The Giver and the Gift, by Judith Gouin (Judith Hogan)

My mother wrote a book back in about 1996. Here it is in its entirety
The Giver and the Gift book 1

cc
The Giver and the Gift

Judith Gouin

Dedication: This book is dedicated to all my sons – Gregory, Adam, Marcus and James, with all my love.

PART ONE
A thick mist engulfed Green Vale Lodge. It came down from the purple hills and shrouded all the Golden Vale of Tipperary, and stayed all winter. The superstitions abounded among the tenants of the large estate, and it was not wishful thinking. For it had been said many times before by the ones who had the sixth sense, that when the pale white cloud stayed that long, it was a sure sign that the angels were a-weeping. To lift that damp veil of cloud, there has to be someone born among them who by their very joyful inner grace and goodwill would impart the spirit of the angels’ loving hope.
Every time that had happened before, it was no ordinary occurrence. It was a definite shining thread woven in the web of belief in the life of Irish folk people. The Tuatha De Danann mysteries had filtered down through the many centuries despite the various efforts of the conquerors religions. Deep down in the utmost sacred secret haven of the group part of the Irish consciousness, the flame of the knowledge imparted an unexplainable inner peace. The ancient Irish truths were linked and bound by these stories that lived so strong in the lives of lovely simple folk, as they toiled and worked for years harboring the particular resentments of their landed gentry landlords. Foreigners from along time back, on our confiscated hallowed ground!
This lot the Gilroy’s had been here since William of Orange had cut up parcels of their land and distributed it out to the leaders of his hellish fighting officers. More than seven centuries before that the Gilroy’s had come across from Europe. Their stock had been from an illustrious family that had been active in service, and their Norman knights had taken a major role as Knights Templar during the Crusades. The chivalrous noble family name bore the meaning “God’s friend”. Their motto on their shield read “DUM SPIRO SPERO”, which when translated, meant ”WHILE I BREATHE, I HOPE”.

Sir Jeffrey Gilroy, the present owner of the estate, had the usual previous privileges that went with the landed gentry style He was a retired King’s Army Officer, and he now served on the Kings Benchas a Justice of the Peace, and was the area’s Parliament Representative. While many of his ancestors had earned the respect of the local people, Jeffrey Gilroy was thoroughly and intensely disliked by his tenants.

By reputation over the last twenty years, the servants at Green Vale Lodge had not a good word to say about the bombastic old tyrant. He treated them all alike with the same bullying tactics. His long suffering wife of nine years had all the expectation of a loving marriage and family life extinguished after many miscarriages and brutal beatings, for not producing him an heir to his prestigious landed gentry property. For the last five years the woman was an empty shell of her former self, to satisfy that bloated man’s desires was written all over her person. What came as a complete surprise was when she fell from her horse and was killed instantly. She was an excellent horsewoman, but the fog had clouded her judgment.
When the House Manager summoned all the staff to pay the Master the usual respects as it was a part of their duties, they found him in the massive reception hall, in an over stuffed chair staring at the mosaic, stone work of the floor. He didn’t raise his eyes to them, and in his pudgy hands held a spirit glass. The ship’s decanter of Waterford Crystal was almost drained of whisky. Solemn as judges, all the staff had assembled near the back door for mutual support of each other. In their sweaty working attire they felt lead-hearted at the duty ahead. Even the landed gentry had to die, as did everyone else, they all had that in common. Shrouds did not have pockets in them, so what use to them was all their fancy schemes and pretty plans to keep their money to only their approved ones.

Green Vale in it’s usual days of semi-clouded glory was a wonder to behold. It’s wonderful green fields stretching for miles often alternated with a patchwork of a forty acre of barley, rye, or oats. The cattle looked the best kept and best bred in all of Tipperary, and they fetched a tidy sum at the stock fairs. No need to push their good points as the reputation of the ownership’s management went before it. The horses also were in constant demand, and the Army would often buy the yearling foals. Neat hedges of tidy hawthorn marked out the roadside boundary of Green Vale. Mighty trees highlighted the rolling contours of the productive land right to three quarters ascent of the magnificent hills.
The huge mansion, so solidly built was in a very pleasing noble Georgian design. Eighteen generous rooms, with an expanse of small-paned glass windows, making them airy and light. The stately reception hall was resplendent with it’s beautiful and spectacular rosewood semi-circular staircase. The two large parlors had rosewood paneling to a height of six feet up to the twelve foot ceilings which had delicate plaster ornate work. Drapery of finest hand-loomed woolen drapes in a rich burgundy colour hung from rosewood window poles. Finest Brussels-made wool carpet squares of deepest ruby red, set with jewel colours in a paisley design, irked the maids. Every Monday their first task was to haul them outside and beat them clean. The solid comfortable chairs and sofas, were of a velvet plush fabric, dyed green, which had faded over the years to a paler shade of the moss of the outside stone-flagged steps.
Books in the library’s hand crafted glass fronted cabinets showed that the family had three professions. These were the military, theology, and the law. Large commissioned oil paintings flanked many of the walls, and on the staircase wall was a gallery of past generations of family members. The spinet in the large parlour, and the Irish harp, and the two fiddles were all polished to a mellow gleam. They were often used at the gatherings of the many visiting relatives as was the Waterford crystal, for it was the delight of the Gilroy’s to see the beauty of it in use. Games of chess and dominoes were encased in their own special tables, and pity help the girl if a piece became missing.

“Aye, they worked mighty hard to keep their assets in easily recognised condition, as if flaunting their wealth made them a better person”, whispered Tilly the sixty year old honest and capable cook.
‘Tis only the honest heart that has nothing to fear when we come to hit the cold wooden box”, replied John Malloy, the Managing man.
“They need us here so that they can live like this”, said Gideon Dockerty, looking at the rare sight of the front of the big house. He slid his greasy cap off and ran his calloused fingers through his dirty dull red hair as they neared the corpse area.
”Aye that’s so, and the mist is still hanging around. Means for sure that times are changing”, concluded Malloy now removing his tweed cap in readiness as they the big hall entrance.
“God love us and help us all! Is he asleep by chance?”, whispered Dockerty, into the cap in his shaking hand.
“Shh your talk. He’s drunk and he could sack the lot of us, if he hears you, you oaf!!, ” returned the senior man, taking in take sight of Jeffrey Gilroy.” He’s in a wild humour, ” observed Malloy. They all silently past the plain wood coffin, getting the deed over with. In utter amazement, the youngest servant who was a scullery maid, said in a loud hoarse whisper,
“The lady looks really happy at last bejeezus!”. The next sound was the crystal glass connecting with the coffin, and the hurried footsteps of the seven staff nervously beating a hasty retreat.
Alone he was now, except for the corpse of his late spouse.
“Women!”, the word reeked through his whisky-sodden brain, and sent a new fire of spite through his ugly aging body of thirty-four years. For the greater part of his life, he reacted to the female gender with venemous spite and violent sarcasm. Now the despicable behaviour was a rock solid rigid protection, and it ensured him that his heart would never again be wounded by any dammed she-bitch. His stone encased heart was guarded by the massive iron cannon of his booming rage which was ever ready to protect him.
Jeffrey rubbed the stump of his right index finger sullenly.

Small, sweet and soft she was, his mother Leah, and she was a child who bore a child. He came into the family by the back door, as was the usual Irish way of describing a bastard. He knew her for four years, and she was seventeen years old when her deformed heart gave out. She was a scullery maid here at Green Vale Lodge where her parents were also in service of their Master. They had lived in a damp, dark, musty tenant’s two room shanty. Considering that they laboured at the big house for nigh on sixteen hours a day for every day of the year, the hovel was only a space to lie down a labour-worn body to sleep and forget, until sunrise.
Leah, their only child, was their only ray of sunshine in their poor miserable lives. Her small delicate face always wore the smile of an angel. Her long fine loosely curled hair was the colour of butter, and her large almond-shaped eyes were like the colour of the violets that he loved to pick for his sweet-angel mother.
The Master’s sixteen year old only son, Richard, found her innocent beauty all too much, one spring night when the full golden moon connected them together in bewitched tender young love. Richard had one week before hand finished his formal schooling at the Church Grammar College in Dublin, and it was the night of fulfillment as he gently proved his manhood with his life-long secret love. Little Leah willingly responded, as the glittering stars above witnessed the loving mutual ecstasy.
The Gilroy Family held a hurried together conclave, and the men of the cloth advised that an arranged sum of money be sent by messenger to their influential cousin, who was the recently appointed Vicar of All Ireland. Swiftly this action bore fruit. The monetary pledge in the right direction, bought at both Cambridge and Oxford, an educational family place in perpetuity. Young Richard was hastened away from his little love’s arms, to the halls of scholarly learning in England.
Not really a scholar by his heart’s desire, he deserted Cambridge to find his niche in the King’s Irish Dragoon Guards. His excitement matched his courage, and the camaraderie of the male bonding matured him quickly. He relished the splendid uniform, and he looked aristocratic dressed in it, and Richard rose through the ranks rapidly to the rank of Captain.
Using the rank and his newly found confidence, he campaigned impeccably against the members of a secret political organisation. The members of the organisation, were a strong selection of farming tenants who challenged their intolerable lot in life. In 1822, Captain Richard Gilroy was shot in Limerick by the Whiteboys in revenge. He had two days previously celebrated his twenty-first birthday.
Leah’s brave little sickened heart stopped that year also. The news of Richard’s death was sent to Green Vale Lodge, and she found out through the whisperings of the servants. She suffered a heart turn that rendered her bedridden for three months before the working two of the four heart chambers gave up the ghost, and released her from her heartache eternally.
Baby Jeffrey would snuggle up beside his pale quiet mother, and almost will her to become stronger. Empathically, she would draw him softly and closely to her, and cradle his bonny four year old body in her thin, scrawny arms. With his noble shaped head resting against her dainty breasts, he would hear her erratic heartbeat. Anxiety would arise from the pit of his stomach, in black stormy clouds of fear. Her gentle pat on his neck did not console him, as her facial complexion abruptly changed from cream to a blotchy blue purple combination.
”Don’t you die and leave me, ” was his sobbing plea. But she slipped away one dark cold night. In the light stillness of dawn, he woke to find an arm around that was not only thin and scrawny, but also stiff with rigor mortis that had set in after her spirit had departed.
No one comforted little Jeffrey. No one held him lovingly and supported the little lost boy. They were all too busy working for their bread following every order.
In isolation, the fearful stormy black clouds turned into a raging inferno of spite, and utter resentment.
“I won’t love anyone any more, and, then they won’t leave me, ” he reasoned, to relieve his desolate abandonment.
While he was fed and attended to in a haphazard manner, he felt quite alone, even when he followed the familiar workers around the estate. They ignored him, and in the outbuilding where the grain was crushed, his inquisitive hand found the appropriate-sized hole for his right index finger. As he leaned further over the cast iron machine to investigate, he toppled on the unsteady lumber box that he was standing on. His left hand grabbed the wide turning wheel, and half of his tiny finger lay among the ground up chaff. A much deeper wound, totally invisible to the eye, was carved in that boy’s heart forever.

With his father Richard’s death, the heritage of the Gilroy land and estates shifted. There was only one other offspring. Her name was Dorothea, born eight years before Richard. She was a comely, handsome woman, and as they said, a dedicated old maiden. She had years before point blankly refused to marry the very presentable but coldly aloof Thomas White. Both families had thought that it would be an admirable match, with the two large properties of land adjoining to be combined. It would have made the largest tract of land in all the county of Tipperary.
Dorothea had many years before given her heart to a tall good looking son of an insignificant local medical doctor. He was refused outright her hand in marriage on the grounds that the family was as poor as the proverbial church mouse. Also his religion was Roman Catholic and that made him definitely unsuitable. Dorothea was a clever young woman and she acted as though she acquiesced to her families strict orders that the young man should never again set foot on Green Vale Lodge. He never did. But Dorothea’s biannual visit to Dublin kept her in touch with her lover. He became a student at the medical school in Dublin.
It was the general opinion of her family, that she was clearly an eccentric. She cared little for socializing. Her love of the garden and her natural ability to successfully grow plants, was taken as a sublimation for a woman’s natural urge to be fertilised and nurture a new generation. Treated often as an outright freak, Dorothea smiled sweetly as she busied herself making the expansive gardens of Green Vale Lodge more beautiful each year.
The addition of topiary work, and two small exquisite sculptures in pale pink marble of two lovers, with arms outstretched toward each other, was only a hint of the smoldering love she felt for the man of her choice. Their long projected plans came to fruition in Dorothea’s twenty-eighth year, when the recently graduated, Doctor Michael Lysart accepted a governmental medical post in the large New South Wales territory in the colony of Australia.
“Yes,” she concluded, “I do have my own destiny role”. The pair eloped and the ship’s captain married the ecstatic pair on the first day sailing to a new life style in less suffocating conditions.

The Gilroys, left without an heir now, resolved to groom young Jeffrey. After all, he had their blood, and they the money. To this end, he became a chattel of his elderly grandparents. Having struck Dorothea’s name off the family tree in the massive leather-bound family Bible when she rudely left Ireland’s shores forever in 1823, they simply added Jeffrey’s name as Richard’s son, with no mention of Leah’s name at all.
With great deliberation, they tersely nurtured him to fit their own needs. A strict scholar was engaged to tutor him, and a precise but emotionally cold woman was engaged to see to the five year old’s physical needs. In a few years, his inner rebellion was set, and on admission to the King’s Own Guards he had charted his course, and he would be the order- giver forever more.
He picked up the decanter from the floor, struggled heavily to his feet, and aimed his large heavy frame towards the staircase. Draining the final dregs as his legs plaited up the stairs, he was now level portrait, he was level with a full length portrait of his stern, long dead Grandfather. He was a Justice of the Peace and depicted in the painting in full regalia behind the austere court bench. Fury exploded and lent tremendous energy to his feelings of hatred and he hurled the decanter at the portrait.
“Take that you miserable despicable old turd! A bastard I am, eh? Came into this family by the back door did I? By God’s truth I give all the orders now, Yes I do! Damned right I do!” The decanter neck was the only piece intact. He feverishly picked up his weapon and in a few rapid destructive strokes the canvas was hanging in shreds.

In her quiet and composed demeanor, Sara-Jane gave no indication that she was overwhelmed by her change in circumstances. A Vicar’s eldest daughter, she had nursed her mother for fifteen years. Now her widowed father had accepted a remote church posting out in the remote Falkland Islands and, at the age of thirty, Sara-Jane had become Lady Gilroy. The most usual hint of change of composure was her demure slow smile when her husband was attending to matters in a far away town. Becoming pregnant in the third month of their marriage added to her readiness to smile. A child she thought may mellow Jeffrey’s attitude. He might even cease the harmful endless talk of doom and miscarriage, and experience a joyful expectation like she was.
Often at night, she would silently take leave of his voracious snoring, to tip toe down the staircase with its walls flanked with portraits of Jeffrey’s aristocratic haughty looking relatives. With a warm shawl to keep off the night chill she would step sprightly through the splendid massive front door, and her heart would be freely uplifted by the sight of the moonlight alighting on the gardens.
Being a great distance away from her sisters meant that she heard infrequent news of her own family. Her father, it seemed was finding life in the Falkland Islands rather stark. However she knew her father’s heart loved simplicity of life, even to the point of vague preference for it. It would seem like a restful retreat from the hustle of worldly problems. Sara-Jane clasped her hands under her growing abdomen as the unborn child within changed his fetal position.
“You dear little soul, I do so much love you and I really want you, little one, ” she cooed.
To her delight a tiny movement of the baby’s head under her clasped hands echoed a response. Such a maternal feeling of utter warmth and joy flowed through her and she was entranced by the sheer beauty of the moment. Her lovely patient mother’s image appeared to overlay the scene, and Sara-Jane knew that the connection was at a higher conscious level than at the solid state of Tipperary.
“If I only had you with me now dear Marmee, “ she called whimsically to the mental image.
“I am very much with you dear one, and I am no burden to you at all, for I have a spiritual body that is fully functional. See me turn around thus. ”
With that the figure of her now timeless, ageless mother showed herself moving to several places in the garden, emitting a dancing glow of luminous pink light. When the spirit of the older woman appeared in front of her daughter she explained.
“Dear Sara-Jane! We are all linked by the power of love, such love, patience, trust and courage that you possess have the most wonderful effect on the higher level of heavenly spirit. I have always felt your love for me outstanding during all the prayers that are offered. Your optimism and trust are like shining beacons from the dark earth level to our level of heavenly realms. You see we are very much in tune to the feelings of love, trust, faith and hope are as joyous love to us whilst doubt despair, and anxiety sent to us your sorrowfulness. How now I realise the gloom of some of the prayers of the church services. It gives the spirit of one departed more trials instead of help.”
Eager to hear more, Sara-Jane listened with more than her ears and closed her eyes gently. Her mothers hazy image was even clearer.
“By the love you give out dear as a living human being, your soul is always giving out the equivalent love, and it is shown as the light around every person. The clearer and brighter the light means how much truer to your Divine Path you are traveling. Sara-Jane you are a joy to behold, you are loving, and so you are loved. I used to think the saints were the only ones able to communicate. In actuality each soul that “passes away” as is said on earth, still continues to very much live, as you can see by me being present with you now. The link, sweet girl, is love for love never dies. I can tell you much, more, and I can feel that you are thirsty for such knowledge. Your spirit within your mortal body has grown by your free-will choice of loving others, because you do see good in every person. In truth, you are recognising them as a Creation of All there is, and allowing them to be themselves”.
“How is it that I can see your body, and yet all who die must surely decompose on the grave dear Marmee?
“Skin, bones and blood do all disappear, ‘Earth back to earth’ is as said in the Holy Bible. Jesus appeared again to the apostles after Easter rising from the dead, on what is known as Easter Sunday, to show us that we do have another body. It is the spirit body. By it we are shown as living colour, around the edge, and the colour is visible all the time. We can no longer deceive ourselves or others again. We show ourselves to those near and dear in love. Know that at the same instant the angels will put us in repore. Your guardian angel is your guide. When you are in any difficulty from burdens, let your thoughts fondly flee upward for peace and serenity surely flows to all who seek you. Also ask for love for your husband to guide him through his storms of life. He is using his free-will by choosing not to love. From this path he has chosen to learn his own lesson from life.
“Marmee, this child I bear now, will everything be well for the child coming into the world?”
“There is the light of help, hope and happiness around you dearest daughter, and your child must surely be blessed with grace by having you for his mother. Ask daily for your needs, by sitting in quiet repose with your thoughts up towards the blessed Son of the Father for your daily needs. You will find it soothing you, it will help to cope at times of your husbands malevolent moods. Ask also for light and love for Jeffrey too. He’s as everyone is- a child of God.”

The child was born at Green Vale Hall as the dawn broke to a clear spring day, in the year of 1850. The old midwife who was hired for the accouterment was experienced and kindly. The young lass in her charge was trusting and tolerant and was rewarded by a short successful labour.
“Thursdays child has far to go!” clucked the bright eyed midwife deftly tying off the umbilical cord and quickly ran her expert hands over the newborn baby.
“Yes m’darlin you’ve got all the things the good Lord should’ve given you, Here’s your sweetest self for a drink from your lovely ma now” laying him down close to Sara-Jane. The baby nuzzled in and latched on and suckled strongly. Jeffrey looked at the bliss on his wife’s face and pronounced in haste.
“Best not get too attached to the lad, for he’ll be sent away to school in Dublin before you know it.”
“The jealous old scoundrel he is, ” thought the midwife “the babe has just made his way into the world, and the old sod is a’parting him from his ma already, with all his fancy notions.”
By the age of six, little William had been given the good foundations of his schooling by Sara-Jane. There was almost a telepathic empathy between them. It was just as well, for Jeffrey was by now appointed to the Chief Justice of the Peace for the Tipperary County, and was often away on court business.
In his early days with the army, his needs for riotous, and copious gorging of sex with the local tarts, for cost of some small pence and none of his emotions. His marriage status did not alter this obscene condescending behaviour and women he considered were mere chattels to be bullied into submission. By the age of twenty-five Jeffrey Gilroy had the early stages of syphilis incubating in his blood stream, and his life would continue this self inflicted pattern of doom.
On William’s sixth birthday, his father sent him to Dublin to the Grammar School, that he had been enrolled in on the day of his birth. There, the child remained for ten years. For the short spell of two weeks at Christmas tide William was a cautious visitor in the house of his birth. His father grew increasingly cantankerous and his mother seemed to grow more meek. Her smile was only seen when they walked together in the gardens of the estate.
“Your father has great plans for you dear William, ” she reported to him hesitatingly when he was fifteen.” He wishes for you to marry the daughter of Major Graham J.P. Her name is Emma, and is a kind enough young lady. Tomorrow night Major and Mrs. Graham and Emma are joining us for dinner. The sole reason, is for you two young people to become acquainted properly.”
“I cannot think yet of becoming so soon a married man, you know Mama, ” said William sensitively.” There seems to be much, much more of this world that I wish to venture to. I can tell you that my heart goes out to other countries beyond Ireland. I fancy myself visiting below the equator and seeking my fortune there.”
“Your father would never give you the time to state wishes, dear son and it would be best just to bide this visiting time in peace. When your schooling is over then see how the land lies.”
His school life was finally over when he was sixteen. His father summonsed the lad into his library den and thundered on the leather topped desk.
“I have educated you until the education runs out of your waistcoat button holes, William! You are a miserable simpering wretch of an ungrateful son. You will marry this woman, Emma Graham! Her father and I have made plans to join the properties for the last nine years, By God’s truth, my wishes will not be thwarted! You will receive no money for your labor here, and you may expect to take over the reins her at Green Vale only when I kick the bucket and not one minute before that.”
The mean old mans eyes screwed up in loathing and he spat out the words, “Hell’s damnation you idiot! You only have to sire an heir to her, and the rest of your life you can hump in the hayracks with all of the country’s poxy wenches to your heart’s delight! What could be a better life than that, live a respectable public life that’s all. I have sown much wild oats in my time.” he bellowed.” That’s what you do when your born into a landed gentry family!”
A parade of his fathers public life events flashed through William’s mind. Growing sullen and aggressive in his splendid army uniform in public and uncompromisingly merciless in the stark courtroom, making each person squirm in utter shame for the least misdemeanor. As an employer taking great enjoyment by extracting his tenants back breaking labour always with the threat of dismissal. The fact was there were very many unemployed people in the vicinity and these poor miserable wretches were living on potatoes, and a far seen hope of a better some time to come. Only a handful could read and write, and they acted like they felt that they forever have to fight the world to live, instead of co-operating with life itself, it seemed to the deep thinking sixteen year old William.
It was the same at Grammar School. The long, pessimistic, self-condemning of the miserable wretches of sinners in this vale of tears, incantations of gloom, posing as every morning praise to the Almighty in church service, the raising of the flag in the grounds, were meant to supplicate the fact that to be born into a leading family was the right of noble tradition. Only a certain number of people would ever be on the approval list.
“Suffocating, that’s what it is Mama. There is no room for initiative, drive and exploration or expectation of any better and free-life conditions. I know that each person is an essence of the eternal love which is in all places, people and things at all times. I trust my guiding spirit. I am going to seek more satisfaction by making new plans and seeing the fruition. Worn out ideas are not for me and I have to be true to my heart.” He quietly whispered his plans to his mother on the frosty winter night.
“God speed you to your new life, then my precious son, ” she said lovingly.” The opportunity to be your own self is, and should be everyone’s’ ideal.”

The very next day at the cattle fair, Brian Dockerty and William counted the gold sovereigns.
“Aye there’s a boat ride to freedom for both of us, as sure as God made little green apples, ” grinned Dockerty.
In rapid succession the next events fell neatly into place as if it was meant to. They rode their horses to the next big town where they sold the well bred animals and well kept saddlery for a worthy price, and boarded the stage coach which was leaving for the seaport town.
There about to depart was a coal fired cutter for Wales. At Swansea the Welsh crew were trimming the sails for a fast running barque whose cargo was destined for the gold fields of California in the United States of America. The two young Irish fellows bought their passage and were shown their dingy overcrowded cabin with eight sweaty crew bodies already occupying it. Dockerty rigged up a wide canvas hammock up high near the porthole.
“Be Gorrah Will! This’ll do us fine. We’ll top ‘n’ tail in it, and be like two boots in a box. Sure an I wouln’a call the King me Uncle!”
The sea journey was uneventful, and the ship encountered no hazards on the high seas. They breezed along just fine. Will and Brian made a few plans from the information of the gold-fields gleaned from the hearty Scottish bosun. It was a good run. Will did some stock lists for the ship’s store that Captain Peters was required to list for the authorities of the California Port.
The ships rum got passed around the cabin and ten swaying dirty but cheerful bodies belted out bawdy sea shanties and body-function noises. Thoughts of home overtook the two young runaways at times and they took bosun McTaggart’s timely advice
“Swig the bottle boys, and wherever ye may be let your wind gae free. And always cover your backside, for then you’ll live long enough to have a full set of snow white whiskers, an be your own mon, an dinna ferget thart.”
The docks of Los Angeles were a hot-potch of cargo vessels being loaded and unloaded in great haste. High rope booms and pulleys whistled great tonnage off decks and pulleys, onto long wheeled wagons, and eight strong horses jumped and lurched the full wagons away while the next vacant wagon took their place for cargo loading. The workers were of many nationalities, and it seemed to the two young arrivals that the docks were the size of the city of Dublin itself.
They secured digs at an unfavorable looking lean-to beside an overcrowded merchant seamen’s hostelry. The noise from the place was raucausly loud, and pitched with the curses of intoxicated voices. Captain Graham always chose these digs in preference to the grimy crowd next door. He also asked the lads to check the incoming cargo and make title of it, and in return he paid for their board here. They had to make plans anyway to join the gold fields and get a claim license.
The motley populace on the streets were an untrustworthy lot. Young Dockerty had his front teeth knocked out, and a short squat knife held against his neck by a crowd of swarthy foreign speaking louts. After that they sewed the rest of their dwindling money into the hems of their breeches, and went about in twos.
Within five weeks, came news that there was a brig from county Wexford alongside the Welsh barque. The yobbo of a captain made it plain to McTaggart that he had a fine purse of gold reward for any news of a missing heir of a Gilroy family from Tipperary. The lads heard the news with heavy hearts.”
“Bejeez but your old man would have bloody spies in Hell wouldn’t he?”
“He doesn’t really love the person that I am Brian, it’s the chattel of the lost heir he’s concerned about.”
“I’m fed up to the gills with this waiting round, and maybe the gold-fields are really calling me further up in the Yukon. There’s a group of girls at the canteen tavern kitty corner yonder. What do you say we charm and blarney the madam there and get ourselves a sweet journey north helping to pack their gear. There’s a big population they say at Dawson City. Plenty of gold.”
“No Brian, you do that your way. I know I feel a call to go Down-Under. It’s a free and cleaner notion. I get it from my intuition, and I know I have to be my own master, to follow my own course.” Warmly he tugged at Brian’s collar “You take great care of yourself though my friend won’t you? There’s a brand new set of rules to be written in both directions of our travel. My thoughts will be for your very good fortune, for you are like a brother to me.”
The older one cupped his knuckle in mock-up hit under William’s chin.
“You keep your bloody honourable nose clean yourself, and may yer be half an hour in Heaven before the Devil finds out you’re dead. Whenever that will be.”
Two hours later, Bosun McTaggart sneaked William aboard a sleek looking clipper. The ship’s Captain was an old pal from his home in Scotland, and was a true- blue friend who would oversee the lad. Bales of wool had been bought and shipped to America and she had loaded gear for the gold fields down- under in Victoria, Australia.

‘The sails of freedom, filled by mighty gusty winds of change”, thought William, his deep blue eyes widened and sparkled as his tall boyish frame steeled itself against the gusts of the southerly opposition, as he nimbly picked his foothold along the crowded deck. Cargo lashed to the decks by thick ropes of skillfully tied ropes poured a wall of freezing water on him as the ship lurched and wearily toppled the other way. Seamen with an expert eye, lashed the flying ends of stray canvas, and bound it fast. Scarcely anything could be heard above the groaning, creaking and sometimes splitting timbers, with the gale that beat a rhythm on the miles of taut canvas. Again and again, the lurching deck touched the waterline and the angry sea invaded the deck with a force of urgency. William was shoved sideways over a pile of canvas covered cargo. Instantly his hands grasped the huge knot and desperately he clung to his handhold and offered silent thanks for his answered plea for help. In the storm that had been raging for four days, the ship had lost two masts and above him a spar hung drunkenly askew. Taking a gasp of air, he edged his way along the precarious muddle of ropes, iron chests, and wooden palings that the mighty force of the sea water pushed around and now crowded the steps to below decks. His supple body bent double and his numbed hands found the stair railing as the broken spar crashed down on him. Pain shot through his head and shoulders as the weighty hardwood battered and sprawled him down the stairs and gravity knocked him down even further
A strong wet arm lifted his head around and grasped him firmly around his upper torso into a sit- up position.
“Aye, there’s a demon or two in this storm lad, ” the Captain rasped, “Get below and take to your bunk”. With only half of his body moving, and the Old Man’s firm grip, he managed to stagger the narrow maze to his tiny below deck cabin. His head was wearing a large gash that extended down to his right cheek, and his ear was badly torn. Somehow he got his soaked clothes off as the Captain tore strips of shirt into lengths.
“You coped a beauty on the brain-box here lad, ” he said hoarsely. Deftly he wrapped the shirt strips about his head and ear, and anchored the two ends on the top of his head.
“Aye, that’s the best that I can do for now, best to stop the bleeding any way lad. Get yourself on yonder pillow for a while. I must get back on deck. I will see you again in a while.” He produced a small silver flask and held it to William’s lips.” Best take a hearty swig my lad, and then get some shuteye. We must take our brig into the nearest port and get her masts refitted. Methinks it will be Hokitika we’ll be putting into.”
“That is New Zealand isn’t it Sir?”
“Aye, and so it is the west coast, and a right pretty place in calm times, ” returned Ced Jones breathlessly, “and one hell of a place to anchor when the gale’s on, Laddie. We’ll get lumber aplenty for new masts and spars too, and in four days, we’ll be bound for Australia to off-load the cargo yonder. We are more than two weeks past due date, and the Company doesn’t take too fine to that. They’re after a pretty profit Lad and don’t take into account the rule of the wavy sea. There’s gear for the gold-fields of Ballarat and urgent supplies at that. Aye, gold is a hard master”, the Captain grunted and left the stale-smelling cramped cupboard sized cabin.
The rum in William’s gullet warmed him all the way to his gut and his cold, wet, pained body, swollen with bruises and patches of large grazes turned and curled into a ball. The damp bedding was soaked now with red blotches, as blood from his head wound seeped through. He coughed suddenly, and his ribcage rattled. His hands instantly guarded the searing pain of the three broken ribs.
By experience, he knew the damage. His enraged father had ten years ago kicked him brutally down the semicircular staircase from his bedroom, and he had landed in a heartbroken heap, halfway down to the landing of the reception hall. His father roughly turned his head, and forcibly opened his eyes. With a look of sheer hate, yelled words of hissing disdain at his only child.
“You’ll mend, more’s the pity!”.
“Yes, and I’ll mend now and I’ll overcome it all as I’ve overcome it before!” he told the swaying cabin walls around him.” Mark my words, there are more ways to be a prisoner than transported to the Colonies, or in a rude jailhouse bound by cold, hard iron. My spirit is free! I follow the irresistible urge still, and also the light is with me, I know.”
Not so much as a physical light of a lantern that everyone can see by. It’s my guiding light, a true inner light of my inner self when I am in contact with my Guardian Angel. It comes with it’s reassuring feeling of the brightness of hope and help. He used to tell his parents of this golden light when he was still in his babyhood clothes, and mother’s eyes would take on a soft lovely look, her slow mile responding with understanding. His father’s florid stare was another matter. His manner conveyed absolute refusal to examine the possibility of the glittering glow that little William took for granted his father must also be glimpsing. The heartless man’s face contorted into an ugly fearful form, and through clenched, gritty, darkish teeth, he bellowed venemous words of hateful spite.
“Never, ever give me any reason to strike you child, for I could so very easily choke the young breath right clean from your pretty body!! You are my son and you will always do as I tell you!! Do you hear me? Always! Do you hear and understand me? You miserable excuse for an heir that I need! Is that clear to your idiot little self?”
“Yes Papa”, William had managed to reply, with a small stream of warm water wetting his breeches as he spoke.
William’s eyes glazed over and as Nature’s anesthetic took charge of his physical body, sleepiness softened the pain, events, and conditions of his present trials, and he fell into a long deep sleep.

Once again he was back in the place of his birth. The golden vale of Tipperary, and the big Georgian family home. He wandered through the immaculately kept gardens to feast his eyes on the majestic oaks, the rowan groves, the stately splendour of the background of the regal purple hills beyond. A happiness surged through freely as he roamed and visited in dream-state. Many times he had taken his mother’s hand and walked the expansive grounds, and in the beauty of this peaceful serenity he would open his saddened little heart to her.
“What is the lovely golden light that I see, and why does it make me so happy and Papa so very angry when I talk about it, dearest Mama ?”
“We each have our own inner self William my angel, and this is our true selves. These bodies we have are just a covering of the true inner spirit, so that our inner self can experience such tangible things at a place in an allotted memory. This is always allocated a word called “a time”. In truth these memories are all joined together, and it becomes a life-time or a time of life. We know that we are having time of life for here we are now, you and I dear little William, walking on the soft grass, feeling the gentle warmth of the afternoon sunshine, seeing the movement of the breeze as it makes the branches of the trees wave. Our eyes are taking in the beauty of the rise of the hills, and as the clouds drift up in the area away above our heads, look at it for a short while.
Look now, see that no one, no person is making that happen. This is what we say is Creation, or nature and some people even call it Mother Nature, for it is a continuous creating thing that is happening, and all without the aid of any person. Papa could not make the sun shine, or order the wind to come from that direction, or make those clouds stand still. We are, you and I, and every person in the World, a part of something much greater in design, much more glorious than humans could ever design”
The captain, put his head around the narrow door of the cramped cabin, and in the gloomy light, he could make out the outline of the lad. He was breathing regularly, he thought, even if he was moving his lower limbs too frantic. The colour of his face was a bit alarming, he thought. Still, he would check up on that again, and see if his long legs were still moving under the thin dirty covering That was a good sign, the Old Man reasurred himself.

