OUE PUBLIC SCHOOLS COLUMN.

Otago Witness, Issue 2894, 1 September 1909, Page 86

OUE PUBLIC SCHOOLS COLUMN.

FOB SENIORS AND JTJNIOIIS. (Couductecl by Mkaisrzn to whem all communications must .be addressed.) "THE MAN WITHOUT A COUNTRY." Refea-enoe was, made neccntlj in the Daily Tunes to the death of Edward Everett £> ,_ J 066 * h «it a simple narrative which he wrote— l don't know whether it was true or fake — made him as famous as anything else he penned. I refer to the etory of NoWs lif«. This I read some tune ago and because I thought it one of the strongest incentives to patriotism, written I made extracts from it, to use eoiae u»y. And why not now? We have the Defence League, the Empire League, the Navy League— -ail to awaken in us a just appreciation of our duties as citizens of a great Empire. Unfortunately we have among us many who do not seem to have any conception of what love of country means, and it i s these I wish to read the extracts. . - - -Nolan had committed a wrong, but'jiras as much sinned against as sinning. " The " big flies - escaped," and on him - fell the brunt. Suffering under the injustice, when tried by court-martial he eaid he did not wieh to hear the name " United States " mentioned again. But let' Dr Hale narrate what took place : — " D— n the United States ! I wish I may never hear of the United States again !" Colonel Morgan, who was holding the court, was terribly shocked and asked the officers constituting the court to retire to his private room. In 15 minutes he returned with a face like a sheet and eaid : " Prisoner, hear the sentence of the court. The court decides, sabject to the approval of the president, that you never hear the name of the United States again." The whole room was hushed dead as night. The President's assent was presumably obtained, for a paper of intruetions to the captain of a Government vessel contained the following :— " Sir, — You will receive from Lieut. - Neale the person of Philip Nolan, late a lieutenant in the United States Army. "This person, on his trial by courtmartial, expressed with an oath the wish that he might never hear of the United States again. - " The court sentenced him te have his wish fulfilled. " You will take the prisoner on board your ship, and keep him there 'with such precautions as shall prevent h\. escape. " You will provide him with euob quarters, rations, and clothing as would be proper for an officer of his late rank, if he were a passenger on your ves&?l on the business of hie Government. " The gentlemen on board will make any arrangements agreeable to themselves regarding his society. He is to be exposed to no indignity of any kind, nor is he ever unnecessarily to be reminded that he is a prisoner. " But under no circumstances is he ever to hear of hie country or to s*e any information regarding it; an<l you will specially caution all the officers under your command to take care that, in the various indulgences which may be granted, this rule, in which his punishment is involved, shall not be broken. "It is the intention of the Government that he shall never again see the country which he haa disowned. Before the end of your eruke, you will receive orders which will g-ive effect to this intention." And so commenced his life'e exile. He was allowed to wear a regulation army uniform, but was not permitted to wear the army button, for the reason that it bore either the initials or the insignia of the country he bad disowned. Hence he was sometimes called " Plain Buttons." It is almost inconceivable that a man could spend years of his life and not hear hardly any mention of his country. But so it was. Once, however, when on shore — I thank it was in the Mediterarnean — at a dance he met a former friend, a young lady, now married, to whom he said. " And what do you hear from home, Mrs Graff?" Almost transfixing him with a cold, penetrating stare, she said : " Home ! Mr Nolan ! ! I thought you were the man who never wanted to hear of home again 1" and walked away.

