"WANTON AND GRATUITOUS INSULT."

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 2998, 22 September 1908, Page 7

"WANTON AND GRATUITOUS INSULT."

ASSYRIANS REPLY TO DR. PURDY. The remarks recently passed by Dr. Purdy, District Health Offber, upon Assyrians are much resented by their countrymen who reside in Auckland ''■"'■■' The doctor, it will be remembered, whtle classing the Egyptians as white livered curs, declared that the Assyrians were much worse, and he] wondered why Assyrians were allowed to live in this country. This has produced a rejoinder from two local Assyrian?, who in writing to the press say:-"Thiß is strong and oucrageous language to come from a Government official. That there are black sheep in every nation is beyond dispute, >and the doctor's own nation is no exception to this rule. It is unfair to brand a whole people for the shortcomings of a few. We have been repeatedly told ( of British fair play. Dr. Purdy has evidently neither learned nor practised it. We challenge this accuser of our people to state that we, proportionately speaking, compare unfavourably with a l like number of any Other nationality in this Dominion. Our answer is that we are a* law-abiding, perhaps more so, than any other given number. Let Dr. Purdy either substantiate his slanders upon an unoffending people or retiact and apologise for hurling at the Assyrians a wanton and gratuitous insult."