We are all a part of an absolutely wonderful Plan that has been made in the mind of the Divine Creator. We have to use words that people use when we want to talk about describing anything that we can see, touch, taste, smell and hear, These are called our five senses, by which our bodies take in our natural experience from second to second continuously. We have speech to communicate words about this, and we can choose to do this, so that we gradually learn more about other’s experience, and at the same time we are learning more about our own mortal selves as well. You can say that this path is giving us an ever growing picture in our minds, rather like reading and learning books, and storing them in your head, for whenever you might want to use them. That is called, thinking, and the things we think are called thoughts, are they not?” Her darling son was following her and he nodded his head with pleasure.
“Tell me more, please do, Mama, “You make it all better, and when you tell it then it is so much easier for me to understand.”
“The sixth sense, that is the one after the other five senses, is the one of knowing, and it belongs to the inner self or the true self, and that is the spirit of you. That knowing and seeing the lovely light is the inner self reassuring you that life-time experiences are only happening to your outside body experience, and your inner spirit is always and forever the true you yourself. As well as the light of hope, there is for the ones with the sixth sense, the seeing of the creative power of ready help in times of need.
Always remember that there are people who do not yet realize that is so for they have not yet seen it for themselves. They see what they only believe to be real, the five senses. Sometimes they wonder what else there is, and then when they think on some more, they find for themselves their own inner light. The extra sense is a very pure love, and it is often felt inside your body as a very wonderful surge of the creative Power of Love, and your daily needs can be completely met and fulfilled through an invisible chain of action of creative Divine Love from the Heavens above us down here walking on our path on our time of life experience. We always have to ask for any help that we want, and we should know that at the same time as asking, we do thank the Divine Love as well. We know that some other something is taking charge of the event, and we sense it as a great guiding love.
You, dear child, with your loving trust, can be just as sure as you are as sure now that your tiny hand is in mine now, that there is another Creative Power of Love that is also holding in love-light your hand. Keep that trust dear one, it makes you bear with courage and hope, even the most difficult and hard times of life. They are our trials of life, and meant to test our growth ability to the reality of the inner self.
Once the mortal self has it’s answer, and is self convinced, that is splendid, for the power of love and creation of your inner you then join to all the other lights of every other creation of good that there ever is, and also ever will be, and knows the sharing in all as a beauty of harmony. When the knowing part keeps on letting you know, it is called inspiration. Another word is intuition, William. Our lessons in reading, writing and arithmetic are called what name dear?”
“Tuition, Mama”, he said smiling up at her. She is a very pretty lady, his sweetest Mama. Her heart shaped bright face with thick glossy hair the colour of a new penny, and her really expressive forest green eyes sparkled showing her even white teeth. She broke into a melodic laugh.”
“So merry and bright you are! And also a perfectly good memory for the lessons that you have learnt from the books with so much interest! It is a gift of joy to me to know that the Holy Creator gave you to me as my beautiful son to always love and share the love of ever seeking more light from Him.
“Yes William, tuition is the word that I had in mind. That is the teaching that I give you. Intuition is the teaching that Divine Love gives you from within your body, right from the very heart of your inner you, your very soul! That is the real learning.
“Does Papa know his answers in this way too, Mama?”
“He must from time to time hear and see these inner leanings, dear William for everyone does. Some people do not want to take a heed of them, and so many have are at fear of them. They prefer to have their own minds to plans that do not include the sixth sense of inner knowing. It then very often becomes very hard to do it all by oneself, and it takes a lot of effort, then the tiredness of the doing it all by oneself then becomes other different things. It becomes dreary and a difficult task, then the feeling from these two, can often turn into resentment And over often despair. All because of not feeling the loving hand of ever present help and guiding light, for with that, dearest son nothing is difficult or impossible.”
“Come here, my lad, do you want to take some gruel?” the Old Man had put his face close to William’s face. He opened his eyes, but the pain shot through his head, and it seemed to explode. He closed his eyes to stop the pain, but it was still there. He tried again, and this time he managed to keep his eyes half opened, and he raised himself up onto one elbow.
“What is the day, am I on my way home?”
“Nay Laddie! You are on your way to Australia, and you had a wee bump on the head. You’ll be alright with a bit more sleep, and you’ll mend while you’re asleep. I’ll stick my face in the door later”. The captain plumped up the meagre pillow, and steadied the lad’s shoulders, as he lay himself down, on his other hip. Sleep came quickly.

“The Divine Plan has in it every person’s good plans always. The pattern of everyone else’s good plan is fitted into the very big overall Divine Plan from the moment your spirit took on the covering of your mortal body, but by then we no longer remember the part our spirit self vowed to play in this mortal life, and we each have had to seek it all over again and then recognise it in this life time of experience.
Often we in our mortal selves get impatient that the things we want and we have done what we should have done, that is asked for or prayed for, are not becoming present in our lives, and we become full of woe,. Because it is not present in the time of the now, the present, we can think that it is not going to happen for us. It will always happen for us, when there is hope and trust in our inner self, when it fits in with every other one’s good in the Great Plan of the Creator. That is the to us the right time of our mortal selves to experience that, and in our inner selves there is a joyful inner peace. In here,” and her two hands clasped themselves over her lovely bosom. Patience and expectation must reign over impatience and despair.
William hung on to every word that Sara Jane had so clearly said, and he had nodded intermittently showing her that he had understood, and he had gained learning in the way she had always made the learning a thing of wonder.
“I know what the word lovely really means!” he said, his childish voice bubbling in excitement.” Lovely means full of love! Like you Mama. You are so full of love that everything you do, is done with this love. Is this so, Mama?”
“I do try to William, I really try. Each night I thank the blessed Angels and Jesus for keeping that light within me bright, glowing and growing, for all the help that I had with the effort of that day, because I know that I could never have coped without that guiding light of hope and help. I also put aside every action of experience in thankfulness. No matter what that the message of the lesson of the trial may have been I put it aside so that the higher being of spirit can help me get more understanding of my part that I play in the journey of myself and other persons. Then I ask my Guardian Angel to watch over me before I close my eyes to sleep.
Each morning, I know that it is a new time in the time of life. Very much like a book, and each page is a new page. The page has no words written on it yet, and your words and actions, also reactions are what is written on each day’s page. Once in a while, as the book is reviewed, you can see how the pieces of experiences fit together, and also how someone else’s experience are closely fitted in with, much the same way as your pieces of fretwork jigsaw.
Each page is a puzzle piece, and as new piece is added, then the picture is seen so clearly, dear William. Hope is the helping word for trust of each day to be better than yesterday, each task to be easier, with divine light, that beautiful, shinning, glimmering golden glow that your Guardian Angel sends as a message to be still and quiet, and then with your sixth sense you will gradually understand more and more as you grow up in years.
This understanding you gradually are able to help by your loving thoughts to other people, and also by guided action when they need some support, and when they are seeking for themselves and they ask you, then and only then you know that it is the sharing of the experience of your own knowledge that they may be able to take out of that guidance what they think seems reasonable for them. This is called divine love in action, my lovely son. Always believe that you can ask for it’s loving help, and that it is given at the moment of asking, it is given in full as the very words are said.”

For three days, William lay in a semi comatose position taking in only a few spoonfuls of rough sweet gruel from a tin panikan. His head had stopped bleeding and the captain soaked off the stained cloth bindings and poured neat whisky onto the open wounds. With a darner and linen thread he stitched back together his ear with surprising gentleness. When the coast of New Zealand was sighted, the wind dropped somewhat and the storm wound down. By the time Hokitika was approached the weather took on a strange calm.
“Looks like a decent day to put into harbour port after all, Lad” Ced Jones confided in William.” I’ll warrant you’ll be feeling like a stroll around the sights of the harbour for a quiet few hours.” The townsfolk are usually up to kindly hospitality and the merchant’s are a cheerful adaptable crowd. There’s eleven pubs in the main street and an ales never far away. Take a wander and see some sights anyhow.”
The main street was graveled but the mud was already oozing up to boot ankles when walked on. Fifteen or so shops side by side had timber walkway placed up on a low platform. Horses were tied outside every pub and there were water troughs overflowing. Mainly wooden buildings of moderate size and the occasional all corrugated iron foundry and smithy. On first sight William was amazed at the feeling of self-sufficiency of the place. The ships outfitter was already making the arrangements for new sails and spars. There was an abundance of growth and optimism in the air here in this little town set on the rugged western coast of New Zealand. About forty people were talking excitedly outside the opulent Grand Hotel and more seemed to join the number as William sauntered along the path opposite.
“I tell you its bloody true I swear it! Jack Crowe has found a bloody nugget that you couldn’t put in the bloody crown of your bloody hat!”, a voice roared from the group.
The man was short bewiskered and wildly gesticulating to drive his point home. There was an eagerness in the crowd that was contagious.
“Found at Broken Gully only this morning. He’s been only there since Sunday and every pick gets up some great yellow.” The crowd now milled around the messenger pressing for more information and several shouting different questions as the news of the latest gold strike sent a dizzy motion of a near El Dorado through their consciousness.
“Blimey mate! Get yourself off to the Gold Claim office you can’t do better than, pick yourself up a five shilling licence,” a stranger called out to William. From the look of them thought William they’ve got a point, to take the gamble is the first part of participation. He walked over to the edge of the excitement to the tall, fair haired man aged about thirty.
“Would it be a better gamble to search for gold here than in Bendigo Victoria do you suppose?” William quizzed tentatively.
“I’m from the Assay Office and I have worked in Bendigo for the Gold Office there too. From my experience I would be very much in favour of trying out this brand new strike first.” What’s your name then, friend?”
“Mine’s Sam Stevenson and normally reside at Box Hill just out of Melbourne” He spoke in a quiet clipped accent and held out his hand.
William shook it firmly
“I’m from Ireland and on my voyage out to Victoria to try the luck at the gold fields. My name is William Gilroy. The ship I’m on is having a quick refit, and probably will be finished in two days, then she’ll be ready to sail off to Australia. I could do with some good advice on the mining though.”
“I’d be glad to oblige. What about dinner at my lodgings at six p.m.? You can see it from here, the two storey house next to the church three streets along. Mrs. Duffy makes a fine Irish stew and dumplings.
“Thats very good of you Sir, and I would be very obliged for first hand knowledge, ” replied William.
“It’s Sam, my name, you hear? We don’t go very much on misters or sirs out here Will, ” he chuckled warmly.” Till six p.m. then.”
The Captain greeted William with some ribald humour.
“Made your acquaintance with some lovely wahine local did you? Got bedded eh?”
“No I’ve been around the group that’s all agog with a new gold find. I’m going to have a meal tonight with a chap I met from the Assay Office. He’s already worked at Bendigo.”
“I reckon the Red Sea would part for you, William. You will find your optimism is your twin brother.”
The Captain had found on the voyage out that the lad was no common man. He had an air of diligent expectancy. From what he had gleaned from the home surroundings, this young fellow had enough grit to stand up and say that he didn’t want to take just what was expected. There was a definite advancing of ideals in this lad’s strong imagination. His education would ensure that he could implement his goals too, and blaze a better, newer trail.
“If it looks like a mighty good proposition then go where your gut feeling takes you Will. What’d you say the inscription on your family crest is?”
“ DUM SPIRO SPERO. While I breath, I hope, ” relied the younger man soulfully.
That night William enjoyed the homely company at Duffy’s’ Boarding house. They were clean honest people who had been living in New Zealand for twenty-two years and having started their new life with virtually nothing but a hat full of dreams. Jim Duffy had come out to New Zealand with his regiment to quell the Maori uprisings, and he was joined three years later by his wife and two children. The signing of the treaty of Waitangi had more or less settled the land placement and only a sporadic outbreak in the North Island worried the Government briefly at times.
With their army pay allotment, they settled down in Hokitika. His wife Essie ran a boarding house, and he and Dave Gray an old army mate started up their small busy saw mill. The Duffy family took kindly to William right away. To be sure the young man could be classed every inch an upper class chap, but he had much more to him than good manners and keen intellect. His warm generous nature would befit this young country with the essence of betterment for all if it had a chance to show its expansive but gentle nature.
Sam and Jim had listed for William the basic equipment and provisions that he would find necessary to take to the digging area. All of it was procurable in Hokitika, and was old Bullocky Saunders regularly ready to take a trip with his wagon pulled by six bullocks in any weather. The town’s Doctor attended to William’s ear in his homely small surgery, and carefully removed the linen stitches.
“He did a fine job of sewing your lug back on. Laddie, the Captains are often called on to do some tricky medicine out at sea, and they always seem to get it right. Even to removing limbs, they are not chicken-livered about their men’s lives.” Tomorrow would be the first day of his newly planned life, thought William stepping briskly in the crisp frosty night.
Was this the turn in the road by which his Makers plan had intended him to take. Mama had wished him God-speed, and she had not reprimanded him in the slightest. A golden warmth swept over his body as he was seeing once again the familiar loving glow and his soul soared with it.” God does have a plan for every man and he has one for me.” he quoted loudly from a poem learnt at school. Above in the ebony sky stars twinkled and one huge star flew earthwards, and William had his answer. He picked his way along the precarious path mainly keeping to the middle of the road and out of the ruts and holes as much as possible. A light lamp in a window here and there helped his vision.
“I wish you luck and a good pickings Will, ” said Captain Jones.” There’s always a collection of sorts not a selection out on the diggings though. Keep your tongue between your teeth, and don’t take anyone on trust until you are fair dinkum sure of them. ‘Tis a sad truth that the rush for wealth brings out the rats in the rotter. They’ll often do the dirty and jump claims and loot and kill as well.”
“I do have an idea of what you mean. To me it’s talking of a man willing to work long and hard and sweat at digging in the hope that there’s bounty at the end of it, and with that he can exchange the gold to become his own master in -the business of his choice. All in a country that isn’t already spoiled and rigid with pre supposition. There’s the opportunities for all people to have our equal share in running of the affairs and for every person to feel to be an equal part. This is where our civilisation has been given a great chance. It’s up to every new settler to answer the challenge. How each person answers the challenge honestly or dishonestly will be up to his own conscience. I’m willing to put my share in, and pitch for a new start to ward a better life style in this part of the world.” They were having a tot or two of best Caribbean rum, and the kindly Captain had wanted to know just what William’s plans were, so that he could report it back to his old sea-dog friend who asked him to keep a friendly eye on this good wee laddie.

It was raining heavily the next day when the bullock wagon piled high with goods and passengers made their determined way along the winding road to Broken Gully. The distance of ten miles took five labourious hours to negotiate the bends, creeks and in many places axle- depth mud. The steaming bullocks responded to the familiar oaths and the crack of the whip over heads, and they and lurched and lunged accordingly.
All about the busy makeshift camp already twenty tents were pitched and as many campfires were lighted. The crowd surveyed the newcomers with interest. The old timers among them ran an expert eye over the youngest, the tall dark haired youth who was methodically helping to unload the wagon load with two others. In his heavy Irish tweed wool jacket, his trousers of canvas twill and knee length leather boots bought in California, he cut a distinctive air. His wide-brimmed hat was placed at a jaunty angle, to run the rain off. William ran the gauntlet of staring eyes.
He walked to the end of the line noting the peg marks of the areas already claimed, his searching eyes seemed at the outer boundary to be seeking out something intangible. After a good ten minutes the youngster then climbed to the rise of the gentle slope and in the rain sat for another while. He had a slightly lopsided grin on his face as he called out, a greeting to the old timers.
“I reckon I will take the easterly aspect over the creek and make camp up on the upper ridge. My name is William Gilroy, and I’m pleased to meet you. I’m here to give it a try, and I suppose I had best get a roof and a bed first.”
“Yea, yea” wheezed old Jack hazily. He’d seen it all before. New chaps giving it a go. They weren’t the material for the back breaking hard slog and, didn’t have the guts to stick to it when as it always did, get rough.
“Done it before, have you then?” he croaked.
“First time ever.” said William putting a pack on his back and over his shoulder, and picking up in two arms a load of long handled tools.
“Well God help you, lad” Jack said, lobbing a massive spit at his feet.” If your wanting any hints on going about things I’m right here. Maybe I’ll know, and maybe I won’t” he added with reserve.
“Don’t fancy that blokes chances much” he said out of the corner of his mouth to Tom “Bullocky” Saunders.” He’s all done up in fancy gear and the cheek of his age; he’s got fuzz for whiskers and blimey does he look wet behind the ears or what?”
“Can’t say more than every bloke has gotta do what he’s gotta do, while some don’t look like they’ve the stuffing for the long hard haul they are sometimes the very one that end up trumps.”
“S’pose so, we were all tenderfoots once, and I have had a lot of corns turned since I was that whippersnapper’s age.” The eyes of old Jack softened.” I’ll keep a weather eye on him maybe.”
William felt a brand new feeling of eagerness as he spoke to the other men who had travelled out to the gully on the bullock -wagon. There was a dip in the low foothills and at the basin the diggers had congregated in a clearing of thick bush. A small stony bank spring swelling fast with the downpour was along the edge of the clearing. Several ridges jutted out past the bigger timber and dense bracken and fern disguised the steep higher terrain.
The other two men were quickly cutting saplings nearby and preparing to erect their tent alongside old Jacks. They had set camp up quite a few times before and in a very short time their tent was erected and they had but their iron tripod together and had hung a well blackened billy in place. Now a fire crackled and smoked under and only then did they introduce themselves. They were two men aged about thirty four years who had lived in Australia for nearly fifteen years and had been on digging fields in Bathurst, Gympie and Ballarat. They also had with them some past run in with the law in Australia and did not enlarge on their personal experiences. Their aim for goldmining was to buy land in New Zealand and to ‘stay on the clean side of the law’. It turned out that they were twin brothers, the Murray’s and they had a great talent for enlivening up a loud night with a concertina and a fiddle.
With great gusto, William after setting up his campsite set his mind to visualizing where and how he would start his exploration. There was a ridge of nine feet in height at the back of his site, and it seemed to beckon him. The feeling that gold bearing soil was around him became very strong. He offered up thanks for the help, guidance, and protection to the Creator, and in trust and faith, that night he slept soundly on a makeshift bed, with abundant hope in his heart.
The dawn chorus of bird-song awoke him to the task ahead, and for the next five years William toiled harder than he had ever seen any of his relatives work. The storms, freezing weather, lonely nights, body pained by back breaking work, never undermined his confidence.
By three months, he had a series of tunnels dug into the hard earth, and the virgin earth had yielded up some ten ounces of gold He had made a journey especially into Hokitika then to have it weighed in and cashed at Sam Stevenson’s office.
“There’s a tidy sum of forty pounds, William. That is a very encouraging area that you must be in.”
“Yes, and I see that the others are finding consistently as well, and they are having to go very deeply as well. Sam I want to send thirty pounds to my home in Ireland, but I have a problem”
“What is it then?” asked Sam pushing the glasses further back on his nose.
“It is to go to my father, but I do not want my name or where I am in New Zealand to be able to be traced. Conscience money if you like, how do you suggest that it could be done?”
“Well, in four days time I shall be returning to my parents home in Box Hill in Victoria, and if you want to entrust that money to me, I could deposit it in my bank and have the Bank of England send a note of payment to your father.”
William was earnestly grateful that his friend put forward a scheme that would ensure that he could feel now entirely independent from Ireland. He stayed at Duffy’s establishment that night and they all had a toast of good health and good fortune.

The Duffy’s grown children were visiting their parents with their respective husbands, and their healthy, robust children that romped outside in play. This contrast in family life was most noticeable, after his stiff, stern controlled childhood. He sought out Sam, and found him smoking in the library, and confided the thoughts to him.
“There is a totally different outlook on mostly every aspect of life out here in this place, and it sure pleases me very much.”
“Yes William, it is agreeably much more relaxed in that most of the priggishness of the Old Country’s customs have been dispensed with. Of course the reason is, that in these newer countries, people do reasonably put what is necessary first. They have to, for there is not very much in the way of established systems that is not still experiencing stability in place yet. The building up, and the binding together, does take up peoples’ energy, and they literally have had to cut away the old and useless methods, to carve out a life and a living. After not many years the old common intricacies of what was right and proper forms of behaviour ceased to apply.
“People had relied on their own inner ideals, and basic good values, did they?” asked William.
“Yes mostly so, but I think that the fact is that the old forms of behaviour, already had become out-moded. It did not come easy though. There are still very many settlers who have not had enough vision to see that we are out of the tight grip of die-hard conventions. There’s still knots of society, who still persist in the farcical practices, and going through the motions of being seen to be doing the right thing with the right people. It irks me honestly!’
“Hypocrisy I suppose, can take so many guises, ” mused William, “but surely it’s in here where it must count, ” and he put a rough, calloused hand across his chest in the area of his heart.
“You have for certain, an old head on young shoulders, ” observed Sam re-lighting his curly wooden pipe, and he then recharged the port glasses.” I see a good deal of enthusiasm in you all the time, and I do not think that you would be overly impulsively either, by your calm manner. Do you size people up on the first meeting, or do you take your time to make a personal view of them?’
“I can tell you plainly Sam, since I know that you will not humiliate me, even if you find it hard to understand. I do have Heavenly help, and I see what seems to look like a light around people. Not only people, but other creations such as trees, plants, and animals. If that light is bright, clear and extending a good distance from their body, I know that the person’s inner spirit is well developed. It also makes me feel comfortable and happy to be around them and be in their company. Your light is very bright and is all around you to a distance of about four feet”, William stated candidly. Sam was listening with ever widening eyes, and his face looked peaceful.
“William, I do know something of what you are saying. My dearest late wife Cynthia used to have such a sixth sense, and could see auras. She and I were rapturously happy. In the third year of marriage, after our little girl Delia was born, Cynthia’s kidneys ceased to function properly. My wife never once complained of the pain that she suffered, or expressed the notion that she was bitter with what her lot in life was.
She would tell me that this was the period of time in God’s Plan that she needed to be here. Her Guardian Angel was always giving her help with hope she said. Before she went into a final coma, she told us all most assuredly that her angel would be coming soon to take her to her real home. She left this world with the sweetest smile on her face. My daughter, who has been in the care of my parents since birth, will occasionally talk to them and me that her lovely Mama is here to say this or that. She says things that Delia could not possibly know, but my in-laws know them as the honest truth of events of Cynthia’s own childhood that have happened. I have always thought that any person with the sixth sense can be a bridge between the divine and the mundane, if they choose to be. I think it is a blessing of some special knowledge that I do not have.”
“Every one has their strengths and weaknesses, for them to be individual persons surely. The knowledge that you say you don’t have, must be there inside of you, as an inner flame, perhaps when the time is right, you will see with clarity the guiding light of your angel. I can tell you that you have a bright pink and gold light of an aura around you most times. This tells me that you do have a sincere love for humanity, and that you give only of the best of yourself and intentions to the service of all people, regardless of what you will receive in return. You do this without fear or favour. I really think that every virtue has a colour Sam, and to me I think it possible to read the character of a person by the colours that are showing with their aura.”
“Very interesting William. Do you say these things to others, I mean the spirit things?”
“Never. Only to my mother who sees spirit. As a little child, I used to talk to my father about in a natural babbling way. He would fly into such an enraged manner, and after some very cruel treatments at his hand, I quickly ceased it to him. This reason, my friend is how I am in a new way of life, rather than be in a grossly indecent state of favoured aristocracy. I do most definitely think that a person is here alive to do more than make and hoard money. This goes for women as well as men, for we are all created equal by the same Creator. To me, religion is just as hypercritical. Every religion seems to judge themselves as to having the correct answer, and everyone else wrong. I know about that too from my old school.”
“I am frankly fascinated with your conversation, do please go on, William, ” said Sam, taking out his pocket watch, and giving the winder a few turns. “The Duffy’s will already have retired by now, but we shall not disturb the household down here in this pleasant quiet room.”
“I think that in the past that there have been some absolutely wonderful teachers of Divine knowledge who have lived on this planet. So much wisdom they gave out, and it was usually in the form of a Way or a Path if you like the term, to better know how to act so as to be truly closely more in tune to one’s inner self. This meant that the person could see more clearly that because humanity was given intelligence, that they were able to more easily overcome the lower nature of the brutish instinct part. In doing that one could see that it becomes necessary to genuinely love all unconditionally. The inner self is the soul, it is the spark of the essence of the Creator in the created. Each person, or thing as a tree, plant, a mountain, even a rock or a nugget of gold, as the tangible sight that we see with our mortal eyes, are of all the All One Creator that we cannot see.”

“What about those things – the angels?” put in Sam.
“The things of creation are always giving out a light which is the sign of creation on the earth planet. By this signal the angels can communicate with the person who has been able to overcome the many traits that humans have over the millions of years, have shed with much help from the ever present higher beings in a different part of a place of existence than we live, which we in our culture call Heaven. Other cultures have given it a different title. The Spirits are the creations of the same Creator that has given life to this planet and all that is on it. They are ever ready to help us on our journey upward to be at the end of our mortal life, in another level of existence, a higher existence. The mortal self stays here, but the soul has to return to the Creator that created it. As I see it, Sam, a part cannot be separated from the first cause, so that the spirit has to return to spirit. The more light of unconditional love the inner self is giving out, the more the help of those higher beings of light and love can help us down here on the mortal existence of Earth. By our thoughts and our intentions we each are known, so that each one of us is responsible for our own souls ultimately, and nobody else can do it for us. What we have been told by the wonderful teachers is that, by a set of rules we may gain more knowledge of how to do this. In all the cultures there is a set of rules to guide all out of chaos and ignorance, each one said to be suitable for each group of people.
On looking at some of the different cultures’ rules, there is one outstanding thing to me. At the heart of it all the central core is the clear instruction to love every part of the creation. To love all as the Creator loves us. The angels, I think are beings of light, having been sent, as they are a very specific aspect of the Creator, taking the form of a person in order to allow a recognition of help given to the seeking person. Spirits of family members often show themselves in the hope that they can reassure and help relatives still living on the physical level that life definitely exists after death. The person can be uplifted by the asked help of this spiritual being along the journey of life. I think that all inspired happenings are really people taking notice of the given divine advice.”
“That does not take into account the way that Delia can relay most accurately the things that she does. Where is that coming from?” Sam asked quietly.
My Mama sees her own mother in the spiritual form, and seems to communicate with her, When she asked how this was possible, her mother’s reply is that all the people are connected by the link of love, and by thinking of them in loving thought, the spirit person connects by that very same light that the mortal puts out, that you and I have called an aura tonight. Incidentally two living persons can bridge the gap of time and space in the same way, by loving thought. Mama and I would be together in that way when I was away from home at the Grammar School. For nine years she always said her sweet “Goodnight” to me. She may do still, here in New Zealand now.

“What do you think of the religions then William?”, asked Sam quietly, wanting to know more of this young fellow’s interesting opinions.
“Well Sam, people have been given so much comfort and they have striven for help and faith through the many various religions, and without a doubt I know that every community has been built on the often beautiful rites and rituals of worshipping their Holy Creator together. Even our laws of the land, are based on the Ten Commandments, so closely is the basic tennants connected with Spiritual Thought, for this was the way for living in toleration of each other, in a peaceful and harmonious co-existence. The virtues are extolled, often now in a very controlling way that can now take from the individual the very heart of their freewill urge to do their own seeking, and often preventing the finding their own light of the Loving Spirit within themselves, by a rigid almost self destructive fear. The persons who never look, may never find, in my honest opinion, for they have literally given to their parson, vicar, or priest that part of themselves that needs to go forward with hope. The Holy Creator gave us all the ability to wonder, think and the right to our own individual opinion, but so often the very young person is crushed by the older, rigidity of God fearing unquestioning demands, that have been made by mortal man, not a loving Maker. I think that all of this heavy load to have to get out from under church-imposed burdens are often wearying, and become over awesome. Some of the churches rather than practice the unconditional love that they preach, are becoming self serving institutions, and the love is given only to those who do not oppose or question them, but follow blindly.
“The religions who have had the love of humanity at heart, from their founders then have often regressed than progressed.” said Sam thoughtfully.
“In their states of static growth, they have made the Creator into some human type old man to fear, than to love and trust. Jesus has said that no man has seen God. God is a Spirit. God simply is. He referred to God as his Father within, and said this is also within each and every person. So if one can find for themselves the God within them, then all else shall be added to them. The reason is that one can simply ask and it is immediately given. Rather if one looks again at the flickering flame of the essence of love, that is the Creator’s image that is within each of us, we might say that with the positively good intentions, good virtues practiced, then the flame must continually grow. One cannot not be separated from the All source of goods if the Creator, God is Love, and we are all the handiwork of that Love. To my mind and reasoning, and Sam this is what I have for guidelines for myself only, that we as people were created you show that aspect of Love.”
“Humanity, in the organizing of the various religions, have managed to put a competitive element into the Source of all Religions. I think that this is where the separation from the Source takes place. Rather than be creative it becomes destructive then.”
“That sums it up very well, there is a competitiveness about the varying types, instead of thinking of the various needs each various culture needs to arrive at the point of their own seeking, many conquering peoples have imposed their form of worship on their conquered countries. The resentment of the people of Ireland has been enormous, and the individual rights of the people have been eroded in the name of religion. The many different forms of looking within themselves is interesting, and to me they are the same aspects of God and the various forms is a rich tapestry of human spirituality. The flame of the spirit within seems to me, to be a connection of the power of the All One Creator, which by contacting that power, teaches us to evolve step by step to the all knowing, ever present God. This is where our guiding spirit comes in, and I am absolutely sure everyone has one, if they will but listen to that gentle inner guidance. I trust fully that all the help that I ask for will be given, the only thing that I cannot be sure of is when to expect it, as only when it fits in with all the other persons plan, will my part of the divine plan come to fruition.”
“Very profound, dear friend. You have shown me that you are a deep thinker. I know that we will probably touch on philosophical points some more. I do hasten to tell you that I find your own particular version though simplistic yet interestingly so. I dare-say we can take this lamp now as it is time to climb the stairs, and turn in for the rest of the night. It is duties again at seven in the morning for me, and you will be on Bullocky Saunders’ wagon. Bound again for more good fortune I’ll warrant.”
“Sam I do hope that my inner thoughts that I have said, have not been in any way dogmatic to your ears. I do only expect these things for myself as a guideline to live by, for my own standards.”
“Not in the least dogmatic Will, you do have a better use of reasoning that is more than anyone else that I‘ve heard so far in my life. You are definitely your own master of your own seeking.”
“It is this new way of life in the most pleasant part of God’s Earth, that has given me the courage to be able to voice what I have always felt inside of me. I am most fortunate to have made your good acquaintance Sam, as I know you to be an understanding, good person of rare quality. I would like you to know, that I feel blessed by the guidance towards your very esteemed friendship.”
“Till the morning then friend, have a well earned rest.” replied Sam as they reached the top of the stairs, and William gave him the oil lamp.

“People are funny cattle,” chuckled old Jack Crow, closing his eyes against the bright sunshine. His wiry body had consumed the best part of half a bottle of whisky, and he was in a tipsy mood.” Thought that would be the last we’d see of you young fella, going into town to cash in your diggings! Y’know Will, the day you arrived out here, dressed up in yer fancy duds, I would have bet five pounds to a knob of goat’s dirt that you would not last out the week! Glad to tell you young fella, that I was wrong. You have some strong stuffing inside that good looking carcass of yours.”
Bullocky Saunders belched loudly, and nodded his head in agreement, and ran a gnarled hand over his weather beaten forehead. “Yep, he’s in for the long haul all right Jack.” He cracked his whip carefully over the heads of his team of faithful bullocks, “Giddap, you mongrely mob, ” he yelled and they all pulled together in unison, as if he had shouted endearments to them. In a cloud of dust they were well down the track by the time William appeared in his working clothes carrying his gear and heading for his patch. Jack pulled his battered, greasy hat over his face and made himself comfortable, as he stretched out on the low bracken fern.
“I’m giving meself the rest of the day off now Will, it’s a bloody good day for it.” “Good for you Jack”. William waved in reply as he cheerfully walked on with purpose. These wonderful old characters were the very salt of the earth, and he knew that he was happy to be their cobber.
There was a definite comradeship on the gold field site, though all of the various types exhibited their individual traits. It did not take long to weld together a strong cooperative spirit as the main common bond was survival. The occupation of hard digging was a tremendous compulsion, and to this end, long hours of extremely torturous work was endured. When any miner in the camp stuck a good size nugget on his claim area, the effort of the search by the others doubled in anticipation.
Within the first weeks of his arrival at his claim, William had devised a rough shaking gadget, that sieved the finest gold pieces to the deepest angle of a large pan base. This saved time on the last stage of the gold hunt, because he also brought water to his area by diverting a small channel of the creek. The old timers and the new chums, as they were usually termed, worked for as many hours a day as there was daylight for seven days a week for the first months to get some money together.
In the long twilight after sundown, the campfires cooked the main meal of the day. It did not take very long for the merchants to venture their goods out to the remote place. Miners bought staple basic goods that would keep in makeshift food safes of hanging shelves, encased in muslin cloth wrappings and hung them up in the trees, away from the flies, and vermin. Meat was always cooked as soon as it arrived, on a stationary spit A whole side of mutton was cooked, and divided up between eight or nine men that shared the cost. An eighty pound sack of flour, sugar, porridge and tea would be divided likewise into smaller amounts that would then be stored in used biscuit tins or empty cream cans, in the miners’ cramped living shanties. Damper made in the lidded cast iron ovens, provided the bread, and the dripping was usually rendered down as the meat cooked, and saved in a container.
Within a couple of months, the unofficial co-operative was working well. After a simple but adequate evening meal, the miners gathered together outside the tent sites, swapping yarns with their cobbers, often passing along a bottle of the hard stuff between them. In isolation they grew closer together, yet they did not reveal all of their past experience of their lives to each other. Two taboo subjects, were politics, and religion. William gleaned much information from the miners when they rambled on. A rough hewn lot mostly, some had been on the wrong side of the law too, but they also had an unmistakable well placed loyalty for each person’s community rights. Their hearts were definitely in the right place, solid gold, often covered up by a gruff exterior and an off- hand temperament.
They are wonderful company, these hearty band of men with shining hearts and good intentions, William said inwardly. Outside old Jack’s tent, a group gathered and sat in a couple of large logs. The campfire gave out a warm glow, and the chaps passed around a demi-jar of whisky. The Murray boys were playing music from their native Scotland, and the toe-tapping tunes had soothed away the days aches from weary bones. Now it was about time to turn in for the night, and the concertina and fiddle gave out a slow hauntingly beautiful tune that turned William’s thoughts to home. and his mother far away.
“I love it out here Mama”. His thoughts sped home once more as they done when he was at school in Dublin. William found that despite the distance between them, that a sweet communication took place between them when he would become quietly stilled, and gently concentrate. He felt that he could not only see his loving mother, but that he could also hear her words in present tense, quite clearly. There was a rapport that each of them truly valued. Tonight under the star studded southern sky, he focused again and easily and clearly a mental picture came into view. His mother was sitting at her dressing table was brushing her long thick glossy hair with her silver backed brush in slow even strokes as she glanced into the mirror, she fancied that she saw William against a background of trees in the moonlight hillside scene.
“William dearest!, ” she gasped excitedly, “I fancy that I see you, and more than that dear boy, I feel it here as well! Do I fancy right, my own dear son? Is that you now with me in loving thought?” She put her brush down and her white hands flew to her breasts, as if to stop her fluttering heart from beating so fast. The mirror in front of her gave her a full scene now of a group of men and William leaving the group to walk nearby and rest himself against an ancient, strong trunk of a tree as he scanned the sky.
“Mama, I am well and overjoyed to see that our special contact is as effective as ever. You look as wonderful as ever you did. I am alive, see me now, ” and he did his old trick of wiggling his ears, and then burst out laughing, as he remembered that he always assured her that he was hearing and seeing her by this same signal at school. Her melodical laugh in return answered him. For five minutes, they covered the past months events precisely and interestedly.
They would do this fleetingly every night with guided love and help, and mutual thanksgiving for their special awareness of the gift from the spirit realms. Better than a telegraph, so recently invented, their two-way communication was instant and powered by a belief in a special inner power and knowledge of omnipotent divine love. this is what linked them in loving thought very specially. Their daily quiet moments together, brought and inner joy to each of them.

