MELBOURNE MEMORANDA.

Otago Witness, Issue 2815, 26 February 1908, Page 82

MELBOURNE MEMORANDA.

By Michael William Stack.

No -v-a.inglo:ry pr-oirvp-fcs m-e to state tK&t this letter may be interesting to Ota go readers of the Witness owing to the fact that I taught schools at Blacks, Macraes Flat, Awamoko, Roslin Bush, Ban Hill, Alford Forest (the last two schools in Canterbury), Waitotara (Wanganui), "Tind Karamea (Nelson). Old colonists will also remember that I edited papers at Milton and Tuapeka. Many of my old New Zealand friends have emigrated to the "bourne whence no traveller returns." Thomas Bracken has been dead some years, and my friend James Macandrew is lost to sight, but to memory is dear. Now, having "chucked off my chest" this perhaps pardonable egotism, I will give your readers a memoir, superficial but authentic, of sayings and doings in Melbourne.

As to buildings, we are erecting a new Melbourne. Old identities in wood, stone, and brick are being levelled, and their place is usurped by thoroughly up-to-date buildings. . Large globular electric lights in front of unshuttered shops gives to Melbourne apparently one long day of 24 hours. This dazzling light in our streets has a good moral effect. It is not easy to steal when an electric searchlight acts * the part of a silent, unpaid detective, and the robberies that are perpetrated in Melbourne are chiefly remarkable for their audacity, the robber apparently acting on the maxim : " Always expect the unexpected." Our new Crimes Act has had a very good effect in clearing our streets of thieves, loafers, and prostitutes. The prostitute fs the real Borgia of the twentieth century. She should be labelled, numbered, uniformed, and located far away from respectable men and women. Collins street, our magnificent avenue of trades and professions, used to be the night -promenade of the foul women of Melbourne. Now, thanks to our new law, whereby thieves, vagrants, and prostitutes can be arrested on suspicion, no detail of crime being necessary, our leading street is remarkably free from the de-graded class, and ladies, homeward bound at night, need not fear contagion from a "fallen sister." Young native Australians . exist — men and women — who would be an ornament and useful in any civilised State. In learning, in athletics, they are facile prince ps. But this flattering side of the medal of young Australia has its reverse side. Wholesale condemnation is severely unjust, but the wholesale hero-worship of all young Australia receives a violent 6lap in the jaw when we read our morning journal, or when we travel in a cheap excursion steamboat or train. There is an atrociously bad Australian young man. He earns good wages where very little intellect is demanded. Of pure English he is ignorant. With defiled, filthy English, with loathsome ideas, miscalled jokes, his tongue and mind is over-supplied. He eats too much meat, he is continually gambling. and he hates continuous ! honest labour. He has many so-called sweethearts oi his own class, and he is made by his " bits of skirt " (euphemism) for "girl ") to believe that he is an incandescent Apollo Belvidere. As a matter of fact, he is an agent-general of Satan. His greatest delight is to stone old men and to assault young girls and old women. I will not say that he is always a coward, but his courage is solely the result of innate blackguardism and muscular strength. It is a great relief to turn from this photo, qf young Australia to the young Australia of the university and the cricket field. There is one thing, however, I must regretfully say about even the superior sons and daughters of young Australia: the young men and young women of Australia are not fluent — not eloquent. They are not endowed with ideality.' If the superior young woman native approves of anything she hears she cor.fines her expressed appreciation to two monotonous parrot-words :> " That's right." One "thousand young men, one thousand young women in Melbourne will all appreciate in these two words: "That's right." They do not at all seem discomposed or startled by the monkey-like imitation — servile imitation — and flagrant absence of originality involved in the honestly bald phrase. He or she does not utter one solitary explanation, no detail, which tells why a certain thing, subject, or person is right. And yet every town has' a church, a library, and a newspaper. So far as detailed logical explanatory conversation is concerned the two sexes in lostralia I must take a very far back seat. But one subject does extort some eloquence. I allude to cricket and football. And goals | and "legs" and half backs do elicit a large amount of rapid tongue exercise from young Australia. I will say that hypocrisy ia almost non-existent in Australia. The men and women, young and old, may be, and are, tongue-tied out of business hours, but hypocrites they are not. As a rule, they do not assume a virtue and have it not. The Australian native young woman is not at all ashamed to have a sweetheart, and although numbers of them marry men almost as old as their father, the greater numbeT of female young Australians much prefer a young husband. Australia is a young country. Except old maids and old bachelors (I am one) we nave no ruins. Here men and women have a. splendid capacious field for original thought and original execution of original thought.,, But what do we find? The Australian young woman .who works a typewriter- has not Mie more spark of originality than has the . clever machine worked by her. "Not merely is the Australian young man and the 'Australian young woman a mere formal mechanic, but he and she Tesents any advice directing- her or aim to pass her or his emancipation act from the formal drudgery of mere machine work. Amusement, pastime — killing time — dancing, gambling — luese are the great obstacles in Australia to original thought, to o?'*sinal execution. As in America, our

patent office should be, but is not, a great institution. No invention, no patents, no original ideas! Ac machines or mechanics the Australian maid and man are to some extent efficient, but the Higher class _of competency will be conspicuous by its absence until amusement is converted into healthy relaxation. At present amusement is the ABC of Australia, instead of being the XV Z of Australia.

