SCOTCH MEANNESS (?).

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1419, 20 April 1912, Page 14

SCOTCH MEANNESS (?).

Sir,—ln your issue of this morning you relate an incident which occurred * at Alanaia, whore a speaker at a certain banquet indulged in a "sly tilt at Scotchmen, and Aberdonians in particular." This has been done, I believe, since time immemorial, and little has been said against it. It has been, treated as fun by all concerned, but I think that'contemptible twaddle of this description.has gone just about as far as it should be allowed to go, and if the readers of English and colonial newspapers enn see no fun in jokes other than those relating to Scotsmen, then 1 must say they have a very poor sense of humour indeed. I am aware of no reason why : ".Scotchmen, and Abordonians in particular," should bo so exclusively selected, and held up to so much ridicule, as the personification of meanness and selfishness. It is a well-known fact—that is, to those who are at all acquainted with fads, and it appears that a very great number of people arc not ncn.u,iinted with thorn— (hat llio Scottish' nation is just as generous, if not moro so, than . any other nation. We need not go far from homo to find evidence to bear out my ■ statement. The first subscription list for the starving women and children in thn Jlothor Countrx during the ooalmiiAii' strike

was opened in Dunedin, the recognised Scotch settlement, and the money, I note, was distributed in English towns. Also, the first sign of nny practical assistance to tho relatives of the unfortunate passengers ond crew of tho Titanic comes from Dunedin, and yet they talk about the "ciinuiness" of the Scotsmen. Thero nro several Aberdouinns now prominent citizens of Wellington, and their generosity, as evidenced by very recent ovenls, is beyond question,* and"a fitting example to others who do not find timo to devote money to nny laudable purpose, but find plenty in which to pass nasty and unwarrantable remnrks about their superior fellow-subjects. 1 may say that 1 have just recently completed a thiee years' sojourn in tho city of Aberdeen, and while there saw no signs of the meanness and money-grabbing habits of which sundry insignificant individuals and others complain. After nil, the joko was unworthy of such a prominent place in your journal, and would have better suited the Saturday "Alleged Humour" column of your evening contemporary.—l am, etc., A.E.M. Petone, March 18, 1912.