On the Broken Gully gold field William worked and planned his future with continued optimism. His claim stake yielded up small amounts of gold continually as the weeks flew by. Soon the warm days had become bitterly cold, and the freezing temperatures made everything stiff, even his leather boots inside his tent. These nights everyone wore extra clothing to bed at night or the chills of winter would stealthily take their lives while sleeping, the old timers advised. His day’s takings no matter how small were added to the money pouch that he wore inside his tough rugged clothes, under his oilskin top coat. Rain swamped the campers by the very force of the fury of its volume, and the winter gales blew tents apart, night after night. The miners tried to make light of the situation, as they would rally around and with willing hands and hearts, manage to salvage anything that the wind had not blown away into the bush that surrounded them on all sides. Whatever their neighbour lacked in basic supplies, was always offered and shared easily, so firm had they become bonded in good friendships.
Other gold fields sites were not so fortunate, by all accounts of the experiences of the old timers. Brutality, theft and even murder had been encountered in greed’s relentless evil chase for the winning stakes. Occasionally, tempers flared here. Usually it would come by way of a man with the personality of a stirrer, and the original crowd let him know in no uncertain terms that it was unwelcome. The stranger would usually ride out soon after, leaving the group to its good harmonious situation.
After six months digging and banking the small monthly results, William rewarded himself with a break from work for a week staying at Duffy’s boarding house. The family had kept a lively interest in Sam informing them that the young Irishman was steadily progressing. They as a family now showed a foster family attitude toward him, and staying in their home in Hokitika, gave him the opportunity to respond to their goodwill. He found their honest enquiries very heartwarming, and he opened his heart to their understanding sympathy.
They lived in a town that was heavily populated with Irish repatriates, and they felt that too often Ireland’s problems and bitter squabbles, between the orange and the green had been transplanted to Westland’s busiest town. Drunken brawls and name-calling was all too prevalent in the name of religion here. Living right next door to St. Patrick’s Church, the attitude of the two priests was that the Duffy’s would automatically accord to them the high town status that they expected and lived by in their native country. Jim Duffy quietly and firmly put them in their place. This was a new country, with a new set of rules, he had pointed out, and they as a family had left that sort of constriction behind them. The Good Lord who was everywhere, knew what they were doing, and since they were very happy then they must be doing it all right. The priests sarcastic reply was to the effect that Lucifer had told God the same thing, in the name of pride.
In the end, Jim Duffy had shown the men of the cloth the gate, telling them that as an honest working man, he had no time for bigots, and that they all too often drove wedges into families to separate them.
“Free will, and your own conscience is the name of the game out here in this new country, ” he told the priests as their well supplied bodies left his property.” Oh, and another thing, – hard work and unconditional love for every creature as well!” The priests had given the family a wide berth, for their three years stay in Hokitika.
When they were replaced, it was by a gentle caring man, who genuinely respected and loved all persons, all creeds, the saint and the sinner. Within months the charisma of this truly humble servant of the Divine Love had won the great respect of the whole town, and he had mended the many broken bridges that the two former ones had left behind.
The warmth of the Duffy household felt especially good to William who had followed Jim’s story step by step, and he knew that he was among like minded people.
“Socrates put it very plainly, ” William remarked. “To find yourself, think for yourself.” The eldest man nodded in agreement. Sam who was also enjoying Will’s visit, felt that this older man, was a balanced man of strength. He noted that here in the library enjoying an after dinner port and a smoke, that each person here, though a different generation, had a common love for freedom of religious thought. They felt at ease discussing the topic.
“It is natural, I suppose for immigrants to bring with them to this new country their modes of functioning, and that is good if it is their comfort and way, but all too often the Church makes rules that God doesn’t, ” said Jim gravely.” They put fear in many a child, when it isn’t a child’s time to have that fear or guilt. I have found that without fear and guilt that my children learnt very easily, and were happy to learn.”
“Fear and guilt are in direct opposition to humanity’s growth and progress, ” put in William.
“The only one that saves your soul, is you yourself in the end, and that is with love and not fear, and in trust not anxiety, ” agreed Sam.
“In the past twenty years, the printed periodicals have issued many articles of challenge to the present forms of both politics and religion, and I follow the debates with interest, ” said Jim.
“Over the past century, so many changes were started by the Industrial Revolution, and new colonization in this part of the World. These and many other changes, have loosened the grip of the older institutions, ” Sam pointed his pipe in the direction of William, “Our young friend Will here is living proof of a new generation, who not only refuses to be bound by the old, but who also rejoices at the thought of the adventure of exploring all that progress and expansion that will surely be a continuing part of these down under countries. Progress continually come, whether the Churches approve of it or not!”
William smiled slowly.” What did Seneca proclaim? “The fates lead him who will- him who won’t, they drag”.
Sam and William joined Jim in a hearty last toast for the evening.
“While nothing changes overnight, I’ll warrant that the future generations of people in our favoured countries, will always match expansive vision with courage. Here’s to them all!” Three goblets touched.
“Let there be peaceful, joyful onward progress, ” added Sam.
“Yes to that”, said William, “and at the levels of the physical, mental and the spiritual equally balanced together.” Their glasses drained, a weary William bid them goodnight and retired to the luxury of his bedroom.

Good returns from the half dozen gold discoveries in the province of Westland, made the area bristling with industries set to add to the wealth of the previously discovered coal deposits, and it was Hokitika’s turn now. Since he had arrived in the clipper from the storm to have repairs, this town had seemed to him to be his new home in every aspect, and he had quickly grown to love the place. New buildings seemed to mushroom every month, and they were large substantial solid ones. Coal fields had previously been it’s main industry along with the milling of the thick fertile bush. Government land was offered free to immigrants, along with a free passage, to those with farming experience, and large tracts of timber felling and land clearing occurred on the province, as sturdy hard-working pioneers commenced dairy farming for the produce to feed the ever increasing butter and cheese factories. The larger land holdings were suitable for cattle grazing mostly. Three quarters of Westland was taken up with rugged mountain ranges, and travel to get to other provinces, was labourious, slow and dangerous. There had been plans put afoot for a rail tunnel to be put through the mountains at Otira, for the train line to link up to Canterbury. The Government of the day was looking for public debentures of money stock to finance this scheme
Sam Stevenson had a first rate financial knowledge, and William trusted his sound judgment. Since he was unable to purchase land in his own name, because the title holder must have attained the age of twenty-one years, he followed Sam’s advice and invested his money in the railway debentures for five years. That was his first investment success, for they were to pay off a dividend twenty-five pounds for every one pound.

On this stay in Hokitia, William had decided to purchase a riding hack. He had helped three other men out at Broken Gully fell some good sized trees, and soon a clearing was the site of a strong corral and a two acre holding yard, surrounded by a post and rail fence. Hokitika held stock for sale down in the stock yards, by the rail station. On this occasion, there was very little in the way of riding stock to choose from. There was an aged black, quarter draught mare who looked solid and reliable, and also a chestnut filly rising three years old, who was thoroughbred bloodstock and partly broken in to leading only. William bought them both and rode the quarter draught Bessie, to the gold field, and Tina led happily from a halter with a rein to the saddle strap. Both horses had been shod prior to leaving the town, and they travelled the winding route very well
By the time Broken Gully was reached, Williams words of gentle encouragement was rewarded with the trust of both animals. Using adapted harness, William had Bessie bring up water in a large receptacle that turned onto his diggings spoil, and the sluicing of the hillside part of his claim site began to be easier, and the yield accrued faster.
Tina had a sweet nature and the procedure of breaking in to be ridden, consisted of talking quietly and earnestly for a couple of weeks at night time, and of placing the saddle on her back for increasingly longer minutes in time, while he touched her body gently, he let the filly know that he would always be kind to her.
When he finally mounted the superb looking chestnut, she gave every indication that she would be willing to follow William’s wishes. With her pale mane and tail flowing in the evening twilight, they cantered down the clearing and out onto the rough stony track, as the occupants of the camp looked on with excited interest. Great was the sight of the horse and rider as they travelled as one. William’s excellent horse riding was the result of his well tutored riding lessons at his school in Dublin.
Now that William had independent means of travel, he felt less isolated from his adopted home at the Duffy family’s congenial home. He became a regular weekend boarder, and they looked forward to his arrival on each Saturday midday. He would take his gold into Sam’s office, then proceed to the house, stable his horse in the loose-box at the rear yard of their garden, and water and feed her after the two hour ride before he refreshed himself with a bath already drawn ready for him. They now looked on him as a member of their family. Still, William insisted that he pay his way, and he found such clean well polished lodgings a pleasure to eat and sleep in. He would read the latest newspapers and periodicals saved for him.
The recently completed cable laid under the sea from Wellington to Sydney, made the cabled news from all parts of the world most topical. Much was happening all around the globe and William kept abreast with it. The news at the time of the first cabled items was the gigantic scheme for digging a canal through a narrow land mass at Suez in Egypt. Through widened eyes he read this amazing news, and he conceived the great benefit that the shortened shipping route between the young country of New Zealand and the island continent of Australia, and more ready access to Europe and Great Britain would be so advantageous.
The recreation offered in Hokitika was really varied, but caring little for indulgence in beer drinking in the town’s public houses, William favoured a quiet cheerful drink with his two closest friends, Jim and Sam. There was a bevy of willing, smiling eager women, ready for lonely men with money in their pockets too, and often as he rode Tina into town on Saturdays, he was conscious of womens’ puzzled gazes following him to the same depot on every occasion.
Mrs. Duffy laundered and pressed his work clothes and his well cut best clothes, and checked for any missing buttons each week.
“You are developing into a fine, muscular frame of a healthy young gentleman, William, ” she noted as she tried the fit of his good tweed coat of which she had just let down the sleeve hems. He had grown at least two inches taller since he had left Ireland, and his frame indeed was filling out.
“There might be a young lady in town that you might want to be introduced to, ” she added knowingly.
William not expecting this candor, flushed scarlet and stammered,
“Oh I’m not in such a haste, at least, um, at least I don’t think I am yet. I’ve been more than occupied since I left Ireland.”
“When the time is ready, I’m sure you will have all the required sincerity to make a special young lady very happy William, ” soothed the motherly lady.
“I will want to settle here in New Zealand you know, ” he said genuinely.” It’s just that I want to be established in a proper way, Mrs. Duffy. My mother is a lovely lady herself, and she is well tutored. She instilled in me a background of respect and appreciation for all women folk. It’s certain that I will want my future special lady to feel equal with me in all respects, for I loved to hear my dear Mama’s intellectual talents. The ideas that women have to compete with men for attention, or be subservient to them, are astonishingly arrogant and belittling to both men and to women, ” said William, removing the coat for this kindest of ladies.
“I know the meaning of what you are saying, it is the strange idea of hypocrisy, and the resentment of being used that often stays with the woman with that attitude, throughout her life. Mr. Duffy and I have always, and I pray God, will always have an equal and loving partnership. I do declare dear William that twenty five years of the joys of our togetherness have forged us so closely together, that no wedge could drive us apart. It only seems like last week that we met and married.” She smiled and nodded at the large framed wedding picture, hanging at one end of the parlour.
“A truly happy couple, you make still, dear Mrs. Duffy. You are both blessed by marrying for true love. I will do that for sure, when the time is right. I have seen her in my dreams, and I know her spirit already. Our angels will be placing us together on the same life path, ” he said softly gazing out through the heavily draped window to the setting sun on the horizon.
“I know that we have loved before too, ” he said the sentence so softly that Essie Duffy did not catch the last sentence.
William’s mother addressed the letters that she wrote to him care of Mr. Duffy. There was a parchment envelope with her distinctive writing on it waiting for him on the parlour table, with a silver letter opener beside it. Eagerly, he opened the letter and read the news she had sent him. His father’s health was still poorly, he had never mentioned his son to her, and she had kept her promise to William, of not enlightening the still angry parent. Sara Jane had attended her eldest sister’s funeral last month. His maternal grandfather, was praying for them all, from his remote British outpost in the Falkland Is. He kept wonderful health, thanks be to the Almighty. Dear William was in her nightly thanksgiving prayers, as she knew that their sixth sense communication was a rare gift from Heaven above. Green Vale’s prosperity continued, thanks to the dedicated love that the workers always put into the property. These people should all have the chance to work on their own behalf, and perhaps New Zealand, may soon see them living there, and rewarding them more appropriately in the future. With love and trust that all, was, and would be wonderful on his journey along life’s path, she had signed it tenderly, “Ever your loving Mother.” He smiled as he put the folded up letter in his jacket pocket, and thought how much his mother would enjoy the freedom of opportunities that were becoming established fairly in this country. Today, he would take a wander down to the Sports ground.

The Sports ground was alive on Saturday afternoons with varied events according to the seasons, and Rugby football was on today. Two sets of teams were in loose looking groups, and some heated shouting was going on at the side line. It seemed that there was a player short, and William was being waved over to one group.
“Can you play the game, by any chance, ” said a burly elderly man of Maori blood, looking at him keenly.
“I played full back at school, and I’d be glad to give it a go for your team, if you are one short” he replied enthusiastically. The older guy grinned.
“Full back aye, good’o eye, just the fella that we need, My brother can’t make it today, but here is his gear, if you want to nick over to the shed and pull them on, while I let the other blokes know that we’ve got a team now. What’s your name then, I’m Pika”
“William Gilroy”, he said over shoulder, running towards the shed.
“Right’o Willy” said the amiable Pika
When William returned, in the gear, there was a couple of smart remarks about his hair style not fitting in with their brand of football, and the captains of the teams were tossing the coin for the first ball. The ground was rough in patches, with a couple of puddles of muddy water, here and there. The two teams were fairly well matched of height, but differed in weight, and they were into the affray of the game with equal determination to win. In the scrums, handfuls of the opponent’s flesh were brutally clutched in an effort to wear the other team’s moral down. The fellow who grabbed William by the testicles, paid for the gross infringement five seconds later when William tackled him, and downed him in the middle of a muddy pool, grabbed the football, dogged off three more chaps of the other team, and with a mighty up and under kick, sent the wet ball whizzing cleanly between his team’s goal-posts. Up went a cheer, as the referee blew the whistle three times to verify that an opening score of the match had been made. His team, responded to the magnificent move that this new chap had opened with, by grinding, rucking, and running the ball, and it was, very much to the delight of the small groups of rowdy spectators who raced up and down on the side-line, keeping up on the game, checking on the referee, and giving their own team the benefit of their inexpert and often illegal advice.
“Heck, down him, don’t let them win, get ‘em in the googlies!” During half-time, there was a quick swig of some barley water for those fellows who didn’t want a drop of the hard stuff. William set his breathing at a pattern that he knew his body would get some more energy from. With his hands held firmly onto his knees he leaned forward as far as he could, and timed the rate of the inspiration of the breath breathing in, and the expiration of the breath going out.
”What in the heck are you doing?” said one of his team chaps at the whisky bottle.
“Getting back more energy in a very short time, it was what we always had to do in our school team games. Here’s what you do” and he gave the simple instruction. The second half was more exciting, the teams were battling now, but the team that William was playing for, had more stamina. Now with only three minutes left to full time, the opponents had no intention of traveling back to their township defeated. As William raced to the line, ball firmly under his wing, a hefty forearm struck his stitched up ear, and a sudden spurt of blood blinded him as he increased his speed, and hurled himself across the line, to the accompanying shouts, and the whistle allowing a try. He knew that his stitched ear had copped an injury, but he placed the ball in the kicked out groove, wiped the back of his hand across his eyes, asked for help from a higher source, and in the count of three, the ball left mid-field, and sailed surely between. The goal posts victoriously. The whistle signaled full time, and the crowds came onto the ground, eager to get a closer look of the talented, bloody tenacious stranger, who plucked their game out of the doldrums into one that they would talk over the beer glasses all season.
Most of the West Coasters, were all well catered for recreation. There was teams of tug-of-war, where two teams of eight men pitted their strength by pulling a knot in a rope past a marker stuck fast in the ground. The knot had to be past the marker for one full minute, before the team was declared the winner. Wheeled machines called bicycles, were becoming increasingly popular on the grass running track. There was a well mowed area by the northern end, reserved as a cricket pitch in summer, also a lawn tennis court close by.
Several sports meetings a year allowed for socialising and were always well patronized. Competitive wood-chopping, in teams and solo events, with precisely placed blows of their fast razor-sharp axes made the chips fly while the hushed crowd looked on, some scarcely able to able to breath until the speedy event was over. Traveling boxing ring bosses, put up purses, challenging any willing local man to fight their traveling champion. Often fairer, were the wrestling competitions, as there were the strict rules of Cumberland to adhere to, and it was honourable to match correctly the weights against each other.
The Scottish community regularly tossed the caber, which was a stout wooden pole of five feet in length. The aim, was to throw the pole the furthermost distance, from holding it upright, in an arm’s clasp. Tossing the sheaf, meant that with the aid of a two-pronged harvesting fork, a well tied wheat sheaf was pitched as high as one could, against a measured wall, and the best effort of three tries was taken as the competitive throw.
Highland dancing, and Irish dancing, and the English Morris dancing, provided the spectacular precision of intricate dancing steps to the stirring ethnic music, as the dancer’s whirled in their distinctive colourful outfits. The dancers were at the time, all men, but many a young lady had a yen to partake in those national dances.
There was a strong horse racing club in Hokitika, with it’s own grounds, and picnic race meeting were held there four times a year. The galloping events of the day were interspersed with the tough hurdling events.
Games of croquet and lawn bowls, were a popular family game in the grounds of some of the larger homes, and was considered a more leisurely way to enjoy the fresh open air. There were a couple of public billiard parlors, for the casual player, and many an inexperienced young person ran the risk of meeting some seedy, greedy, characters there, hustling for the quick quid.
The many rivers, were popular for swimming and rowing, and fishing for trout and whitebait. The widely popular picnic, where the food was as varied and as plentiful as a banquet, and thoroughly enjoyed by all ages in the many places of natural beauty, that guaranteed one a rest, from the worries of the world for a time.
Several traveling musical shows and singers performed to packed houses. They were usually given standing ovations from the warmly welcoming West Coasters to all who brought them entertainment, since the difficulty in traveling to their isolated province, earned their hearty thanks. Families of friends relied in seeing each other regularly at weekly church services from the four reverently built town’s churches. The churches solidly organised activities, included working bees, Bible reading, and auxiliary meetings for the women folk.
At home afternoon and evenings were extended by invitation only, for card games of poker, whist, bridge or canasta. Hokitika Town held several Social Balls a year, and the correct dressing was expected, and all the social etiquette was strictly adhered to.
Several Lodges were formed and followed. The Masonic, Forrester’s, Odd Fellows and the Druids Lodges being strongly supported.
The Government funded Education Department, had erected the first school in 1849, which catered for ten pupils, and twelve years later, a larger, more substantial building of four school rooms ensured that all children, from the age of five years were educated free of charge, to the age of fourteen years.
The Hokitika Town Council was elected for a term of three years, by the householders of the district, and many men with good intentions furthered the progress of their town. There was a Public Atheneum in the Council building, and the library rented books at an annual cost of three shillings to each household. Twice a week, at these rooms, there were reading and writing lessons for adults, who had not been given the benefit of a formal education.
The two Doctors, who had come to the town area fifteen years before, were still there, and the hospital was a large six bedroom home. They were good-natured, jovial family men, who knew every family in the area, and the disposition of them as well. When William had his ear repaired after his injury, his anaesthetic was their sense of humour, and their skill, repaired his ear back to the original shape that he was born with.
The officials of the Police Force, Post Office and the Railway, wore the distinctive uniforms of their occupation and office.
There were three General Stores, selling a full rage of groceries, patent medicines, toiletries, and tobacco, cigars and smoking pipes. Besides that, they also sold kitchenware, hardware, tools, taps and copper and galvanized iron pipes.
The Stock and Station Agents, sold stock foods, stock drenches and medicines, crop seeds, vegetable seeds, fencing materials, gates, sheep dip liquid, inflammable liquids, hurricane lamps, cream churns, milk separators and galvanized iron stock-troughs. They would order the latest in farming implements, drays and carts from Christchurch to be delivered within six weeks.
The Haberdashery Shop, traded an assortment of materials for clothes, curtains, sheets, towels. It stocked hand turned and treadle machines, ribbons, skeins of knitting wool, fine embroidery silks, scissors, needles of all types. There was a selection of ready made clothes and underwear, footwear, head wear, and several glass cases containing gifts and trinkets.
Every morning at seven thirty, the shop keepers swept the area of the wooden boardwalk outside their shops, with sturdy hard bristled, long headed brooms, and bid every person a cordial good-morning greeting. At Christmas time, and the few Public Holidays, the shopkeepers decorated their shops, and the Town Council put in much effort in organising a local parade, led by the Auxiliary Garrison Brass Band, and the Caledonian Pipe Band, along the streets decorated with tricolour bunting, and the ever plentiful native plants and ferns.
Bakers delivered their goods house to house, as did the Milkman and the Butcher in signed carts. Their horses were quiet, gentle creatures, who would not be frightened by the town’s usual three or four stray dogs roaming the streets, periodically.
There was a printing shop next door to the bank, that put out a town paper locally, twice a week, and the lean-to of the Bank of England was the Assay office, that Sam managed, single-handedly.
At the end of the group of retailers, was the Smithy Shop, always with an audience of small boys, watching the sparks fly from the glowing forge, when the smithy used the bellows, and the glowing metal was expertly hammered into shape with a series of metallic ringing. The blacksmith was also the local farrier, and all of the horses were shod with well made horse shoes.
At the shore end, where there was always a variety of fishing fleet, and ocean going tall-masted ships tied up, the boat builder had his high roofed building, and through the wide double doors, hoisted sails, ropes decking and ready made spars could be viewed among the anchors, and ship’s wheels.
The Sawmills were all at the hill end of the town, all three of them and they had neatly stacked piles of dressed timber, rough planking, fence posts, and cords of sawn up fire wood, still with the bark on. The Duffy and Gray sawmillers, carried a gross of corrugated iron sheets, weighed down with some hefty planks against the strong winds that would suddenly blow in from the Tasman Sea. The mill also had a stock of plain coffins, placed away discreetly in a shed apart from the main group.
In their isolation from the other South Island provinces, the West Coasters enjoyed their own community-bound spirit. They worked hard, and they played hard as well.

Within the first year of being at Broken Gully, the camp had moved three times. The well worked diggings, showed how many long hours of back breaking labour had been put in, as the tunnels and mounds of rubble snaked around a radius of a square mile. among the early tailing sites, there was a small group of Chinesemen who patiently picked over the rubble, with a set of fine sieves. They kept very much to themselves, and Sam had told William, that their small gains were sent back to their native China, each month.
There were still tents to be seen, but gradually wooden log huts were erected for more durable use. A wall of corrugated iron, meant that an inside fireplace made the miners lives more bearable on the freezing nights. Inside William’s hut, he had rows of shelves along most walls, to store provisions high above the damp earth. The window space, had no glass in it, but sported a rolled up blind of canvas which could be latched down when the weather was inclement, and during the summer months, he tacked muslin across the space to keep out the insects. The floor had a layer of heavy even logs, dug deep into the earth for warmth. The furniture that he made was frugal but adequate. He had attached a long bunk to one wall, and underneath his tin trunk stored his clothes. He put up pegs on the wall spaces, for his tools, work clothes and the all important oilskin outer wear. On the other side of the tiny room, a small table was attached to the wall, and with canvas and split wood, he had constructed a surprisingly comfortable armchair. In the fireplace, a short stout iron drum was cut down, and placed on a bed of rocks, so a fire would be safely contained in it and inserted into a four foot high stone, protective wall around the three sides of the fire area, was a sturdy iron bar, from which the kettle and cooking pots hung securely.
There had been three severe fires in the huts, and one hut had been burnt down completely. Old Jack Crowe, was down at the creek that night, when the wild wind had whipped the fire in his hut into a roaring inferno. He had nothing left, except the metal shovel and pick ends, and a twisted gold pan. His cobbers had rallied around him and got him started again, as they built him a lean-to, to the hut that Bullocky Saunders used from time to time.

By now, five of the miners had brought their woman to the camp. The Murray twin brothers had spent a two week period stint in Christchurch, and had met two sisters from Galway there, and had brought the pleasant, bright eyed, merry girls back with them after a hurried double wedding ceremony. The happy foursome worked well together, and within two weeks, with help from their friends, their two single huts were enlarged on each side to comfortably accommodate with privacy. William had helped to fell the slender tree trunks needed, along with the other miners.
The Murray brothers held a house-warming spree when the work was completed. They put a suckling pig on the outside spit, and the wives cooked an array of wonderful, delicious food without many conveniences. A good time was had by all.
Ettie Murray was twenty years old, tall, dark haired and ample, while her sister Lizzie was three years younger, shorter, slender, with a mass of curly bright red hair. They had come out to New Zealand three years before they met their husbands to be employed in the service of household help, and had free passage and employment placement. They were very fortunate in being employed in the same good hotel in Christchurch together, and the girls settled to life in their new country, without many pangs of home sickness.
Some of their friends did not fair that well. The treatment from insensitive employers was cold and offhanded and distinctly class orientated. Often the employers showed no understanding of the anguish suffered by the young women of being transplanted in a country and a life so different from the village life that most of the maids had previously known. The young timid women, often felt ill at ease with the stern treatment, and of being unappreciated for the long hours of arduous daily work for a few paltry pounds a year.
When a man came on the scene, with an offer of escape with a marriage proposal, many of these young women left their employment, in exchange of a lifetime of unrelenting thankless drudgery, of a worse servitude. There were others who married kind and appreciative husbands and formed a close bond of reciprocal loving co operation, and these people were the stable backbone in the building of optimistic community life.
William found the Murray ladies happy cheerful souls, and noticed what a difference domestic bliss had made to their husbands. They were protective and proud of their wives, and their manual work seemed to take on a different purpose and a new enjoyment.
The weekend excursions into town to the family that he was so genuinely fond of, marked a well earned rest from a week of self disciplined hard work, and his participation with the football club, the enjoyable team spirit and the commendable victories that they won throughout the season, brought together a healthy maturity to his years, and never once did William feel lonely, or insecure.
The years passed with an ever renewing enthusiasm for the daily joy of expectation, in the adventure of life. He had many friends, who found him a reliably kind considerate and understanding person, and his social calendar was full as his presence was enjoyed by friends who were both young ladies and young men.

As each month at the camp progressed, William developed even more respect for every individual’s right, and grew more tolerant of their oddities and their various behaviors. They were doing their best, with their view of what they thought was the best way for them, and he respected their views. Without the help of any guiding institution, this small knot of people had worked in close cooperation. Why was that? Does it have something to do with simple needs, simple pleasures? Does the digging in the digging in this virgin earth, and the finding of gold, make my thoughts meander on so? Yes it does. It is the result of expected finding of gold by digging. The digging is the action of expectation, and the gold is the reward! God is both the Giver, and the Gift. He would ponder on these words of thought expression again in Hokitika next weekend, he vowed.
William enjoyed his manual work gold digging. He felt close to the very heart of Nature herself, and often, deep down in a trench, the raw, fresh smell of the newly dug shovelful of earth filled him with an astonishing wonder at the thought of uncovering the beauty, that previously may never have been looked before, by human eyes. How many years had it taken to lay down this soil in layers, and what trees and wildlife had been the Earth’s inhabitants, when the soil down here was topsoil?
William laid aside his shovel, and wiped his wet brow with his coloured neckerchief. His own height was just under six feet and two inches, and there was a good more four feet of trench above his head. No wonder she was called Mother Earth! This beautiful planet’s land masses had the ability to grow the glories of nature by this wonderful basic substance, that had evolved by a plan so absolutely, perfectly precise! With a sudden magnificent flash of intuition, William realized joyfully the wonderfully tooled, finished product was indeed the result of the primal sea life, volcanic fire, and plant vegetation, and decomposed animal and plant life. It was indeed the original fine product of the four elements – water, fire, air and earth. The solidifying end product, was indeed the Earth!
The simplicity of the greatness overcame him, and William raised his two arms up skywards in deep reverence.
“Thank You, Great Creator for the magnificent work of Your Whole Creation. I now see more fully that what I thought was a Father God, is really the whole Universe of Your created works, and there is not one thing that You are not present in! You are everywhere, in all places, and at all times! From now on, I will see You in every person, place and thing as my fellow creatures, having been created in Love, by the intelligence of Your all loving Plan of Creation. I must try always to extend my love to encompass this, and by thinking from this point, that everyone is indeed a genuine part of Your Marvelous Plan.
The human element in the animal species has been blessed with Your loving gift of the ability of thinking. This gift is also a creation in itself for it is a part of Your greater creation. We each have the ability to create the circumstances by the very power of our thought, and how responsible I must vigilantly be with my thoughts. I clearly see now, that we are indeed always an individual part of All that Is, and that my thoughts of love and hope then create, while the thoughts dwelling on not loving and doubt can destroy, and the destructive thoughts always become something else, for there is always a reaction to every action! How great is the responsibility, the individual’s intention for thinking only the good and therefore the creative, is the onus on the freewill of every person. And not only for myself, but also for every created thing.
Every human is thinking every minute of every walking minute, they cannot function except by thinking. Even to working a simple action of moving the muscles of the body, it is first preceded by thought, though most of the thought of action of the body has become so repetitive in the first few months of early life, and we have constantly added to our intelligence, that the original thought has been lost in the effect of more learning. The thoughts of the parents, also must have some bearing on the accomplishment of the young child, with the expectations of the adults powerful thought. Each individual person, must be expressing, and exhibiting, at each moment of their lives, a portion or an aspect of YOU.
“I clearly see that I am to love every person innerly, as a brother, as a brother, regardless of what their behaviour!. By creative thought, I create, build and sustain. By unloving thought, I destroy, abolish and help obliterate! Thank You Divine Intelligence, I now know for certain, that I am my brother’s keeper!! The words came out with a force of love, from the very depths of his heart, and echoed around the trench, resonantly. His conviction was complete, and was exhalted in the rapture of the joy of the joy of knowing.
The rope ladder beckoned William to ascend to the surface, as the day was nearly done, but he placed his hand on the other sturdy handle beside his shovel. Raising the pick, he brought it’s sharp pinnacle edge crashing against the boulder molded side of the trench, and a shower of residue left the bank wall. It was indeed a bank wall, for there appeared a skein of pure yellow colour that ran twelve inches deep, and about seven feet along the wall side!
“My Brother’s Keeper” will be the name of this mine!! Thank You dear loving Great Creator for this precious gift. Thank you all you patient guiding Spirits, who have helped me every step of the way,” was William’s heartfelt humble prayer of thanks.
Two more strokes of the pick, and he had enough gold nuggets to fill the crown of his hat, and the light of the day was failing fast. Carefully, he made his way up the ladder, and he sprightly walked to the camp. When he neared the group already home, he shouted jubilantly,
“Gather here, Friends and see it for yourselves! This is the day that I have been waiting for!!” His brimming hat, and his smiling face showed it all, and told them that it was a pay load on William’s patch, and he had struck it. Shrieks and yells filled the night air, and the chatter of all of them congratulating him at the same time.
“God’ struth” shrieked Jack, dancing a merry jig.
”This’ll bring in the whole bloody world, if the news gets out just yet, ” said Alex Murray wisely.” What are our chances, Lads, do we spit the news out yet, or calmly keep on going for a while. ?” Bob Murray favoured the waiting period.
“It would be better to await a wee while, and gauge in two weeks for the strength of your gold seam, and, it may have petered out after a one big find. Then, we will have dragged in the fevered outsiders in among our honest bunch, and all of us have proved our loyalty a dozen times over to each other, ” Bob stated sincerely.
“Are you suggesting that I would be better to dig on to get a more accurate measure of the amount of gold in the claim then Friends?” William asked them all.
“Damn right, son, ” wheezed old Jack, ”all of us geezers here trust each other, but strangers commin’ in fast, you can’t.”
The Murray wives dropped their chores, and ran to the circle of excitement, wiping their hand on their aprons.
“Holy Mother of God, ” screeched Liz in her thick brogue, then quickly made the Sign of the Cross, when she saw the gold booty.” Did you ever see such a thing so lovely, in all your livin’ days, Alex darlin’’, “ she cooed.
“Oh Lordy Sweet Jesus”, echoed her sister, and her wide mouth made a beguiling smile, ”God love you William, ” and she threw her arms around him, hugging him tightly, in warm congratulations.
They were all very thrilled for him, all of the miners from their happy hearts felt that he had deserved this windfall of victory, for in all the tough uncomplaining toil, Will had matched them, manfully.
The experience of the older men, counted with the young man, so they would carry on as usual, and he would ride to see Sam about it, soon. Much too excited to cook that evening, the whole camp dined on thick, cold meat sandwiches, washed down with a demi-jar of whisky. They were a merry lot, singing and clapping and dancing to the music, and enjoying the idea of successes in their future also.
“Twenty four thousand miles away you are, Mama, but do you know what happened today? God’s blessed earth has given me a gift of gold, and even more precious, is that I think that I’m getting more understanding of divine wisdom. I am truly thankful tonight Mama, truly thankful.” In the centre of the golden glow, Sara Jane’s elated face clearly nodded her understanding.
“You are well loved and protected, my darling William, and guided with the spirit of Love. I do know that your new wealth will not spoil your heart or soul. Be happy, and know that you are loved for your very self, among your fellow friends.”
“Indeed, I could not have found a more perfect place, nor more easy to love people, than the ones here in New Zealand, Mother mine. When Papa’s days are over, I’ll be wanting you to join me out here and enjoy it for yourself, for as long as you want to.” he said earnestly.
“Why I surely will! Now dear William, send your loving thoughts and prayers for you Papa, for the help that he needs in all his distress. He’s very tormented at times, and when I put the white light around him, it calms his anguished cries.”
“Yes Mama, I do love him, he is always deserving of our love and light. We each have to walk our own life paths, and I see that Papa’s lesson of life started very early for him. I send you the light often and ask for help and strength for you also dearest Mama, for you always would give completely of yourself, without ever counting any cost.”
“Goodnight to you dear son, till next time, soon”
“Blessings and joy to all under Green Vale’s roof, Mama tonight.”
The vision was gone, and in it’s place was a golden new moon, and hundreds of brilliant twinkling stars.

For the last three years, Sara Jane had nursed her husband, with loving tenderness, and now he was almost completely insane. He was quieted and calmed as she soothed his terrible nightmares of fear. As he deteriorated rapidly, he would not allow her out of his sight. Mentally, he was an infant again, so she cradled him close to her and rocked him gently, kissing his fears away with a loving compassion
“Don’t you leave me, don’t go away without me, my dear, lovely sweet angel !You always leave me behind, when you know I want to go with you, sweet Mother.”
The grandfather clock in the hall below chimed midnight, and Sir Jeffrey Gilroy had held Sara Jane’s hand for the last time.
.. When the solemn cortege took his remains to the family plot at the church yard, there were three dozen eager distant relatives impatiently awaiting the reading of the will. Jeffrey’s only legally recognized child, his heir, was already listed as missing, presumed dead, and had been registered to that effect in the County Records.
After a distant cousin had succeeded to the title, and to the landed property, and the obligatory words of bereavement were given indifferently to Sara Jane, she began to feel a slight relief as some of the burdens began to lift from her tired shoulders.
Capital that she was left, she would invest in some share-bonds in Lipton’s the tea company for William, and she now busied herself with something which had a couple of years ago, had been an acorn of an idea.
Her plans were to visit her two sister’s welcome homes, then to visit her aging father, who was active still in the Church ministry in the Falklands and then continue her travel quietly in secret, out to New Zealand. William had given her a glowing account of his newly adopted country’s growth, and marvellous progress. He had travelled extensively, the well organised towns and cities, and had been enthralled by the sheer scale of majestic natural beauty. Roads and railways had linked up a network throughout the entire length of the two main islands, and a ferry service linked up the two straits of rather rough water of this three island country.

