. Mr. J. Stevens, M.H.R., addressing his constituents at Marton, the other night spoke as follows, according to the Wdnganwi Herald, on education.— -Let us hope, moreover, that the applause given to him was of some significance :— " There were one-seventh of the population of the Colony who were practically debarred from receiving State aid for. the education of their children. There was the Catholic section of the community of this Colony, and he could assure the audience, that from conversations he had held with person ß who were capable of giving an opinion on the subject, that Catholic children were not considered to be educated unless educated in the faith to which their parents belonged. He knew that it might be said that they Bhould avail themselves of what is called secular education, but they could not. They must either give up their religious belief, or they must educate their own children. The Colony paid at present £315.000 to £320,000 for education, and if they could reduce this to something like £240,000 he thought that would be sufficient to carry out the education system of the Colony, if the redutcions were made in some such way as he had indicated. If they were to do away in a great measnre with 6tate nurseries, and not allow parents to send children to school who were not old enough, nor capable of learning something, they would save a great deal. He thought it would be a most disastrous thing if they were to inter"fere with the present system of secular education. They could lighten the burden for the section of the people he had spoken of, if they were to reduce the necessity for taxing themselves for education. This one-seventh of the people contributed its shars for the education of Protestant and other children, and at the same time its members put their hands into their own pockets, and paid for the edu. tion of their own children rather than accept an education which they believed to be contrary to the creed they were taught (applause)." It is hardly to the credit of our contemparary the Timam Herald that he has chosen to play second fiddle to the. Press of Melbourne and to the Press of Melbourne in anything but a praiseworthy character. That Press in attacking the Irish cause has been actuated by some base motive— either by the race-hatred that is strongest in the lowest natures, and that lead* it to rage against the Irish people ; or by religious bigotry which is a distinctive feature of, narrow minds, or by the necessity under which certain editors are placed of ministeiiog to the wants of some of their patrons who desire to recommend themselves to the notice of high society in England, and gain permission to play the flunkey by virtue of having influenced the colonies to oppose the Irish cause. To play second fiddle to a Press so actuated, and be bigot or flunkey at second hand must be acknowledged to be no very noble occupation — and yet such is the position in which the Timaru Herald places himself. No one supposes that the Press of Melbourne is in all sincerity gush, ingly loyal, for is it not the leading Press of a colony which is now, without contradiction anywhere, declared ready to sever its connection wi.h England, if only the remote cause of injury to it be permittel to arise ?— as, for example, in the transportation of French crimina's to the South Sea Islands. For a Press like this to cry out against the desire on the part of Ireland to abolish the causes that have long been her ruin is shameful impudence— a^ it may well be questioned if the loyalty of the Timaru Herald is one whit more sincTi than that of the Press of Melbourne. The Timaru Herald; then, hus published two articles that are a re-ha=th of all the calumny poured out against the Irish cause by the Melbourne Press, and to which is added some further calumny that seems to be peculiarly his own. He has, for example, discovered reasons to hint that the Messrs. Redmond made away, in some disreputable manner with the sum of £15,000 collectedjby them in these colonies— £ 13,000 of which

had been acknowledged as received at home from them before ever they left the country. He has also pretended to discover that they founded a secret society here to C3ntrol affairs, and which would render the federation of the colonies exceedingly dangerous. And various other bits of information of somewhat a'similaT'kind he pats forward. But, as an instance of the fairness, consistency, and iris* dom with which our contemporary argues, let us compare a passage in his article of the 12th inst. with another that occurs in his article Qf the 14th. In the first he condemns Mr. Redmond for declaring that Irishmen are determined to give no political support to those of their countrymen who deserted their cause, and made their own terms with the bigoted anti-Irish majority during tl c visit of the delegates to the colonies. In the second article he quotes with approbation the decision of the Australasian that not a '■ single man who identified himself " with the mission in question should be returned at the next election— though why Irishmen maynot^exer. eise their freewill as well as anti-Irish men, our contemporary wottld, perhaps, find it difficult to ►ay. " We have no intention, however, of following these foolish and bigoted articles in detail, We happen to know that the Timaru Herald is conducted by a gentleman who is possessed of some brains and considerable experience, and; therefore we see plainly that all this foolery is insincere. It would ' be a vain, task on our part were we to undertake to point out to our contem porary the false conclusions and absurd statements wiih which the article? are fully crammed, for we can honestly enterffiin no other conviction than that he himself i 3 quite as well aware of their n&tnrejT as we or anyone else can be. It only remains for us, then, to express surprise that any motive could lead our contemporary to emulate the Melbourne Press in its hatred, bigotry, or flunkey ism — and our surprise is the greater to find that a gentleman of whom both Irishmen and Catholics have ere. now deserved well should endiavour to stir up antiCatholic— anti-Irish — rage against them. The motive, however base must be a strong one, and we shall await with cariosity further developments.