THE CAMPAIGN OF SLANDER.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVIII, Issue 14, 5 April 1900, Page 3

THE CAMPAIGN OF SLANDER.

A WEST COAST OPINION.

Fbom an outspoken leading: article in the Brunner Newt of March 19, we make the following extracts : ' S lattery was stripped of his cloth for habitual drunkenness in Ireland, subsequently he was imprisoned in America for selling indeoent literature, and he is now employed in touring this land preaching in the foulest terms, the blackest slanders, and calumnies against a Church whioh he once vowed upon the most solemn of oaths to love and serve for ever. We hold no ''ahares" in the Catholic Church, neither do we wish to defend her by any means when fair and honest criticism is levelled against her in a decent and honest manner, but when an impostor of this ilk comes around stirring up sectarian bitterness and bigotry and preaching in terms that are not fit for decent ears, we feel we cannot support the imposture. His words only appeal to the lowest class of community and wherever he has been his lectures have been shunned by every decent minded Protestant as well as Catholic. The Auckland Observer, not noted for any amount of delicacy, has spoken out in the strain in whioh we are now writing ; several New Zealand journals have done likewise. At the populous city of the Thames Slattery's audience numbered 40 ; at Napier it was small ; at Wellington he was left almost severely on his own. He enters not a word in contradiction or in protest of all that the Tablet has said of him, and the Editor of that journal holds documentary evidence to prove all his assertions, and invites any respectable citizens of Dunedin to see the original documents and fears not the law of libel. His lectures, we are told, savour very strongly of profanity, slander and filth, his object being to stir up rancor and hatred for the sake of £. c. d., and then go elsewhere. As already said, we hold no brief for the Catholio Church, but we venture to state that the time is coming when impostors of this sort who are true to no creed and who are the enemies of honor and decency and truth, will find no place in this fair young Colony where religious liberty is found and where harmony and brotherhood are sure to reign in Bpite of color, or creed, or class, or country.' After referring to the manner in which Catholic and Protestant joined hand in hand in connection with the various contingents for South Africa, the Brunner News continues : ' They who die with us to-day shall be our brothers ; and away with Slattery and all his kind whose lives are a dishonor, whose presence shocks every principle of modesty, and whose only aim is to appeal to the foulest and most sordid minds for the sake of money. Of the sham ex-nun who " travels " with Slattery we Wish to say but little. It might even be enough to state that she travels with such a companion, but we gather from the pamphlet above referred to that she is not and never was a nun and her imposture is as great as his. We do not wish to describe what we have learnt her to be. Away out in the recently beleagured city of Ladysmith where fever and hunger were raging ; on the open veldt where bulletß are flying and shrapnel is doing its grim work of death ; in the death-stricken hospitals of Durban and Kimberley we know of many of Mrs. Slattery's sex who are bending in loving charity over the dying and the dead and soothing the soldiers' last agonies irrespective of creed and without fee or reward. They are nans ; and it will take all Mrs. Slattery's elocutionary powers to make even the lowest strata of the people of New Zealand, where the flowers of virtue of every denomination grow up in harmony, side by side, believe that she is worthy to criticise, let alone abuse, the class of women to whom she only pretends she once belonged.'

Investors in dredging, mining, and other shares will notice that Messrs. Mark Sprot and Co., sharebrokers, Hokitika, have an advertisement in this issue. Mr. J. D. Lynch, principal of the firm, has had sixteen years' goldfields experience in the service of the National Bank at Greymouth, Ahaura, Nelson Creek, and Hokitika.— „,%

Massey-Harris Company have taken over the old established cycling business of Messrs. Turner and Turner, of Elizabeth street, Melbourne, and have strengthened their staff by engaging Messrs. Spire, Arthur, Cecil, and Sydney Turner. These well and favourably known young business cyclists have been assigned to important posts in the Massey-Harris organisation. Mr. George L. Scott, the popular North Eastern representative of the company, has been promoted to the charge of the central district, where he will direot affairs from the Ballarat Depot. — mm * m

Mybbs and Co., Dentists, Octagon, corner of George street They guarantee highest class work at moderate fees. Their artificial teeth give general satisfaction, and the fact of them supplying a temporary denture while the gums are healing does away with the inconvenience of being months without teeth. They manufacture a single artificial tooth for Ten Shillings, and sets equally moderate. The administration of nitrous-oxide gas is also a great boon to those needing the extraction of a tooth. Bead adrertdM ment.— MM * m