The gold strike on William’s claim proved to be rich indeed, but the seam deposit had terminated sharply to the usual sporadic, small nuggets embedded in minute rock crevices, and many hours of work were needed to accumulate even a reasonably small return. The two weeks of intense and earnest digging had given William a gold fever seeker’s rush, mainly from the expectations that the other miners might, at any shoveled cut attain the same great find on their site. They plugged on with their hopes still high, regardless.
The huge gold deposit on William’s site had enriched his bank balance by ten thousand pounds, in two weeks, and his close friends that he told, were overjoyed at his amazing good fortune. His heart was set on purchasing a larger tract of land outright, and have the capital to fence, stock, and build a future home there. He would be able to own land when he attained the age of twenty one years. His mother had sent out to him, a copy of his certificate of birth, together with her written approval towards becoming a permanent settler citizen of New Zealand. Jim Duffy felt comfortable with the role of surrogate father, and he assisted William with the official forms, and had agreed to act as sponsor to him.
New Zealand was now his official country.
Since the Constitution had been passed by the New Zealand Government in 1847, Parliament had become increasingly independent from the Westminister system of the British Parliament. There had been an optimism charged with the young Nation’s vitality and achievement. While based on England’s institutions, there was a general adaptation, that gave regard for the individuality and stability for this newest member of the British Empire.
The education system, which had commenced with the rudimentry mission schools in the 1830’s, had grown in twenty years, to have compulsory, free, integrated, and co-education for all children, from the age of five years till fourteen years. The priority of the settlers for the Province of Otago was so highly prized, that in 1869 the University of Otago was founded, and in the year of 1871 the first students had enrolled in the classes or degrees in Law, Medicine, Music and Arts.
The Land Wars that encountered the passionate fighting by grieving Maori tribes who had not fully committed to the sale and the taking of their tribal lands, had often caused monumental difficulty in the securing of land, and the safety of the settlers had been often jeopardized by the fatalities of a number of new settlers. This had occurred in the North Island, with the one severe attack in 1843 in which 22 white people and many more of the Maori people had lost their lives in the northern area of the South Island. The sparse population of the Maoris in the south, by comparison with the greater majority of the Maoris in the north, had the effect of a closeness in dialogue and cooperative understanding without threatening situations. The cooler climate of the southern regions had not attracted the Maori population to live there in large numbers, and the Maoris in the South Island were friendly and quickly hospitable to their new neighbours.
William felt in his heart that he would find his desired land to buy and settle on somewhere, south of Dunedin. He listened with interest to Jim’s accounts of the early days of the Maori Wars of the new colony.
“The old ways are never given to the new ways without a struggle,” Jim reasoned. The memory of the Maori warriors proud stand in the thick bush which camouflaged their brown strong bodies, whilst his own of a bright red jacket and blue trousers had proved no help, only a target. He had been duly honourably discharged from his Army Corps, when a flying spear had buried skillfully in his left thigh, and the deep wound had caused him agony for a long time. In Westland, the Maori friends that he had made, had shown him the appropriate native plants, and the application of them, rapidly repaired the damaged tissues, and he had recovered the full use of his limb completely.
Jim explained his thoughts to William and Sam, in the library that night.
“It’s a fact that the culture of the Maori people is based on the style of a community, or a large family tribal culture. Often one family tribe will impinge on another family tribe, and that necessitates a battle to settle the difficulties of the aggression. Sometimes, the battle is with words, sometimes it is a full-scale body battle. Naturally, they were not going to give up their battle earned territory of their now distinct settled tribal lands without going through the motions of self-defence.”
“As in Ireland, I can surmise that for many generations to come, Maori people may look upon the settler people as usurpers.” said Sam.” Resentment is such a destructive hurdle.”
“Especially if the victor is not a gracious winner, ” put in William.
“Well the Maori people didn’t seem to resent the white people coming, living on their land, and taking whales and seals for their use. It was only when they saw that the white people and ran the country, their way, and that they – the Maoris – did not now make the rules. The rules would now all be made by the Government, and it did not allow for the old tribal ways of settling aggression disputes. The Government would now be owning the land, and did not allow their defensive drive to harness. Fairly astute in regard to what was happening in nearby Australia, most Maori tribal elders had debated that to concede to a treaty where it be their right to have their each tribal land protected in perpetuity. The greater majority of the Maori chiefs signed the Treaty. Greed and the years of implementing and integrating a new set of institutional systems, so that everyone’s rights are protected, and impatience with the difficulties, are still playing a role of eruptions and disharmony.”
“For all these present conditions though, there prevails a spirit of longing for an enjoined, successful partnership of the two peoples.”
“You say that the Maoris conquered a Race of people, who were they then? “ asked William with interest.
“Every race of people has first conquered and then been conquered themselves, and one might perceive that this has been the way of all lands that the migration of the human evolvement since they came out of living in caves. It is a pity that there has to be so much ego placed on ownership of God’s Earth, for we are each one of us, only caretakers of any part of this planet, for our place to live our mortal lives on, the sale and ownership seems to reduce to the same modern progressive equivalent of instead of the effort of a battle, the effort of the work to earn the money becomes the battle with individual person who want to buy, and has to produce the capital, and the many years of physical effort of work is often much harder than a battle skirmish when the whole family feels it has been insulted by another.” was Jim’s considered opinion.
“The whole pivot seems to me to be that there are parallels of the two cultures. The Maori culture takes pride in that if they all think as one then the end result of not being hunted off their land shows the strength of their dominance, even thought the cost to that principle is often the killing of people in battle. The European settler concentrates on the physical work for monetary gain, the saving up of money, of those years of work, so to have enough capital to purchase the land on which years of further work will be put in with years of long sustained physical effort, and the reward is in seeing the land cultivated with loving care, and the family fed, housed, and happy and contented, as they remember that this mortal life does have a timed end. The contrary principle to this ideal is if the workers doing the work for others, may often not be fairly paid and recompensed for their physical effort, and the greedy monetary gain has again killed, by the strength of the dominance. So to sum it up I think the struggle is caused by an ego drive for a power control, by any means and by any race, and each person has to in the end overcome all the worldly implications, family, cultural, anything that limits each person’s inner seeking. No matter if we think that we aren’t helped, divine activity is taking place in us all whether we see it or not, so our tolerance for each other always is our biggest hurdle. The very simple answer is that we each are our brother’s keeper.” was William’s thoughtful simple summary.
“The Morioris were living peacefully as food gatherers, and nine hundred years ago approximately, the warrior Maoris landed and now there are only a remnant of the former peoples who are living on remote wind-swept Chattam Island in isolation.” Jim had a wealth of years of experience in this country, and he could vision a bright future where human dignity would eventually make no need for a racial distinction.
Every Sunday, Wlliam studied the land gazette for the block of land that he knew that he would be guided toward. Parts of remote south Otago and even further south in Southland appealed to him as he kept up with the areas that looked promising in the published descriptions of land for sale.

There had been changes in the household here. The Duffy’s eldest daughter Margaret, had lost her husband, when felling timber on a hillside operation a giant totora tree crashed down on the man killing him instantly. His grieving wife and two young sons and one daughter came to their Hokitika family often, for comforting support.
Sam Stevenson and Margaret had formed an affectionate dignified friendship that culminated with future plans of marriage when one year had passed. After a movingly beautiful ceremony, with William as his grooms man, they had enjoyed a small delightful afternoon and evening with a banquet and toasting the well-matched happy couple, and splendid music in a marquee set up in the sunny garden at the Duffy home. The next day the new family group travelled to Wellington, and after a sea voyage to Melbourne made the acquaintance of Sam’s pleased parents and excited daughter Delia. While they were holidaying in Australia, Sam met with the Board of the Bank of New South Wales. There he was offered a managerial post with one of their agencies in Dunedin. Because Sam could see a good secure future for his enlarged responsibilities, he readily accepted the position with the banking concern.
The newly formed family were soon welded into a happy unit of shared love and respect and within a year, Margaret and Sam became the proud parents of twins, a son and a daughter, which cemented their wedded bond. Their home on the Roslyn hill in Dunedin was a pleasantly styled large comfortable place, built of Oamaru limestone blocks. From the garden, the view of Dunedin’s harbour and city was both expansive and extensive.
The bustling city, having been established without any major problems of land for sale. The Otago Provincial Council was also the overseer to the early formation and administration of the province of Southland. The men on the Council had a wealth of experience in organising, and were gifted with a wide vision. The large, solid public buildings seemed to reflect the determination of these hardy God-fearing stalwart people. The settlers came from crofter stock and also men qualified in trades, and the challenge of fitting into a new country, they met head-on, without any fanfare. Their needs were taken seriously taken by the Council, and the settlers were enjoying the effort of their hard work and strength of purpose, when they were exuberantly rewarded with the finding of gold on Central Otago. Very many of the people that came flocking to the lure of the gold, came from Australia, as in the pre-colony days of the whalers and sealers who had enjoyed the flow of people who steered their own course along the adventurous path.
William visited Sam and Margaret for the family festivities of their first Christmas in Dunedin and was very impressed to find travel arrangements so accommodating. The railway was warm, efficient, and the beauty of the country was viewed in comfort from Christchurch to Dunedin.
Two weeks into the New Year, in pleasant summer weather, he journeyed further south with Sam. After taking the train to the enterprising large town of Invercargill they hired some reliable and fit horses to make the trek further inland. Land had become available in the central and northern parts of Southland, and the purchase price was most tempting.
The land on the first part of their trail was of a low lying and often swampy type, much of it covered in native fax, and the tall white flying feather-like flowers of the toi toi bushes. After two days of riding and passing through three little hamlets of huddled buildings, they passed on to a larger township, with two stores, two hotels and a dozen houses. On the fourth day, the altitude began to steadily rise and wonderful hills began to close in on three sides.,
To William, it seemed like they had entered a new world, and he could feel his inner spirit rise in joy. The wide open grassy plains and small stands of native trees now had become thicker, with many more varieties of tall native trees. Some of the huge trees were over a hundred feet high, and the shades of green differed, as they were crowned with profuse flowering of scarlet, yellow, pink, red orange, cream and white flowers. In the dense undergrowth was many types of ferns, from the tall tree ones, the pongas, the smaller varieties of a paler coloured silver fern, and the hardy bracken fern.
The sounds of bird song filled the air, and the lazy cheeping and buzzing of the insects provided another note of content of the harmony of the wonders that behold Sam and William as they rode at a leisurely pace, drinking in the sheer beauty of this utter peace. The road was a narrow gravel track, barely wide enough for two stage coaches to pass. They had seen three coaches when they had stopped at a roadside hotel, in a junction township where the southern road and eastern road forked, to become the one northerly route. Longden was a busy looking junction, with a small group of buildings, and a dozen people were engaged in the town’s activities so it seemed.
They had conversed with the host of The Carriers Arms, one of the two surprisingly large looking hotels in town. Settlement had been an activity in the area, especially since the gold strikes in Central Otago, and there had been an appreciation of the potential for the likelihood of farming in the form of stock grazing on the outer bigger holdings.
The biggest difficulty, their informant said would be the fencing of the large perimeter. It would take miles of boundary fencing, and he had it on reliable information that the owner was liable for this, under the purchase of sale clause. The soil around this area, was producing some excellent grain harvests, and the settled farm holdings that ranged in size from one to three hundred acres, had to be initially broken into it’s fine friable tilth, by ploughing it initially with a heavy implement that made a deep furrow. Some of the smaller holdings, had numerous boggy areas, and much draining with field tiles had made the water table very advantageous.
Mine Host had reassured his listeners that this Province would, from the progress that he had seen in nine years, be worthy of all the effort that was necessary to make farming viable in this part of the country.
The local farmers had experimented with some sheep breeds, and had found the big Southdown, and the versatile Romney Marsh, to be the most suitable to the high rainfall of this area. They still had a propensity for foot-rot, but careful examination, and painless excision, kept the sheep relatively problem free.
There was this hotel for sale, if they were interested in the hospitality trade, the owner offered cheerfully, William and Sam thanked their host for his neighbourly information, and told him that they must press on their journey.
The Southern Alps in the distance, with their snow capped peaks even in the warm summer, were majestic, and there was a fast flowing, stone-bottom river named on the map, the Oreti, that followed it’s course along the low foothills across the wide open valley. Sam checked their copy of the survey map from a low grassy hill they had climbed to get a full view of the very wide grassy valleys between three steeply rising hills.
In the sunlight, the river sparkled, and like a bright blue ribbon it curved along the foothills across the valley from where they stood. Tall trees made the higher hills appear very close and the colour of rich emerald green, and as far as the eye could see, were more valleys cleared in the foothills.
“What a sight of wonder, my friend!” exclaimed Sam, “it is simply spellbinding in sheer natural beauty and I have never seen a place to match this, in my whole lifetime!”
“I’m completely lost for words, and I am finding it very hard to drink in this sight without my eyes filling with these tears of utter thankful joy, my friend, ” said William, husky in voice and his hand wiping his moist eyes.” The hills all around, are like a garland to the sky, and I think that I shall name this place “Garland Hills.”
“Very appropriate, and very pretty. Don’t forget my friend that you are buying this place freeholded from your very own efforts of muscle, mind and soul. So don’t forget to give yourself a garland for your mighty will and sustained determination, you do have to honour yourself too, William.” said the faithful kind Sam.
“Sam, I have had the kindest friends placed beside me on the journey, and all through out, the help of the most wondrous higher than me, and it is also that I know this in my heart, that makes this moment the crowning glory that it is.”
They rode around the area for two days and noted that the bracken fern was prolific among the limestone surfaced hillocks. To purchase this parcel of land would be a very big undertaking they concluded, as the fencing and felling timber clearing seemed a mammoth task in itself. Several areas had swamp land, and the tussock grass on the higher ground was suitable for grazing only. The Government survey map had given a detailed them a detailed description of the flora and soil content, and together the two men studied it carefully. Out in this fresh virgin country, William had already selected a perfect homestead site for his future home, and he confided his plans to Sam who in turn encouraged him and wished for William the very best abundance, and prosperity. As they camped out under the mantle of the starry sky, he sent his message of his desire and his thanks heavenwards.
“Mama it will take a lot of grit and muscle, but it is easily the loveliest place that I have ever seen. My very spirit thrilled to the certain knowing that in the years head will be rewarded by returning harvests of exceptional quality in this unspoiled fertile place. My future wife and children will be loved by this favoured land too.” His mother joined him in the centre of the golden vision.
“William dear, I can feel that you are at one with that special and beautiful place of the Creator’s hand, and I’m sure that you have had spiritual help to lead you there. Ask for Divine help to know how best to develop the land without spoiling the Great Creator’s work. Now dear son I have already written to you. Your father was buried four weeks ago, and now that you have found your land, I feel that it is time to tell you, that from now on, your life will be forward bound.”
“God rest my father’s soul, and Divine Love be upon him in Peace and Joy”.
“Mama I wish for you to see for yourself the place that I’ve chosen to call Garland Hills, to call home. Are you quite well enough to journey half-way across the world, dear Mama?” Suddenly he seemed to given a sigh from his mother’s image.
“Yes dear I am still fatigued from the last couple of years, but I am sensing your elation dear William, ”and she chuckled quickly “I do think that a visit out to you, would be an excellent tonic. Yes I am coming dear, and you will be receiving word that I will be leaving Ireland soon. My heart is cheered and happy at the thought.”
The gold was showing rapid signs of petering out. In the last year, only old Jack, the Murray brothers and William worked Broken Gully. The other’s had left in droves when William’s strike had not been evidently associated to their claim areas, and they looked to further afield for luckier finds.
The Murrays had five children now in the two families, and Lizzie was expecting twins at Easter time. The Murray men were thoughtful about their future, and they felt that their uncomplaining cheerful womenfolk, deserved a greater stake in a life of more convenience and comfort.
During his journey back to Westland, William felt that he was now making inroads of progress with his life as he thoughtfully re-read the title deeds of the Garland Hills land. He would ask Jim Duffy’s advice on the milling of the big timber, and if he could arrange for the Duffy and Gray to arrange for the overseeing of the large felling, he would be more than happy to contract with them. By the time he reached Hokitika, he was bolstered with enthusiasm, and he headed to the familiar two-storied home, with a notebook full of ideas.

Within two busy weeks, many changes had occurred, and peoples lives had completely turned around. Jim and Essie Duffy decided that they would like to let their business partner buy them out, and they made plans to live in Dunedin where Sam and Margaret were already negotiating the purchase of a small comfortable private hotel. Their other daughter’s husband who had been Jim’s leading hand was qualified to mill William’s timber, and that young family would purchase a home in the nearby township Longden, with a view to commencing their own business, after William’s contract was completed.
The Murray brothers and their wives bought in partnership, the Carriers Arms Hotel in Longden with William’s generous help. Their wives ran it spotlessly and cheerfully, and the happy sturdy children helped to swell the future numbers of the school roll of the local primary school. While Ettie and Lizzie Murray managed the money carefully in the hotel business, Alex and Robert Murray became proficient in the agricultural contracting business around the district. The fencing contract on Garland Hills was their first of many for those jovial, fair-minded brothers. They employed local men on the work of William’s boundary fences, and the gigantic task was completed within nine months.
Old Jack, who had no family of his own, stayed at the Murray’s hostelry, for the six month period that the Garland Hills homestead took to build. He then made himself scarce of the town after that, and lived on the peaceful big property, where he was content to potter around. He would visit The Carriers Arms every Sunday, and enjoy the sight of the children growing, and the fuss that the two large families made of him. But he was a free spirit who liked nothing better than seeing this bonzer place take shape into a well-run top class high country farm. William had given him Tina now that he had broken in to riding, her first foal a colt, the jet black. handsome Brian Boru. He loved riding the gentle aged Tina, around these hills of unparalleled beauty and grandeur. On occasions he would stoke up his secret whisky still and brew up a fine drop in the bush, in the company of the jubilant bird song.
When the humour took him, he would ride around the stony shingle river bank and put his pan in for a try for a nugget or two. It didn’t worry him as there was gold all around him, he would say out loud to the golden blossomed kowhai trees, sifting the rays of the golden sun down on him, and the golden chain of friendships in these mellow years. But the purest gold of all, was the peace that it brought to his once lonely heart.

William had welcomed his mother in a glad though tearful reunion, on the dockside at Bluff. With a howling gale wind biting into their bones, he carefully held his mother closely, and felt her tired small body respond to his unashamed protection. Her life of berated weariness would be over now, he had vowed to her, and she could enjoy the freedom and wonder here in this uncomplicated, vitally progressive country, for as long as she wished.
Sara Jane found that she could not find the words to describe the whole harmonious scene, and the unity of its beautiful countenance enthralled her. Her visit at first rejuvenated and reinvigorated her, and her health responded to her joyful soul. Her loving son had carved out a life for himself and others, more resplendid than did any of his forebears in Ireland, she congratulated him with admiration. He shared his abundance, with finance and donations of money for the public good, and for the future generations. His love for his fellow man was reflected in every gesture to his neighbour, without any thought of solicited reward. After many long years of conditional wifely silence and dutiful compliance as Lady Gilroy, Sara Jane found that life in New Zealand was like a perpetual breath of extremely fresh air, and her visit became the focal point of her studied love of humanity.
The Murray families, gave a public welcome in her honour of arrival. Her new friends warmed quickly to her insistence that if she called them all by their first names, they must do the same.
“Too much store has been put into grandiose titles, and it is most unnecessary to spoil what could be, great wonderful friendships, by the insistence on overstuffed ego-produced protocol. I was born like you all, and when I go I do not believe that there are written titles in the places of heaven, just words like Good and Faithful Servant, “ she said quietly to them all. Twenty five smiling faces raised their glasses in a toast to her.
“Welcome to the District, Sara Jane.” The Murray’s music rang through the night air until the pink fluffy clouds appeared in the sky to the wondrous bird song accompaniment.
“It’s a joyful help along the road of life to have been put among such good honest people, and I give my thanks to the love of guiding spirits, ” said William as they jogged home with Brian Boru stepping out briskly between the shafts of the practical Surrey cart.” It’s something to be jubilant of, and to celebrate, to have the company of such great neighbours. The new granary will make a superb ballroom for such an annual affair. We will arrange for a harvest festival celheigh after the busy season is finished, and it will be open to everyone in the District. I will put up welcome invitations in Murrays and in all of the stores.”
“What a lovely plan, to have a night for all to gather for a time of shared enjoyment, and the huge granary is the ideal place.”
Sara Jane had arranged with her sisters to ship out for William’s new homestead, the beautiful old mellowed sturdy furniture, silver, crystal, fine linen, and the exquisite hand-worked embroidery work that she had patiently made when she had sat beside her mother’s bedside. They had been her dowry when she had married Jeffrey.
In this new beautifully built home of locally grown timber, there was a lovely marriage of the old and the new, the effect of which was both pleasing and exciting. When they unwrapped the grandfather clock, a stream of slow tears coursed their way down her face of genteel beauty and her emerald green eyes had looked into her beloved son’s anxious deep blue ones.
“Dear William, you will want to make this life truly full and complete, won’t you? I do not want to be an obstacle to your marrying and having your own lady to see to your needs much more happily than your father’s and my marriage contract turned out.” William took his mother’s roughened hand, and stroked her graying wings of hair that appeared by each pretty ear of her piled-up hairdo.
“Mama, when the time is right, I will surely know. It just hasn’t arrived yet, and God is never late. My heart knows that there is a special woman, and I have even caught a dream glimpse of her. Till then, I love all the ladies honourably and honestly. You must never consider yourself to be an obstacle. My love will be from the heart fully and joyfully, and she will be my partner in every sense of the word.” Sara Jane’s heart was reassured as her handsome son wound the clock with purpose, and quietly closed its glass-fronted door.
The paintings that she had done in her early marriage, were still unframed, and were of delicate sensitivity. The portrait of William, at the age of three with his dark curly locks and his wide -eyed smile as he had sat for her on the garden seat near the dove-cote near the pink-marbled lovers, fell out of their wrappings, along with some gentle, sleepy scenes of quiet beauty.
“We will visit Dunedin soon, and stay with our very dear friends the Duffys and Stevensons. It will give me a chance to be present at the wool sale, and you can delight yourself shopping with Mrs. Duffy. I will have your paintings framed there for you, so you can choose the prettiest frames to do them proud, dearest Mama. Why don’t you stock up on some art materials to paint the splendid countryside here for your sisters?” he said cheerfully
“This lovely place has a grandeur of spectacular colour, and I don’t think that an artist’s brush could entirely do it justice. The thought has occurred to me though, and I am going to try to capture some of it’s image.” Sara Jane was her happy self again and her wistfullness had disappeared as a bright smile lit up her face. They had always understood and had been open with each other.

Sara Jane felt herself become busily involved with farming life, and shared personally in the trials the problems and the tests that the seasons of change and challenge brought. As the first five years was one of indifferent crop yields, cattle and sheep were their mainstay in those years, and the market price fluctuation of wool clip and meat then added to their uncertainty of the year’s income. Rabbits brought in by some short-sighted homesick settlers, were now in monstrous proportions, in nearby Central Otago, and they were spreading into Northern Southland with the speed of wild fire. The work involved in trapping these rapid breeders, added to everyone’s trials of life on the land. She had a truly warm fondness for all of the people, and was always ready with a greeting of pleasure, and in her heart she was at peace.
William grew ten acres of potatoes, which flourished in the black soil. With horse-drawn deep-tyned harrows, he harvested them and the sacks of potatoes sold locally and in Invercargill. The smaller garden beside the homestead, was where Sara Jane spent time daily, and the delicious meals with freshly grown vegetables and fruit were a credit for the variety and wholesomeness.
She had poured over the catalogues at the general store, and soon there was an adequate orchard of fruit trees, and bushes of gooseberry, raspberry, and black and red currents, as well as rhubarb, angelica, and other many herbs. She grew the annual vegetables from seed packets, and it gave her such pleasure to discover that she was gifted with ‘Green thumbs’.
The flower garden was commenced on the hillside home site, as she had sent away for the hardy well known tree species, a fence line of poplars, some oak, maples, weeping and pussy willow and wattle and gum trees, blended in with the background of the native flaxes and toitoi. bushes. Several dozen highly perfumed new rose tea bushes, and sweet more common climbing roses, honeysuckle, and lilac trees, mock orange and daphne bushes were planted beside the house and outbuildings, from small sack-bound bundles that arrived for her at the local general store. She arranged a magnificent display by under planting hundreds of spring bulbs of daffodils bluebells, match heads, snowdrops, lily of the valley, under the roses, tall stately irises in many rich colours, and Christmas lilies in huge clumps, blended in artistically. Her friends visiting the homestead, would always be given generous bunches of flowers and their cuttings to grow in their own gardens.
Old Jack Crowe, in his shy self conscious way, would take great pleasure to be working in the garden with this charming woman, who had a natural gift of harmony and had turned a house into a home, and some bare paddock quite soon into a place of flowering beauty and perfumed colour. Always, at any month there was some plant in bloom. The hive that he had carefully built had attracted the bees, and he had an added interest in his life when he discovered with glee, that these honey-laden miracle insects, had no intention of giving him a sting for his meddling with them.
As each busy year was completed, a harvest festival dance, called in Gaelic a celheigh was held in the granary at Garland Hills, and everyone in the district enjoyed a wonderful night of merriment and gaiety after the year of hard sweat and toil.

The Murray ladies, had a brother back home in Galway, who was experienced in farm work, and he and wife were interested in obtaining employment in his sisters’ area. William wrote to him, and described the job that he was offering, and the conditions and rate of salary and bonus, together with a description of accommodation for them.
Liam and Brigid O’Connor, were established happily by Christmas, seven months later. They were absolutely happy to be in a safe secure environment near relatives, and were delighted with their three bedroom cottage, with their own garden area prepared, and a quiet horse and a sturdy jogger in the out-buildings for their own use. Liam was a fine, healthy, tall, red haired man of thirty three, barrel chested, and he had very pleasant tenor voice, and an ever ready, hearty laugh. Brigid, his thirty year old wife was a neat, plump dolly little woman, with flawless cream and roses skin, and two beautiful dimples showed as she smiled. They had been married for ten years, and had not been blessed with any children. They loved their nieces and nephews, and at weekends would often have them at the cottage to give the busy Murray ladies a spell.
Brigid was a methodical little person who worked with what seemed little effort, and she sang softly always as she did so. She and Sara Jane became firm friends on sight, and they looked forward to sharing the housework together three days a week. When there was extra busy times at lambing, shearing and harvesting time Brigid’s energy tripled and she sailed through the work, still singing and smiling.
The work at Garland Hills routinely followed the seasons, from Spring ploughing and sowing to lambing, then lamb and cattle docking, cattle branding, to shearing which lasted till Christmas. Following on fast was Summer grain harvesting and hay making, then stock drenching, culling, mating, and stock and wool sales. After that the final ploughing of the land where the recently harvested grain of wheat oats and barley was planted in mustard seed, and the nutritious crop was again ploughed in to replenish the soil. By late April, the final ploughing and preparing the acres for the sowing pastures and grain, the main work of the year was finally done. Late Autumn, and early Winter, fire wood was cut and stacked, fences and gates were repaired, and horses shod. Then and only then could a well-earned rest be taken. The way of life was far from tedious, and the results of all efforts were there for all to see, the great rewards and the tremendous satisfaction from the energy outpoured with patience and expectation.

Sara Jane and Essie Duffy enjoyed very congenial company together, and they would often travel together. One year they went to Melbourne to visit Sam Stevenson’s parents. The leisurely holiday was very illuminating. One night the Stevensons invited their next-door neighbours to make up a card party, and the pleasant young Dixons chatted amicably.
“My grand parents came from Tipperary, ” said Janet Dixon, “they were married on board ship by the Captain on the voyage out here to Australia, for my father was a Government employed medical practitioner for many years.”
“What are your grand- parent’s names, ” asked Sara Jane, “for my late husband’s cousin Dorothea Gilroy married Dr. Michael Lysart on board ship in 1823, his parents dis inherited her and then Jeffrey was made heir to the Gilroy estate.”
Janet’s delighted face was a picture.
“That’s my grand-parents and that’s their love story! They have only passed away about ten and twelve years ago, at a very ripe old age. Dorothea and Michael had fourteen children, all healthy all living. My mother Rosalie, is the eldest, and she and my father live in Adelaide.”
“It seems then, that we are tied together by a bond of progressive exploration in this century, a get out and have a go for it time, ” said John Stevenson, and his sweet spouse Jane agreed wholeheartedly.
“Look how our Sam met your William, Sara Jane, and not only Jim and Essie but also their lovely Margaret, ” she said gracefully.
“Yes its a truly great Plan that each of us belongs in, and everyone of us plays a part, ” Sara Jane brightly replied.
“If your William can ever visit us, we would introduce him to my brothers and sisters, there is a mighty swag of us now here in Australia, and we are his cousins. Next year at Easter, we will be having a family reunion, and what a surprise for us all it would be, if he can be present.”
William did join the Lysart family reunion, and he saw in his Australian relatives the great loving companionship, that his early relatives Dorothea and Michael had commenced by venturing and believing in a better life than the outmoded one. He wrote to many of them, and his Australian relatives enjoyed the returned hospitality, with them all amazed at how he came to be the owner of the lovely property. He found in his new found family, genuine warmth in loving caring and sharing, and his affectionate heart found that there was plenty of room for them all.

The years passed with activity and progress. As more land was broken into careful cultivation, the response of the rabbits became even more pronounced. In all of the district, they had to trap and shoot them, because the rabbits now competed with the stock for the grass. One frosty Winter night when the moon was full, Liam and Jack went out on a rabbit shoot, but only Liam returned alive, for Jack had accidentally shot himself when his gun went off as he climbed a fence.
They could hear the younger man calling out as he ran across the home hill, carrying old Jack. As William hurried to the door he could see the tears streaming down Liam’s strong weather-beaten face.
“God help him William, he was just rattling on, saying what a good shot he was even at the age of eighty-eight, and laughing in his old cackling way, and the next thing was the gun going off. He’d left the catch off in all his excitement!”
They lay him on the kitchen table, and it was Sara Jane who thoughtfully and tenderly closed the old man’s eyes. There was no pulse to be felt.
“He’s on his way to his Maker, and his own loved ones that have been patiently awaiting this bend in his road, my dear ones, ” said Sara Jane, handing Liam a large brandy, as Brigid entered the kitchen.
“William has already harnessed up Brian Boru, he said to tell you all.” she told them helpfully. Her own Liam she cradled to her ample bosom, and wiped his poor sorrowful face.
“Dear Liam, his time was up, my darlin’ one, and there has to be somethin’ that takes us all, and at least the poor dear old buggar died a’laugh’n. Can you not see, that’s how he would have wanted it? Happy as a lepricaucn to the end, ” and she took a sip from Liam’s offerred glass. Sara Jane looked at the small wiry still body on the table, and wiped away the bloody mess from the dear man.
His funeral in Longden took place three days later in the pouring rain. Jack Crowe was laid to rest by his many friends, with dignity, respect, and the loving goodwill of all.
Doctor Gowland had a nip of brandy in the bar at Murray’s after the funeral.
“Your mother seems to be a bundle of energy I know, but when I examined her eyes for her last year, I noticed some signs of advanced artery hardening, in the eye spots. Since then William she has been seeing me for she has a lot of dizzy spells.”
“Are you saying then that my mother ill then?” he asked anxiously.
“Yes, I’m afraid so, her heart is now very enlarged, she has carried the burdens of far too many, and I wanted to let you know before, and she asked me not to trouble you.”
“Can nothing more be done for her then Doctor, might she benefit by a spell in a hospital, or what can you advise me?” Poor William was now feeling the full impetus of what the kindly doctor was telling him.
“I’m saying that if dear mother would want a nice long sea voyage, with no over exertions, she would reach Ireland with a little time to spare to see her beloved sister. You know William, you would be giving her last dearest wish, to be seeing the land of her birth.”

In 1888, William and Sara Jane had a particularly calm and serene voyage to Ireland. They had many ports of call on their journey, at Melbourne, Freemantle. Durban, The Canary Islands, Lisbon, and the Channel Islands before finally disembarking at Tilbury docks in London. A small coal-fired boat speedily chugged them from Liverpool to Dublin, and they were met by her sister and nephew.
The four proceeded by coach to the town that Sara Jane was born in sixty-eight years before. There once again for a short while, the heightened colour of her cheeks had disappeared for she seemed to take on a new lease of good health. His mother’s eyes were shining, and her laughter, was light and bright. and here was a contented joy for the last time together.
“I know what you are thinking, dear son, and it is your dear place in New Zealand that you will be going to soon, and I will be taking the homeward journey back to our Holy Creator. We both know that it is not a cause to be sad about, darling William, and that Love never dies. We will still be a part of all that is, and we will still have a communion of spirit, for that is the link that is the bond. So remember to be glad of the special knowledge, and let your future family know of this loving certainty.”
Only hours later, she collapsed and was in a coma, and they tenderly held her hand and cared for her. William held her head and shoulders as her unconscious breathing became erratic. and her body was shutting down each mortal organ systematically.
He kissed her temple,
”Go Home, dearest Mama. You will be rewarded as a good, kind and faithful servant that you always have been, and I do truly know as you do, that Love never dies.” The rays of spirit lights that they had seen hovering over their sleeping darling, now became a blaze of glorious colour of soft luminous content, and Sara Jane opened her smiling eyes and eagerly reached forward. In the hushed moment William realized that Sara Jane had indeed gone home.
She was buried quietly as she had wished, in the peaceful old graveyard beside her dear Marmee, and her youngest sister’s well tended flowering places.

END OF PART ONE

PART TWO
Liam and Brigid had corresponded to him that everything was doing well at Garland Hills, that there was no need to hurry back, and to take his time to heal the sorrow. William had fully accepted his mother’s departure, but he was grateful for the understanding and the loyalty of those good and careful O’Connors. He had already prepared a plan where they and the Murrays would take a journey with their young brood to Ireland.
The stock firm of Wright Stevenson’s in Christchurch, had appointed a new manager who was distant cousin Anthony Lysart. On arrival at Lyttleton, the Canterbury port, there was another letter awaiting him from Liam, and it was all good news, so William decided to pay a visit to Anthony, where he was warmly received and pressed to stay for a while in their new home. Christchurch had laid tramlines, and the horse-drawn vehicles made travel easy in the flat, pretty English-styled city. He had a most enjoyable time exploring this cultured city that he normally just passed through.
The Lysarts had settled to living here very well, and they had a Parish ball to attend within a week, so had been pleased to have William meet their social group.
During the early evening, another group made a quiet entrance and William caught sight of one of the ladies. Their eyes locked in a gaze of instant recognition.
“Here you are, my own true love, ” was his thought to the most especially precious, lovely smiling face.
“Yes, I am sure that we were meant to meet tonight, ” came the instant telepathic soul reply.
They were at a reserved bay of tables and chairs adjacent to his hosts, and Anthony was quick to see the expression of enraptured joy on the two peoples faces.
“Do you know the Readings then William?”
“Um, no, but the fact is I’ve seen her forever in the dream state- it can only be her, and er -sorry but I must sound a bit deranged here, I just know that Anthony, the young lady in the white dress, I must talk and dance with her, “ William was still in a state of flustering.
“Then we must get you introduced to that young lady! I have met the Reading gentleman, so I can approach him with ease. He’s a very distinguished lawyer who handles much conveyancing, ” said the surprised relative, smiling.
When they danced together, Katharine and William stepped joyfully as one. He had no qualms in letting her know that he had seen her in many dreams, and that he felt that he had always known her. Her green eyes and butter-blonde hair in perfect setting of lovely high cheeks, her sweet mouth so upturned in a dazzling smile, made his very body ache to hold her closer than was etiquette. She had a light glowing from her that he had perceived at first sight of her entrance into the ballroom.
“Could I, may I, call on you soon, Katharine?”
“Yes William, I am sure that my sister Moira and her husband Lennox would be pleased to greet you at their At Home afternoon tomorrow.”
She had the most alluring heart shaped face, and her chin had a perfect dimple in it. His heart was beating up near his stiff collar of his dress shirt. He knew that they were meant to be together, walking side by side, an equal love partnership for the rest of their lives.
The At Home afternoon was a blur of events for William, as he was so entranced that he felt concentrating on expected conversation most difficult. Lennox Reading was good judge of character, and he had noted William’s obvious genuine interest in Katharine.
“She was born when my lady wife was traveling out to New Zealand via Cape Horn. It was a very stormy passage and their voyage took ten months. Moira’s parents came from Scotland, and their surname was Harrington, both parents were qualified teachers, with a University of Edinburgh degree. It was a tragic journey. The older man paused, and offered William a cigar. The comfortable study smelt of leather and lavender oil furniture polish on the quality mahogany wood. At his feet was a faithful golden retriever dog called Hayley, who cocked one eye open at William, as if she was telling him that he was already accepted into this superb family.
”Moira was sixteen years old when she stepped ashore at Lyttleton, carrying her two week old sister, Katharine.
She had been conceived and born at sea. Her father was washed overboard when rounding Cape Horn for the third time, and every able-bodied man passenger was called on to help the struggling ship’s crew. When Katharine was born, her mother died in childbirth shortly after, and she also was buried at sea.
My partner was down meeting some friends who had been passengers and they had told Gilbert about the sad-plighted young woman. He found that she was trained very well with the secretarial work, and he offered her a position with our legal firm. My sister gave Moira a suite of rooms in her home and looked after Katharine until she was old enough to go to the boarding school that the Good Shepherd Sisters ran. When my first wife died three years ago, Moira favoured me, by becoming my dear wife. Moira had established ten years ago, an Employment Agency here in Christchurch, and is still the Director of the busy Agency. So that William is the whole story.”
“Such trials for one so young a person, ” said William seriously, then he paused and smiled, ” still it’s the very inner soul that makes one drive further on.”
“Well, yes. You were the same age, on arrival in this land, were you not. You have done it all on your own with only your conscience for your guide.” William had told Lennox Reading the full story of his birth, voyage, gold seeking days, in fact he had answered every question with honest clarity, so that his intentions would be made most honourably open.
“By your own two hands, you worked towards your destiny, so William, “ he leaned forward and grasped his hand in a firm grip, ”I do welcome you, and it is my pleasure to give you Katharine’s hand in marriage.”
“There is not a man in the whole word happier than me at this moment in time, and I swear that I will love and cherish her always. I thank you so, Lennox, “ he said with fervor. They joined Moira and Katharine in the drawing room beside a cheery fireside.
“We knew that you two people were deeply in love at the end of the first waltz, ” cooed Moira, in her light Scottish lilted accent.” We do have a wedding to plan now, and what better place than in the flowering orchard, and we shall have a buffet luncheon in a marquee there also.” She was so very happy that her sister’s dearest wish, to marry the tall handsome gentle man that she said she kept seeing in dream after recurring dream, had finally come true.
Exactly a week after they had first formally met, the life-long lovers were married under the apple blossom, and words could never describe their enduring mutual love.