Melbourne traffic is very great, and very serious to life and limb. The 20, 30, and 40 miles per hour motor car is building up quite a record for accidents. " Look behind and before," must be the guide for all Melbourne pedestrians, cyclists, and horse riders. We have a block in Collins street. On Saturday between 10 -a.m. and noon this block is populated by the men and women who apparently have full purses, plenty of time, animal spirits, and who love " fun." As to fun, I may add that a certain type of men and women in Victoria say fun when they really mean vice. This fun, like oharity, covers a multitude of sins. The earliest evidence for a divorce case is fun, but when the plaintiff or co-respondent receives the bill of cost 6, the fun becomes pathos. We .have some attractive holiday resorts — St. Kilda,, near Melbourne, has a small open-air concert room where the English pierrots ligitimately appeal to the risible faculties at small prices. Like all places, St. Kilda has its poor people, but as a whole it is aristocratic. We have Gippsland Lakes, Mornington, Healesville, and Queenscliff and Sorrento. We have the Buchan Caves, recently discovered. Try anct imagine Esquimo land in the midst of semi-tropical Australia. The Buchan Caves might be called Fairyland in Scandinavia. Adjectives piled on adjectives could scarcely adequately depict these wonderful caves. The prismatic glories of the stalactites hanging therefrom transport the looks on to an " Arabian Nights " entertainment. Not in Arabia, but in Lapland. Our State Government are doing now what should have been- done years ago — making the caves known, — and I may- here say that many lessons can be learnt from New South Wales on the subject of advertising summer holiday places. The cheapness, the easy exit and ingress of the beautiful rivers and bays near Sydney is beyond all praise, but Victoria is slowly awakening to a due 6ense of responsibility. 'Our leading, statesman is Mr Thomas Bent. This erstwhile market gardener has the energy of 10. average men. He is our Seddon — he is not polished. He is an Australian Oliver Cromwell, a Bluff King Hal. He is acute, and has a quick perception of the motive of his fellow men. To use a slang word, he is not easily " had." If Bent had been in Paradise, and vizier to Adam, I believe " our Tommy " would have outwitted the serpent. Another John Bull is Sir William Lyne. He acts in politics much in the way that a bullock driver act 6 with his team. Lyne can both bark and bite. Mr Deakin is his opposite^— suave, diplomatic, learned, oratorical, painstaking ; oui Alfred is always the gentleman. You will see how our Senate is afflicted with either Socialism or anarchy when you read of what Senators Largie and Stewart spoke about the murders in Lisbon. Yes, we have both -Socialists and Anarchists — the Socialists striking at the root of individual ambition, the Anarchists laying the hatchet to tne root of the whole social system, and accompanying each stroke with th© words, "Destroy, level! level!" We have German Socialism and Anarchy, Irish Home Rule, Russian Nihilism, and about 90 Christian sects.

The Roman Catholics vie with our city hotelkeepers in having the best city cites. The Scots Church is largely independent ,of pew rents and the collection plate, as the elders own valuable property. Dr Bevan, of the Congregational ChuTch, is paid his £800 salary by the renting of j the Congregation Hall. His church is not [ half full mi Sundays. The Rev. Mr Edgar 1 (Methodist) keeps closely in touch with the poor, and yearly gives a tea to all folk over 60. The exalted Australian > Church has for its minister Dr Strong, who was sent away from the Scots Church on of alleged heresy. The proximity of the Australian Church to the Unitarian Church is against the interest of the Unitarian congregation.

Reverting, out of place, to. holiday places, I should not omit referring to Sorrento, which can be'cheaply reached by steam boat from the city. Sorrento, if not discovered by George Coppm, was largely advertised by that recently deceased comedian, manager, speculator, and legislator. Sorrento is an ideal holiday rendezvous; it has both hill and plain. The air and -water are pure ; the back beach of the ocean is grand. In Sorrento there are two trams — one run by steam, one drawn by horse. The Continental Hotel is now a success under the control of Mr and Mrs. Benson.

Both at front and back beaches there is mixed bathing. The citizens will soon have a new theatre, built, strange to say, on land recently occupied by both saints and sinners. The former tenants of the land were the V.M.C.A. and Tattersall's Club. Meynell and Gunn declined to sublet the Theatre Royal— rent, £100 per week, — and Holt and Anderson agreed to build a new playhouse. Now, I conclude. On April 7 I sail per Ortona for Europe, after 51 years absence. I trust that my old Otago friends may ihave a happy new year, and I hope that the Otago Witness, wherein in the past I have written - much, may live long and* prosper.

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