A VALUABLE COLLECTION.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 113, 2 November 1911, Page 4

A VALUABLE COLLECTION.

Some little time ago Mr. W. H. Skinner, with that publie-spiritedness which has' always characterised him, offered to present to the town his collection of Maori curios and antiquities. But he made it a condition that the public should provide a building where they could be safely housed. The offer was a magnanimous one, and it deserved to have been accepted with enthusiasm. In some towns such a generous impulse would have been greeted with cheers, and there are some municipalities in this Dominion which would in all probability have had the necessary fireproof building well on towards completion by now. This is no ordinary collection. Mr. Skinner has made the collection of these curios and historical records a consuming recreation for long years past, and he lias become possessed of many articles of which there is no known duplicate. There are stone t.mings which are said by the Maoris to have been brought with {hem from the island whence they came. There are stone images, implements of war and implements of industry belonging to » faraway age. The. value of the collection cannot, lie assessed. A wealthy curio hunter would probably be glad'to pay from ten to twenty thousand pounds for it. Are we going to let slide this opportunity of securing for the town this wonderful treasure of the Maori days of yore? We trust that some of our wealthy men will take up the matter and start a list handsomely. From what one hears, there are many old volumes and old relics of early Taranaki which would be gladly vested in the public were their owners assured that these would be safely housed. In days to 1 come tliey must be highly treasured.