On the train journey to Dunedin, they had the privacy of a compartment to themselves that was also a sleeper at night, and they lay together, in a loving entwinement of blessed rapture. She was so young yet so wise, and her years at a boarding school, was meant to prepare her for marriage by their terms of thinking. “I could never understand it, when the dear sisters would say that marriage was a woman’s duty, and with that thought to the fore all the way through the subject, they would insist that is was in doing one’s duty that made for a happy life. Dearest William the act of our bodies joining as one is the most glorious pleasure! That also proves to me, that our wonderful Creator made the female and male human bodies to fit perfectly into each other in sex to absolutely have the utmost joy in the ecstasy of the loving uniting that feels so totally exquisite!”
“It’s our state of mind that we have about each other, we love each other so absolutely. Our needs of giving to each other completely and of receiving from each other is truly balanced, for the total reason that we have for making love, is indeed love. Then and only then, does a man and a woman experience the perfect quality of the gift of their lives expressing the Creator’s love”
“I’m sure there are many stages of this love, dear William, for when I think of Lennox and Moira’s marriage, then there is a very rich and deep loving feeling there, but it was probably his first marriage that had so much exciting spark of the finding out, and now, with Moira, he does know, and is confident, and they are very happy to share and care together.”
“Yes, you are very right, and I do think also that there are many types of loving. My love for my mother is a totally different love to my love for you. I have memories of waking up at night in the middle of a dream that was so vivid, and knowing that this wondrous feeling, quite unspeakable in words of description was love reserved for only you. We are not doing anything to control and hinder the free flowing love of the two of us, ”
“ My darling, by the fact that you and I are now talking our feelings out aloud to each other, tells me that there is not one topic that needs to be secret for I know that we do understand each other completely. The idea that the pleasure of our loving union of our mortal bodies must never be mentioned, is a gross imposition and put on humanity, by people not our loving Creator”.
“It well be that when the ideals of true loving are fully known, and the greater majority of people do at last think for themselves, then the prudery and using sex as a power control will cease. To be able to enjoy our marriage from this very beginning, dearest Katharine, is to me the most beautiful blessing of all!”
“I will always want you, need you and want to give you a completely full love, ” she whispered as their naked bodies fondled each other in open delighted joy.” It’s the most beautiful feeling, to be loved by you dearest William, and I can not stop telling you!”
”We will love, and love forever!! The pleasure is overtaking us in a huge beautiful wave after wave that is coursing through our bodies unhindered, because our inner selves are totally flowing through each of us, in perfect harmony. We are being completely at one !!”
“I think that our Guardian Angels have been keeping us together in our dreams, so that our marriage would get off to this magnificent start, my darling William”
“ When you came into my life, I knew you at once, and I also knew that we would be partners like this forever. Did you hear my spirit talk to you then at the ball, my sweetest heart?”
“Yes William, ” she nuzzled her lips into his neck, “I knew, and so did my body! I could have so easily lain with you so very easily, that very night! So magnetic was the pull of sweet nature.”
They talked of their life experiences, and they laughed, and they shared the same ideals, that they said it would be considered positively indecent to be so completely in harmony, as they were.” And I’m glad, ” she added.” I know that you and I have been guided to each other, and we will be continually guided. We have our trust in that spirit love, ” he said sleepily, putting her lovely white hand on his rising loving part, and her pink nipples responded, as if by some celestial call once more.

Many friends gathered outside the coach stop at The Carrier’s Arms Hotel. They were dressed in their best clothes, and were a quiver with nervous excitement. The O’Connors had received the message by post this morning. The news that William was bringing home his bride, was all so new, and to take it in when so short was the notice! Oh they were happy for him!! He had made the news also a surprise to the Stevenson’s and the Duffy’s in Dunedin too, and they were overjoyed with the obvious happiness of their beloved friend. Katharine was all the angel that William said that he knew from his dreams. Their wedding gift of a Spode dinner service, was a gesture of the happy occasion. As the coach drew to a stop, William alighted first, and gave his hand to the most beautiful woman that anyone in the township had ever seen. Her graceful figure went on his arm to the length of the pavement, as she so obviously was pleased their acquaintance, giving each of them a sincere kiss on the cheek. The Murray families were as happy as the O’Connors, and they all wished them a long wonderful life time of happiness. In the bar parlour, everyone raised their glassed on high,
“To William and to Katharine, long may they be blessed with love and joy.”
“A long, happy and fruitful life’s journey for each and everyone of us, ” replied their ever loving friend William.
And so it was. It was obvious to all, until the end of their lives.
William Jeffrey Gilroy was born in 1889 with ease an the very day that he was expected. Brigid was there to help with the birth with the kind Doctor Gowland, and William her loving husband supported her shoulders and head in his gentle arms. They had welcomed their first born into the world together, and gazed at the miracle of this precious infant, who knew instinctively to suckle his nourishment at his mother’s invited breast. Brigid was so motherly toward the young eighteen year old Katharine.” I can see somehow that the Good Lord has given me another lovely lady to oversee to, ” she confided in her big wonderful own husband Liam, on the night that the Gilroys had told them of the coming baby.
“It’s a new life for an old, as the saying goes. What we need in this world is more people like our dear friends here, ” he agreed.
“She can cook and clean well too, and she’s got a perky happy smile all the while too, that I feel just at home with our Katharine.”
“Good then. Now come here, my honey-lamb to bed with me, ” he added sheepishly.
“I need you too now, ” and she reached over towards his night shirt clad body.” It’s a lovely great big man that I was given and all, ” she said into his lovely kind eyes, smiling contentedly. His large hands stroked his pretty dolly wife beside him, and he told her earnestly.
“If Heaven is not better than this, then I’ll be staying right here Brigie darlin”
“Don’t be talkin’ so, we are not at the age of moving on towards the next life yet. Are we?”
“No, never at all for years and years, Brigie darlin’..”

The following year, in 1890, Mary was born, and the homestead was filled with love of laughter and joy. Helen Murray, who was looking for work, was engaged by William to help Katharine with the young children. Her familiarity with her own large cheerful family, under Essie’s own spotless tuition, made the choice an excellent one, for Helen fitted in at once to Katharine’s routine, and gave steady able help. She was a well mannered young woman of fourteen years, black haired and buoyant and as bright as her mother, and she had five years to spend before she could enter her desired School of Nursing at Dunedin. Her efficient work helped that there was always a lovely happy bond, even though there were now three women working together, and they were very happy to do so.
Their combined efforts made time for the making of delicious jams, pickles, chutneys, and the preserving of fruit for the supply of winter needs. With shared enthusiasm they cooked for the teams of hungry local men at the busy periods of shearing and harvesting, and the busy seasons went like clockwork. Together, they took huge baskets of filling food of, sandwiches, scones, pikelets, fruit loaves, sausage rolls, and large slices of delicious cakes. They had big containers of homemade lemon and barley water, and ginger beer, to quench the thirst of the men’s dusty throats. They boiled the billy and poured out steaming, hot sweet tea, to replenish the energy of the hours worked in hard manual work. On the kitchen table at Garland Hills, there was always on time, a nourishing hot meal, and plenty of it, for the workers at breakfast, lunch, and at tea time at five p. m.
William and Katharine, always in complete harmony with their lives so in step together, had their time for each other, and since William had no intention to turn his beloved Katharine into a baby producing spouse, was sensitive to this degree. Their next children were welcomed into the world, with thoughtful planning. John was born 1897, and Veronica in 1898, and Thomas was born in the year of the new century, 1900. Edward was welcomed by the robust growing in 1910, and James completed their happy circle in 1912. As each child was born, William planted a commemorative tree in the orchard, which represented to him a mark of acknowledgment in the fruitfulness of the Divine Creator.
He showed to them all, the able and loyal stability that reflected his inner desire of communicative, deep, love, with ready words of encouragement and his ability to respond to their individual spiritual awakenings, at their different ages. Patiently the loving parents explained the presence of the Holy Creation in everything that was in their world. To their grateful children, in gleeful response of innocent curiosity of their childhood, the parents were the provision of all that was helpful and hopeful in the preparation of their own adult years in the future.

Through hard times of depressed markets of stock and grain, the failing of businesses and the collapsing banks, coupled with flooding and fire losses, there was an air of gloomy set-backs, and periods of great difficulty for the pioneering blood and sinewed hard-won successes. It was heart wrenching to see not only business life fall away during a time of booming achievement, but also for those hard-working souls to line up at the soup kitchens in their thousands in the country’s cities and large towns, and to have to resort to the charity of their fellowmen to keep body soul and sanity together.
Hope of booming success was dwarfed by the most cataclysmic natural disaster in 1886. The world marveled Pink and White Terraces were destroyed forever by awesome act of God, when Mount Tarawera erupted in an early June morning, and over one hundred people perished.
The effect of the fear of this so thought punishment from God, had literally brought the country to it’s knees. Many recalling the hideous unemployment problems were the feelings and causes transferred from the older established country to this new vigorous one. The rampant gloom of the cities echoed soon with the same cries from soap box orators, and the trade unions which commenced some twenty five years before, had become more cohesive, as the politicians were forced to keep the individuals rights of life in New Zealand their top priority. When the balance was addressed by the swinging scales of justice, there came upon the Continuous Ministry of Parliament, with it’s emphasis on the public works and land schemes, now some divergence toward the alleviation of human personal suffering. There had been established in the 1880’s the development of the New Zealand Insurance and the Public Trust Corporation, but a Government vote narrowly defeated a motion that would have established a pension granted to widows, orphans, and those persons in genuine hardship, due to unemployment.
The Provinces of New Zealand had their own Provincial assemblies of Regional Government, and due to the foresight and dynamic leadership, the whole country was renewed with one welded Government from Wellington, because the abolition of the Provincial Assemblies was finally brought about towards the end of the 19th century. Some tremendous new changes followed the inspired new comers on New Zealand’s political scenes, and the large amount of loaned ten million pounds, brought new purpose into the precarious economy.
The country had been severely curtailed by the absence of transport, and it’s inner heart communities did not have the fast means of transporting the agricultural products to the markets, both nationally and internationally. Employment could now be offered, in the large schemes opening up networking both islands. These new opportunities the Government had hoped would further prevent the prevailing huge drift of work force towards Australia.
The eighties and nineties were still the years for seeking in the country’s soil, for the all important coal mining, and gold seeking was added to with gum digging in the kauri forests of the far North Island, and the idea that the country should strive towards self- reliance had never been obliterated.
Frozen mutton arrived in England at the undreamed of speed of ten weeks commencing with the first shipment loaded into the S.S. Dunedin at Port Chambers, Otago. This had an impact of immense optimism, for within ten years, there were within the two islands of New Zealand a total of seventeen freezing works operating and employing a large amount of seasonal workers.
During the eighties, the combine-harvester, which was an American invention, made the harvesting work of large areas of wheat, oats and barley plantations relatively easy, and ensured that more land on the plains areas were utilized, particularly in the grain growing areas of the provinces of Canterbury, Otago and Southland. Steam driven traction driven engines provided power for running threshing mills, and the road haulage of up to three hundred bales of wool. The Murray brothers invested their hard earned money in a traction engine and a combine harvester, and ensured further contracts in their agricultural business, which necessitated more labour to be employed by them.

For ten years, Garland Hills was in constant progress with cultivation of all the valleys and low foot hills by the use of eight steady draught horses and heavy duty deep-furrowed ploughing, and pasture sowing. William and Liam worked well as a team, and twice a year they would lead two teams of farm help to contract the mustering of the grazing cattle stock from the high country, and the sheep from the lower range of hills.
After the initial five years of experimenting, William had added Merino breed of sheep for the grazing pastures, their finest wool clip was very much in demand at the wool sales. The Southdown and Romney Marsh sheep had medium wool clip, but it was a more tender and better quality meat that this sheep breed produced.
William had a great love for the draught horses, and those sure footed loyal animals were trained by exactly the same method that William had years before broken in Tina, his first horse in Broken Gully. He bred a line of grey Clydesdales that were a sight to be seen working in perfect unison, and he exhibited them at the Agricultural and Pastoral shows in Invercargill, Gore and Dunedin, in their well polished leather and brass adornments. They won many prizes consistantly over the years.
One stormy night in 1889, lightening struck several haystacks, and the burning hay and the gale-force winds carried the flames to set the stables into an inferno. There were nine horse in their loose-boxes, and every one of them were saved by Liam, Brigid, William and the very pregnant Katharine. They quietly blindfolded the frightened animals, and talking gently to them led them through the flames quickly to safety. The gale-force wind whipped through the crackling roaring flames, and in thirty minutes, the big stable building was burned to the ground. When new stables were built, there were rain water tanks and hoses at the ready, for any such emergency.
Since the weekends were for recreation as far as possible, excepting during the busy lambing, harvesting and shearing, it was the usual routine, to try to have the weekends as free as possible, and their wives aimed at this principle as well. To this end the women had each weekday planned, and though busy they were well organised.
Monday was wash day, and the washing was done in the boiling copper which was fired up by the chopped dry logs. Two cold rinses, and a third rinse of blue water for the white clothes, made them snow white. The pillowcases, table cloths and napkins, dresses, petticoats, and the men’s best shirts went through a starch bath, that was made by boiling up rice, and using the thick water that resulted diluted to various strengths of stiffness desired. By morning tea time, sparkling clean washing would fly from the long clothes lines that were propped up high into the breeze by twelve foot saplings.
Tuesday was the ironing day, and the iron handles clasped firmly one of the four iron bases that were heated on top of the stove. The long sheets quilts, and curtains were put through a mangle press and the large wooden rollers ironed the creases out. There was a clothes hoist in the kitchen ceiling and clothes would often be put on so that the rising warm air would ensure complete dryness. Any mending and missing buttons were repaired on ironing day.
Wednesday was a day for cleaning and scrubbing, scouring, polishing, window and mirror cleaning, dusting, and polishing the silver, brass and copper. The homestead seemed to have a smile on it’s face, and a glow everywhere, and the smell of lavender oil furniture polish silver cleaner and eucalyptus disinfectant, mingled with the huge bunches of freshly cut bouquets of flowers throughout.
Thursday was a time for going into Longden and collecting stores, that had not been left at the road gate at Garland Hills, and stores were ordered then for the following week. Accounts and wages were paid at the bank agency there. If any visit to the Doctor was necessary then it was usually done on this day, unless there was an urgency. The men always had a hair trim once a month at Longden, and the barber splashed a liberal amount of his sweet smelling bay rum on each head afterward.
Friday was for cooking, baking of the main bread requirements, as well as pies, meat loves, scones pikelets, buns, biscuits, and large cakes of at least five varieties. The main cooking for the weekend was done, and visitors would always be welcomed and catered for.
Brigid and Katharine combined the tasks of both houses together on washing, ironing and baking days, and the load was more pleasant as the two ladies merrily worked in enjoyment of each other’s company. They took pride in seeing the work being done, and knowing that they could spend time with their men on Saturdays and Sundays.
Often they would all go to The Carriers Arms Hotel dining room for a hospitable dinner, or a function of dancing and singing to attend, to which they all gladly would partake in the recreation. Many times Katharine’s strong soprano voice and Liam’s rich tenor voice would be called on for an item of a duo or a solo, and the audience always appreciated their willingness to perform. The annual Harvest Celheigh, in the granary, was always an outstanding night of enjoyable gaiety, and the whole of the district turned out for it.
The two Exhibitions in Dunedin saw all at Garland Hills staying at Duffy’s Private Hotel. They were captivated by the New Zealand South Seas Exhibition of 1889. They viewed all of the manufactured as well as the thousands of handmade goods that was made in New Zealand, Australia, the Pacific Islands, and also the far off countries of the Northern Hemisphere. New and innovative ideas, gadgets and machines were demonstrated and appreciated. The Grand Procession on opening day, and the amusement galleries, all added to the enjoyable spectacle.
Meeting up with their friends of loving families was in itself a treasured time, which over the years, and the enlarged families became even more treasured. Every three years, there was a holiday to Christchurch, to Moira and Lennox Reading’s elegant, picturesque home on the banks of the Avon river. They enjoyed the many cultural options that Christchurch had always found time to indulge in. Each Christmas, among the many welcomed house guests at Garland Hills, the Readings faithfully made the long rail journey, for the meaningful festivities.

As the young Gilroy family steadily grew up through the years, there was a blending of responsibilities allotted, appropriate to the age of the child, and good natures and pleasant manners were established as a matter of course and common sense, without severe lecturing and forbidding. The genuine good humour, so close to heart and hand, made light of any strained or awkward situation, and often around the dining table, their parents would ask each family member for their own opinion.
Far from being expected to live and work on the land, William sold off a block of land on each young person’s sixteenth birthday. That money was put in the bank in their own name, with the view that the money would allow each of them to pursue their chosen course in life. The two eldest chose the teaching profession, and they went off the Teachers Training School in Christchurch and were qualified teachers by the time the two youngest children Edward and James were born. Veronica became a legal secretary, also in Christchurch where her talents as a court recorder were valued.
In the days when most young women were brought up the feel that an early marriage was to be their outcome, Katharine and William encouraged to their daughters as well as their sons, to live fully on all levels, of mental physical and spiritually, to enjoy the pathway that was their life, and to travel to other areas of this world and to experience for ones’ self, but most of all to think for themselves.
William’s personal view was that all killing was a human imposition on the Holy Creator’s peace and love, and the animals were treated humanely when the occasion arose, but to think of people at war was as he understood the situation, a totally uncalled for predicament. The Laws that bound the universe, were in place already for harmonious living of all the World’s people, if only they would look deeper into the issue. Katharine’s thoughts matched William’s, and together they had decided that, their children having been brought up with this very foundation, must also be given their opportunity for making their own decisions.
On the day that they had given their written consent for their seventeen year old John to enter the Army in 1914, a lump of sorrow had formed in the throat of Thomas, who at a height of six foot two, was a well formed fourteen year old. His brother John he reasoned, was four inches shorter than him, and Tom knew that he was very bit as strong in body, and as good a horseman as his brother who was going off to Europe without him, and Tom wanted to join the Army as well. To this end he made a secret plan and he forged his parents signature, and was well in Europe’s battlefield before his true age was discovered.
On the night that Thomas had left the school that he boarded in at Dunedin, his parents had felt a sudden strangeness in their usually comfortable sitting room at Garland Hills, and the young four year old Edward and infant James were also troubled in behavior that night. Brigid called out to Liam,
”Come and see what is in tonight’s sky, for the full moon looks to me to be blood-red, Liam darlin’!”
Thinking that his studies were worrying the young scholar, the headmaster had not informed his parent until a further six weeks had gone by after the long Christmas break. Thomas had covered his tracks by leaving Southland early for a period of time his parents thought would be spent with Veronica, his sister in Christchurch.

Heartbroken, with the thought of their scattered family, William went walking in the crisp night air, asking for courage and spiritual help to face this situation of crisis, both for their family, and for all families. His golden light of love was answered as ever, without fail as it was every night, and on this night the peaceful, comforting Sara Jane came into his vision.
“Dearest William you are, as so very many are on the earth level of consciousness, most saddened by the state upheavals of war that now exists in a bitter battle. You calm yourself dear one, and let the light of heavenly grace flow healing and peace through you now, ” she told him though her smiling lips never moved.
“Mama this never occurred to me that one let alone two of the children would be taken to thrust death on another, and be in line therefore to receive the same!” he cried out loudly, as he paced the home hill, “I thought that I had left all those fighting conditions behind me when I left Ireland!”
“So you hoped my son, and you have contributed by your thought to the peace that has been around you, for you are correct in your inspired intuition that one is attracting to oneself what one is giving out, because you need to balance or to experience for your soul quality.”
“Am I experiencing, and not only me but the whole family the sorrow of our two boys being absent, as a punishment for me having run away from home when I was sixteen years old. Are you telling me this Mama?” The thought pattern had alarmed him.
“Well dear William, apart from the public disgrace of you not obeying him, there was another kind of hunger that your father felt, for a while he had no patience with any child, but he thought in anticipation that he would have a comrade in his grown son. He never got the chance, but then that was his lesson too, and his bitterness made him more lonely still.”
“My heart and also my sweet Katharine’s heart is aching for the swift and safe return of all those beloved young men, Mama dear, please ask with us of all the highest heavenly beings on the highest parts of Heaven itself for peace on this Earth, so that our lives can once again be free from this fear and destruction!!” he pleaded.
“You, and everyone needs to know that fear brings about more fear, and the only thing that will neutralize that fear is to find trust, and to build on that loving, believing trust. How I remember how difficult this is to do in a mortal body, the human preservation instinct does take preference, and seems to cloud the mind. See now dear one rise above the earth plane with the help of your guiding light, your own Guardian Angel has something of utmost importance to show you. Be not afraid, for you are well protected, and I am also with you on this journey at this time. See for yourself what the many thoughts of destruction have been built. They are caused by the effects of not loving. Yes, not loving and trusting is hating and destroying hope, albeit your own hope. Certainly see how the dense cloud of darkness has surrounded the whole planet, and my higher guides are telling me to relay to you that it is the atmosphere of accumulated greed, jealously, pride, controlling and enslaving of other weaker human beings. Instead of loving and helping the other weaker ones, the stronger humans have been controlled by a power of separation from the loving oneness of the All Great Creator. They have not been their brother’s keeper of life, but their brother’s judge of who is good enough in their own earthly eyes, to live and to die with their own destructive thought. This is what has been happening down through the ages, and disapproval has turned to hatred, and has been passed on from generation to the next generation, combined with ever increasing fear. Man has enslaved himself William, for God has not done that to humanity. Your sons have set themselves a time to be born so that their souls are on Earth at this saddened time, as each of us did, for the experiences we needed to have to use the free will of the mind to grow in grace of soul by right thinking and right doing.” she continued, with light shining brighter in response to William’s horror of his given vision of the cause of the present utterly dreadful conditions.
He could see in his mind’s eye, ghastly powerful dark clouds of such immensity. As he gazed further downwards on a foreign landscape, he could see mortal combat of gigantic guns, dense choking smoke and explosions as many men’s bodies were torn apart like so many tiny dressed dolls, and shafts of bloodied steel attached to the guns of the foot soldiers in hand to hand combat, in huge seas of mud. He saw his own two beloved boys, riding through the affray, and swiftly pick out of this nightmare of deepest despair, a fallen comrade. And now as he looked, there was John’s horse shot from underneath the very saddle, and John was flung to the air for thirty feet. When he landed, it was on an already wounded soldier. The shrill shrieking of agony was dwarfed by heavy artillery fire, and through the storms of splintered fire and explosions. Another brave horse pounded through the putrid smoke filled hazy scene, and with a call,
“I’m here friend, hang on and you’ll soon be out of this, ” he lifted his unrecognized brother onto his jittery mount, and seeing, the second body, Thomas slid off the horse, and with a powerful lift set him also on the big bay’s back. Then Thomas spoke to his big bay steed,
“Come on my valiant one, take these boys to the safety of the Red Cross wagon!”. He ran like the wind alongside, leading his precious charges to the outer edge of the destruction, where William could see a tall distinguished Army Doctor, and his daughter, the slightly built young lady assistant doctor, deftly attending to the many wounds, with loving compassion. He lay his own two newcomers on the one stretcher remaining, and he felt Thomas’s young heart take courage, as he leapt on the big bay horse, and they galloped towards the battle once more.
“There, Child of Peace, now you see how important it is to keep your thoughts of love and peace for all creation flowing, by that you are given strength to go on. Come with us now above the clouds of despair.” The scene changed, and his given picture was of countless Hosts of Spirits of Love and Light pouring unceasingly the brilliant beams of beautiful rays with so much compassion and joy, that he felt that every part of his body was totally renewed by a much higher and truer hope and trust, than he had ever before experienced. There was a feeling of being totally looked after by the whole universe of the absolute goodness of that outpouring of Love that these beings were steadily aiming to the entire planet. He raised his arms and his face towards the vision above,
“Oh my Great Creator, Thine will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven!” and exhausted, he fell, his full body length, on the hill’s soft lush covering.
A couple of hours later, his eyes opened to the flickering light of the lantern that the distraught Katharine was holding.
”William! Oh precious William!, how I have called out in this night for you! I will always be at your side, for I do not know how else to be, than forever with you my dearest darling.” He sat upright, and patted the space beside him, and as she sat down he put his arm around her shoulder and gently kissed her wet cheek. Then he told her plainly and lucidly just what he had seen during the whole awesome experience. Katharine had listened in wonder at the full implication, and afterwards concluded,
“We will have to set aside a time each day to join in with all the forces of Love and Light in the days, or years ahead, however long it needs to be and visualize that only good is coming, that Divine action is taking place, whether we can see it or not William. You have been given a wonderful opportunity to know that there is always a reason to ask, and to be thankful and trusting always for the Divine Love.”

Edward remembered his two brothers returning from the war in 1918, for he was eight years old, and had just learned to ride his pony across the small hurdles that his kind father had made for him. When his parents received the letter of their arrival, he and James stayed at Liam and Brigie’s home while they went up to Lyttleton, to welcome home his big brothers. For four years, they had kept a time after the evening meal, and their father had said someday soon a letter would come to tell them that Thomas and John would be coming home on a big ship, and that they would need a time of rest, and that they would probably ride with him, around Garland Hills.
Out of the nine young men from the Longden district that went away to The Great War, only five returned. The district honoured the men with a Welcome Home function in the Longden District Hall. Despite the merriment and festivities and the speeches, the young fellows returned to their homes with hearts that had been drastically changed by their wartime experiences. Thomas, now eighteen, was stooped in the shoulders from the almost continual coughing from the fumes of the dangerous mustard gas that he had inhaled for four months while he had been attached to the dressing stations on the battle-field with the Medical Corps. His brain had been altered by shell shock, and his mind now said to be permanently enfeebled, the Army report read. They had stated that his youth had given him enormous enthusiasm to follow the medics orders, and that he had carried them out to the letter, and had brought very many wounded soldiers to the safety zone. In the last campaign before his was wounded himself, he had been posted as missing temporarily. He had been held at bayonet point, not at his throat, but at his horses throat, and had been forced to hand over his faithful horse to one of the enemy. While behind enemy lines, where he had been marched, he made a run for freedom into a thicket of dense woodland area. He had made every diversion that he could think of to get back to his brigade, and it had worked miraculously. A party of German scouts had pounced on him with their dogs, and despite many dog-bites to his body, Thomas had outran them, excepting for the big fit leader of the dog pack. The huge Alsatian with teeth bared and snarling ferociously had chased him into a densely forested grove, and Thomas in desperation had strangled the dog with a brutish strength that he had no idea that he had possessed, and had hidden the body of the animal under the deep leaf pile accumulation. Then swiftly he had headed in the opposite direction and had hidden himself, while the German dog scouts had missed his trail. Under the earthy mound, the musty dampness clogged his already depleted breathing system, and though there was six inches of water beneath his body, this had been the safest place for him to stay under cover. His puncture wounds were stinging and paining so much that he was sobbing in agony while choking back the noise, trying to keep silent. He felt as though he was buried half-dead, and he could not get out of his mind the look in that dog’s eyes as he had cleanly with one jerk, broken it’s neck. For a split second, there was the feeling that the dog had said,
“I’m sorry, but I was just following my masters orders.” He had been found a week later, when the Germans had been forced to retreat. He had waited for the sounds of English spoken by the Allies, and Thomas now had open infected sores and was in a very confused mental condition.
John, who had been wounded from shrapnel when his horse was destroyed, had received extensive surgery from his lower abdomen to his knees, and had been left with a noticeable limping walking gait. He had breathing problems from the poisonous gas fumes, and on exertion, had very laboured breathing. After a three month hospital stay in Belgium, he was back on the battlefield at Mons.
All of the heroes were gaunt, tired and noticeably lacking in optimism. New Zealand, whose population was hardly yet one million, had patriotically supplied her gallant young men, out of whom 17, 000 of them had been either killed in action, or died of wounds and had not returned home again. Katharine and Brigid sensed that nourishing soups and soft foods were required. Dear old Brigid ever loving and caring, would spoon the thick nutritious vegetable broth into Thomas’s mouth, coaxing the wan pale boy,
“Come then my lovin’one for your lovin’ Brigie this broth will make you feel well. It’s lovin’ soup me Darlin’ you can taste the barley in it.” The family knew that the peace and the gentle atmosphere of the wide open land, and comforting love would help time heal the inner wounds, and they were to pack lunches and see the two young sons ride out slowly over the home hill with Edward and James following closely behind them.

During the period of the first World War, the manpower of England’s farms were lowered, and enormous agricultural effort was extended by the countries of the British rule to send food supplies. New Zealand had attained nationhood when the status of a Dominion was declared in 1907. Even though there were thousands of it’s young men away from the shores, there was an effort unmatched so far in the country’s history, and contributed record amounts of food produce to England and her Allies.
At this time William had felt that he would survey off several blocks of land for smaller farms, and nineteen blocks were offered to the Government first to their debated land schemes. Garland Hills was long established into a profitable farming area, and William had no intention of becoming a land squire. Several families had purchased the higher grazing land, and they were mainly from Scottish origin, hard-working and decidedly Calvinist in their attitude. The greater majority of the land was balloted by the Government, who had earnestly hoped that the returned servicemen would be able to make their life turn around by the challenge of farming life. Adjusting to returning home from the war to farming life was often not nearly as easy in practical terms, and there was almost a ten year period in the peoples lives that no amount of flailed effort could make them see that there was always yet another challenge. The new farmers to the area were encouraged by the older experienced people who would follow seasons, weather, and the pattern of ploughing in the crop-grown fertilizer. The younger men seemed to William to want to reap every harvest at a break neck speed.
“It’s almost as if they are acting out their resentments in their way they treat their land Katharine. They are frustrated with being new to the area, new to farming, and new to the pace of seasonal development. I can see that the attitude sometimes is there to make as much money in as little time, without truly caring for themselves, their work efforts, or the land.”
“The new century has already brought us all so many changes William, new ideas are taken up and acted upon within weeks of conception, but not all of it is unprogressive, dear William.”
”No, you are right, it is not all unprogressive, but I can sense my darling that there is less and less human warmth, even in the buying and the selling of produce and stock. I will still go on the shake of the man’s hand to seal any deal, and I hope that our children will not give away their generous traits to the suspicious ones that are creeping in with much mistrust of neighbour to neighbour.”
“You an I have guided our children, and given the best example that we could in terms of human values from our own light within, and we must leave our trust of them to their own inner light, while we follow them with our love, and we are doing that. Was there more to the sensing that you have stated, Dear?”
“What seems to daunt much of the population, is that there is no worldly condition that cannot be helped by asking from within, knowing that the moment of asking it is given. The Spanish influenza is a very explicit example of the destructive thought predominant. Our newspapers are now full of the numbers of the population that have died from the deadly menace. It is now said to be 5, 000 dead, and that number does not always include the Maori population, which the report says could be well near 7, 000 in all. Fear does bring to the person, the thing that they most fear.”
“Thought is what each person does each waking second. I know that it would be an impossible task to have hopeful thoughts for one hundred per cent of that time. One must decide on one’s best course of action, think of all the progression as well as the contra-indications. This is really decision making, in the widest terms, though William, I’m sure that if one kept with one’s own flexible mental attitude, then it is a lot easier. The grace and love from one’s own Guardian Angel helps one to make the decision with right thinking and right doing, and I would say that the right action would follow.”
“That is a very overall assumption of the simplification of the understanding that we know of the spiritual way of looking at the total view, Dearest. There is a real stumbling block for many persons still, that they have in their thinking though, well I perceive that there is still something, and yet I am hesitant to make what seems like a judgment, for I wouldn’t want to do that at all Katharine.”
“You are the last person who would be termed as judgmental William, and yet if some thoughts are never openly discussed, then do you not think that some valuable dialogue opportunity may be lost? So what in your thinking could be contributing to decisions from right thinking, and right doing? Do tell me, if you will.”
“All right Katharine, but it is only a small still voice part of my inner self which says this that I am wondering about now, there will be in a time ahead many more that will wonder, and look intensively at in the future. They will do it from the aspect of brotherly love, and I know that they will be divinely guided to enquire too. The basic premise seems to me that a greater part of humanity seems to be questioning some of the very oppressive teachings of the Churches.”
“People must from time to time get to wonder about the state of their own lives, in regard to what the Churches’ ruling is surely William.”
“I do think that some do get an inner voice call that does make them wonder, and I would think that it would be a small minority of people. The young person’s inquiring, are the very ones that I was thinking of at this moment, Katharine. The one condition of teaching that springs immediately to my mind now is the teaching that each person is a soul born in sin. Just think back as a child. Who does a child first enquire from? Parents. To know, they ask the very fist pivot of their lives: the parents. I can see that the parent who gives the same stock answer that their own parent gave them, that is without doing any individual thinking, then that may be the very cause of the child being felt to be worth very little love, and may even do a great deal of damage to the child’s image of itself. Certainly it must do damage in removing the child’s right to natural joy of childhood, I think.”
“I would say that from my own experience of the sisters’ teaching, that being your brothers’ keeper meant that you were personally responsible for making sure that your brother or sister did not waiver from their Church’s teaching. I remember once that it was said to us in a class of religious doctrine, “Just think how you would feel if you lived a good life and reached Heaven, only to find out that your sister was burning in Hell!”
“Zealots, there has always been, and for the most part it has been encouraged by the clergy for the ill-educated people to genuinely feel that guilt; for by doing just that, just think what a contrast the clergy were placed in. Even the joy of love of a man and a woman in sexual union has been made generally for those folk to feel that it is an animal brutish act- except to bring another soul into the world to increase in population for that church to control. The control is perpetuated by again teaching that only a church-approved obligation shall be enjoyed The only alternative is the hideous word and practice of excommunication. The word itself means that a person shall not belong to the church, but I ask you Katharine- how can a person not already belong to the Creator’s creation of all that there is!”
“On the young impressionable ones it is a very big onus to shoulder. The nuns were passing on the method that was given to them from the days of the monasteries, namely the remark supposedly attributed to St. Ignatious Loyola who founded the Jesuit Order in the sixteenth century.” Give me the child till he is seven, then I will show you the man, ” was supposed to have been quoted by him.”
“It does not take very much imagination to cast one’s mind back to the events of that time then and then you can get the feel of the politics of the time, the Inquisition, the scientific study statements of Gallileo being forced to be retracted by that inspired genius. It was a hideous ploy of the time to hold on to control of the minds, hearts, money and the countries of a very large proportion of the then known world. The resulting gross misery did affect people to wish to find another place to live in where they could have freedom from the Churches’ tyranny, and then the some progress was made in the general evolution of mankind. They all expressed their willingness to commence a set of new conditions, but then they had the same old fears still”
“Do you think that with each generation, then there is more personal freedom experienced by the individual in regard to spiritual thought and practice, Dearest?”
“I do so hope so, because there is the cause and effect always in operation, and people are in the place, with the people, under the conditions whether good or not so good for their own learning. Katharine, how many people know that they are the master of their own course!”
”Well dearest William, our childrens’ inner light is well developed, and they know that they are on Earth for more thing to do than just make money. They all have the knowledge that the giving of service to each other has more accumulative rewards, that can not be bought, stolen or rusted, when the action is from the heart. They have not suffered from our guidance and example.”
“That’s because we have always said that God is Love, and not an entity to fear tremblingly- and that we join ourselves to our Holy Creator by recognizing each person is created to know, to love, and to serve the One God of all, in our best individual way.”
“We separate ourselves when we think that we are not good enough or holy enough for God to love. Even the word holy- it comes from the Old English traditionally, and it means whole!”
“If a young child is taught this last dreadful lie, then they may never be able to rise to their own thinking ability, for their mis-guided teachers perpetuate the old curses of the Old Testament of the Bible.
“It seems to me that Jesus came into this World with a mission to teach Love only, never abuse of love, and showed to the people a way to be in contact with the Source of All Love, he did not found a church, he showed by example in healing their etherical and astral bodies that their physical bodies were made whole, therefore well. He gave the directive of praying “When you pray, pray believing that it will be given.” Just that, and I think that he meant literally that, and the person’s needs are given. It is the person’s doubt that puts the time gulf there. Jesus had a perfect trust in the Holy Creator, and he never put the time doubt there realising that all the time is one for The Holy Creator is ever present at every moment. He was so able to show this factor in the miracles of changing water into wine, the raising of Lazarus, the multiplication of the loaves and fishes. He simply bypassed the natural idea of time as humans usually think of it, with the perfect trust that he had of the Holy Creator.”
“Yet after he died, Jesus revealed the biggest mystery of all, and they knew that souls live on in Love and in expectation of that Love!”
“Yes Katharine, then why isn’t this the main ingredient of the teaching of the Churches?” “You know William, you have had the early answers from your Mother, and she was first convinced from the experiences of spititual contact in the link of love from her Mother. You had to be strong in your self-conviction, for to be continuous in the faith of the inner self. What if people were born so dominated as your Father did to you, and then the school system that you were thrust in tones also added. Now add further to that the miseries of not having any money or any options. Wouldn’t that have a different effect on that person’s morale?”
“Yes they would probably cling to the Churches’ teachings as if it was the only stable thing to rely on, and probably never do anything other than shallow thinking, never venture, never wonder. Most of all probably never realise that their is only One Plan and that is God’s Plan, One Power and that is God’s Power, and that everyone without exception shares equally and unconditionally as the created parts of the Creator, and can call on that power within at all times.”
“Much knowledge was denied to the people when the Church brought into being the Index of Forbidden Books away back in 1559.”
“There were those thinkers at that time who did obtain the knowledge without the use of the books on the List, and they received their knowledge from the highest knowledge via their inner light, so the Love that links us all has never been absent. It seems to me that it was only absent in the approval of the churches teachings.”
“The Dogma of the Infallibility of the Pope has still made the laity in the power clutches of the Churches teachings even more so, and it seemed to me at school that it was overemphasized on purpose, William. There was also a readiness by the nuns to accept that since the Church was almost two thousand years old and still teaching, then it must be the true Church.”
“Dogma is a very powerful form of control, and for a person to believe that they can only be truly happy, all that is necessary for them is to have faith in the belief of a proclaimed dogma seems to me to be a sure way to control the masses of the people.”
“The very functioning of the person is directed in this way, I think William. The classification of sin, mortal and venial. Mortal sin unconfessed would send us to Hell, we were told at school, while venial sin unconfessed would make us have some years in purgatory, while we would be sufferring for not being good enough to be happy in heaven, until a certain period had passed, and a price had been paid for the transgressions. The mortal sins of consequence, apart from murder which is the ultimate of not loving our neighbour, were of the order of emphasis given to us were these ones. Missing Church on Sunday on purpose, not confessing one’s so called sins, at a certain period of the year, to another human being, who is a priest of the Church and be told by that person whether or not the sin is forgiven, and the penance to be said or done to take away the punishment of that sin. The so-called impure thoughts, which are William only the natural growth of the physical body and the chemicals produced from the glands of it, in preparation for the enjoyment of the Creator’s given gift of pleasures of a man and a woman rewarded in seeing touching and expressing and feeling Life expressing Love.”
“When the generations past and also the present have been taught that life is for pain and suffering, and not for pleasure of cooperative service, they were bound by the darkest, bleakest and most ignorant of all of the love of our Holy Creator.”
“Most of the children have been taught guilt at their Mothers’ knee, so that the Mother could feel that she had not only done her best, but that she had done her best by the expected demands of the churches.”
“I do not think that many years will pass before there will be a change of attitude in this regard. Surely the experiences of the war just passed must be about the worst level of human injustice. People will say “Enough! There must be a more loving way for Nation to live side by side with Nation!”
“ Humanity has continued with or without the teachings of the Church, and just take a look at the eastern countries whom the Church has found great difficulty in converting to their teachings for many centuries. They have functioned and evolved with their philosophical ways, and they are still continuing as well.”

