“A ROYAL HOLIDAY.”

Manawatu Herald, Volume L, Issue 3946, 23 May 1929, Page 3

“A ROYAL HOLIDAY.”

SIR. HARRY LAUDER. ON NEW’ ZEALAND. “I came to New Zealand with one idea in any mind, to have the first royal holiday I have ever experienced in my life,” said Sir Harry Lauder 1 , speaking at ‘Tuesday’s luncheon of the Wellington Rotary Clulb. “I was not feeling too good. -In fact, when I left Bonne I was practically an old man. I felt it, and I suppose I looked it. too. But after my sojourn in New Zealand, I challenge any man,of 25 to-day for anything.” (Laughter and applause). Sir Harry described his visits to the far south and the far north of New Zealand, liis shark* fishing in the Bay of Islands, his trout-fishing at Lakes Rotorua and Tanpo and on the Waikato River, and his Atlantic salmon-fishing on Lake Te Annu. There was a great satisfaction in fishing in Now Zealand, he said, for, if you caught a fish, you got something really worth while. He went ou!t. (fishing ten nights on the Waikato and caught 3fi rainbow flront, the smallest of which weighed 4Mb. and the largest 1041 b.; and he was getting the 104pounder and a. 9-pounder set up to show the people in the Old Country Hip fish they caught in New Zealand. He had .brought two special “minnows” out for the salmon-fish-ing on Lake Taupo, and he caught fish with them every tilme. “But at. last the salmon beat me,” he added. “They got away with the two minnows. Tt is all right, however, I got the minnows to try them. I got. them for nothing, so the shock of losing them was not extraordinary. (Laughter). It was just a quiet sadness.” (Renewed laughter). “The next, time I am thinking of having a holiday,” declared 'Sir Harry Lauder, “I am coining hack to New Zealand again. I think it is the most wonderful occupation in the world fishing in New Zealand. It. is worth coming all the way from Dunoon to New Zealand to catch these fish; and if I can spread the gospel of the beauties and the amenities, and the warm hospitality of New Zealand wherever Igo round 'the world,' I am going to do if.” (Applause). He finished by singing a song of his own composition, “Cronies of Mine,” with the refrain, “I am always in my glory with cronies like you.” “That is how I always feel when I’m with Rotary,” he i-elmarked amid loud nppl aiise.