Take another instance t On one cruise & parcel of English books tame on board, and amongst them was the newly-published " Lays of the Last Minstrel." The officers formed a reading circle, and Nolan was permitted to join in, no one dreaming that there was anything of a national nature in it. It came to Nolan's turn to read. <- Poor Nolan," the narrative says, " read steadily through the fifth canto, stopped a minute and drank something, and then "began, without a thought of what was coming, — Breaches there a man, -with soul so dead, Who never to himself hath said — It seemed impossible to us that anybody ever heard this for the first time; but all these fellows did then, and poor Nolan himself went on, etill unconsciously or mechanically — This is my own, my native land! Then they all saw something was to pay; but he expected to get through, I suppose, turned a little pale, but plunged on, — Whose heart bath ne'er within him burned, As home his footsteps he hath turned From vMtndering on a foreign strand? If such, there breathe, go, mark him well. By this time the men were all beside themselves, wishing there was any way to make him turn over two -pages,- but he had not quite presence of mind for that; he gagged a littie, coloured crimson, and . jstaggeted on, — For him. no mmartrel raptures swell ; 'High iEough his titl«s, jarovd Ms name, Boundless Jiw .-wea&h *s wish. can claim, Desfrito thefce titles, power,- sad pelf,. The wretch, ooacenftrecr all in self.— and here the poor fellow choked,, could not go on, but started np, swung the book' into the «ea, vanished into his •state-room, and wasn't seen again for two months. . He never read aloud again, unless it was something he was sure of, such as the Bible or Shakespeare. Bat it was not merely that. He never entered in with the other young men exactly as a companion again. He was always shy afterwards, and generally had the nervous, tired look or a heart-wounded man. On another occasion a number of negroes were rescued — from a slaver, if I remember rightly, — eaid Nokun, who was the only one who could make hwnfl&M known to thed. told them where the captain proposed to land them Here, again, as the foMowinig will show, Nolan was in a ipiathetioaAly awfcwanl position: — "Tell tibem that I will take them all to Cape Palmas; but this did not answer so well, for, to all intents anr. purposes^ that was as far away from their luwne as New Orleans or Rio Janeiro was — that is, they Troxild be eternally separated from home there. Their leader, therefore, began to propose infinite other expedients in most voluble language. Vaugiiain. wanted to know what he was saying. The drops stood on poor Nolan's wlhite forehead as he hushed the men down, and said, " He says, *Take us home* take us to our own country, take ua to our own homes, iiako us to our own picaninnies and our own women.' He Bays he has an oid father and mother, who win die if—tinay do not see him. And this one says he' left his people ail »ck, aaad paddled i down -to Ferineui*) to *beg the ivthite doctor \ to co*ne and help' them, and that, these j devils oaug&ffc him in the to.y, Just in sight of home, and iih*t he has never seen anyone *rom home since then. And this, aae sa-ys," he^ further .jfcoked^u*,, "thajb he. has. not heard a word frnm his \.bome' n» '•» , months, -while he has been locked np in an infernal" barracoon. Veug>han always £aid he gTew grey himself while Nolan struggled through this interpretation. * Yee, j yes^ yes/ ne replied, 'tell them they shall , go to th» Mountains of the Moon, if they will.' And after some faihion, Ncion did so. And then tibey all fell to kissing him again, and wanted to rub his nose with theirs." How he fek can faintly be estimated by the advice he gave tp a young man: — '' Youngster, let that show you what it is to be without a family, without a home, without a country. And if you are ever tempted to aay a word or do a thine that shall put a bar between you and your family, -vo" r home, and youa- country, pray God, in His mercy, to take you that instant home to His own heavea. Stick by your family, boy ; write and send, and talk about k. Let it be nearer and nearer to yonr thottfht, ihe farther you have to travel from it; and rush back to it when you are free, as ifoti poor black slave is doing now. And for your countay, bay, and the words rattled in his throat, mud for tite* flag," and he pointed to the ship, "never dream a dream but of *ervin« her as she bids yon. though the service carry you through * thousand hells. Ttfo matter , wbasfc happens to you, no matter who flat- ■ ters you or abuses you, never look at another flag, never let a night pass but you pray God to Mess that flag- Remember, boy, the* behind all these men you have to do with, behind oflßcers, and &»- vernment, and people even, there is the conntiy hen-self, your country, and that you belong* to her as you belong to your own mother. Stand by her, boy, as you would stsawl i>y jout mother, i£ tfaose devils there had got hold of her to-day." How, when he knew that death was approaching, he had the development and history of tiie United States outlined for him, is intensely realistically told, but 1 11 pass on to the end. I should nave said before, perhaps, that the narrative is assumed to be toid by one who, at the last, wa« in Nolan's confidence: — " He asked me to bring him the Presbyterian ' Book of Public Prayer,' which lay there, and said with a smile that it W( >H~ open at the right place— and so it did. There was his double red mark down t&e page; and I knelt down and read, and he repeated with me, 'For ourselves and our country, 0 gracious God, we thank Thee that," notwithstanding our maaufoW transgression* of Thy holy laws, Thou hast continued to us Thy rnarveilous kind-jtes-^'-^and so to the end of that tnanKS- . giving. Then ho turned to the end of the same book, and I read the words more familiar to m- : ' Most heartily we beaeeon Tbee with Thy favour to behold and bless Thy servant, the President of the Dnated States, a»d all others in authority,'— and the rest of the Episcopal collect. JJanfowl,' said he, 'I have- repeated those prayers night and morning, it is now 55 years.' And then he said he would go to sleep. He bent me down over him and kissed me; and he said, 'Look in my Bible, Danford, when I am gone.' And . I went away. " Almost .immediately after he breathed his life away in a ftmile, and Danford looked into ifae Bible where a slip of paper marked these words : * They desire ft country, even a heavenly : wherefore God is not aeheoned to be celled their God.:, for

He hath prepared for them a city.' On the paper he had written : ' Bury me in the sea ; it has been my home, and I love it. But will not someone set up a stone for my memory at fort Adams or at Orleans, that my disgrace may not be more than I ought to bear ? Say on it : In iieta'ty of Philip Nolan Lieutenant in the Army of the "United States. Hie loved his country »s no other man has loved her; But no man deserved less at his hands." What do you think of it? Do you think the reading of these extracts will make you love your Empire with an intenser iove?