left a vacuum in their lives which can best be filled by the European helping to find the answer to this difficulty. While young people are still in the process of breaking away from long-standing habits of life in their rural home communities, it is important that they should have some focus of social activity in the place in which they work. That focus can well be given through a Maori community centre or club, one feature of which can be the cultivation of Maori arts and crafts. By the use of activities with which young men and women are already familiar, or in which they can find some pride, it is possible to bring together those who would otherwise be lonely and homesick. These activities can give them an active interest and a regular leisure occupation. The leaders of such a centre will also look on it as an opportunity to maintain some form of discipline over the outside activities of the members. I know of no better way of explaining in definite terms those ideals of conduct required to strengthen their resistance to the temptations which often surround them. It helps to bridge the social gap which is the main difficulty facing these people. Such clubs, of which Ngati Poneke in Wellington is a shining example will have a part to play for many years to come in placing the Maori in a modern community. A community centre in a large city provides a link with the past to these young people who often feel that they have lost their past in coming to a new environment to throw down fresh roots. A centre gives a new sense of community to those who now live in a place where there are no traditions, no strong kinship ties, and no established way of life. It brings to lonely young men and women new friendships and traditions which reach back to the past, and stretch forward to the new life they are beginning to develop for themselves. It organises activities for young people who have only pathetically dark and lonely streets to roam in before retiring to a dingy room to seek the sleep and rest needed for the next day's work. It will be a place where they can entertain their European friends; where they can meet with each other and play games with each other until all the social adjustments are successfully made by the majority of Maoris, when the need for separate Maori community centres will no longer exist. When this stage is reached. I am quietly confident that the powers of endurance and the high courage displayed by the Maori soldiers on Galiipoli and in Crete and North Africa will be equally as valuable to New Zealand and the British Commonwealth in the years of closer partnership that lie ahead. The future can be faced by them with hope if they as citizens of this fair country, along with their European friends resolve that people, goodwill and service will be their guiding principles. Such is the product of one hundred years of beneficent contact with the British rule.

He Pitopito Korero At the annual meeting of the New Zealand Golf Association, Mr John Hape of Dannevirke was elected one of the two vice-presidents of the association. After the election of officers the new president, Mr F. S. Johns, of New Plymouth, pointed out that Mr Hape was the first Maori to reach the height of vice president in national golf administration. * * * Scout Moananui White, a 14-year-old Maori patrol leader of the Kauri scout group at Mamaranui, near Dargaville, has been awarded the certificate of meritorius conduct by the Boy Scouts' Association, for rescuing a three-year-old boy from drowning. He jumped into a deep pool near a timber mill at Mamaranui to bring the boy to the surface and held him safely until men arrived from the mill. This is one of the St George's Day awards of the association approved by the Governor-General, Sir Willoughby Norrie. * * * The owners of Tahora Block have decided to pay their debt of £1,200 to the East Coast Commission rather than sell their land, 1,700 acres, to the government. Situated in the middle of a large State forest in the Urewera, the block cannot be developed. It was part of the East Coast Trust Lands, and until the charge on this block was met, the commission could not wind up. * * * The annual reunion of members of the Pioneer Maori Battalion of the First World War held in Wairoa last March was attended by over 200 people. Organizers were Messrs A. T. Carroll, H. Jones, Page, and H. E. MacGregor. * * * Ian Heperi of Takapau, Central Hawkes Bay, is one of the New Zealand Scout contingent attending the 3rd World Scout “Jubilee” Jamboree in England. He is the only Maori member of the New Zealand Contingent. Son of Mr and Mrs Dawson Heperi, he belongs to the Ngaitahu sub-tribe of Ngati Kahungunu. Ian (sixteen years old) is a pupil of the Waipukurau District High School. Last year he won the High School's Junior Atheletic Championship.