"THE REAL MIND OF NEW ZEALAND"

Press, Volume LXI, Issue 18419, 27 June 1925, Page 13

"THE REAL MIND OF NEW ZEALAND"

A "DAILY MAIL" ARTICLE. («01C OC* OWV COORMJOXBBST.) LONDON, Mar 14. The "Daily Mail" has begun to give greater prominence, to the Dominions in its news and in special signed articles, with the object of cultivating the growth of Imperial unity and mutual understanding. Its principal leadcrpago article in to-day's issue deals with New Zealand, under the headlines, "The Heal Mind of New Zealand—A Very Candid Article." Tho article, which is written by M. C. Koane, of Christchurch, is as follows: — "New Zealand is growing fast. In JS7S its population was 300,000; in 1900 it was 750,000; to-day it is a million and a-third. But we have become conscious that tho rest of the world is growing too, and that there is next to no change in' the one great fact which oppresses us, namely, our isolation. "Twenty years ago it troubled us little that we were 13,000 miles from Great Britain. War could not come nearer to us than the North Sea, and the Navy could attend to that; wo could always sell all the wool and meat and butter that we could produce, and we could borrow all the money we needed.

"To-day our old sense of perfect security is gone, although we can still sell our produce to Britain and can still raise loans there, adding to tho debt which mainly accounts for the growth in cur population and our activities. We are entirely dependont, that is to say, upon Great Britain, and more of us realise this every day. Dominion Differences. - "We feel no strong sense of closest kinship with any of the other States of the Empire. Their problems are not ours, nor their ways our ways. "We never think of Canada without thinking of her froward nationalism and her great southern neighbour. ' "Australia jars upon us very often, and the measure of our affinity is the fact that the. compound word 'Australasia' is no longer, seen in print in New Zealand, and has been condemned tacitly and expressly by the Press, and even by some, of the large public organisations. South Africa, with its Hertzog and its incalculable Labour Party, merely makes us uneasy. We have not yet.reached the stage of slightly agonised wondering what will become of us, but. we do'realise very acutely that our future is more than ever bound up with the'-future of the British Isles. We . might borrow money : from" America; we might sell all our. produce, .instead, of some only of it,, to America or Europe; but we do not-wish: ever to be forced into .doing this through .Britain's,- loss of her present position. .The New Zealander does not want to think of existence other wise than under the Union Jack. •■ ; ' « • loyalty to .England.

: "All this'is not theresult of mere | self-interest." New Zealanders love and respect the spirit of England, and while they fully understand the extent of the oversea Dominions' efforts in the Great War; including their own, they understand just as ; clearly the magnitude ..of ..Britain's sacrifice and the great courage, and' unselfishness of her policy sincethe enaing of the war. • •" 'Britain is good enough-for me,' is a phrase I heard,from the late Mr Massey many a time, and it is the sentiment of most people in this Dominion. TheJate.Mr.Seddonlused to'speak in thrilling ; tones, of tlio 'Empire; Mr 'Massey preferred to speak of the Mother-country, which still means more than the Empire does. One doubts .whether Mr Majckpnzie King or Mr Stanley Brace would ever say.'Britain lis gbod enough" for me.' unless with annihilating qualifications. And here, ;I, think , is a fundamental difference between New .Zealand and the other •States of the Empire.. . '■'■'* We should ;like;a'measure' of tariff preference from Britain that would benefit Vus, but ..there, is no New Zeaiander who: will, not admit that the balance, of obligation as between Britain' and New Zealand is heavily on our side, 'and that our moral and material debt to. Britain is and will long remain beyond our means of repayment. It is not alono of ourselves, facing the spectre that has vanished from the North Sea to reappear in the Pacific, •that wo are thinking when we support the' Singapore plan. In everything that concerns .international affairs and the of. trade,: Britain's interests and our own are by. most people here thought of as identical. • Labour and the Empire. . "It -has not. needed crises to bring these' facts out, for •we have no crises ; here. ..This is a-very placid country—prosperous, industrious. humdrum, ignorant "of most of the. troubles that afflict >the older, lands,- Economically the Dominion is'sound; politically it 'faces no more serjousdifficulty than the persuading of-the Liberal and Government .parties to abandon; their reasonless .quarrelling and present a solid Lfront to'the Socialist challenge. 1 But that challenge-is- serious, and our I Labour Party/is rather redder than yours. ( Mr ,'Clynes and Mr .J. H. Thomas' would' not. feel nearly sb.com- ! fbrtable in'it as Mr Kirkwood or Mr I Maxtori. - • . .

'', Yet. not many : New Zealandeis fear that, the -Empire would suffer. grave injury from a Labour Government in the Dominion, for the reason that although the most extreme aritiImperiaL sentiments aro held.and expressed by bur Labour leaders, practically all of whom are admirers of the Bolshevik rule in Russia, the' Labour voters include, a very substantial number who at heart arc, as sound on the fundamentals' of Empire unity as'anyone. And destruction, swift and sure, would fall, upon any Government tampering.with the fundamentals." •

/Regarding the word '■ phenomenal" and. its use in the sense of wonderful or' exceptional, I'find from the Oxford Dictionary (says " Affable Hawk" in tie '.'New Statesman") that the word was first introduced and, of course, used correctly by Coleridge in 1825 ("Aids to Reflection")'. In 3850, however ("Dante and "His. Circle"), Rossett: used it in the sense of "■ remarkable"; "to afford a glimpse of the.phenomenal fact that the bosom of the Church was a refuge-of shorn lambs." I have no doubt that its d requent use in newspapers was started by '.'The Infant Phenomenon" in "Nicholas Nickleby." A suggestion of- ignorant pretension still hangs about this use of the word. It is repugnant to . a scholar, but if scholars had always had their way our languago would- be poorer: "meticulous," for instance, would 'still mean, "fearful" instead of "over-careful about minute details"—a word particularly useful in .this. connexion. The credit of words depends upon the prestige 'of writers who ' use ' them, and. therefore ijt- is up to (do you" deplore th4t, expression.?) careful writers to adopt useful- words.and phrases which liavo'kept bad,company. "Sense" used a' verb, 'meaning -to apprehend vaguely,; iB a'vivid, wordi '.'they.met,' ind ; he - 1 sensed an enemy*';, "jview-point''. can be ..useful, too, .especially; when "*' point of view'' would introduce'aribther "off '' into the sentence 1 . We should overcome reluctance to accept'-English .compounds, v for we •feel ido such, aversion from., learned foreign ories. : ' ".Airman" has. at last •ousted ; "aerdnaut," 'arid "hand-book" was once:.thought .. <".