One of the mares foaled that night, and Edward and James were there to see the miracle of birth. The little boys had the process explained as the uncomplicated birthing took place. Gentle Thomas was at the mare’s head talking kindly and quietly to her, as she lay on her side on the clean straw floor of her loose-box, in the stable. As the muscular contractions made the mare’s big belly rise high, they were told that every time this happened then the body of the little foal was brought closer to the area of between the mare’s legs, and would protrude through, and be soon outside the body of it’s mother, Bonny. When this happened after a n hour and a half, their eyes were bright with wonder. The disc shaped object that was the afterbirth was passed next by Bonny, and in perfect instinct she cleaned up all the entrails of the birth. Her filly foal had successfully risen to her feet awkwardly on her long legs, and was looking for her mothers teats to drink milk. Bonny was giving her new baby sound communication, and the pretty dappled grey filly was responding, as William patted the foal’s wet untidy mane down to one side only.
“There Bonny, your filly will have a beautifully tidy mane. What is her name going to be, Thomas?”
“ Frances, I would like to call her after Doctor Frances Thompson, but we could call her Fan for short, ” he said excited at the thought of having his lovely lady that he often thought of, named with the sweet little foal.
“When can we ride the filly foal?” asked James walking back to the homestead, with his hand in is father’s big steady hand.
”Oh not yet, my wee fellow, we must wait until her back is strong and very well formed, and then we will have given her our promise that we will not hurt her lovely body. When we have Fan’s confidence, then we will gradually put a saddle on her back to let her feel the weight of it. Then we will put more weights on the saddle as she gets older so that she has some idea of the weight of a person. You see James, her eye does play a trick on her, and she thinks that people and objects, are three or four times the size that they really are.”
“Does she think that I look as tall as Thomas then?”
”Yes, I would think so, and then Thomas would be like a tremendous giant to her as well.” They laughed together as they came up the path to kitchen door, and a ginger coloured fluffy kitten sprang out at them from underneath a catnip bush.
“She will first have a halter put on her head, and then when her teeth have fully grown she can have a soft bit put into a bridle. The bit goes over her tongue, and then we will teach her patiently that when we pull the reins to this side that means she is being asked to turn in this direction and then the other rein is pulled it means the opposite direction. Then when we are sure that we have her complete confidence, then we will put a saddle on her back, and mount her for a short ride.”
They were late finishing the milking of the two house cows, and the winter sun was starting to set in the sky. William lit a Tilley lamp and the kerosene spluttered initially, then gave off a bright white even light as he hung the lamp on a hook in the centre of the dairy next door to the freshly scrubbed cow byres William poured half a bucket of warm milk into the separator, and Katharine turned the easy handle. The two spouts of the top cam had receptacles already placed under them to collect the separated milk and the cream. Already the steady flow of the separated milk was pouring into a galvanized iron bucket, and this would be given to the pigs. The cream was somewhat slower, trickled from the second spout into a wide enamel bowl. They chatted away affectionately as they worked together, and the job was done within half an hour. In another bucket the sixty round flat metal discs that were threaded in a large holding metal safety pin were immediately dunked into the cold water to remove all traces of the milk, and rinsed several times to make certain.
Katharine and William had decided that their dear friends would be needing early evenings and more rest with their advancing years, and they elected to do the night milking together. Brigid and Liam had protested they lived a great lifestyle they said, and milking was a pleasure not a chore. However it was a cold early winter, and they settled to let Gilroys do the night milking, if that was what they wished. William reset the cams in numbered sequence back on the separator. Taking the lamp down Katharine carried it at William’s side as he fed the squealing waiting pigs.
Doctor Les Gowland’s new car made loud back-firing sounds near the homestead, and together they went towards the car to greet him and his elderly retired father Doctor Henry Gowland. Les was very perplexed,
“My auto here gave it’s usual backfire noises after climbing the hill from the road gate, and young Thomas came out of the door in a scream of terror, yelled “Keep your bloody bayonet off my little filly, you ugly bastard.” and now he’s headed for the stables.”
“He’s very scared still, but don’t worry Les, John is very good at soothing him. He has nightmares still, and John is much improved, and he spends a lot of time with Thomas calming him because he said that he understands where Thomas’s mind is at times, ” Katharine explained patiently.
“We have a new foal in the stables, Bonny had her filly today, and we thought that it would be an interest for Thomas to have charge of her. He’s probably being very protective of them both.” added William.” The Army Doctors did give us a fairly concise report, and it was thought that Thomas might be permanently affected. He does seem to his mother and me to be still a fourteen year old, “ the strain showing in his voice.
“Time will tell all, ” said the kindly older Doctor Gowland.
“The mind is a very tricky part to diagnose, it’s a job for a specialist. How about I make an appointment for both Thomas and John to be checked out at the Medical School in Dunedin, for your peace of mind? I hear that John is thinking of going up to Wellington, to have a look at joining the Railways.”
“Yes. he’s really looking forward to a career with some traveling, and he will need a medical for it too, so thank you Les, for your concern, and please make the appointments, and we will all go up with them.” Katharine agreed,
“We would be wise to have a check-up arranged for Thomas, for our dear boy is not at all himself for long periods.” The big black cast iron kettle was singing merrily at the side of the huge shiny wood-fired stove. There was a steaming tureen of soup in the centre of the kitchen table, and lamb chops sizzling in the large pan.
“Our dinner is cooked, so will you have some food with us, dear friends?” Katharine invited the two visitors.
“We’d be pleased to join you good people, ” said the burly large framed younger man. Both doctors took their suit coats off and made off in the direction of the bathroom to wash up before their dinner, as William came down the hallway.
“Good thinking, dearest for it isn’t many months since young Les’s Doris has passed on, and they have been looking a bit lost ever since.”


“You must have been the first place in the district to put in a septic tank.” said Les cheerfully, glad that he didn’t have to usual trek outside to the toilet.
“The very first, and the cottage was the second one, ” smiled William, “it is the right name when the toilet inside the home is called the convenience.” Katharine took a gong down from the mantle shelf high above the stove, and going to back door, gave a few well timed beats of the brass musical instrument.
“We bought it at the South Seas Exhibition and we’ve used it to let the children know that there was a meal ready on the table, ” she laughed.” there is only a small crowd now.” Edward and James came from their rooms and saw the doctors already seated in place at the table.
“Done your homework my good men?” William asked them. Edward replied for them both. Seven year old James was shy of strangers, as he had a slight lisp, and he relied on Edward to do the talking for him in company. The back door opened and John led Thomas in.
“He came running over to the stables and I was stoking up the loose-boxes with chaff, ” he paused and rubbed his brother’s shoulder, “You’re okay now, aren’t you, Tom? We have talked a fair amount about how we have to remember that every noise is no longer the enemy.” They washed up and joined the family, and their father said,.
“We think that we’ll have a trip to Dunedin soon, do you two big fellows want to join us for a winter break?” John’s face broke into a grin,
“That’s where you got your auto from, didn’t you Doctor?” and with that all eyes turned to William to see if this was the reason for the visit to Dunedin.
“Yes I did purchase my auto there, and if you want lessons, the I shall be glad to give you some John. First I would like you and Thomas to have a check-up with an old medical friend to make doubly sure that you wouldn’t have any blackouts while driving a sleek shiny new car.”
“Yes sure Doctor, really that would be okay with me“ and he looked sideways at Thomas and raised his eyebrows.
“Both of you two would be a good idea then. My word Katharine, this is a delicious meal. May I make a quick telephone call and tell my housekeeper that we are eating here? I quite forget that we do have all these convenient gadgets. It does take the anxiety out of poor Mrs. Nesbitt’s life to have me call her.”
“ She doesn’t trust you driving in that auto, ”laughed William. When he returned to the table Les was beaming with pleasure,
”Mrs. Nesbitt tells me that Longden is going to be electrified next month. What do you think of that William?”
“That is tremendous, and it will improve life for everyone. It will be a long time before the electricity lines will come the seven miles out here to Garland Hills, and there’s still the other homes built across the river. There is a generator put on the market recently, that runs on kerosene, and I have an appointment to find out more about it. I am assured that it is well guaranteed, and the motor is powerful, and if all goes to plan then we will have the electricity experts have then we will have all the buildings wired up for it all.”
“Will it run everything, lights appliances, gadgets like the new -fangled wireless?” asked Henry.
“Yes, there has to be electrical power points put in the buildings for the appliances, but there is even a water heater that heats the water now, and an electrical stove”.
“It will do away with chopping the wood small, Edward, if your Dad gets one eh?” Doctor Henry nudged him.” The generator, is it a big noisy piece of machinery like the traction engine William?”
“ No it’s a very compact size, and it does have a dull monotonous thudding sound, so it is probably best to put it as far away from the living quarters as possible, in a small shed by itself, and I would suppose that if the shed could be sound proofed as well, then so much the better. The generator has to be on day and night, and is said to run very economically.”
“One would appreciate the convenience very much, ” said Katherine smiling her usual sincere smile.
“We are living in a very exciting time, after that initial post-war period, now we are rebuilding with confidence again. The twenties will be a going-ahead phase for all, I should think!” William looked at Edward and James,
“There is talk of a motor bus going past our road gate soon, and that means that you boys may go to Longden each day on it to school, instead of having to stay for the week at Murrays’ if that happens.”
“Are you getting ideas of what you want to do, John?” asked Les Gowland.
“I’m making enquiries about the New Zealand Railways. I would like to be a guard, for I like the busy schedule, and there’s plenty of room for working up to a promotion with the service.”
“You sound as if you have thought about it in depth John, Good Luck with it all.” Katharine took out a large apple sponge pudding from one of the stove’s two ovens, cut it in slices and set the portions in huge desert plates for each person. She placed a large jug of fresh thick cream beside their guests.
”Wonderful! we are really being spoilt with our favorite desert now.” Henry said jovially, “When I cook for Les here, he gets indigestion without even desert.”
The two doctors joined William for a port in the study and were content to have an hour or two when they wouldn’t have to go out on calls. Old Henry Gowland turned the port glass in his hands,
”Times have changed indeed, but there’s still all the good things remaining at Garland Hills, still the great hospitality and the sincere friendship, and nothing can take the place of those wonderful qualities.”
“Things are moving here as well, Henry, and nothing can stay the same forever, and neither should one want it to.” said William, “
“Many of the older folk have now gone in Longden, their children are bringing up their own young ones, there is a growth in the birth rate all right, ” said the old doctor.
“Alex and Robert Murray now passed away, and their boys have the business blooming. Bob Murray has just bought the Northern General Store last week”
“You’ll be missing John when he leaves to join the Railways, ” said Les, ”Isn’t he your right hand man?”
“He’s going to do what he feels like most, and we have brought them up to do the job in life that makes them the happiest, for then there is pleasure in doing it and it becomes a service of love, and it takes the hard out of the work.” Katharine had come into the study, and the two young children had hugged their father and he had kissed them tenderly, and whispered a goodnight to each. Now she was back after tucking them up in their beds.
“Our family is getting smaller each year, but we often see our grown ones and their little ones, this house is very used to a crowd. I think that when William built it, he did plan it that way!” She took a glass that William held out to her, and their eyes met in love still.
“John will be off to Wellington for training if he is accepted for the Railways. He’s fond of the cities, and he finds it an exciting thought, so he seems to have recovered from his war experience very well. He and Thomas are reading to the youngest ones some daring adventures, but those children have closed eyes already.”
“John’s very bright with mathematics, you put a row of five figures across a page, and a row of five figures down the page, he will have added them up in seconds.”
“You have a right to be proud of all your daughters and sons, for they have done you both and themselves credit. Like my own one here, ” said the old kind doctor putting his arm on his widowered son Les.
“Katharine and I are of the opinion that we will probably have Thomas in our care, and after we have gone the families’ care, for the rest of his life. He’s not at all improving, and there are some things that have to be accepted, and our opinion is that Thomas will always be a fourteen year old in his mind.”
“I’m sure that his family will take good care of him William.” said Les Gowland.” They are patient and proud of him. What’s this that I hear about Mary and Veronica going to be having a journey to Ireland after Christmas? Are your girls career girls, by the looks of it?”
“They want to have a look around the world, and they are going to take Liam and Brigid with them too. Our girls have plenty of social life, and have not been pressured to race to the altar, but one day they will know when it’s the right man.” Henry looked at his offspring, who was fumbling uncomfortably with his handkerchief.
“You always had a yearning for Mary, right from Primary School days. She and you have had some good times through the years as young things. Now that your dear Doris has passed away, God look after her, you will have to look at the future, Son.”
“Mary and I have always been the best of pals, and I do have a great deal of respect for her, but I don’t think that she would care enough to take on me with the busy practice that it is now, ” he said tentatively, and sadly. Katharine came to his rescue.
“Yes she would, dear Lesley, she would. If you had some time, and paid her some attention, I think that you would get a very pleasant surprise!” Les brightened up considerably.
“Well then I will. I’ll do that, there’s the telephone, the new communication to enjoy the challenge of trying to win Mary!”
He did get a very pleasant surprise, for Lesley Gowland renewed his young romantic interest in the lovely tall stately Mary, and the two became engaged and planned to be married within the year, on her return from the overseas journey. The two Gilroy young women had enjoyed growing up at Garland Hills, they had followed their chosen careers, and they had not worried when occasionally, the rather cruel comment about being’ old maids’or being ‘on the shelf’ was mentioned.
William, the eldest son, had married when he was twenty five years, and his Tessa and their three children were happily living in Ashburton, where he was headmaster of a school. They enjoyed traveling to Southland in the train, for the long school holidays, and Katharine and Tessa were very close.
Tessa’s brother Lindsay Hadley in Christchurch, was paying Veronica some lovely compliments, and he had been smitten with the dark haired vivacious young beauty with the Eaton Crop hair style, when his sister had introduced them at Moira Reading’s happy home. Moira had lost Lennox suddenly six years previously, and Veronica her niece lived with her. Moira had always been interested in the arts, and she was vitally full of interest, and completely at ease with all the young people that would arrive at her artistic gatherings regularly. Lindsay was an architect, and also had the same interest as Moira and Veronica, in landscape painting. His classic car was at disposal to drive his two favourite women to a peaceful remote area, and they would encourage each other with friendly banter. Just as years ago, when Moira had known that William and Katharine were meant for each other, her romantic heart was seeing a repeat performance in Veronica and Lindsay. She already had made arrangements to build for herself an elegant smaller set of self-contained rooms, at the conservatory end of the house, and Lindsay had drawn the plans with aesethical care to match the original building.

The sea voyage was a wonderful, sparkling adventure. Liam and Brigid, with Mary and Veronica, enjoyed their sensational times ashore at Singapore, Colombo, Karachi, Port Said, Alexandria, Naples, Genoa, Barcelona, Algiers, Gibraltar, and Lisbon. When the cruise ship finally completed the leisurely voyage, and arrived in Southampton, Liam informed Brigid
“We have gone clean around the World now Brigie, and how does it feel to be a world traveler?”
“ Just fine it does, me Darlin. ’The time we’ve had bein’ waited on hand and foot at every turn, I shall never forget it all. Seein’ our girls in their fine night clothes dancin’ and the great music as well, it has been a real tonic for I feel a young thing myself!”
“And soon we will be walkin’ on the Emerald Isle, and seein’ all our kinfolk as well, in a couple of days, darlin’ Brigie, ” said the contented Liam, taking his dolly little wife’s elbow and steadying her down the gangway.
“Just fancy seein’ those jolly faces!”
They never did set foot on the Emerald Isle again. The ferry was a fast new one, launched that week at Liverpool, and this was it’s third trip to Belfast. The turbulent waters and stormy passage had made most of the two hundred passengers violently sick, and the new crew had done their best in the appalling conditions, but the rocky waters off Belfast’s coast was the ferry’s graveyard. As she struck the rocks, the crew had hailed out over the loud-speakers for all passengers to assemble at the life-boat stations. There was a maddened scramble as the crowd ran the lurching, steep, wet decks. The storm became more raging than ever, and hearing the instructions became very difficult.
“Women and children first” the man closest to them tried to bellow out over the gale-force wind. Mary and Veronica each put their arms around Liam and Brigid as the ship gave a sudden sharp lurch, and they all tumbled onto the deck in a heap. Liam was in agony. He had broken his thigh bone, and parts of it were visible outside of his clothing. The frantic ferry crew, hastily putting passengers on board the life-boats, came to their rescue.
“Quickly You good people here, two more places in the life-boat now launching!” Brigid pushed Mary and Veronica away to the deck staff,
“Get in there me darlin’ girls, for I will keep with me darlin’ Liam and I’ll keep me weather eye on him. Away now! We’ll be seein’ you both soon.” On board the bobbing life-boat, they strained their eyes to keep track of Liam and Brigid.
“Look, their boat is being lowered now, and they are safely off!” shouted Mary to Veronica so concerned. The next second, ropes broke and all the occupants of the life-boat were tipped into the Irish Sea, as the horrified crowd watched helplessly. Crew threw down life buoys, but there was no sign of them being used, as no heads were surfacing. The Gilroy girls clung to each other sobbing on the dockside, awaiting news of survivors. The ferry company officially declared that all of the passengers in the stricken life-boat had been drowned, and all of the other passengers off the ferry had been rescued. Two days later, the girls travelled to Galway with the coffins of the two dear friends that were so much a part of their lives, and their family. The families in Galway held a short wake for their beloved ones. Veronica and Mary understood about the wake, and knew that it was the occasion to speak to the departed one’s soul to make any amends of any past grievances, and to let the soul know that the folks living on Earth are happy for them to go ahead of them into the light and love with their own Guardian Angel, to be happy with their passed-over loved ones, and to their reward on the next level of the spiritual realms.

Longden in the spring of 1921 was a very happy town. The farmers were getting top wool and meat prices, and the lambing averages were up, and the town’s Dr. Lesley Gowland married Mary Gilroy, on a sunny Saturday morning. Everyone wished the gracious happy couple, a long wonderful lifetime together.
In November of the same year, there was another young couple to occupy the cottage on Garland Hills where Liam and Brigid had spent the majority of their happy lives. The young Sandy and Louise McKay had had their hopes for a rehabilitation farm dashed, when they did not qualify for a ballot. Their name had been one of the many replies that William had received in answer to his advertisement for the position at Garland Hills. Now with the established property, and their own pretty cottage home and garden of their own, plus the new car that William had bought, they were more than content with the situation. Sandy had been at Mons in Belgium and on August 1917, he and many others had seen the vast angelic vision in the sky, and he had known from that moment on, that he was always looked after by his own angel. He was an average height, a very gentle man, who had lost one eye in the war, and was a willing as willing to learn as Liam was before him. William had read Sandy’s letter of application, and it had stood out like a beacon to William that this was the right one. He had rung the McKays that same night to invite them to come to Garland Hills to see if the position would suit them. The nervous young couple arrived at Longden, with the feeling that this secure area was a good solid town. They were self-conscious that their thin clothes would have to be replaced by warmer ones, by the sight of the snow-capped hills in the distance.
Louise was a thin, pale young woman of twenty one years, wearing a print dress, and she had borrowed a hat to add some dash to her poor outfit. Her short hair and fringe was the colour of mahogany, but her complexion and gaunt looking appearance, gave evidence that she had spent four years in the sanitarium with tuberculosis. She had met Sandy there when he had been a gardener there, after his return from the war. Their love for each other had inspired the desire within her sickly body to be well, and Sandy had given her the strength. His gentle manner coaxed and encouraged her, and two years from the day that they had met, she was discharged from the sanitarium, in satisfactory condition.
Sandy had been brought up in the city, but in his heart, he knew that if he had the opportunity, then he would learn to be a good caring farmer. He soon soaked up all the information that he could read, and he was a very ready and willing listener when William would give him the benefit of his wide first-hand knowledge of farming. Katharine put Louise’s nervousness at rest from day one, and she took a lively interest in seeing that young woman really blossom with her life on the wide open spaces of Garland Hills.
Since most of the farm work was now contracted out, the days of hustle and bustle were over for William and Katharine. The washing machine, hot water cylinder, vacuum cleaner, electric iron, electric range, and radiators, and the refrigerator and the cold room, were the progressive additions that had come with the electric lights and the wonderful radio, as a result of the kerosene generator that William was quick to see the advantages of. The cottage had been wired for the electricity at the same time, and there were lights out in the outbuildings, and out in the yards.
Every day at ten a.m. the men came into the huge spotless and friendly homestead kitchen for smoko, and Katharine had the table laden with morning tea.
When the men had gone out to work again, Louise and Katharine sewed on the treadle Singer sewing machine, or spun wool, knitted, and enjoyed the continuing stories of the radio serials, and each other’s very congenial company. Louise had lovely long white tapered fingers, and some evenings in the welcoming sitting room with the log fire burning cheerfully, she would play the piano with a delicate, sensitive touch.
Veronica and Lindsay Hadley had an Easter wedding in Christchurch, and they toured the South Island staying at Ashburton and Dunedin, and were home at Garland Hills for the annual Harvest Celheigh, where all the District toasted the relaxed happy couple.

In 1923, young Edward went to boarding school at Christ’s College in Christchurch. He felt awkward at first in the conspicuous stripped blazer, and the stiff straw boater hat, until he realized that there many other guys feeling the same way. His studies were no problem, for he was interested in language, and had an aptitude for them, and he proceeded in a methodical way to arrange his prep time so that he could also do spare time reading, from the well stacked college library. Initially, he found the dormitory life a rather noisy hectic pace, and he soon learned to tune out by raising his conscious mind to a higher level, which gave him a dreamy look, and the ever ready comics had nick named him Prof. Edward’s favourite hero was Earnest Rutherford, and was entranced by the New Zealander who had won the Nobel prize for chemistry in 1907, and he would absorb himself in the theory of atomic structure, and the theories of light and speed.
He kept from his class mates, the fact that he could read around each one of them the colours of the spiritual energy that they were emitting. He was naturally clairvoyant and clairaudient, and his parents had impressed upon him the necessity of using those spiritual gifts with charitable discernment. They had impressed on him the value of personal privacy of the individual, the method in which the opening up to spirit and the closing off after communication, and they had explained the reasons for the necessity for all of these factors.
“In all communications with spirit, it is vital that one always operate from the highest spiritual intention. That means, that you ask from the highest part of yourself, to the highest spiritual help; for anything less is rather like half-heartedly doing it, and though something psychic will come through it will not be of the highest, and it could be very much lower and be mischievous. There are such entities who are still operating very much from an egotistical rather than a pure loving intention. Just be sure that you ask them if they are operating in the same light that the master Jesus has, and if not, then instruct them to leave. Ensure that before opening up to a communication, that you always put the spiritual cloak of divine love and protection around your physical body. This can be done by mentally enclosing yourself in a ring of bright light of your choice, and at the same time call on your own guide who has been with you from birth to show you the way” Edward had the respect and love of his parents, and they needed to give him the last minute refresher advice. He listened and absorbed it all. His lovely mother was saying quietly more, and he gave her his full attention
“Afterwards, do thank Spirit, for the help, knowledge, requests granted also. Spirit will never impinge on your freewill by doing anything without asking for it to be done, so remember to ask, always expecting to receive. It is not good form in spiritual exercise to boast of having the abilities, or to show them off as an exhibit, or to think that oneself is better, holier, or more advanced than others, by being able to see and hear spiritually, and dear Edward we do ask you to be most particular, and we trust that you know how to link up with All Love.” Edward had seen very many communications of Spirit, in the company of his parents and his brothers and sisters, and he had been given the example of the highest individual pure loving intention of them all.
Weekends were a relaxed time, for after Saturday morning chores and sport in the afternoons, then dressed in his best uniform, and after being inspected by the Duty Master, he was free to go to the Visitors’ Lounge, where Aunt Moira waited, to swish him out to the waiting taxi. He did not have to return to the College until after tea on Sunday nights. She loved the mannerly, well spoken, confident Edward, and she shared his humour of laughing with people, and never at them. Within two years, she had guided him through all art galleries, the museum, coffee and tea shops where there were people who read tea cups. They had visited the French-influenced town of Akaroa, the busy port of Lyttleton, the Hermitage at Mt. Cook, and the high country village of Hanmer with the warm, sparkling health restoring mineral springs. They had climbed the Cashmere Hills of Christchurch, bathed in the sea at Sumner and New Brighton, had delicious picnics among the daffodils in Hagley Park, fished on the banks of the Waimakarere River, and skated on the frozen Lake Colridge. On a long weekend, they sailed on the Lyttleton to Wellington ferry and spend an exciting time exploring the capital city, in a hired taxi. Parliament House, the largest wooden building in the Southern Hemisphere fascinated him.
In Aunt Moira’s company, he had felt a great flow of love coming from her, and she was positively energetic in everything that she did. She smoked her tailor-made cigarettes from long ebony holders with flair, held in long white tapered fingers, with ruby coloured fingernails. Sometimes they would go with Veronica and Lindsay to a silent movie, and on the night that they heard the first talkie movie, they were elated. Dinner at one of the first-class hotels with silver service was usual once a month, and there was a reserved table that she and Lennox had used for years, and Edward appreciated the fine food after boarding school fare. She had taught him the difference and varieties of wines, and which one was usually most suitable for the food that they were enjoying.
Always, there was the feeling about her, that there were too many pleasures in life, to even have the time to say “I’m bored”. Veronica and Lindsay, and their adorable twin daughters Rosemary and Vivian, loved him dearly, and they treated him as quite grown-up. They taught him the latest dances, the tango, the shimmy, the black bottom, and they had the latest records of jazz, as well as the soothing classics. He minded the twins for them at times while they went out at night, and they left him plenty of chocolate biscuits to munch on.

After two years, there was a hub of excitement as James joined him at College, and Edward knew that he could see to it that James did not suffer from pangs of home-sickness. When James had elocution lessons, then Edward also had his at a similar time, though he had no need to, for he did not have the speech impediment that his youngest brother had. Together they had drama lessons, and they found themselves naturally immersing themselves into the parts that they were performing. On the sporting field, they preferred the summer game of cricket, and Edward said that he was never better than mediocre. At home, they had their own horses so they would have dearly loved to have been able to take part in equestrian events, but there was no such facilities at the College. Many of his class were his life long friends and acquaintances, especially their debating team. Edward attended the daily church activities as a matter of course, and he was secretly glad that he was not ever asked to sing in the choir, as he could not sing in tune. James had a lovely tuneful voice, a legacy of their Mother, and was a choir-boy from day one.
In his final year at College, he was a Prefect, and he refused the usual practice of having a junior fellow shine his shoes, run his bath water, or indeed anything demeaning at all.” That is not necessary, ” Edward told the Prefects’ Meeting.” The young one has his own shoes to clean, and get his own bath, and I’m most independently capable. Skivvies are a noxious, belittling practice, and it is time for it to be out-moded!”
He would very much liked to have seen the hideous, practice of canning out-moded as well, and he had seen the abusive canning had often held a power sway for some prefects and teachers. He knew in time, with more enlightenment, it would be. If he had to give out any discipline, he would ask the fellow to write out the school rule that had been broken, and then write as many reasons as the fellow could think of, why the rule may possibly have some value in the school. He would suggest the fellow do some thinking in regad to self-discipline was usually reasonably in place in a person’s personality, by the time a person was commencing their twelfth year, and that there was a designated channel to air all grievances.
He had always asked for spiritual help with his studies, and there was an ovation for the popular, surprised Edward when he was awarded Dux of the College, and Aunt Moira, Veronica, Lindsay and James beamed in pleasure of the deserved honour, in the audience.
When the time came for him to choose his career, he found that he wanted to continue his studies at Lincoln College, the agricultural faculty of Canterbury University. Moira had bought him a rakish sports car for his seventeenth birthday, and he was able to stay with Veronica and Lindsay in the home that the dear generous lady had signed over to them. The study courses at Lincoln College had attracted a large proportion of overseas students, and it was a fairly cosmopolitan atmosphere that prevailed.
One of his closest friends was also his distant relative from Australia, Giles Lysart, and already held a science degree from a Melbourne university. He was studying agronomy in post-graduate work, and had several new theories on grain cross pollination. He was a tall, well built, smiling fellow with hazel eyes and straight brown hair, and he smoked a curly Sherlock Holmes pipe, and wore the latest snappy tweed fashions in clothing. Giles was absorbed in chemistry, and physics, and to Edward’s delight, in philosophy. Another close friend of Edward’s was a brilliant young man from India, who in his meticulously wound turban, had a fascinating, finely chiseled face. Raji was tall, dignified, well-spoken and well-read. Giles and Raji were often guests at Aunt Moira’s group evenings, and they enjoyed her tremendous hospitality, and the people there speaking with genuine interest on varying topics.
Occasionally, Edward’s car was crammed with the three long- legged young men, and their luggage for the long journey home to Garland Hills. His brother James, had by now finished College, and was working at home under the excellent guidance of his caring father, and the confident Sandy McKay.

