Too Many Guests!

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 381, 15 June 1928, Page 4

Too Many Guests!

Lunch was “Off” at Lyceum Club POPULAR LECTURES sYorried members of the Lyceum Club luncheon committee rail hither and thither yesterday with -puckered brows as they tried to arrange a few extra seats for the crowds of who wished to attend the monthly luncheon talk, an event in club life that j is growing increasingly popular. And all their efforts could not make the dining room accommodate all those who wished to attend. Mrs. a. E. Mulgan was the speaker, and she took as her subject “New Zealand Women and Leisure.” Miss Ellen Melville presided in the absence of Mrs. W. H. Parkes, whose daughter, Mrs. P. J. McClatchie, is seriously ill. The members passed a vote of sympathy to Mrs. Parkes and Mrs. McClatchie. Commencing her address by giving her interpretations of the word "leisure,” Mrs. Mulgan proceeded to draw comparisons between the amount of leisure enjoyed in New Zealand and in other countries. Mrs. Mulgan quoted Bernard Shaw, who had said that upon the right employment of the leisure time of the people depended the future fate of the world, and endeavoured to show how gratly mankind in general might benefit if only people would make the most of their leisure hours instead of frittering them away in useless trivialities. A DOUBLE ENTENDRE? Maude Royden, who had been impressed by the fact that New Zealand women were “very domesticated,” was also quoted by the speaker, who wondered if perchance there had not been a hidden sting - in the evangelist’s words. Miss Royden might, thought Mrs. Mulgan, have considered that New Zealand women had a lack of outside interests, or, again, perhaps she only meant her words as tribute to their housewifery, without any double entendre. The possibility of women having much more leisure time was stressed by Mrs. Mulgan, who declared that women themselves were to blame for_ the fact that they were always busy with some little task or other. Were women to cultivate the art of elimination in their homes, they would have much more time to spare. Most homes were cluttered up with meaningless ornaments and furniture that meant nothing except so much unnecessary work for the housekeeper, and Mrs. Mulgan pronounced the fate of all the frivolous little household gods that, with their Dresden china prettyprettiness or their gleaming surfaces, have endeared themselves to the hearts of so many housewives. They all meant work in accumulating and in keeping clean —so away they must go. No more may the little lady of eighteenth century Sevres porcelain smile coyly at her boy friend in a china group across the way. She has rj,Q. practical meaning, and if women are to enjoy leisure, as Mrs. Mulgan defined it, they cannot waste time qn such futile things as ornaments. The pride that looked to the amassing of possessions was false, said Mrs Mulgan, and in holding it in such high regard women were apt to lose sight of the finer things of life.