INTERCOLONIAL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVII, Issue 49, 7 December 1899, Page 19

INTERCOLONIAL.

The Rev. Father P. J. Walsh, of St. Francis's Church, Haymarket, Sydney, has obtained leave of absence on account of ill -health, and will shortly take a trip to the Home countries. His parishioners intend to make him a presentation before his departure.

On Sunday, November 19, Mdlle Trebelli, the distinguished vocalist, sang at St. Patrick's Church, Sydney. M. Wiegand and the choir gave an effective rendering of Guilmant's ' Mass,' and Mdlle Trebelli sang Gounod's ' O Divine Redeemer.' Mdlle Trebelli left for the United States on Wednesday, November 22.

The Good Samaritan Order in New South Wales consists of 19 convents and 182 Sisters, and also the Industrial Orphan Reformatory (Manly) with 136 inmates, St Magdalen's Retreat (Tem'pe) with 100 inmates, and a Receiving House, Pitt street, with 60 inmates. The Sisters are practically supporting and training and reforming 300 women and children.

A few Sundays ago the Archbishop of Adelaide completed his 53rd year, and was the recipient of many good wishes. His Grace has made a great and continuous success of his long career of service in the cause of the Church, and wherever he has been, his name is held in esteem approaching to reverence. Dr. O'Reily did excellent work in West Australia, and he was a model prelate at Port Augusta, but his greatest triumphs have been won in his present archdiocese. Dr. O'll»-ily is an all' round man the Southern Cnns). He is a deeply-versed theologian, a thorough scholar, a most expert mu»ician, and a greatly skilled financier. Indeed, it is hard to say where the limits of his knowledge and culture end.

A Grand Commonwealth Fair was opened in the Town Hall, Sydney, on November 18, in aid of the institutions of charity conducted by the Good Samaritan bisters. Ab a picturesque spectacle nothing- finer had ever been seen in Sydney. The opening ceremony was performed by his Eminence the Cardinal-Archbiehop ia the presence of a distinguished gathering of citizens of all denominations. In the course of his address his Eminence said that some few years ago one might count on one's fingers the few Sisters who were engaged in foreign lands diffusing those blessings of religion. At the close of the last century there were not more than 100 so engaged, but at the present day throughout the length and breadth of Christendom there were no fewer than 40,000 nuns engaged in missions of benevolence. At the meeting of a British Association held only a few weeks ago the statement was made that so late as last year about 500 persons died of starvation in Great Britain, which was a terrible announcement to find made by an association in their own day. One would think that the progress of civilisation would render that impossible, but whilst the happiness and wealth of many might be increased, undoubtedly miseries and sufferings would also have their progress. There was another feature in the work of these ministering angels to which he might refer. Men were engaged in the struggle of war in South Africa, and our own brave fellow-citizens had gone there, and he was sure they would reap the brightest laurela for their bravery and heroism. But they must experience the hardships, reverses, and wounds of war. In the three hospitals of South Africa the nuns are ministeri' g to the wounded, and even in the beleaguered township of Mal'eking the wounded soldiers are under the care of our devoted nuns, and if needs be that any of our devoted Sisters are wanted to minister 1 say there are hundreds of cur Australian Sisters ready to show the same heroism, the same heroic devotedness in ministering to their suffering brothers, aye, even rivalling those men's own honour and heroism on tho battlefield. This matter of ministering to Eoldiers on the battlefield was a new thing in the history of the world. The very first to engage in such work was Miss Florence Nightingale, who, he was happy to say, still continues in her career of benevolence, looking after the sufferings of those in the hospitals in her native lind. One of her first duties

at the Crimea was to send home all volunteer nurses. It was expert attendance that was required and not inexpert and inexperienced volunteers. Then for the first time nuns — the Sisters of Mercy — were summoned to the battlefield, and their heroism and devotedness left nothing undone. From that day to this wherever there was an enterprise that would engage the highest talent and highest devotedness, nuns have been summoned In the late war between the United States and Spain in Cuba and Porto Rica, we had experience of what the results are of the ministrations of the nuns. At first none but volunteer nurses were admitted to the hospitals, and among the patients — suffering not only from wounds, but from plague and yellow fellow and a thousand other maladies — the death rate was 52 per cent, of those admitted to the hospital. It was seen that such things could not continue. Then 250 nuns were placed in charge of the hospitals, and the death rate fell from 52 per cent, to 7 per cent. That is to say, out of every 100 poor soldiers taken to the hospital, 45 were saved through the devoted ministrations of these heroic Sisters.

