AUSTRALIA'S VIRTUES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 345, 22 March 1910, Page 2

AUSTRALIA'S VIRTUES.

WHY MS. FOSTER FRASER LIKES COLONIALS. CIVIC PRIDE. London, February 4. Mr. Foster Fraaer, who has contested a seat at the general election unsuccessfully since his return from your part of the world, writes cheerfully and breezily 01 his trip to Australia and New Zealand. He likes Australians, and he evidently enjoyed his stay at the Antipodes immensely. Here are some of the traveller's snapshot impressions culled from this week's Sunday Chronicle:— "There are men who sneer at the Australian politicians chiefly Australians themselves. I don't. I liked them. They were good fellows, usually big, frank, open-minded men. The local barber may be the Minister of Defence. That is democracy. And though certain etories did trickle into my ears, I concluded that in none of the new countries of the world are politics cleaner and more honest than in Australia. Ali the Legislatures were miniature Westminsters, except that members read the newspapers when they did not want to hear each other. In one House, where I was introduced by the Premier and the Leader of the Opposition, I sat by "the Speaker. Mr. Speaker sent out for an evening paper, so that he might read about a hoise race. Fancy Mr. Speaker Lowther at Westminster—but no, you cannot iancy any such thing.

-THE POLITE AUSTRALIAN. "The Australian is a long-kggea rel•law. He is polite. I want to keep on saying he is polite until I get all the world to believe it. I was warned fifty times against going to Australia, for I would find him 'a bigger blow-hard than the man from Chicago.' That is not true. And I shall say it is not true whenever anybody says it is. The Australian has his faults—and one of these days I shall write what they are—but he is courteous, gentlemanly, and he is not always 'blowing.' He has a good heart, and his hospitality—well, anybody from the Old Country whom he Thinks decent he takes to, and will do anything for. The mischief ; .s that we cold-blooded, busy Britons have not the time to do the same in return. So many an Australian comes to England, gets a 'Glad-to-see-you, hope-you'xe-well, goodbye/ and goes home disappointed, and thinks we put on airs. He is £ot given to humor. He is silent and rather serious. The Australians are the most seri-ous-minded branch of the Anglo-Saxon race I have ever struck. Tliey do not laugh much. At St. KUda, near Melbourne, or Manly Beach, near Sydney, you will see the best dressed and most contented throngs oi holiday-makers in the world. But you will hear precious little gay talk, and laughter does not seem to be needed in this land of sunshine.

PRIDE OF TOWN. "The personal joy the Australian takes in the growth and beautifying of his town is something which should stir the Britisher who grumbles at his own town, but abuses any outsider who presumes to join in the grumbling. Here 5s a true experience. I was dining in Melbourne. The lady at my elbow sought my opinions, and I said the usual polite things. Then suddenly: She: You've never seen a finer place than Melbourne? I: Oh, I couldn't be so enthusiastic as that! She: What place is finer? I: Well—er—London is more intering, I should say. She: What has London got better than Melbourne? I: Oh—er—well, we've got Westminster Abbey, you see. She: 1 am sure your old Westminster Abbey is nothing to Melbourne Cathedra). I (with excessive politene?s): But have you ever seen Westminster Abbey? She: No, and I don't want to. Melbourne is good enough for me..•nd I think you're one of those Englishmen who think it is Tight to look down upon us.

"Dear, dear! She was quite a nice woman —and a very weli-kno>\vn woman in Melbourne society. She did not want to be rude. I saw that. Only she was going to stand up for Melbourne, and no globe-trotting newspaper man was going to swamp it under with his Westminster Abbey comparisons. Quite right, too. If I had been a Melbourne man I would, possibly, have acted the same. When you get civic pride like that—a bit blind, but genuine—you get fine towns. And Australia has beautiful towns—not only the big towns, but the smaller towns, nicely laid out, boulavarded, fitted with gardens, decorated ■with statuary, and all the rest. I have never made any secret that if I were a younger man I would like to settle in Australia."