Page:Letters from New Zealand (Harper).djvu/349

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Letters from New Zealand
317

many parish churches, open to all. No doubt, only a few years ago at home, such Cathedral Services must have often seemed a mere farce. Hardly a score of worshippers in such places as St. Paul's, London, besides the officials. Happily, this is all changed today. Nothing has impressed me more in the course of my occasional holidays than the crowds which may be seen in such buildings, not merely on Sundays. I think we may be sure that, as time goes on, it will prove the great value of the efforts and self-sacrifice made by the churchpeople of Christchurch to build their cathedral. We owe much to the foresight and generous enthusiasm of the founders and pioneers of the Canterbury Settlement.

I have been much struck lately by the appreciation, freely expressed by numerous visitors, of the beauty of our New Zealand homes. They do not only speak of the scenery of the country, which attracts so many, but of the way in which the homeliness of the Mother Country has been reproduced: "It is England all over again! cottages, gardens, country houses, plantations, orchards, tennis lawns and pleasaunces, such as one never expected in a country only occupied a few years ago." I explain that much is due to the character of the people who have made it their home, bringing with them their old traditions and customs. New Zealand owes something to its remoteness. There has been no indiscriminate inrush of immigrants. The people throughout may be said to be a picked lot. And of late the Government have taken precautions to exclude "undesirables." No one can land without something in his pocket to enable him to make a start in earning a livelihood. It is a country which invites the home instinct of our race. Very