The Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR P.M. Resurrexi. WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 21, 1881.

Thames Star, Volume XII, Issue 4050, 21 December 1881, Page 2

The Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR P.M. Resurrexi. WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 21, 1881.

The arrival of another Mormon Mission party to New Zealand by the last San Francisco mail deserves some comment by the Press of the colony. The mission is composed of six persons, among which will be found a late Timaru convert. They are staying at the Gorernor Brown Hotel, Auckland, where they tan be inter* viewed. They are by no means a prepo* sessing lot of men in masculine eyes, whatever they may be in feminine. They are ascetic in their diet, and not sociable in tbeir bearing, as though they bad determiued during their pilgrimage to mortify the flesh for the impurity of tbe soul their Utah surroundings produce. Of course

they come here women hunting, with the chance of picking up some credulous and not over-witted man with money. By same mail that the Mormon Elders came, we also obtained the October number of the Fortnightly, which contains a paper headed "The Latter Day Saints as they are," by Edward A. Thomas. Prom this paper, in the interests of morality, quotations are made. He says: —" The system of proselytising is now carried on with more skill and energy than j over. Numerous missionaries are sent] from every conference to Great Britain, j Scandinavia, Australia, and the Southern { States. As the converts pour into Utah,' new colonies are plaited in every adjoining State and territory. Laws are enacted by the Mormons rather for the encouragement of licentiousness, than for the prevention of vice. When trains loaded with emigrants reach Salt Lake City, the apostles and the dignitaries of the Mormon Church—men, sleek and opulent, gather to receire them ; and to gather for their own harems fairer and more youth* ful inmates. Until this object is accomplished other brethren must remain in the back ground, and gaze in silence. Some time since one of the twelve cast his odious glances upon a girl from Denmark. He was nearly sixty, she was not over eighteen. The desires of the great apostle were intimated to her by a Danish Bishop. She acknowledged that the union with so high a dignitary of the Church would confer great honour upon her, but confessed that a young countryman of hers had won her affections during the voyage, and that she had promised to marry him on the following day. She supposed that that statement would settle the matter. She was told, however, that she must not resist the wishes of one of the anointed of Israel. She remained firm. The expectant bridegroom was next interviewed by the bishop, but with no better success. Great surprise was expressed by the priesthood at such contumacy. The will of one of the twelve was not to be gainsaid. That nigjitr the maiden was forced into his harem." The next morning her lover, the viclim^f the Danites, was found alive but mutilated in a glen of the Wahsatch mountains." Such is one phase of Mormon life, described by an impartial witness in one of our leading London monthlies. One other extract, and we conclude these prurient details. Mr Thomas says :— "Seduction is common in Utah, and as the result becomes manifest the girl is saved from open shame by being made the third or fourth wife of her seducer. He may soon tire of her, and procure a divorce. She will enter another harem as the wife of another polygamist. By these methods of procedure, one woman may, at the age of forty, have had several so-called husbends, all of whom are at that time alive. But the worst features of the custom is that a woman hitherto specially virtuous is frequently divorced and compelled by the usages of the country, and by the necessities of life to follow the same course," In another issue

we shall deal with the Mormon doctrine of blood atonement. One as revolting as the polygamy of the Latter Day Saints.