THE FUTURE NEW ZEALANDER

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 166, 7 August 1909, Page 1

THE FUTURE NEW ZEALANDER

PROPHECY BY SIR ROBERT STOUT. A DIFFERENT ENGLISHMAN. London, -25 th June. _ Sir Robert Stout, speaking at the New Zealand dinner on Monday evening, took us his text a little incident that occurred i'ii his steamer on the passage. Home. Somebody wanted to know if some ol the passengers were Australians—they were all speaking English. Jt was sometimes necessary, said Sir Robert, to define a New Zeala'nder. Some people believed they were a colored race, in some respects they were English. The pioneers had come from England. Scotland, and Ireland, carrying with them their household goods and house hold gods. Their ide_a.s and principles ivere those of England, but now that he came to England he discovered that the New Zealanders did not possess all the ideas and principles of the English. Tu flucneed by our surroundings, we had changed them. The future New Zcalander had not yet been made. He was still English. But climate and institutions would change him, and in the end - wc should have a variety of the English race. Our country was one of mountains and plains, the whole physical features quite different from those,of England. And the physical features of » ■ country had a great effect on the ra"e. 'Hear, hear.) Compare the Highlander with what the Highlander would call the flat-footed Saxon, and see the difference. (Laughter.) The Highlander had the imagination and the poetry that the man in the plains did not possess. Imagination and idealism would he. limnd. too. in tlie mountainous districts oi New Zealand. Our different sun and other climatic conditions would produce differences in the race. . The future Now Zealandor, if Mncaulav could have pictured him, would not lie like an Englishman, and lie would not *pe;ul his time sitting on a broken-down, bridge. He would have more idealism than the Kllg-ll-'hwan. more alertness, more poetry, and more imagination. lie would be a different variety of the English race, and they intended, with their free edir* cation, to make him a belter one. The highest possible education would soon be free to all. If England had the same proportion of her young men getting a l.'nivcrsity education that New Zealand had. the number of undergraduates here would lie more than doubled. If the democracy was to lie saved they must have the highest passible education. (Hear, hear.) The Press, too, was' an , important factor of education. He believed they had no evening paper in London, except perhaps the Westminster Gazette, which he considered the best of their papers. (Laughter.) Yes, he was not iullfionced by the political aspect o fthe papers at all. Next to Tin Times, the ilornipg ll'ost was the best morning paper, There were two or three evening papeN in small New Zealand belter than those in Loudon. (Heir, hear,) They had more intelligent ami better leading articles, more thought in them, and, what is more, they were much more judicial in tone, and not so partisan. (Applause.) The New Zealand papers were not "yellow" because they hail to appeal to an educated people. Education in future was going to make democracy possible. Here the restraints and customs of the past were in Hie Wood, 'flic history of the past was in the blood, and the people . did not know it. We had not these conditions, and so in the future the New Sicalander would be a variety of the Englishman, more artistic, more tolerant, more idealistic. As Emerson said, they would not hitch their waggon to the past, but to a star, and try, ever considering what the future would be, to carve out a life of high idealism, setting their face to the future and looking forward to a grander and a better race than the world had ever seen.

If England ha* as many drilled men fur her iiopiihilioii n- New Zealand had, .-he would possess an army of l'/ s millions. (Loud applause.) One. thing we must guard against was hcing degraded, ruined, and degenerated hy that species of social 1 ifc- under which millions did rot Snow where their next meal was to come from. F.ven if "we had to live comparatively poorly we might still lie a thoughtful people, a vigorous' rare, phvsicallv strong, intellectually great, and morallv pure. Then he cared nothing for riches and millionaires, naval ami military armaments, for they would have a great country and a noble history, n-iiTl thai would do no disgrace to thcEiHish nation even though it should be a variety dilferent from the race in Mie Homeland. (Applause.)