THE CHURCH IN NEW ZEALAND MEMOIRS OF THE EARLY DAYS

New Zealand Tablet, 27 August 1908, Page 12

THE CHURCH IN NEW ZEALAND MEMOIRS OF THE EARLY DAYS

(Contributed.)

OTAGO (continued).

From the * History of the Catholic Church in Australasia 7 I extract the following:—' A Scotch, gentleman^ who made his .way to Otago a little before the gold fever set in, says thqt in "1851) the Catholic Church had no' position there. There were' no priests, churches, or tchqols in the whole district. In an interesting narrative this settler goes on to say : "An old priest Father Petitjean, was in the habit of coming to the district once a year, and traveling, all round.it, visiting evecy possible Catholic, some of them being often- as much as twenty or thirty smites apart. At this - peripd, there were only n inety Catholics in the whoje province, inching &, dozen or so in the City of. Dunedin Whea Father Petitjean. first arrived in the .City of "Dunedin he - was in rather a bad, position as regards, clothing. J*e had a swag on his back, and was accompanied by four o- five Maoris Mass was first cejeb^ed. in an. old bpttle store belonging, to '1 gentlsman named Burke. There .were about sixteen to eighteen people present, and among the primitive conveniences as an aid to the fulfilment of their religious duties Ay.as a small loft, which was got at by means of, a. ladder ascending from the ground floor. This, however, was not.the. first occasion on which Mass was celebrated in Dunedin, the- first being some years previous, when the Holy Sacrifice' wa« offered in a small wooden house in .he North-East Valley end of the city. The second, it is stated, was in even more strange surroundings, being in a skittle alky. On, the next occasion of a visit from a priest the resident Catholics secured the use of the courthouse from the Government. Strange to say, in this courthouse justice anj religion were dispensed frequently, for, after the Catholics had thuse of it in the. morning the M^Hodists held their services then* . in the evening, while the. business of the court was attended to throughout the week- This state of matters - continued for severa) years, til| finally Father Moreau arrived among the <*ood people of Otago from the North Island, and on the commencement of gold mining in the province a very large rush of minerlook place from Aus'-alia and ebewljere, and the littk congre gation of old colonists their numbers suddenly increase I to a multitude of adherents. The Rev. Father Moreau was then formally appointed, and sent from the' North Island 'to labor in this new vineyard of the south. He was a Maris* Father a saintly and good old man, and he had no sinecure before him as his labors extended over the whol* province of Otago Wherever there wns -i Catholic in need of instruction or cor. solation, Father Morexa did not spare himself to attend to them - No matter in what part of the back country his services were . leqmred, or what dangers he had to face in the shape of wild mountain track, or dangerous rivers 10 cioss -mbridged, nothing could det:er h:.n from doinp. his duty, and re attending to those in need of- His servicas. . On one occasion, coming back from v mission of this- character along a wide range of hill"- country . which lies between what is' now the town of Lawrence""and th-> C.ty of Dunedin, he was suddenly stopped by a mob of bushl -rangers, who tied him up to a tree in a gully on the slope of. th* Maungatua range, their purpose being robbery; but on discover \li u ac T c f g they relea3ed him -- and 'fctwii :*,.«•.■ FaYhV- 2' i°°? *?e? c **? ™ var <* * a better; world .Father Moreau, dunig his missionary' labors in' buned n i, bull a comfortable wooden presbytery and a small brick" church. On North Vf 1 mm l hh ° P MM ° ran> hC wa *. transferred **" North Island, where he labored as a missionary 'atnoVg. tot .Maoris fall tne d,y of his death, which occurred at Safu a the end of. l 88 3 or the beginning of ,884. , He wiffi^ Maon scholar, spoke the language like a Native,' anPwas'^ tlCularlyt IC ularly suited for his work.' .?,

