DAUGHTERS OF MAORILAND.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXIX, Issue 8392, 4 April 1907, Page 7

DAUGHTERS OF MAORILAND.

(By Charles C. ;Keade).

A GLIMPSE OF THE NEW ZEALAND GIRL.

lit is the privilege of a young man l to speak of a girl as a flower. New A Zealan.l girls are like flowers. T hey bud in an atmosphere of nature. Beside them, English girls are as blooms from the garden -some are purely hot-house creations. A life amongst bush-clad vales and rugged hi Hi, pointing to the purest of raia-w,wheel skies, is essentially a life of liberty. It is the environg ment that develops the typical girl of I Maoriland, with her merry eyes and a " laugh that makes the valley sweet ■with melody. She revels in freedom. Her 10/e of it becomes a prerogative which defies the customs and conventionalities of older countries. By it she loses neither freshness nor modesty. She is a law unto herself—the creation of a unique environment. So much libarty of thought and action compared with .what is permitted her English sister develops in the maid of Maoriland a. marked trait .independence. She thinks nothing ?*of catching and saddling her.own v horse, or riding alone. It is, just that spirit whichinfluencesiher-wholeilfe. She carries it into :her studies; it becomes , part of her social attainments—a foundation-stone; in the edifice of her domestic, experience. It ; Is identified -with an iinexhaustible: fund of energy, which .the climatic; conditions, and configuration of NeWj Zealarul undoubtedly develop. Thej two qualities taken together, and we; have this vivacious, bright4faced i maid of the Pacific emerging from the shores of her .wooded islets, a, creation of Nature, sweet .with the) innocence of childhood. ; Her capacity for energy.finds.many; distractions. A certain aphereiofdo-. mestic utility has to be .filled by almost • every New Zealand girl—an' outcome consequent jupontliviijgiin a ? community of scattered population.; Her out-of-door occupations are: usually vigorous. When.herrhack iis| turned out to grass, she.takes up a' hockey-stick and wields 'it with a rare will. To the young New Zealand girl especially hockey is.a passion.! She loses herself ; in enchantment with the game, and runs like a deer; —when the landscape is devoid of! man. Her enthusiasm igrowa ito.a; white heat. Hockey and,a.horse— ; f preferably a -log-yumper—trepreaent : L the height '.where enjoyment grows, dizzy. After that -fallows tennis and golf; maybe, a'little croquet. Her; pastimes are beyond .the reach, of thei • intruder, and iin that .she loses nothing. of womanliness .or naturail ireifinement.; Sport is the handmaiden .to her studies. She believes in JRuskin : when he says "idleness is a sin"— not much otherwise. The New Zealand girl is anxious to ''get on.": The life of the great -world without reaches her only in murmurs. . Her imagination builds upon its throbbing - cities and great activities. The > people who can participate in such , are, to her, a superior raee. Hence her desire to raise the level of iher 1 attainments so that she can .enter their lives. Therein she xe,veals ambition. Having once been "Home,'" iher Ideas of things are brought into focus „ with facts. Maybe she returns to r her own country with a higher appreciation of its attractions and conditions of living, but none the less relaxes the desire for progress j Born and bred in a country where live "political rights of women" are past discussion, she naturally takes a >,wider interest in the welfare of the, State and people. Her ideas flour- ■ iah unrestrained by the influences of .custom or association potent in ,older countries. She lives in the pure fresh atmosphere of the hills Until its sweetness becomes, part of iherse'f. The sense of the beautiful in her nature unfolds almost unconsciously in surroundings where pictur.esqueness passes from beauty to glory. She envies the English girl living in a land of picture galleries —galleries that to her are temples where art attains its highest expression.. Her thoughts are conceived in liberty. It is the force of the outer «torld that materialises them in tfcuth. Living in a community where abgeflce iof congestion tends to make people cosmopolitan, the New Zealand jgirl takes unbounded interest in other, people, particularly if they possess the charm of the English home training. She will stare at a man in a way that would scandalise an Early "Victorian spinster. It is a privilege that no false modesty debars her from using. If a man can speak with enlightenment of England. or of London particularly, dhe will listen to him with delight, for it is the dream of almost every maid in Maoriland to eome "Home." London itself is, to her, a wonderland of inexhaustible charms. The great city becomes an inspiration. She realises in it a conception of life and magnitude never to be effaced. When to her island home she returns, the force of contrast assimilated in her • mind by the throbbing life and sighs of the metropolis enables her to speak with discrimination. Her language is tinged with rapture at the glory of its galleries and concerthalls. She tells her friends with equal force the power of its wealth; the potency of its poverty. The latter convulses her with pity. Such degradation of life is beyond the flight of her imagination. Her democrati c instincts revolt against it. It is thus she gains an appreciation of social condition in her own country. To her the keynote of character is ■ freedom. She is the child of liberty. Her life is mingled with the glory of ' its surroundings and she comes down om the hills of Maoriland, sunfdssed and fragrant as the wiidflower that filled her childhood with dreams.