The busy times on the land were superb experiences for the two city born guests, and the local people had really taken them to their hearts. Especially Essie Murray’s granddaughter.
Lillian had become instantly attracted to Giles. She was home on her annual holidays from Christchurch where she was a staff nurse since her General Nursing Graduation. Edward could see that Giles had taken a mighty big breath when he had clapped his eyes on the delightful, naturally beautiful young lady with the curvaceous figure. Edward and James had known Lil since their birth, and had stayed with her family at their home during the week to attend the primary school in Longden, so she was like a sister to Edward. Even more so because she was nearer his age than was Mary and Veronica. Giles and Lillian made a graceful pair dancing together, for they were completely at one with each other, and engrossed from their first meeting. It was a foregone conclusion that they were in love.
William and Katharine cared that their house-guests would be feeling completely welcome, and knew that Raji did not drink alcohol. Katharine had made up a very pleasant fruit punch for him. They had many evenings in the comfortable sitting room, beside the warm log fire in the huge stone faced fireplace, and Raji had given his own opinions from his spiritual philosophy beliefs.
“Yes, we do believe in reincarnation of the soul into another body, so that the soul may learn a new aspect of the lesson of experience. It may be that the soul is in a person who needs to know how it feels to have some action of karmic debt done to them- to be on the receiving end of what they have possibly done in another life time, a previous one.”
“ So Brahmans believe that all karmic debt will have to be cleared, before more grace can pour forth, by way of spiritual knowledge. Is that so Raji?” asked Katharine interestedly.” Basically, yes, and Brahmans have also a strict lifestyle pattern of Universal Laws to live by. Next April I will be going home to Karachi, and I will marry the bride who was chosen for me when I was four years old, and Gia was then three years old. We have had to shun any Western idea of branching out to do our own physical looking for a marriage partner.”
“Why is that so? Can you not follow your own heart then Raji?” asked William.
“We can decide to do or not to do, yes, but if one is a Brahman, and truly trusting in the Universal Law, say the Brahmins, then the Universe has already made the perfect match for me, for what I have given out in love, that is Universal Love. My parents choosing Gia for me, is the last link in the Universal design of the woman that will be my life partner.”
“Do you know her already?” said Edward, “if your parents knew each other, then you may have been playmates as children.”
“I have not even seen a photograph of Gia, and neither has she seen a photograph of me.” Raji rolled his eyes, “I know that this must seem to be a very strange basis for a foundation of marriage, but my trust in the Universe is very strong.”
”Can you divorce then if you are not having a good marriage?”
”Divorce Edward, is occurring in some of the Moslem and Hindu sects, it is still not common. But for a Brahman, there is no divorce, that will be recognised. It is like the Roman Catholic church at present.”
“A cousin of mine married his bride when he was seventeen years old, and she was fifteen. She was not at all in any way physically beautiful, or even had one pretty quality in the physical terms. I thought that my cousin must be having his faith tested sorely. By the time three years had gone by, his wife was exquisitely beautiful. You see beauty is only skin deep, and with the love that comes with the trust of the Universe, then each skin cell can be filled with the light of that Love, and can literally change the physical appearance of the person.”
“It must have been a great lesson to see that change Raji. Yet in the same way, I do believe that we are experiencing these very same reasons of physical appearance in our culture. My sister Moira, would sometimes say, ”You get the face that you deserve by the time that you are forty years of age, ” She meant the inner reflects the outer, because if one is following the path of what one came on Earth to do, then the magnificence is reflected in the physical body. For example, one’s face can reflect peace of mind, happiness, or with thoughts of resentment may show sorrows, or haughtiness”
“ It can be a mirrored refection of the inner feelings of the person indeed, ” said Raja.” Mrs. Reading is a wonderful person of great soul quality, and she enthusiastically lives every moment of her life. She has so much spiritual help to give out, and she seems to have more spiritual energy continually flowing into her, for she never seems to be drained emotionally. That can happen when listening to people who are having emotional difficulties. They can be caught up in the speaker’s emotional vibrational pattern if they are not careful to remain detached” William reasoned carefully.
“She has a wonderful balance that comes from using the physical, mental, and spiritual in equal proportions, and she has operated in the positive emotions for the greatest part of her life. She was the right person to be Katherine’s sister, so she could encourage her to be true to herself from a young tender age, and not bow to everyone else’s expectation.” Katharine gave William a dazzling smile,
“She is a beautiful soul, that is true dearest William, so are you, and all of us here. We are very privileged to meet you Raji, and please be happy with us here, and come some more times whenever you feel like it. Do you think that it is possible that my sister and I have been together in another life time Raji?”
“Quite possible, Mrs. Gilroy, for if there is anything that has been left undone, wouldn’t we want to complete that promise? I do think that certain groups of souls reincarnate together, at certain times, to bring a spiritual upliftment to a country, even a whole planet. I also think that when a lot of persons die in a fire, or a shipwreck, or such, then there is a group of souls who have finished what they have decided in spirit to do, then the accident is the catalyst for the departure of the souls. So is a terminal illness, a catalyst for the same departure for the soul of the individual.” William wound up the grandfather clock, with a large key,
“Our son Thomas, who as a result of traumatic experiences at the war in Europe, did not mentally grow it seems. He does still inquire, and look and listen, and he seems to be at peace with himself, and everyone else. He has some behaviours the doctors say is not normal if optimum maturity has taken place. He cannot settle in one place, and is away to yet another family member to stay with them every two to three weeks. But he is not abusive. In fact he is the opposite, and though, he is even more child-like in his trust in everything of the Universe, except that he has one dread. He has a dread of dogs.”
”We love him dearly, ” Katharine said, ” and being child-like, we cannot give him any more than an appropriate responsibility. Edward and James are truly absolutely good with him, as are the rest of the family. He is always affectionate, and in a quiet content way.”
“Did you ever find out why this happened to Thomas, Father?”
“From the doctors’ the reason is that the poisonous mustard gas has made irreversible massive cell damage in the cells of his brain. From my Mother in spirit, she has said that Thomas has chosen as his ife path, to be the instrument for many persons that he comes in contact with, for them to choose to either be charitable and compassionate to, or to choose to be disparaging and cruel to. You know how hard it is when the whispered words, “Tom Gilroy, the soft simpleton”. is said sometimes? Well it is not our problem Edward, it is the person’s problem who is saying it.”
”I know that Thomas has a perfect inner light, and that he gives out much love. He probably gives it out more than most. He even gets more handsome, the older he gets by comparison with some other people with mental defects, ” smiled Edward.
“There you have an excellent example of what I have been trying to explain! Because one is following the path of what one came on Earth to do, then the spirit is grown in magnificence, and it is reflected in the physical, “ said Raji bowing serenely, with the palms of his hands joined together.” There have been many souls born on Earth who have taught that each person has within themselves all the Love of the Whole Universe, if only they knew it.”
“You mean like Jesus and Buddha?” put in Edward.
“There are some special ones, Jesus of Nazareth, Buddha before him, and before that time was Abraham, Zaroaster. Also Mahommed, Krishna, and Tsaeo and Brahma and others. There have been what we call Avatars, since then. There have been some special souls who have reincarnated that are known for their teachings to uplift the burdens of the painful experiences that humans were suffering in anguish. All of them have said one thing in common, and to me it seems to be this, Love the Creator, love the created family of Man, and do unto others as you would have done unto yourself “
“Did you know that up to the sixth century, the Church believed in reincarnation, and then it was voted out at one of their Councils?”
“How could so huge a principle be voted out? Just because the Church does not choose to have the principle that is called reincarnation- that does not mean that reincarnation is not happening as a natural spiritual cycle of spiritual progress!” said Edward.
“The saddest thing about the early Church making the prohibitive decisions, is that it has often set the minds of thinking into rigidity ever since, excepting for a few brave thinkers who have dared to wonder.” suggested William.
”There is the erroneous time element, of the minds set this way of whole groups of people, that they will get their requests answered in a queuing up fashion, that the Father in Heaven will answer their prayerful requests when it is their turn.”
“God is Universal Law of Love and is present in all things, at all places and at all times. Divine action is taking place whether we see it or not.” added Katharine, and William agreed.
”That we know is so. Omnipresent and omnipotent are the theological words to describe that. So how do we separate ourselves from God? It has my own long belief that we do so by our very own thoughts. When we hear someone say ”I’ve asked for this or I’ve prayed for that, ” and then they have added “ but it’s been a long time coming, “or” I haven’t got it”, then they are thoroughly watering down the flow of grace of the granting it.”

Edward graduated from Lincoln College when he was twenty one years old, and that same year, he was best man at the wedding of Giles Lysart to Lillian Murray, and the large country town of Longden celebrated. Lillian’s bridesmaid was her nursing friend, Alice Brody. When the bride’s garter was thrown in traditional fun to see who the next bride would be in the group, it had landed on Alice. She was a rather prim young lady, and was self-conscious of the humour attached to the occasion.
“Are you looking a bit perplexed at the thought that you are being the next chosen bride in the group Alice?” said Edward quietly to the blushing young woman.
“I really didn’t plan on it landing on me, ” she answered stiffly.
“Then you’ll take it in the fun of the occasion of our clean country fun, and just relax and go with the flow, ” he said, trying to be reassuring.
“Oh, I’m a country girl, and it’s not that I don’t know the customary garter throw, or the barricking, ” she replied defensively. Edward sensed a deepest hurt coming to the surface in the intensity of her answer.” I can’t think that my father would approve of a husband for me solely on the casual landing of the bridal apparel. He is a very strict man”
“Are you not yet twenty one then?” he asked, feeling foolish that he had stated the obvious.
“We have to be twenty one years to sit the state finals in General Nursing, ” she said, with a look and more than a tone of annoyance in her voice, and then lowering her eyes to the floor she moved away from him. Lillian saw Edward’s discomfort, and took him aside.
“She’s had a crisis in love, and has just given up the love of a man on her father’s say-so. He’s a very rigid and controlling man, who is also one of those bigoted church people.”
“What a shame, she’s a rather beautiful looking girl-even if she is a bit intense with me, ” he said empathically.
“She was having a passionate affair with her beloved Dennis who is her third cousin, and her father has refused to see reason that the distance in blood relationship is no longer applicable. On the back of the marriage licence it states that first cousins may legally marry in New Zealand. It’s more than likely that he has some gripes with Dennis’s family, and refuses to allow a marriage of his own offspring to theirs on an ego basis of winning the fight still, for the two families have not spoken for some years now.”
“I see. That accounts for the withering glance to me. Look here Lil, this is your day and Giles’ so let’s be merry and bright, maybe it will flow on to Alice.” He gave Lillian a close loving hug.” Where are you two lovers going for your honeymoon Lil?”
“Up to Queenstown tonight, it’s been our favourite place close by ever since the time that you lent Giles your car, to take me out on the very first encounter with young Cupid. Queenstown is where the angel proposed to me, on board the Earnslaw on a lovely warm moonlight night, after a fabulously lazy day, at isolated Glenorchy. The nights will be nice and cold up in the snow caps, and induce early nights and late mornings, ” she babbled on naturally to him.
“Have a fantastic time, you two love-doves.” he said as Giles brought another tray of martinis to them.
“Gotcha,” said the beaming Giles, “We will not be surfacing for three days, ” he laughed in Lillian’s ear. They were off to a great start, Edward reckoned.
“We shall see you on the return and call in on your parents. Maybe James will teach you how to milk the house cows, ” he squeezed her shoulders.
“Don’t ever learn to milk a cow Lil, and you’ll never be asked to do it!” advised Edward.
“Where do you think the house cow will go on the quarter-acre section of our Lincoln College home, when you return to lecture there, Honey?” she said curling up against his broad welcoming chest, picking off the white carnation from his lapel.” Are you going to take me to Queenstown dressed in your tails and top hat?”
Lillian was a very good humoured, understanding girl, and she knew that her friend Alice was also. She went off arm in arm with Alice to the hotel room at the Carriers Arms to get changed into her smart traveling suit of pale green shantung silk.
“Are you glad to be starting at Dr. Griffith’s surgery in Gore this week, Alice?”
“It’s got to be better than ticking off all the junior probationers for not putting their hands behind their backs when talking to any nurse senior to them!”
“God yes! It’s a whole lot of useless ceremony, and it has nothing to do with looking after sick people. It just lets us know all the time that old Florrie Nightengale was hung up on the Army discipline way back in the Crimean War times! Good times must be coming soon for you, dear Alice.”
“Can you feel it in your water? Remember old Sister Potts saying that a long while ago, when we were just out of preliminary school?”
”I remember her well, Old Potty we called her! White shoes thumping, pointed at ten past ten on the clock! Always checking up to see if a young handsome house surgeon was taking too long with the young pretty nurse, who was chaperoning him as he examined his female patient. She was a real spoiler!”
“She caught me with Garth Anderson when we stopped the lift half-way between floors, and we had had a sultry ten minutes once on night duty! The old battle-axe nearly got us both on the mat, but for Garth’s quick lying.” Both girls laughed at the remembered event.
“We’ve truly had some great times, all the laughs, and gripes were worth it, and we knew it all along. No more sneaking past the Nurses Home supervisor, old Minnie Mouse when we’d stuff our beds and go out to the dances after p.m. duty.”
“No more Dennis giving me a leg-up through the ground floor window, that you had faithfully made sure was open, so I could get into my uniform and be on duty at five fifteen a.m.!” said Alice nostalgically.” I’m expected to be serious, dedicated and professional now, and you can go on being the gorgeous dizzy loving wife bird, and oh Lillian, you deserve each other and the lifetime of mutual love. I know that you were meant for each other, and there’s no doubt that you and Giles will be sweethearts forever.”
“Why don’t you go back to the dance party and smile at Edward? He is honestly the most loving and understanding, intelligent considerate fellow under his witty humour and charm”
“That’s what unnerves me, and I think that he can see right through me, and I feel most uncomfortable that I am so transparent, Lil. I promise you my friend, that when we go back to try to put these thoughts out of my mind, it’s your lovely wedding day still, and I’m enjoying it so very much. Edward’s seems to be a popular person, I suppose everyone knows each other here in Longden, as they do back home. I suppose that’s why every young woman is hanging on to his quick quips.”
“Alice Honey, he’s the most eligible bachelor in Southland, and I can tell that he thinks that you’re just it and a bit too!”
An alarmed look suddenly came across Alice’s face.
“Are you saying that he’s got an eye for me? I gave him the proper wave-off, see, I’m as hopeless as ever!”
“No you aren’t! You’re soft, sweet, squelchy, and you can see yourself asking me to be your matron of honour, that’s if your big family will leave a place for me!”
“Maybe I’ll elope, and then there’ll be no acid test from home.”
”Hon, come back to the hall now, and keep wearing that warm living happy smile, and I’ll give Edward the wink for you.”
Giles and Edward were exploding in laughter when the two girls joined them again.
“We’ve been talking to the old ones over there in the corner, and the gaiety of the occasion has gone to their heads. They’ve been telling me not to invite old cranky Harry Loach to our tin-canning, if we have one when we come home to Longden from our honeymoon.”
“Why did they say not Giles? Everyone gets invited to a tin-canning, it’s open to everyone in the District.”
“Well, keep out of the way, or rather keep the pantry door locked. It seems that old Harry has been playing up again.”
“He’s been playing up since he was born, and everyone knows that. What transgression did he do this time?”
“Well, Mrs. Blee said, and I quote her,
“That instead of going outside the back door for a leak, he opened the pantry door by mistake and let fly. I had just opened a five pound tin of plum jam and I had to throw half of it out!!” The four were convulsed in laughter, and somehow Alice felt that Edward had forgotten her aloofness of the earlier conversation.
“Can I call and see how you are settling in at Gore, soon?” he asked sincerely.
“Yes please do, and when you come perhaps I’ll have some Gore versions of old Harry Loach.”
“There always is characters around. They are nature’s smile makers, and the literal salt of the earth.” Edward called sooner than he meant to. Coming home from a wool sale in Dunedin, his car skidded on the soft shoulder of the gravel road, in the driving rain, just on the boundary of Gore. When he had to have his scalp stitched, Alice was assisting Dr. Griffiths.
“I say Alice, would you call this Destiny? Are you free tonight by chance, for if you are we could take in a dinner and dance. The good doctor has said that I’m not on the critical list!”
“I’m free in ten minutes, and thanks Edward, yes that would be really super. I’ll be ready at seven p. m.” He made her laugh all night, and when he drove her home she felt like she was already looking forward to spending more time with him. He called regularly, and Dr. Griffiths and his housekeeper had noticed that the earnest, quiet, serious Alice was sparkling when she had been out with Edward. He had continued to tell her the funny saga of old Harry Loach. His long-suffering wife had left him, as she had had enough of his shinnanikins. Before she had caught the early Queenstown bus, she had thrown all the bread out to make his life more difficult. Harry called into Garland Hills homestead, and Katharine had cooked him a hearty meal, and the old fellow was grateful. He told them the story in his usual comical manner, at the table.
“The ducks in the duck pond are diving for dough, and there’s no bloody bread in the house!” There had been many rifts in the marriage before, and old Harry had liked to publicize the grimy details around the district. He held his plate out to Katharine,
“I say Kate, have you got anymore vigibiles in the pan?” She had put another serving of chops eggs and last night’s leftover vegetables on the hungry man’s plate.” You may have lots of wimmin in your life boys, “ he winked at Edward Thomas and James, “You may have a hundred wimmin even, but you’ll only ever have one Mother. You blokes have a real pearl of a Mother.” He had grinned at Thomas, “Am I right Tom?” Thomas agreeing amicably, was always pleased to hear nice things being said about his family, and he was filled with pride to hear Harry being nice about his mother.
“Mary cooks a great feed too, Kate. I was there on Wednesday to clean up the vigible garden for the Doctor, and by Jove did she put a fair spread out on the table for morning tea. Scotch eggs and all. Said she remembered me telling her that I liked them the last time I was there a fortnight ago. I do like them too.”

Six weeks later, a tall rugged young man, thoughtfully leaned against the sturdy trunk of a kowhia tree, on the bank of a fast-flowing river. The heavy flooding of immense volume, was caused from the melting of the winter snows of the Southern Alps. He was lost in thought now. Beauty of the river, such a deep sapphire blue, sparkling in the warm sunshine, the wide sweep of a shingle bank, over on the other side, and the gentle rise of the lush green pastures where the stock contentedly grazed, gave him all the reassurance of hope that he needed. The stands of tall trees, that his father’s wisdom had saved from milling long ago, guarded this fertile land from the usual soil erosion, and water moisture. He had ensured also, that the higher hills on the outer boundary edges, wear Nature’s covering of protection from the elements. As far as the eye could see, the whole harmonious scene of these fertile hills and valleys, was a joy to behold, and he gave silent thanks for the heavenly rapturousness of this gift from the Holy Creator for this great bounty.
Edward had been born here in the Gilroy homestead, to lovingly proud parents in 1910, and his youngest brother James eighteen months later. They were the youngest of seven children born to William his father, and his ever-smiling mother Katharine. Last week, their other five children had sorrowfully returned and they had buried their dearly loved parents. William had passed away in his sleep, and sweethearts till the end, her boys found out the next morning that she had gracefully slipped away to join him, in her sleep. The doctor had for the last two years, warned William that his heart was wearing out, but he had no idea that Katharine suffered any malady. He and concluded that as when couples were as happily and closely bonded as these two were, then there must be a reluctance to the spirit to stay so far apart, and her pining heart gave up beating, in the lonely night to join her eternal beloved.
When Edward proposed marriage to Alice, she said that she would like time to think about it. She had confided to him in an open way. Her parents were strict Catholics, and she had thirteen brothers and sisters. Whenever anyone called on them, to take them out, her father would make the point that the fellow had to stay until the family rosary was recited.
“What if the fellow is not a Catholic, and doesn’t know those prayers?” asked Edward.
“Makes no difference to my father, everyone is everyone, and they are on their knees on the sitting room floor. It puts off the non-Catholics all right.”
“Tell him that I’m deaf and dumb then if I have to meet him, that should settle the score. Shall we elope!”
But that did not settle the score, for Alice was in her fear-driven way, a very devout Catholic, and she could not imagine anywhere to marry but the church. Unless he became a Catholic then marriage to him as a non-Catholic was out of the question. Her upbringing had been grossly controlled. She had told Edward some events that had made this succinctly clear. When Alice was fourteen years old she had ridden a hack out to where her father and brothers were harvesting wheat at a distance of six miles from their home. The working men had forgotten to take their prepared lunch that morning. When her father had opened up the large basket, he soon found the salt had been omitted, and he was furious and demanded of her, “Go back home at once Alice and bring it!” She did.
“That is enough to soul-destroy the best natured person.” said Edward, and he thought to himself that the man had a very cruel streak in him. She had told him that when her brother’s and sisters had gone out to an evening entertainment, then the next morning, her father would call them out of bed fully one hour before the usual time to rise.
During the revelations of her family life at home, Edward perceived that so much joy and spontaneity had been drained from Alice at an early age. Her thoughts of marriage to Edward, were clearly tied to the expectation that she would be commencing a new and better lifestyle. Years of ingrained fear of loosing her immortal soul in mortal sin, were all persuasive. Edward had been overcome with her account of the beautiful sad Alice’s joyless, loveless life, and he knew that he loved her very dearly.
To please the family, and to satisfy the priest, Edward was baptized for the second time in his life, an hour before he was married. During their nuptial Mass, he also made his First Communion. He could not understand the priest’s elation,
“You’ve been well-blessed with three sarcraments on this day, Edward!” as he coyly welcomed the newest member into his flock.” Baptism, Holy Communion, and Matrimony, “ the man rambled on pompously.
“You might wish it was the last rites sacrament of Extreme Unction, if we don’t rush this day through, Edward!” said his brother in law, Frank, who did a very good job of supporting him on this day. He had told all of his family that is was going to be a small quiet wedding, however he noticed that the smallish South Canterbury church was practically filled by Alice’s own close family.
They had a holiday honeymooning in the North Island, and he was left with the distinct impression that Alice did not have much interest in exploring new areas, and her vision had not extended much beyond her home provincial, and her large family. She was with him very loving and sweet, when they were by themselves, but she quickly retreated into her protective shell of aloofness in most company. He lay beside her, and his mind wandered back in time for a while.
When his parents had passed over, suddenly there had been a tremendous gulf in the lives of Thomas, James and himself. Sandy and Louise McKay, and their four healthy children, had shifted nearly a year before their death. The happy couple had saved their money, and had bought themselves a good sized farm, making use of the low mortgage repayments of the returned servicemen’s privilege. William and Katharine had stocked it with their pedigree stud stock, as a farewell present in genuine gratitude for their loyal caring years with them at Garland Hills.
Mary and Les Gowland, busy though they were, were a tower of strength to the two youngest men of the Gilroy family. Mary would bring out scones and big pies, and bread form the bakery, so that they would supplement their plain fare. She would put their clothes through the washing machine, and have their best shirts ironed and hung in their rooms ready for wearing. They were appreciative young brothers. and it was evident to her that they put their knowledge of farming to good productive use. The land was well cared for, and their yields were well maintained, and she complimented them often. Edward felt the world drop in produce prices before it became reported in the newspapers. With rapid escalation, the gloomy daily headlines told of a period of stagnation and despair before long, and he felt the responsibilities of a different type.


He was now asked to walk into his father’s very capable boots, and he had not balked at this, but it was unsettling.
He would stand outside the homestead with his mug of strong sweet tea in his hand, the smoke of his cigarette curling upward in the cool air, gazing at the land, thinking of his parents who had faced many tough decisions in their time here at Garland Hills. He felt confident that their love and help was available to him on the perpetual spiritual love link. It was. Many of the decisions were the result of being in touch with that flowing love, and his heart would be greatly uplifted. His loneliness had soon healed.
“My dear son, money has gained more importance in the present century, than ever it was meant to. People the world over have made money their God instead of the means of barter for the buying and selling of the services that is the work of human hands. Services can be expected to be paid for by money, so that other services may be bought and paid for by money. In this way, money is the vehicle for a fair exchange of the process of people helping each other with use of talents, information and advice and the blending of weaknesses and strengths, which is present in the human condition. That is the original intention of coin being brought into being.”
“What then, Father, do I need to keep uppermost in my mind with this regard to payment of money for goods sold and bought, if these times become tougher?”
“Our own guides, who are with us on our beautiful, happy, level of spirit, are with us immediately we have a yearning to know more information, just the same as it was on the earth-level, so the spiritual help and love is completely an onward process. Right at this moment, we are being informed from the guides, that there is a massive World upheaval and changes coming in the market of money itself. You will find that stock markets will crash, as a result of panic withdrawal. There will be many crisis as a global result of the precarious unstability of money. New Zealand will once again be in the grips of a depression that will bring anxiety, suffering and remorse, as a wave of global unemployment reaches her shores, and it will quite some time before the depression will lift”.
His father in spirit looked a young man who was radiant, and brimming with purest love, as was his mother. Their forms were of a luminous shining beauty, that had increased in brilliance, from the light of lovely always whiteness that had been ever present in the aura around their physical body, when living on plane of earthly experience.
”What part does Garland Hills have to play in the coming years, and how can James and I best help to employ more, and to give more security to them?”
”There will be many feet that will find themselves walking the roads looking for work, dear Edward, Katharine joined in, “You will hear stories of hardship from them, good hard-working people from all walks of life, and every story is a tragedy in itself. Be a beacon for the light of hope, do your best to put them at the door of hope, and give to those that you can the employment that you can possibly give. Remember, dear that having done that, that is all that is expected, for you may not pick up another and put them on the same life pattern as you if; they have their different path they have their own free will, and see in your physical way them overcoming the difficulties.” William was again sending his understanding to his son.
“When we think that we are helping our neighbour by literally picking them up and placing them on our particular spirit-path, we are very much hindering them instead of helping them. They are merely held back, if you were to do this, and their experience would be prolonged; since it comes not from their free will and from their right thinking. That is why Edward, senseless preaching is of no spiritual value, for the recipient is given a very large dose of fear instead of understanding that there is an immense more amount of knowledge. If they wish to investigate it to see if any of the knowledge feels right, and a person feels their own truth with their own heart, then son it the right time for them”
“Yes Father, I do unerstand that we all have our own pace of learning. Is that what reincarnation is about?”
“Indeed it is. There are many repeats of the same level of living, and the same material conditions persist, because the cause has not been identified and rectified in the human condition. Until this happens, humans keep drawing to themselves the same obstacles to happiness. Until each particular individual learns their spiritually planned lesson, in the way most suitable for the person in the school of life, there is no advancement. In our family that Katherine and I brought physically through our union of physical love, among our children were souls with all different amounts of spiritual knowledge, therefore spiritual progress. If each individual would send out the thoughts of love of the total Holy Creation, there would be an instant change in that they would have a global paradise, on Earth. The main obstacle to this at present, seems that Man does not know how wonderful he is, or why he is. Man keeps thinking that he is only human, and so many do not yet realise the spiritual knowledge that Man is Spirit inside, which is already perfect, and that is all Man needs to know for Divine Love to flow.”
“Until that part that is sticking and stopping him, until that part comes to the party then, he is not going to move. Is this what you are conveying to me?”
“Yes, that is so. In ignorance, Man is ignorant, and that is all right because that is his lesson. Your part in their life is to see all the people as worthwhile beings to love, even if they are doing despicable actions, the spirit within is part of the Creation, and the Holy Creator is in that. For that reason all people, without exception are most worthy of your love.”
“Love with a person’s conditions attached to it, is not Unconditional Love at all. The truth is than when we are capable of unconditional love, and freely practice it while in a physical body, then we have reached a very high level of spiritual awareness, and then may no longer need to reincarnate.”
“There are present at all times, many people who have reached this balance, and they teach by example only because they love without exception, all their brothers and sisters in the World, and they tolerate of their searchings and seeking, without picking them out of their spiritually chosen path.”
”Each person knows when they are doing their chosen spirit-path, they have spiritual peace that comes physically evident. They have peace of mind from their highest inner self.”
“The Master Jesus always would say, when he was on this earth” Peace I bring you” and he taught by example, only the human element was generally not progressed enough to be able to understand the full implications of his most highly spiritual words. For the most part, they took the literal word meaning instead of the example of his unconditional love.”
“Jesus sends each person his unconditional love still.”
“Is it a human mental condition, that is, from human thought due to arrogance and ignorance, that has put the untaught restrictions and conditions on his teachings, then Father?”
“Yes Edward.” The words in spiritual communication were barely registered in Edward’s conscious mind when a spiritual vision of clairvoyance was given to him in explanation of his query. He was experiencing a scene that was a projected image into the future.
He saw eight city men who had come to Garland Hills within three days, looking for work. They were sick, weary of body, and saddened of heart. One of them was a young man in his suit that he had worn daily to his work at a city law office. The man crossed his tired legs and the soles of his shoes came into view. They had huge holes in the soles, and to enable him to travel to look for any type of work, he had placed cardboard between him and the road.
The calendar on the wall of the homestead revealed the date, and it read 1934. Edward also saw the back view of his Alice, with a baby girl over her shoulder. Patiently she patted the infant’s back, to help her bring up her wind. The Gilroy children had known from early childhood the strong comforting reality of being aware of spiritual help, in every area of their lives. Their parents William and Katharine, had been guided with a deep love that had become a strong influential belief within the loving family bonds. The parents had let their knowledge help their own children to find their own path.
By an unconditional love, they had showed them by example that by operating from their own highest inner self, and pure love intention, in their own time, how each person can obtain physical, mental, emotional and spiritual knowledge and help. They imparted to their children the wisdom that there is always a spiritual upward spiral of progression, and that cycles of humanities’ conditions are included in this spiral.
“In truth, one never stops learning, and no one can state that they have learned it all. The more one knows of Spirit, the more one realizes that there is so much more to yet learn.”
In his dealings with every person, Edward saw in them no mater what their behaviour, that they were a creation of the One Holy Creator, and that all persons are related. It did not matter that there was a difference in colour, nationality, or belief and creed, to him it served to show the wonders of the varieties of the Creator, and he saw in union of the whole creation a spectrum, endless wonder, and pleasure.

The healing he practiced, came from his highest inner self, stimulated by pure love intention. The method that he used was simple. Whenever he saw the person who had around them an aura, of light and colours that denoted sickness, which he had said he thought came from negative traits exhibited in the person’s choosing of their own free will, then he would ask that person’s higher self if they would like healing. If there was a contra-indication, then he never personally concentrated on that particular soul. He silently asked through his guide, to send divine universal love to that person.
Most people felt very comfortable, and drawn to this man’s interesting company. Though they knew that Edward could think of other views, other perceptions of their problem, he did neither judge them, nor did he push his own view onto them. They had no idea of Edward’s method of healing, as he did not mention religion. He spoke of each human being’s inner self guidance, and the listener would assume that he was meaning a person’s intestinal fortitude, or his conscience. His close friends Giles and Lillian knew and understood the clairvoyant gifts he possessed, because they had known his parents, and had asked in genuine interest, on the subject of spirit. Alice had discussed the topic only marginally with Edward, and had given him her opinion. She thought that there was much to fear.
“If we were supposed to be able to see into the future, then we would all be doing it. It isn’t natural! It makes me shudder!”
“How would you feel if I said that as very young children, everyone does have the ability and are naturally in tune with the spirit. As discipline is firmly imposed, without love and often under pressure; that’s what dissipates the spiritual knowledge connection.”
“All children have to be taught to behave themselves, and it is the parents task to make sure those unruly thoughts get nipped in the bud.”
“I would have thought that unruly thoughts will still be there, but now never get the reason onto the surface. Instead of being discussed, perhaps they might get shut away deep down in the psyche of the person, and perhaps cause some even worse disturbing behaviour.”
” Are you saying that you have a theory that mental disturbance may be caused by the fact that a child was not listened to, even when their imagination is running riot?”
“ What do the medical books teach?”
“Well, not all that much really, at least there wasn’t much in our nursing textbooks. Most of the reasons were usually reduced to the fact that either an absence, or an imbalance of chemicals produced by person’s body produced sub-normal behaviour or behaviours in the patient. Occasionally there is behavioural disturbances due to drug induction. Also a trauma, a crisis or a shock experience. There was mention that some mental illness may be a family inheritance.”
“You haven’t mentioned repeated fear- induced, rigid -disciplined, expected behaviour. I would venture to say that in the years to come we may be hearing that there are more ways than we know of yet at this stage, just what happens when the person’s inner self has not been given a chance to naturally develop”
“I do know that a lot of the things that you have told me concerning us have been true, and of the most unexpected and unusual happenings and occurances as well. I find it very uncanny, and it makes me shudder, and I worry about it, so I don’t want to know.”
“Alice dear, are you putting fear into the thinking of it instead of trust? You know that prayers are heard and answered, therefore, could you have channeled that part of your mind towards allowing yourself some way towards the belief ?”
“No I think that when the time is right, then God answers prayers.”
“Words that have a familiar sound to them are often reassuring.” concluded Edward, feeling that there was no more to be said. There, about three feet away from Alice’s lilac satin dressing gown, hanging in the air, in letters twelve inches high, and in sparkling words of purest dazzling white, a sentence read: “Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock, and a door shall be opened unto you.” He saw it and read it silently.

When Edward bought Alice back to Garland Hills, the beautiful sight of the home hills moving with rabbits was devastating. The noxious animals, without any predators, had bred so fast, and in the last two weeks had become a menace. A few people in Longden had been making a living trapping them. The dried pelts had brought in some cash for they were used in making the felt for some types of men’s hats. There was a disparaging note from the furriers, and a reluctance to make womens’ coats from the common bunny. In a desperate bid to obtain some quick control over the pasture ruiners, people on the land, spent time feeding out bait to them. For three nights, they fed out plain carrots, and on the fourth night, Edward and James laced the vegetables with strychnine. They repeated this procedure for one month, and it had the effect of eliminating seventy five per cent of the rabbits. Though they would have to regularly trap and shoot, they had by no means eliminated the pests.
A new industry was born in the district, when the lime works was built and operational. The crushed limestone rock from rich outcrops on land that William had sold to an Otago company, was sold to farmers, delivered in bulk by trucks which spread the finished product of super phosphate directly onto the more level paddocks.
The local people of Longden had welcomed with a relish the new Mrs. Gilroy. However it took some time for Alice to drop the cloak of reservation, and by that time there were more than a few ones who felt insulted at the slight of deep shyness on her part. By the time Alice was expecting her first baby, she had very welcome news from Lillian. Giles had applied to manage one of the government funded agricultural experimental stations, and he was successful in obtaining a station near Longden area. Edward had been secretly been hoping that his beautiful Alice would warm to the locals, for isolation had been one of her principle reasons for non settling. Now with their friends coming to area, she smiled more readily. When the Lysarts shifted into their agricultural home and the girls resumed their close friendship, Alice brightened up considerably.
Both of them had their first babies in the same week at Invercargill. The young mothers slipped into the roles naturally. Giles and Edward both had confidence that these practical nurses would carry on their responsibilities of their babies with shared joyful fulfilling interest. Every time Lillian had a baby, so did Alice, and they would mind each other’s little ones each time the other was in hospital, and the two week stay was a relaxing recuperating period. for each of them. Alice was born with a pelvis that would only allow breech position births, so she was always a candidate for a high forceps delivery after a long labour, and she became filled with horror at the thought of trauma ahead of her. Once the baby were born, she was protective and very loving, as she cared and nurtured the little ones, and was filled with quiet pride as each of the milestones in the growth was reached and passed.
Visits to Garland Hills were plentiful, and the Lysarts enjoyed the lazy summer Sunday afternoons down by the river, with a delicious picnic spread under the trees. The bird song chorus of the tuis and the bell birds, and often the large beautiful coloured wood pigeons cooing as they trustingly came near in their paired for life couples. The men fished the river and were most rewarded, for the brown and spotted trout were large and succulent. The rivers had been stocked by fingerlings from Tasmania in 1868, and were plentiful. The standing brick chimney, was the only remains of William’s first shanty cottage, while the homestead was being built, and later became old Jack’s paradise home. The profusely blooming daffodils, were multiplying each year, from Katharine’s original planting many years ago.
The Lysart children were attached to the Gilroy ones with the same loving bond that their parents had, and it seemed often as if they were one family, so close they had become.
The big homestead was more than adequate for house guests, and Alice’s relatives had made the journey to Southland several times. Edward had found himself tuning out from the old man’s continual questioning in regard to his future plans, finances, and his interests in investments,. His brothers would usually busy themselves at a safe distance from the home hill. They were dubious in regard to Edward, James, and when he was there Thomas, but they reminded Alice that she had married, and had come to live in a fully established home, and that she wanted for nothing, and that she had a household budget for a month that a lot of families’ had to exist on all year. Her father had screwed his eyes up, and pointed his short, dark and smelly pipe at his second eldest daughter, and commented shrewdly that something good must have come out of her orange but now convert husband, even if the man looked a dreamy looking sap at times. Edward was not used to being so manipulated, nor to this confusing manner of being so judged. He was neither orange nor green, he was himself and he knew where his inner light came from.