An Appreciation*. -- ' ' Writing at the time of the, Right Rev. Dr. Moran's death, a well-known journalist, now .a, prominent Parliamentarian, state 1 apropb; of Father Mote&u and Vrei'uous rimes in Otago :— ' The fact- th_a.ti the Protestant clergy actually rose above any narrow feeling ..in the hqur of the Catholic people?s . grief, reminds in--. of 3 notjess sqlemn kove-taking in the Edir burgh of the South though, on fchat occasion it was' a' farewell the- people spoke to a living. man^l refer to. the. departure' from Dunedin of dear old Father. Mxjreau (if I do not spell his name correctly, I claim the. indulgence of those who knew it better than myself).- Everyone in the city expressed and felt the" deepest sorrow when- that oil man left them to take up "the work of a missionary among the Natives of the Wanganui -River region, and the scene at tha* farewell was one that wjll never fade from, the memory of thosejwho witnessed it. Father Moreau— peace to his ashes—was'a-well-known figure on the Otago goldfields in- the early days, and I have often heard the diggers tell how much they loved the old man who, staff in hand and with his swag" upon his back, tramped over mountains and swam rivers that he might reach the men ,who had gone into the then mountain fastnesses in their pursuit of the preciojs metal. Many a sturdy Protestant listened with reverence to that old priest when, setting up his altar in a digger's tent for want of a better housing, he addressed loving words to those who had little time to listen to religious teachers. They would always assemble, though, to hear the simple story, told in broken English, of man's redemption. Has that race of missioners ended, I wonder? Or is it that the opportunities for that sort of thing no longer occur ?

' What wonderful changes there have been since the pioneers of civilisation made their way from the first rush to Gabriel's Gully up through the interior of Otago to the Dunstan and on to Fox's— now and for many years called the Arrow— along the liver to the iz-Mile ; then at Arthur's Point and Big Beach, and away up to Maori Point and Skippers on the one hand, and to Moke Cieek and Moonlight on the other! I can remember when the journey up the Arrow and Shotover Rivers was a perilous thing indeed, and in fancy I can still see the pack-horses creeping along the bridle tracks, past dizzy precipices, and sliding down or clambering up steeps that it seemed sheer madness to attempt. But a few years ago all stores, timber, and other material for the mines had to be packed from the Arrow and Queenstown to Macetqiwn and Skippers ; but there was plenty of gold getting, and there was an air of prosperity that did one good to note. In the winter months it was a marvellous sight to see laden pack-horses, with shoes cocked and roughed, literally clawing their way along the narrow mountain tracks. Nowadays, there are roads for wheeled traffic to most of the old fields, and 1 had the honor of being one of the party who made the first journey to Macetown along the road .made for vehicular traffic from the Arrow. Then there was made the dray road from M.Uer's Flat to Skipper's Point, and to-day I read in the Post of a woman having driven a team to Skippers and back ! The correspondent who supplies the information to the Wellington paper says :~" I am confident in saying the drive to Skippers and back has never till" now been performed by a lady. A visitor to Queenstown (Miss P. Maunder) from the North Island drove a pair of horses there and back the other day. The distance is twenty miles or more. It would be almost impossible to conce,ve a mpre difficult or dangerous road to drive. After crossing the Saddle (some 4000 feet high) the road descends rapidly It .s excavated out of the face of a clif*. and often not thirty feet without a sharp turn. Hundreds of feet below the river rushes. Another great danger lies in meeting teams, as the road is not wule enough, except in certain places, to pass. However, four or five were met on this occasion, and much surprise was evinced to see a lady handling the ribbons so well and gracefully " To weather, this account will read like a romance ' In -the course of a sermon at St. Joseph's Cathedral on the zzr^i oSTtj? the jubnee ° f otag ° (( ' 8^ £ Very Rev. J, ONe.H, o f Milton, spoke (in part) thus :-• Piftye.ght years ago the first Christian missionary,, Bishop Pompallier appear**, at Otago Heads. '.In the "SanTta Maria- he w^ around.the coasts ministering to those engaged in the whS rade, and preaching the Gospel to the Native race! W P*Sat 7s "t0 . Ume tIU pr ° VinCe was **»*. *££

with their swags, over trackless wastes. . Catholicity in Otago earner ' m T nSe inCfeaSe fr ° m thG VktOrian ««»«. who came h.ther .n the early sixties. In a few years the Holy See m response to a petition, established a bishopric in the proving'

(To be continued.)