PUBLIC OPINION.

Hokitika Guardian, 29 June 1927, Page 4

PUBLIC OPINION.

' OLD CAAIPAIGNERS. The geographical isolation of New Zealand makes the meeting of old wartime comrades at times surprising. An Englishman, now a happy New Zealander, was amongst the unlucky ones whose duty it was to ford the Akxlder River under the lire of CTunje’s riflemen. He happened to drop into an Auckland hostelry the other day. A quiet. gentlemanly old fellow was seated at the table. ••’Am 1 mistaken ?" be asked. “Are you an old campaigner V “Em not a soldier now, but r went through the South African War." was the reply. ‘■'Where-' asked the elder man. Further conversation led to the fact that both were in the Roy a 1 Buckinghamshire Regiment in 1900. The elder man was a captain and his newlydiscovered comrade was a private.

NATIVE-BORN TREES. “It is becoming a reproach. the way we are planting so liianv exotics and neglecting our own characteristic New Zealand .trees,” said Aiiss Ellen Ar-lville at the Auckland City Council's meeting, when a request was before that body that Aferivale Avenue, Epsom, .should be planted with trees. Like so many <i the Auckland Streets, it rejoices in the name of Avenue, though quite destitute of anything leafy. Aiiss: Melville said she was sure there were many native trees that were quite suitable for planting in our streets, and site wished t’ .o c’ttncil t • seriously consider

using them in preference to the interminable foreign trees. The ALiyor (Air George Paildon) promised the matter would be given consideration when it came before the Parks Committee.

A HUMAN* PREFERENCE. “ Most of us instinctively approve a decent, honourable way of life. Most of us also prefer clean linen to dirty. Rut, when clean linen cannot conveniently be got-, some wii'l put themselves about a good deal, others not so much, to overcome the difficulty. This, we allow, is a matter of individual taste. Hut is our preference for hit'll and honourable livinjz no more than that f fs the rightness of the right, the nobility of heroic effort, iust a thing like clean linen, about which some people arc perhaps a shade too faddy, others a good deal too slack!'”—Canon Streeter, in his book " Reality.”