Mr. W. W. Wardell, the distinguished Catholic architect and brother of Mr. H. S. Wardell ,>S-M., of /Wellington, New Zealand, died at Sydney on Sunday, November.l 9. The deceased (says the Sydney Freeman's Journal) closed a life of noble labours a life crowded wiih artistic triumphs, in a .manner in keeping with the modest gentleness which marked his .whole career He had devoted the best of his rare gifts to the service of religion, making the designing and superintendence of church buildings a labour of love, and he died, as he had lived a fervent Catholic. His oil friends, the Jesuit Fathers, gave him the last consolations of Holy Church. The deceased had reached his 76th year< His name will go. down in history as the man who designed and .directed the erection of two great cathedrals — St. Mary's in Sydney and St. Patrick's in Melbourne. The position and the honour, and perhaps we should add the good fortune, Mr." Wardell enjoyed in connection with these two cathedrals, made him a truly remarkable figure among the architects not- of Australia alone, but of the world. We believe we are correct in saying that to no other man in our own times has the great privilege fallen of preparing the plans of two magnificent Gothic cathedrals and of seeing his lofty conceptions in one. case completed and in the other case nearly so. If Mr. Wardell had done no other work, such monuments as St. Mary's and St. Patrick's would be sufficient to give him enduring fame. Yet, while he lived, he himself spoke of these achievements without the faintest sense of pride or boastfulness. His last days were given to St. Mary's, and it is of interest here to recall that it was he who first mounted the recently-C3mpleted central tower of the cathedral. Almost up to the day of his death he gave directions to the contractors, who are just finishing the groining of the aisles. Deceased leaves two sons — Messrs. E. S. Wardell (Melbourne) and Herbert E. Wardell (the well-known Sydney architect) — and three daughters — Mrs. Dr. Power, Mrs. Covely. and Miss Constance Wardell. Mr. Wardell was born in London in 1823, and was educated for the profession of a Civil Engineer, but a strong desire to be a sailor sent him to sea at an early age. After a few years he returned to his first destination, and entered the office of Mr. Morris, one of the surveyors to the then Commissioners of London Sewers, who was also engaged in general practice, and afterwards Mr. WardeJl entered the office of Mr. W. F. East, a London architect. During the railway mania of 1843, and after Mr. Wardell was largely engaged on surveys for projected lines, and at this time when the attention of all artistic England was engrossed by what was calied the Gothic revival, he made the acquaintance of Mr. A. W. Pugin, then a prominent leader in the movement, and soon caugbt the enthusiasm of his friend, devoting his spare moments to sketching and measuring ancient buildings within reach of his railway surveys, the localities of which being constantly changing offered a very larere field for such pursuits. In 1846 he received his first commission for a small church on the Thames, and immediately after another for one of greater pretensions at Croom's Hill, Greenwich. From this time to 1858 he erected besides other works some thirty churches and other ecclesiastical buildings in England and Scotland. In 18.">8 his health failed, and he had to seek the more genial climate of Australia, and shortly after his arrival in Melbourne he accepted the appointment of Chief Architect to the Government, and in the following year succeedei the late MajorGeneral Pasley, R.E . as Inspector-General of Public Works and Buildings. While filling this appointment, which he held for nearly 20 years, Mr. Wardell had the responsible charge of the design and execution of all the works except railways and roads undertaken by the Government, embracing an extensive and varied range of engineering and architectural practice. In 1878 Mr Wardell's connection with the Victorian Government ceased, and since then he resided in Sydney, during which time he designed many public and private buildings. He waß amongst the oldest of the Fellows of the Royal Institute of British Architects.