ROYAL VISIT TO WESTLAND.

Hokitika Guardian, 8 April 1920, Page 4

ROYAL VISIT TO WESTLAND.

GENERAL ARRANGEMENTS

In connection with the Royal visit and the transport of school children to Hokitika, the Government and Canterbury Education Board will assist with regard to meals, and free transit will bo provided over the railways. As far as possible country children will be accommodated in Hokitika by billetting, and the public will be asked to notify the secretaries what they can do. If it is necessary (as it probably will be) to provide sleeping accommodation overnight, this will be arranged in the first instance for boys over 10 years. Younger children will require to be in the caro of parents, guardians or friends. It is hoped to get the girls accommodated at private houses. The school teachers from Teremakau to Inter-Wanganui are being asked to notify the probable number of scholars who will be in Hokitika for the Royal visit, and the number over ten years for whom accommodation will be required. For schools beyond the 1 ailhead, enquiry will be made also as regard transit arrangements. County children, adjacent to Hokitika, should if possible (owing to the pressure on le al accommodation) arrange to return at night.

A special function for the Christchurch Road and Otira children will be arranged for at Otira on Thursday, May 13th. Arrangements will be made for the children to travel to and from Otira by ordinary train that day. At Otira the children will he given a treat, presumably lin the school grounds. The Royal train will arrive at Otira at 2 p.m. The station and yard will be decorated, and the children drawn up to be reviewed by the Prince. An e - fort will be made to have a band in attendance. Mr Bruce (County Chairman) will visit Otira in about ten days’ time to confer with the School Committee, tunnel workers, and the Public Works officials in regard to a programme for the day. The Prince’s stay will be confined to fifteen minutes, but the entertainment for the children and adults will extend into the afternoon The function at Otira is being included m the offical programme of the tour. Advice has been received that th text of the Westland address to His Roval Highness has been approved by His Excellency the Governor-Genera.. The following is the text of the address in question To His Royal. Highness Edward Albert Christian George Andrew W ' Havid, Prince of Wales, Earl of Chester in the Peerage of the United Kingdom, Duke of Cornwall in the P age of England, Duke of Rothesay, Earl of Garrick, and Baron o _ frew in the Peerage of Scotland Lor Scotland, K.G., G.M.M.G, M.C., - etc.

May it Please Your Royal Highness. On hell aif of the inhabitants of Hokitika Borough and Westland district, we desire to extend to you on the occasion of your visit to this portion of the Dominion of New Zealand a very hearty and loyal welcome, and we desire particularly in the interests of tho rising generation, to thank yon for your visit to this locality. ' You have have travelled much in the various parts of the great Empire to which we are convnced that the warm and loyal feelings which are felt towards tlie Sovereign will be strengthened bv your visit. We hope that your visit to the Dominion may be to you, a very Peasant experience, and that you will carry away happy memories of the Dominion and its people. On our part. we shall always regard this very pleasant event as most propitious, one that will not he forgotten, and which will create sentiments of 'personal regard and appreciation attaching us more closely than ever to the Sovereignty of Great Britain, the glory and traditions o which were so strikingly maintained during the fiercely exacting period ot the Great War. We trust that your future will be attended with every happiness and prosperity, and on behalf of the people of this Western community beg to subscribe ourselves, Your loyal and dutiful servants, Mayor of Hokitika. County Chairman of Westland. Chairman Hokitika Harbor Board. Chairman Hokitika School Committee. The address will be in dj*™ illuminated by an artist of the Lyt ton Times Coy., and will be in a ca U of Westland woods ornamented Winn COM. The pvep-t.oe Of the latter has been entrusted to J. Brocklehurst of Revell Street.