Page 2 Advertisements Column 7

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 190, 23 September 1909, Page 2

I "One of my most pleasant experiences in my recent trip to Queensland was tin*, meeting with an old friend and newspaper colleague of a quarter of « century ago," said Mr. Holiert IMI, oi Ashburton, to an interviewer. "A dozen 1 .vears ago this gentleman (Sir. ]Sanliclii) ; became so sick and tired of his dai'v contact with humanity in his calling as a journalist that he decided to quit til. l lmunts of men and live i n seclusion anl voluntary exile 011 an island oft the Xorth Queensland coast. 11c applied if, the Queensland Oovernment, niul had Dunk Island, the C'oonangleliah of the Macks, transferred to him in fee simple. And there, in the company of his wi'e and two blacks (aboriginals), he has lived the simple life for twelve years His justification for this eccentric acti.m may be best expressed in the words o' Jlioreau: If a mail does not keep paoe with his companions, perhaps it is because lie hears a different drummer. U't 'linn step to the music which h hears.' [ met him on the deck of a steamer that was passing the island. »Vc adjourned to the sitting-room. and there, lie told me something of his life on the island, and his reasons for taking it. up. all of which may he found' in extenso i„ his book, The Confessions of a Beachcomber.' The conversation | may he summed up lU > follows:—"! have lived a dozen yearn on the island ml feel n. dozen years younger.' Anil he , looked it. Sincii the publication of his hook he has become famous, and has received letters from all over the globe from meji of high and low de»rce alike all anxious to know move about his mode of life and whether he has found tho philosopher's stone,"