The White Ribbon. For God and Home and Humanity. WELLINGTON, FEB. 18, 1918. A NOTABLE PARCEL.

White Ribbon, Volume 23, Issue 272, 18 February 1918, Page 9

The White Ribbon. For God and Home and Humanity. WELLINGTON, FEB. 18, 1918. A NOTABLE PARCEL.

Our Dominion President has just received a box from America, which contains articles of great historic interest to White Ribboners. It is a gift from Mr Horn, Topeka, Kansas. The • box itself (whose dimensions are, roughly, 14 inches long by 6 inches wide and 5 deep) is made of wood from the old Kansas territorial Capitol at Lecompton, 20 miles east of Topeka. It was the seat of Government when the Free State men marched to Lecompton, overthrew the bogus Legislature, drove the Missourians across the border, and established a Legislature from which the present State Constitution and the State of Kansas was organised.

The box contains a gavel which is made from a billiard ball and a brevet-handle by a saloon-keeper of Osawatomie, Kansas, who decided to close his saloon and open a notion store after receiving a personal visit from Mrs St. John, wife of ex-Gover-nor John Pierce St. John, who made a public speech in the saloon, and pleaded for the closing of the liquor bars at Osawatomie, a> a step to a saloonless Kansas. The gavel was presented to Mrs St. John at Olathe, Johnson Coun y, at a public temperance meeting in July, 1880, and was used by her on her memorable tour through Kansas during the campaign 01 that year; it was beaten on the walls of the Kansas State Senate Chamber bv Mrs Mary Ellen Lease, and was wielded in a humorous manner by the famous Carrie Nation at Paola; Governor St. John pounded this gavel on the blot k at Denver, Colorado, in the Convcn tion when the liquor element lost their last hold on politics, and went down and out in that State.

The gavel was presented to Mr Horn October, iqi6, and is now held by him ; presented to Mrs Don, National President of the New Zealand W.C.T. L T ., as a mark of deep respect of the Kansas people to her, and to the organisation, as well as to New Zealand in general, trusting the souvenir will bring New Zealand the same or better conditions than Kansas, resulting in saloons being driven from the State. Mrs Don intends taking this gav"’ to Convention, and handing it over to ,>ur Custodian of Records. There is also a Ruler, made from American Fragrant Cedar, from the log house where Abraham Lincoln was born. It was given to Mr Horn’s father in 1863 during the Civil W ar, by the owner of the land where the log cabin still stood.