THE MAORI and HIS PRAYER.

King Country Chronicle, Volume III, Issue 113, 7 December 1908, Page 5

THE MAORI and HIS PRAYER.

Bishop Neligans' sweeping assertion concerning paganism has already been pretty ably refuted, but if any. further proof were required of the baselessness of his assertion, it could be found in a certain Maori who dwells en the Northern gumfields. Recently, the coloured gentleman visited the local store to replenish his larder, and the storekeeper, being a loquacious individual, casually asked how many children he had. The Maori explained that he bad eight—six girls and two boys. "Yes," he added, "my wife have six girls, one after the other. So I go down on my knees and ask the Lord for a boy. I said: 'Oh, Lord, you give me boy—l give him to you; I make clergyman of Well, the Lord sent the boy, and a clergyman now, sure enough." so," said the storekeeper; "I suppose you made a Wesley an parson of him, eh?" "What!" exclaimed the coloured gent. "Wesleyan? No bally fear. No Wesleyan for me. Py corry no! I great Rangitira. No Wesleyan, or Primitive Methodish. or Baptist, or Presbyterian for me. No! I make him Church of England parson. You bet!" And he went away, leaving the storekeeper pondering deeply over the vast knowledge of theology and denomination possessed by some of those to whom Bishop Neliagn and his followers would probably allude as Pagans.—- "Free Lance."