SNAPSHOTS.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 19177, 7 December 1927, Page 13

SNAPSHOTS.

[By Scrutator.] The Rt. Hon. Mr Amery, after paying his Ministerial devoirs to South Africa and. Australia, is now doing the same to New Zealand. He has visited Auckland, Wellington, and Christchurch, and at this present writing is at the Hermitage, ogling and courting Our Lady of the Snows, Mt. Cook. The three cities named have vied with one another in the enthusiasm and cordiality wherewith he has been treated —indeed, his has been a triumphant procession throughout. And each of them has; in point of climate, been consistently itself. Auckland was hot and muggy. Wellington was dusty and windy. Indeed, a specially typical Wellington gale greeted him on his departure, and the steamer battled with it all the way to Lvttelton, which sho reached more than three hours late, and with her funnel thickly crusted with salt. Christchurch was simply perfect: bright sun, zephyr breezes, and just one of those light, tiny showers of ours that descend on the earth beneath gentlo as a benediction. Who arranged his itinerary I don't know, but it may seem at first sight as if both he as our visitor and we as his hosts have received scant justice in the length of his stay here. One day in Christchurch appears unfair to both. Unfair to us because we were entitled to see more of him, and hear more, too. Unfair, to him because, after all, though a Minister, he is only a man, and within the one day he had divers dinners, afternoon teas, and other confections to face, and withal to deliver himself of nine or ten speeches—indeed he admitted at one stago that he had lost count at nine or ten. That he accomplished all this so successfully, and in no speech repeated himself, is the highest tribute that could be paid him. And I pay it right-heartedly, as I'm sure do all who had the pleasure of listening to him. And his speeches were all impromptu, or seemed so. Thus, in one, he found time to pay a delicate and well-deserved compliment to Professor Macmillan Brown, who presided at the United Service dinner. In another he gratified us all by declaring, inter alia, that Christchurch was not only a most beautiful City, but a City the most typically English to be seen outside England. And many friends of mine who have travelled far and wide do testify the same.

In the same speech, Mr Aniery playfully bantered our Mayor, the Rev. Mr Archer, and did it so neatly that I can't help quoting. Mr Archer, when introducing him to the meeting, said lie had known Mr Amery's brotlher-in-law in Yorkshire. He was then a Liberal member of Parliament, but since then he had gone in for a process of political degeneration —he had gone over to the other side. Turned Conservative, in short. Xliis was greeted with much' laughter, in which Mr Amery joined. When conoluding his own speech, Mr Amery turned to Mr Archer and said: "You, sir, have referred to my brother-in-law. The gospel I preach is'the unregenerate gospel to which 1 have always held, and to which I am glad to say my brother-in-law is as good an adherent as I have eiver been. (Laughter.) Since the days of which you speak, lie has entered on the straight and narrow path. (.Renewed laughter and applause.) You, sir, have taken the broad and easy way that led to the Mayoralty of Christchurch—a Mayoralty in which, if I can judge, you have earned the appreciation of an overwhelming majority of your fellow citizens, to whose welfare you have dedicated yourself." tApplause.) The "broad and easy way" referred of course to Mr Archer's Labour principles or proclivities, and the other Biblical and clerical expressions must have been inspired by the "Reverend." And the . retort was robbed of all sting by the compliment that crowned it. I can fancy Mr Archer bowing his acknowledgments and blushing as lie bowed.

But if our day is too short for us, what of Dunedin, where he has stayed only half a day ? How is the hospitality and enthusiasm of Dunedin to. be crushed and crowded into that? If some indignant Dunedin member say, Mr Sidey, - who is an authority on summer titiie—should put a question about it in the. House'and ask Mr Coatea to explain, who could blame him? An explanation, if not a justification, occurs to me here, and I present it to Mr Coates for what it is .worth. Admittedly the. time allotted to Dunedin —as. also to Christchurch was too'"short—but both these cities aro in the South Island, and counting his West Coast trip Mr Amery will have spent much more time there than in the North Island. In the long perspective of Islands, the South Island .is thus distinctly favoured. According to a recent article in The Peess Mr Amery tempers • his Ministerial activities with mountaineering. He has been - on the Swiss Alps and there done deeds of derring-do. Mountain climbing seems to be a passion with him. For how else are we to explain the statement .in last Thursday's paper that in Wellington the. very first thing lie did after breakfast at Government House was to sally forth and climb Mount Victoria? The name is a misnomer. It's not a mountain at all. As everybody knows, it's nothing more than an exaggerated pimple or pustule of clay and tussock—as innocent of ice and snow as is Latnbton quay itself. One hesitates to conjecture that he was trying to escape the dusty blasts of the streets. No; it must have been the mountaineering itch that drove him. Now we in the South Tsland have genuine climbing to offer him. At Mount' Cook, with its attendant peaks, the Hochstetter Dome, the Majte Brun and others . i needn't mention, he will find within a few miles of the Hermitage a welter cf moraines, glaciers, and avalanches, ice-cutting, and ice snow* and rock climbing to satisfy the most fastidious and exacting of mountaineers. It is said that, greatly daring, he proposes to climb Mount Cook itself, and we all wish he may. But even if he doesn't we feel satisfed that when he comes back he will admit that in mountain glories New Zealand has as much to offer as the Swiss Alps or any other place he has ever seen or is likely to see. This will afford him some solace for not carrying off Mount Cook on his watch chain.

Of course our delight in Mr Amery's presence is not entirely personal to him. He has done much to win jis with his charming personality, but our'enthusiasm has a deeper root than that. He is the first British Cabinet Minister to come here, and his visit is an official recognition by the Imperial Government that New Zealand has attained her majority and is now a full-grown member of the great community of Nations that, together with Great Britain, and under the Crown, constitute the British Empire. And as with New Zealand so also with the other Dominions, Canada, Australia, and South Africa. This is a high note, and Mr Amery has struck it clearly and well. And his .visit is only the first of many to follow. Indeed when the airship has passed the experimental stage, and a regular airship service is in operation (as it soon must be), I hope and believe that these visits will be both regular and frequent, And the owe

frequent they are the for the Empire. I can conceive nothing mora valuable than the easy and frequent meeting of British and Dominion Ministers in the flesh. Half an hour's conversation and interchange of views will do more than reams of correspondence, in bringing and keeping the far-flung Dominions and the Mother Country^together. And there will be reciprocity. Not only will British Ministers come to the Dominions, but Dominion Ministers will go to Great Britain, and to one another. Mr Amery follows the example of Mr Baldwin, who recently visited Canada, and set that eountry aflame as the first Prime Minister, of Great Britain who had ever shown himself in any of the Overseas. That some day, and not far from now, we shall have a British Prime Minister here is what all of us in New Zealand both hope and belifeye.