“I am trying very much to look at all the good, for there must be the inner light flickering inside each one of them.” He was in a loving spiritual contact with his parents.
“My son you are being tested for your bigger task ahead of you, an so is Alice. Each of you will be in different parts of the World for some years, before you will be restored as a family again.”
“What are you saying? Do I have to leave Garland Hills and be without my precious family Father? I love them so, and the thought of the work finished at night, and to be gathered around the fire with Alice and my little girls, fills me with a peaceful harmony.”
“Yes you are a good loving husband and father, who knows how to support generously on all levels, ” said his smiling mother, “and you will continue when you come back from the war. You and James will bid farewell to Garland Hills, but you dear Edward will return, for you still have much to do and more spiritual knowledge to impart. You will impart it to your little ones.”
“The darkest clouds of world depression have instigated ghastly political unrest, and the unleashing of yet more sorrow to come will be a trial for the world over. There is a second world war on the horizon.” his father sadly informed him.
“Keep that bright light of love burning bright for every man woman and child, and all of creation. We love you and send out help, hope, healing, and always dear one – thoughts of happiness.” his father said.
“Yes, I feel it streaming in, and it restores my energy Father, and I have seen the little ones with the joy of spirit around in their play and their laughter
“You are knowing it, and sensing their soul growth. You remember that we would wonder about reincarnation, and we had much discussion with Raji? Soul growth from past life learning is present at birth ”
”Yes, I have often thought about the fact and the fallacies that Raji gave from his opinion, and how he was most sure that the reason why the subject of reincarnation was not considered was the erroneous thought that humans can come back again as animals. Does not fit in with the ever onward progression of the soul, but it makes sure the subject of reincarnation does not get any serious study, by most people.”
“We notice at times that Alice’s light is weakened times, and she is being sent help to remove the darkness of her fear that grips her at certain times.” Katharine said.” There are many stages that soul growth takes Edward. Each time a soul comes on earth they have to learn to open up to their knowledge that they brought with them. The reason for this lies with the fact that throughout the past centuries the oppression of religious thought has had an accumulative effect of mass doubt and fear. In children, they do not naturally put fear in place; their first actions are love and trust, that is until they are molded to the expectations of behaving exactly like the rest of all the other members.”
“If they don’t then they will be thought to be out of step, and even thought to be acting abnormal. Because the majority who follow will be given the approved label of normal. Now nobody wants a label, especially a label that puts them apart from the group, so the young child is either subtly converted to group thought, and they put aside their natural spirit communications.”
“The spirit of the young child has come from the spiritual level only very recently to be in the body of the child and still has some memory of spirit, and so it operates in this manner until it is forced to operate according to other instructions then?” asked Edward.”
“Very definitely, that is what happens. It is often done in the name of common sense and logic, but the action is the result of repression of common sense and spiritual thinking.”
“Do the spirits of the young children, if they have the memory of spiritual knowledge also have the memory of their past lives?” Edward asked.
“If a spiritual part of the person had knowledge of previous lives coming into knowledge in the mind and kept reminding them of the circumstances of past times, then there would, very often, be extra difficulty put in that person’s life path. So we are informed that to ensure this handicap does not confuse the person, the spirit has submitted to withhold memory of it’s past life while it is operating on the dense vibration of the Earth as a human being. When the human being is sufficiently interested in spiritual knowledge, then they will raise their dense vibrations effectually with spiritual light and tune in with their higher inner self, then tune in to their guide who patiently waits for them to do so, then they are ready and able to access the akashic records on the higher vibrational spiritual level where all experience is written.”
“What stops them from continuing to do so as a child is the conditional love put on them by fear and ignorance of parents is it?”
“The parents are the first obstacle in most cases, I am told reliably. They have also shown your mother and I that when quite a few incarnations have taken place, then there is the small still inner voice heard. When a person sleeps the spirit never sleeps and does travel to that level from where it has it’s home. Quite often there is memory as dreams, and more often there is the contact as inspiration, for more than the physical operates at once you know.”
“What about the souls who have had not many incarnations?”
“ Edward, Alice is a soul of such, and very vulnerable, so she needs much love and support.” his mother put in.
“You have seen the effects of that where Alice’s family are concerned. The younger souls of experience are very much concentrating on swerving power by manipulation. You can counteract this by putting projection of light and love around first yourself, and then her and the children: and wearing the mental mantle of divine light of the highest, ask that ever expanding divine vision be given helpfully, “said William.
“Keep doing that Edward, and ask the love to flow into you as it will be replaced instantly. If you didn’t put that light around you first, you would have found that you would have been feeling rather downtrodden, lowered in spiritual energy, and very much depleted in spiritual strength.” Katharine said helpfully.
”Is that why Alice gets to feel like this at times?”
“Yes dear one, ” she said.
“Definitely, she has been given such a stunted amount of love in her very early years, and in this added to the fact that this is a small number of incarnations, and is a young seeking soul. You can appreciate the difficulties she has. You are teaching and helping her very much, even if you physically do not see much change. You are learning from her as well.” William continued.
“Families have often several members who are at different stages of levels of incarnations. There is in the children that we have on Earth, and you have in your own children. Note that Edward, ” his father advised with love. Edward had seen the auric light change when fear of trust in the grace of Love, was not precedent. It was most noticeable when she was expecting her babies, and he had felt helpless to help her bodily, but he had asked for ever steaming love to flow. His father had seen his pondering
“You are correct in what you saw, for the fear was like dark gray iron bars around Alice, and it acted like prison bars imprisoning, and barring the steady flow of divine love and help. In the outer personality the worst fear are reflected in the personality of the person. The most extreme cases show up in somewhat unsavory traits in the personality and can often become cruel and sarcastic, or cynical and arrogant, and we have been informed that is the means of the personality trying to cope on it’s own. Them doing it by themselves, without spiritual help – because they have not asked for the help. Humans having free will, means that Man must do the asking, for Spirit will never interfere.”
“Most humans who have ingrained fear, tend to think that the experiences of life will be repeated continously, for they expect that, and you get what you expect.”
“What about the constant change of flux throughout the universe. Does it not have some helping effect?” Edward wanted to know.
“Yes it does in the manner that the universe itself brings in changes of environment in the energy that affects the Earth and so cycles of change are occurring in the temperament of all Earth’s inhabitants with the season of change, so there is always some activity going on. The real change is when a person consciously decides to make a change. The thought is formed, and then the quickest way for it to occur is to ask spirit to help. Left to the person’s self – the personality, the effort is tiring, and if the intention is weak they can often give up, and despair. The person with many incarnations will do the first, the person with few incarnations will usually do the second.”
William said.” Each generation learns more than the last one, so there is progress by education and at the same time by the learning of each incarnation of the spirit. When a child is an infant, the parents teach and guide the child. The young person growing up passes in many ways the new things that they are learning back to the parents, in conversation, in aspiration or by example.”
“Do people assume that their learning is over when their school years are finished and that learning stops where they leave school and that they have learnt it all? Do people also assume that they have had children so they can be manipulate into their own stagnant beliefs, and in their later years their children should physically look after them as a duty for being born?”, Edward wondered.
“It is the flow of spiritual love from their child that will sustain the elderly parents. Seeing it as a duty can cause resentment, and a feeling of being put upon, and the person caring for the older person can often use the excuse to not do their own life plan and feel down-trodden also a victim and martyred. We come on the earth level to be as much a part of each other, as we are in spirit, still each very individual, and to help one another in love. Just as your father and I still come to you. It is not to check up or to manipulate, but in loving joy that all our love continues. We come only when we sense that you want us to be near. We can detect this from your inner light, as ever, dearest Edward”

“Love never dies, ” smiled his father.” When ideas are set firm, then mentally people close off all possibilities. Here on this spirit level, we attend the wonderful classes that the higher spirits teach, for there is Halls of Learning, and for those spirits who are open to more and choose to do so it is thrilling and exciting.”
“Yes Edward, there are the answers in spirit to all the queries that we had wondered about. From our spirit teachers, we have learned that as incarnating spirits, we choose our gender sex; for the role that we need to take – either male or female, there is no third sex. At times we would have been a male and at times we would have been a female so there is no call to be deriding or degrading a person’s gender sex, and if was truly known and understood on Earth there would be no competition and presuming that one sex being better than the other. The sexual confusion that results in homosexual practices, can be traced directly from the inability of a person to relate the perfection of the plan of harmony of bodily function of male fitting into female, and the resultant giving and receiving of equal loving pleasure. Their sexual immaturity is, we are told, a stunted and not yet a fully developed physically spirituality.”
“Sexual deviation, and practices coming from them is the lower self-conscious physical self then?” asked Edward.
” Yes, that seems to be so, Edward. When a person with not very many incarnations is on the Earth level, they often have a very much lowered spiritual knowledge, and will often be here to repeat the very basic things that they have not yet been willing to learn in the physical body. One of these experiences is deriving pleasure in a self-centered, ego-centristic abuse, and because the young soul wants immediate and uncommitted pleasure. They mistake and use power sensation only in their ignorance. They have not yet sufficient inner light to recognise that male and female cooperation is the Creator’s plan of spiritual means of the ultimate in physical sexual pleasure, and is the gift of life expressing love. The practice of sexual gratification of two persons of the same sex gender are the physical signs of an unlearned spirit who wills not to love, who does not yet know that each person is made in the image of their one Holy Creator. That form of sexual pleasure does really destruct the spirit somewhat, we have learned in the Halls of Learning. No soul, who has high learning and understanding could deliberately will to do such an act” explained William. Katharine continued, “We choose our parents, for the type of experience we want to have. Often it is to repay back our debt of karma, and it is the spirit that incarnates that does the choosing to attain a state of being in grace so there is no valid reason for saying that it was ever a parent’s fault for any unsavory circumstances for the child’s spirit chose that particular set of parents. Time spent blaming on Earth is time wasted, this masks the reluctance to physically get on with the tasks of learning on their life path. We have, by choosing our parents, chosen our country of birth. As we have in different incarnations chosen parents from various nationalities, we have no need to look down on people who have a different colour skin and customs to our own on Earth, and to be racially prejudiced is to show how apparent it is that the young seeking soul needs to have more incarnations in the same country and culture that they yet despise. Their very next incarnation is usually to be placed there, and on the receiving end of someone else’s prejudice!”
William explained “If anyone has chosen conditions of misery and poverty because their chosen parents are in these circumstances, there is the tendency to assume by others that an unhappy start in life will continue. That thinking by themselves and others is so destructive in that the thought is perpetuated, and it is not true pure love of spirit – it is pity, and it gives the person more of the same. Send out light and love in the healing of the spirit of the person – so that the person can be enabled to get on with what they came on Earth for.”
“This is only a worldly condition. The Holy Creator made only of himself, in His own image, and has given the spark of His own Spirit as each man’s inner self. He made of Himself and He never made a poor thing, and when Man thought that – then Man set in place class distinction!”
”Class is not something that a person has to stay chained in the sticky situation, for they have their own free will to seek their own inner self, for a change to a better to ask of their guide and all the help of hosts of highest spiritual beings for a change of better circumstances. It is their own comparisons to others in better situations and conditions, that cause resentments envy, hopelessness, depressions, bitterness, and then hatred.” Edward thought deeply,
”So there is a stagnant period when nothing improves, and they have more of the same conditions, ” he said.
“Yes, people do get what they expect. By thought, we ask, we pray, we desire – all has the same result. It is all the same thing, since the only thing that any person does is to choose by thought, and the intention of the thought that is the action part. The Universal Intelligence acts immediately on what thought will being put out. It does not analyse, it does not wonder if that is truly what you want or need. It gives you back what you put out, into the Universal spheres. You could say that a person draws it to themselves.”
“The manner in which the request is granted, and the person receiving will be manifested by taking many different ways in worldly appearance. Maybe that someone tells you a view that produces a further extension of thought in you, it could be something that you read and it makes a stimulating thought pattern that fits well with your individual inner self, and you can see help and truth in it. If the request is for a materialization, you may have someone decide to give it you as a gift, or a loan, or a bequest. God the Creator is both the giver and the gift, and makes His own amazing channels to manifest it. The request will be given by divine inspiration, divine revelation and divine illumination. Jesus was teaching divine truth when he said that when you pray believing it is given. The doubt of the person is the thing that prevents it. When he worked those miracles, he had no doubt. He was a very, very high spirit, and he saw the perfect spirit of the own Creator as person’s inner self and he took the time lag away by him concentrating on his own trust of “the Father within”. That was Jesus’s name for the spark of divine light within every part of the Whole Creation. It was entirely in his belief thought system.”
“So every persons need is being met every time, whether for good or not so good.” said Edward in understanding of the wonderful teaching imparted by the love that still linked them as strong as ever.
“It has much to do with their chosen life path, Edward. Each time a soul incarnates, there is both some learning and some teaching. The one who has not incarnated very many times, has a lot of learning ahead of it, for they have to subdue the basic lower tendencies of negative tendencies, as well as set their sights higher towards the virtues. Every soul has had to progress in this way. There is always a variety of people with different levels of spiritual levels of spiritual progress due to the numbers of reincarnations.” “The soul who has learned much, cannot unlearn and act from the lesser basic traits. They are on a life path of teaching by example, and the inner light will be the compelling force to do this. The evolved soul is hurt by being in the physical presence of another operating at a lower light, and sometimes in that person’s presence, their will be a distinct need for total unconditional love. There is often an accompanying clash of physical personality as well. In the spiritual realms, this is reversed, and the lower light cannot go near the one with the higher light, for exactly the same reasons: the vibrations hurt them. This is the means by which there are different boundaries of the Spirit Levels, and all of the souls are grouped together, with the same amount of learning.”
“That fact somewhat explains and makes sense of the various temperaments, expectations, and the attitudes, to me, ” said Edward.” This also may be the reason that Alice does have such a dreadful time while she has our babies, so please help me to help her dearest parents. I would so much like for her not to have the dreaded pain of childbirth!”
“They were answering him as softly and with a great flood of love.” Yes we do, and many hosts of heavenly higher beings than us are also sending her and the developing baby always much help, hope, healing and happiness.”

Giles and Lillian were having tea by the fireside at Garland Hills, with James, Alice and Edward. The children of both families were in bed, and sound asleep. The weekend had seen the annual Harvest dance in the granary, and the usual gathering together of the people in the district had brought a great deal of love flowing, as they merrily danced, sang, talked and laughed together. Each family had brought a plate and a bottle, for supper and shared breakfast. There had been no sign of intoxication, just a night of good humoured enjoyment, and no one had been allowed to become a ‘wall flower’ for everyone was up dancing to the enticing toe-tapping music. Now the peaceful atmosphere prevailed, in contrast to last night’s busy activities. The four friends had been together many times, since they had met, married, and had become parents, and there was always a special feeling when they were gathered together.
“I do hate to think what would happen if the Agricultural Department closed down our River Downs scheme, and canceled the programme, ” said Giles thoughtfully.
“Oh dear! Is that likely to happen?” put in Alice, with an anxious tone in her voice. Her friend Lillian and herself, as well as their husbands being best friends, had enjoyed not only their life in Northern Southland, but Alice was finding herself more relaxed about many more issues in life, and had found a deeper enjoyment within her soul, and one that she had never known before. Her shopping excursions to Invercargill had become a regular two weekly expected day of shared pleasure. After their routine stores were bought and packed in the car, they had gone through the city’s big department stores trying on hats, sampling the different perfumes, checking out the latest fashions, materials, and this season’s colours in H&J Smith’s, Boyes’s and Haynes’s amply stocked departments. They would treat themselves to a luscious afternoon tea at the Brown Owl tearooms, and return bright-eyed to their homes, often sporting new and exciting hair styles. They had both joined up the local branch of the Women’s’ Division of the Federated Farmers, and they had expanded their interests to many aspects of their husbands’ work and circumstances through this interaction. The variety of speakers that the club invited, the hobbies and classes, had all been instrumental in helping the younger women settle. Alice would still prefer to disclose only to her friend of her nursing days, and the close bond was of deep lasting affection.
“You never can tell what a new Government will do. Their policies can change overnight.” Giles said soberly.
“You have done a tremendous job with implementing your theories on grain pollination Giles, and the spectacular results of the soil strip testing of super phosphate is going to set New Zealand soils in order. I would hope that for all the Government’s cost cutting, that they will not sacrifice all your worthy talent and effort.” said Edward with feeling.
“There’s a really worthwhile project that Giles feels could help the New Zealand wheat grower. He wants to cross pollinate the dry Australian wheat with the heavier New Zealand one usually grown here, ” said Lillian admiringly. She knew that Giles needed much moral support for the huge project that he had spent many hours in earnest contemplative study, and that he wouldn’t mind her mentioning it to their dearest friends in confidence.
“We would be sure to support you in this branch of Federated Farmers, ” put in the eager James.” It would be a tremendous boost if we had an improved strain. Would it be possible to have a wheat that both suited our climate here, without being so prone to getting mildew?”
“I hope so James. There would be less chance of mildew setting in and ruining the crop because the Australian variety has a harder husk. and if we could pick out all of these good points then there would be a wheat type with the advantages of being suitable for the New Zealand climate and soils, and would store much better. There’s an awful wastage in flour that will not keep well.” explained Giles Lysart.
“Our fellows will be plugging the cause to the local M.P., and lobbying the Government, if they even think about closing River Downs.” said Edward.” They have money for more things trivial these days, but not for the essentials.”
“Well, that’s what election promises are for – to secure the present government another term in office. They’d like to have our votes.” James responded.
“Well I’m going to vote for Michael Joseph Savage’s Labour Party. He’s going to make having babies in hospital free form financial charge!” Alice patted her tummy, “And this one is due after the election.”
“Mine’s due two months before the election, and we shall be forking out fifty six pounds, for the delivery and the two week rest-up” joined in Lillian, picking up her knitting needles. She turned her face towards Alice,
“Are you sure that you feel up to it having our little ones stay with you here this time ?”
“Course we will have them dear Lil, that goes without saying!”, Alice hastened to reassure.
“We have got to get James in the mood somehow to get out among the girls who have been giving him the eye for so long!” There was a couple of hopefuls in the granary last night who would not have said no to sparking like a lightning rod!” laughed Giles.
“ Did you do any good for yourself, behind the hay bales last night James? Okay we won’t ask further, with that coy grin, and all right I won’t keep worrying, or this baby will be a born worrier” said the radiant Lillian.
“Our little ones and your ones do so enjoy the freedom here, all the wide open spaces to let their imaginations run riot. There’s no boundaries, except the river, and that’s always been out of bounds for us as kids as well, said Edward.” There was a drowning further up country last week, obviously it was someone who was fooled by the surface, and didn’t know of the Oreti’s treacherous under-currents.”
“The river has claimed many lives, ” said James. The trout are running very well now. I caught a four pounder brown trout, and Alice made a great soused trout dish that tasted like salmon. She’s the best cook in New Zealand, and we live like kings since Edward and Alice married, ” James said with fervour.
“Don’t worry it’s never the cooking of the food that is the problem. It is the serving it out to strangers that is! You weren’t here on the last Division meeting, as you had a doctor’s appointment Lil, so I’ll have to tell you about it. There was a crowd of children this time, and you know how I do give them their afternoon tea out on the verandah, party style? I did that, as there were fifteen children and nine ladies here. I heard an older child making a cutting remark about Gertie Bradshaw’s huge nose, and I was very glad that the children were out of earshot of the adults. Then I came straight back inside and served up the afternoon tea inside, putting the tea trolley into the centre of the sitting room and letting them all fill their own plates as I offered the milk and sugar. When I got to Gertie, I politely said “Do you take sugar in your nose Mrs. Bradshaw?” Honestly I don’t know how I got through the afternoon with her glaring at me. I had spluttered out an apology, but it didn’t make much difference to the situation.” Alice was mortified as she told them now. The sitting room shrieked with laughter.” Poor darling” said Lillian, after the men had laughed heartily.
“You didn’t tell us that night at teatime. She hasn’t seen of much humour that’s all Alice, ” said Edward grinning widely still he knew that Alice would have been in a state of heightened anxiety, and everything done properly always mattered to her.
“She’s got a hooter all right. Did you know that’s Gertie Bradshaw is Harry Loach’s, sister? She’s as deaf as a post, ” he reassured Alice.
“Come to think of it they have similar features” Alice said relaxing and wiping her glasses.
“Those nasty little moments don’t last for very long Alice, ” said Giles, who was still thinking of the boo boo she had felt.
“There’s too much happening for people to remember them for long. A new scandal or a new condition comes up every day. It just so happened that day was your turn. Don’t you reckon that this year has gone fast or for that matter the last few years have simply flown?”.
“Well yes they have, ” said James, “Talking about flying Pan America that flew from Christchurch have safely landed in San Francisco, so we are now linked to global airways. I heard it on the radio news just an hour ago.”
“Lovely, ” said Lillian, “We shall all be able to fly to London for the Coronation of George VI. I wonder what Edward and Wallace are doing on Europe?”
“We’ve had plenty to take our minds off the world politics situation, ” said Edward, “from having a flight service over Cook strait in 1935 to Jean Batten’s epic eleven day record solo flight from Great Britain to home here there was national pride in his voice.
“Flying has to be the way to travel now. The time for it has well and truly arrived, ” said Giles.
“Our sports fellows put their all into the events at the Olympics at Berlin. Jack Lovelock’s fantastic fifteen hundred metre win. I’d say our team felt bloody uncomfortable with Hitler’s powerful military display throughout the ceremonies though, ” voiced James.
“What do you think is going on over there?”
“We are being fed something through international politics that gives me indigestion. It doesn’t sit right, in fact it does make me down right uneasy, ” Giles said.
“I’ll tell you what I think. Germany is being pushed from the inside by the house painter come Fuhrer, old Hitler. He has the German fraction eating out of his hands by a fortunate set of events, not by his sterling leadership qualities. The unemployment of Germany was taken up building the roads for fast traffic to all the bordering countries that could be handy to make war on his neighbours as a secondary intention that really maybe is his first one. Then he has started the big plant of ‘Volkswagen’ the peoples’ car. There again the recently expanded Krupp Steel works, could be a smoke screen cover up for a mega ammunition factory. I’m praying for World peaceful Progress right now, ” he added softly. The sitting room was quiet and the logs sent up a shower of sparks suddenly. Alice shuddered and then protested.
“Please Edward, don’t talk with that tone in your voice, I have shivers up my spine.” She gathered up the cups and saucers and wheeled the tea trolley out and Lillian followed her to help wash the supper dishes.
“Its been a wonderful time, as always Alice dear, ” she gave her friend a hug, “
“We are living in strange times though I have to agree with Giles and Edward, there is something going on, and I don’t know if our children are going to grow up on Garland Hills as happy as Edward and James were.”
“Yes they will dear Alice! When Edward and James were littlies their two elder brothers were over fighting in Europe. It was their parents who held the security for the young ones. If something does happen, and dear God I hope it doesn’t then I don’t think New Zealand is going to be a battle ground. Rather it will probably be the Northern Hemisphere again. We never know what strength of courage we have until we are tried and face it. My Granny Murray used to say and I believe that its true dear Alice.”

1938 saw the return of the Labour Government for a second term. They promptly implemented their election promises of humanitarian legislation and the Social Security Scheme brought relief to the thousands of lives as never before in the history of the world. Pensions, for orphans, widows and persons medically unfit to work, those who could not obtain employment. Free public and maternity hospital care and treatment, free school dental treatment, free doctors consultations, free post birth care with New Zealand’s Doctor Truby King Plunket Nurses and Karitane Hospital training were implemented. Housing was boosted for those with a low income by the Government building state houses for a very modest rental fee.
Alice had her a third daughter at St. Luke’s Hospital, and she looked at the tiny baby, who had come into the world feet first. She had a head full of pale gold fuzzy hair and her eyes were large wide and opened most of the time, turned from the birth blue to a deep emerald green within two days. She had been strong and sturdy from birth, even though she was born a footling breech delivery and the cord had been wrapped tightly around her neck three times. Dr Gowland had hastened the final part of the delivery, thinking that the infant would be in gross distress and he was unable to get a clamp under the tightly wound cord. However when she was born, she was wide eyed and she breathed on entering the outside world, and the staff breathed a sigh of relief as she made one healthy sound, and put her thumb in her mouth.
“She’s come into the world with a purpose, ” said the St. Luke’s Sister. She wasn’t curling her knees up she was already standing, and with those eyes, I would say she has been here before for she’s fully aware.” Sister was a very efficient and rather brisk midwife. Alice found herself feeling a bit superstitious at the manner in which this dark skinned woman talked. Some of the patients had whispered that the lady was part Australian Aboriginal and could communicate with the spirit of each baby. When asked, she told sister what she thought of naming her third daughter, and the older woman had looked at her mistily and left the room. She returned about an hour later, and took Alice’s hand and said earnestly, “That daughter of yours needs a name to help her not to hinder her, for in take years to come she will take the burdens of many people both in her country and in mine. Dear Mrs. Gilroy her name should be Monica.”
In accordance to the teachers as she had been bought up, Alice and Edward stopped the car at the church on the way home from leaving the Maternity hospital and had the baby baptized, and she was named Monica. The car drew up later at Lysarts and there was the joyful Lillian with her own three and the Gilroys two, all perfectly organised with lunch about to be served. Alice put the new baby on Lillian’s double bed and placed a pillow on each side of the tiny bundle, as all the children eagerly gathered around to welcome the newest baby to the happy group. The little girls inspected the miniature face and fingers, and compared her to their dolls. The only boy in the group Ross Lyasrt knelt really close up and gently kissed the baby on her sweet lips, and then he whispered some words earnestly to her. The infant’s eyes followed him as he was moved off the bed by his mother.
“Come on my dear boy, the wee one has met all the gang, and now let her have a nap. We are going to have a party for lunch today, darling, ” she hugged the lovely three year old.” Gosh, Alice we have six children, three each, and it’s getting to be a bigger livelier Christmas every year.”
“I’m starting to collect their presents for the stockings, already.” said Alice, who thought that Christmas the most wonderful time of the year.

The next spring was mild, and even the equinoctial winds were the strength of a gentle breeze. Garland Hills had a record lambing, with very many multiple births. In November, 1939, the radio in the kitchen was giving out the six a.m. news.
The Prime Minister, Michael Joseph Savage’s voice was clearly heard to state “We are at war. Where Britain goes, we go, Where Britain stands, we stand.” The gravity of the news sent a hushed shock through the homestead kitchen as the four adults at the breakfast table, Alice, Edward, James and Thomas looked to each other for support. A small cry issued from the bedroom and Thomas pushed back his chair from the table and walked slowly from the kitchen, with tears on his face. Alice followed him a few minutes later to find him tenderly rocking the bassinet, and Monica with eyes open and smiling at him while he sang softly to her. Later on in the same month, the nation knew the full implication of it’s Prime Minister’s words as the newspapers carried headlines and photographs of the battle of the River Plate when the New Zealand Ajax class light cruiser H.M.S. Achilles scuttled the German pocket battleship Graf Spee. In January 1940, James received his call up to war, and Edward went to Trentham to the Strategic Intelligence Unit. The District had farewelled the eleven local men, and Thomas had sadly waved his brothers off, then had quickly turned to Alice to promise,
”I will help you Alice, I won’t go and leave you lonely and sad.” Her face was wet with tears, as she saw her three little girls holding each other’s hands and being so good at the crowded railway station. Giles and Lillian were there also, being a tower of strength. The Agricultural Department had given Giles full cooperation and they had given him assistants to help speed up his wheat experiments.
In June 1940 the passenger vessel Niagara was sunk off North Cape of New Zealand, and the Sister at St. Luke’s withheld the newspapers from all of the patients. That very morning, Alice had had her fourth child, her first son. He was a ten pound bonny infant, and she had him named Michael John. She was not feeling at all well, however she knew as always at the times before, that Lillian had held her other babies safe in her absence till her return home. It was a dreary, gloomy time, and the fact that her strong beautiful son was strong and bonny, was the strength to help her convalesce quickly. There was an elderly farm manager assigned to Garland Hills now. The Government needed to boost production of all agricultural production. The first fellow that was appointed was overly given to the bottle, and in the cottage one night sunk down in take comfortable armchair with his bottle in his hand. Four hours later, there was nothing left of the pretty cottage but a charred ruin, and the old fellow was in the Public Hospital with severe burns.
Letters with overseas stamps on the envelopes were eagerly awaited by all, for they were the only links of love that were read and reread, as time went by, the letters became frayed with handling. As the months dragged wearily by, there seemed to be the never ending war news. The announcement of the bombing of Pearl Harbour by the Japanese, caused the extreme anxiety feelings to escalate into a near panic situation. There were rumours rife of Japanese submarines located in the many isolated inlet areas of coastal Australia and New Zealand. Home Guard services commenced, with every available able bodied man over the action-serving age, doing his best for God, King and Country. The women had risen quickly to the call of the hour of need, and there were many areas in all the armed services of the Army, the Navy and, the Air Force where the young women played an extremely valuable role. The woman of the Land Service, girls among whom were many city born women who learned rapidly and became admirably skilled with agricultural production.

Edward was stationed in the Pacific Islands, and though his letters home were posted by a courier delivery, he had never been able to write his actual location, nor state where he had been on missions. His aptitude for language was being utilized, for after the initial pressure cooker courses in the most commonly used languages of the areas, they were then on their own.
He called spiritually for help with all of his work. The accuracy in pinpointing the areas of enemy build-up on maps, was by completely trusting in asking of his highest intention of Love and Light. He saw all people as his created brothers, and not flotsam and jetsam of humanity. The jungles were teaming with deadly fevers and poisonous snakes and spiders, and he surrounded himself, and his team fellows with the brightest light of divine protection. In all his dealings with the national people of any island, he showed respect for their customs, no matter how primitive others thought, and sometimes vocally belittled them.
He would obtain the trust and cooperation of the island people within a very short period of contact with them. He had first sent out thoughts of light to the area, the people, then ask his own spirit guide to contact the spirit guides of all the people who would be on their path for that mission, to let them know that it was in peace and in the cause of world peace of the Holy Creator that he was standing for. Then Edward asked if the Unit could have any vital clues forthcoming, and sound judgments in the hope that in interfering with the enemy’s plans of invasion, and preventing the landing of large amounts of people, who would surely be in the theatres of combat.
Gradually, as the Allies Intelligence filtered through their back log-books, they realised that what had been happening, was that the enemy was slowly but ever strongly being pushed back towards it’s home of origin. There were cycles of long and vicious attempts by the invaders, and without loosing sight of victory, Edward endured many days of the steaming, hellish, conditions of the jungle, with his comrades despite many times being without nourishing food, and with just a trickle of clean drinking water. Tablets were issued in the hope that the ever present mosquitoes did not delay this most necessary survellient of operations.
By the end of the first year in the humid incubation areas, there were several changes in personnel due to tropical fevers, and enemy snipers, At times, short in man power the ever increasing work was swiftly dealt with as the Japanese had become more offensive.
By Easter, 1942, Edward found that he was becoming breathless on exertion, and his breathing gradually became more laboured within six months. There was a depot on New Caledonia, where after months of jungle and sea operations, their team would have a few days of rest and relaxation, and there was medical attention available there. The American base there had a fully equipped hospital, with all the conveniences that were possible. Even to refrigerators, not only for blood, medicines and serum, but also for ice-cream, coke, and ice cubes for drinks. During a brief stay at the American hospital, Edward was thoroughly checked out medically, and as a consequence of having rheumatic fever as a small child it was discovered that his heart now had two leaking valves, which were enlarging at an alarming pace.

He was flown to Auckland, New Zealand, to the American run Green Lane Hospital, where he underwent surgery which had a very dubious recovery rate. On the flight, some fruit drinks were given to him, and the ice cubes were made from local island water. When Edward’s temperature rose, he was put in isolation, and hurried tests showed that he was badly affected with malaria. In the post operation time, he was in a severe comotosed delirium. The medical and nursing staff were not surprised that he was very vocal. What astounded them was that he was talking to people who had lived away back in another century, in fact several centuries back in time. His parents were listed as deceased, but at times their patient was talking to them in the present, and as if they were in the medical isolation unit.
His recovery was speedy, and the heart chambers were fully working, and his respiratory system was given the satisfactory clearance by three weeks, and Edward was given one week to travel with his wife, to one of the most remote southern parts of New Zealand, to visit his home and his four young children.
The Armed Forces flew them to Taieri the Air Force Base, near Dunedin, and Giles and Lillian were there to take their close friends home quickly, for the precious few days. Lillian, able to relieve some of the anxious pressure from Alice, chatted with Edward in the back seat, and gave him the run down of some of the local happenings, which Edward responded to with his wide smile, and his usual good humour. Giles could see the deep lines of strain from his best friend’s illness, and he was not totally sure the Army should have the gall to tax this weakened man again. He kept to himself these thoughts, and cheerily engaged Alice in conversation as he sped the car toward Garland Hills.
“What’s your impression of flying then, Alice? You’re the second of us to have had the excursion!”
“It’s a really dreadful experience, because the plane kept bumping up and down. Edward said that it was only pockets of air encountered by flying over mountainous terrain below. Honestly Giles, you could never get me up in a plane again – or they would have to anaesthetize me first! Each time it went down, I thought for certain that we would crash.”
“Were there any others in the plane as well as you two, for not many people alighted”
”It was a service run to Taieri, and the service men had nothing to do with Edward’s unit. They didn’t even know him, but they were very good to him and to me. They were almost flippant about the war.”
“I would think that if they were out of the actual war zone, then they’d have to tune out for as many hours as they could Alice dearie. You know, blow off steam, rather like you and Lil did after a frantic nursing duty. It’s highly necessary to do that, to let go, you know. We’d all end up insane with worry if we didn’t, Alice.”
“Yes, I know all those points, but we are married now Giles, and I no longer can think in terms of just myself. The responsibilities of being both a mother and a father weighs heavily on me. Very often I’m on the end of a short fuse, and I do smack the children now. Before Edward went overseas, I never did that, but then he would explain to them, and even make discipline fun. Remember?” Giles nodded,
“Yeah, I do.”
“For the first few times I couldn’t see how that would work, but he has the magic touch, and even Monica has it, though she was a tiny little eighteen months old when her daddy went away! I gave her a smack the other night when she got out of her bed, for the third time that night, and she turned her big green eyes on me, and with a trembling lip said soulfully, “I’m your baby girl, and how could you hit me so hard.” It made me think straight away, of all the four children, she’s the closest attached to him, and the most like him in personality.”
“Ross loves her dearly, and she is his constant companion most times. Even when they are playing with all the others, those two, Ross and Monica are nearly glued side by side! Ross tells us that there are Maori children that they speak to, and play with.” There was a brief lull in the back seat, and Edward pricked up his ears.
”Has there been a Maori family move into the district?” Alice drew her breath in audibly.
”No there hasn’t Edward, but you know how children go on with their imaginary playmates and all that, ” said Giles lightly.
“Well you used to talk to the Maori kids yourself, when you stayed at our home in Longden, when you and James first went to school, Edward, ” Lillian reminded him. Alice cut in quickly,
“Ross is at school now, and he is much more forward than his class. He brings home two reading books, plus a couple of library books as well each day! He just loves school.”
Here we go again, thought Alice, grimly. She had been hoping that she may have got Monica out of the habit of imaginary pals, and there was enough of real pals for her to play with.
“Giles has made a breakthrough with the wheat cross pollination, ” put in Lillian eagerly. The subject turned as Giles and Edward had a lengthy discussion on the subject of agricultural importance, and Edward plied him with questions in genuine interest, until they saw the familiar landmarks of home.

When they reached Longden boundary road, there was a buzz of activity as Giles drew the car up. The children bounced and tumbled out of the house, followed quickly by Thomas, to welcome home the soldier man. Edward’s two elder girls, Ann and Catherine, came running forward, and then slowed down shyly. Monica hugged her daddy’s knees tightly, and Thomas stood beside him with his long arm draped around his young brother’s stooped shoulders in empathy. Alice brought the baby son that Edward had not yet seen, and two year old Michael was looking seriously into the eyes of the man who now held him tenderly.
“Hullo young man, you are a bonny big fellow, but not too sure who I am. I’m your daddy”, and he gave him a kiss on his baby soft skin, and another on the top of his head.” My word Alice, but he looks like a real Brody, with his round face and noble head. Dearest Alice you have done such a superb job with our little ones, in trying times.”
“Michael, that’s Daddy, you know the man in the photo that we all kiss every night at bedtime.” Alice was trying to help the serious little chap recall.
“Too little he is, dear. He’ll remember me properly when the time is right, when I’m home for good. We won’t confuse him just now.” The big girls came up and touched his uniform gingerly,
“I know you daddy, ” said Ann, and the second little one parroted the comment, and they smiled and hugged him now.

“It’s all passing too quickly, ” said Alice, trying to keep the tears from surfacing.
“We have done quite a lot in such a short space of time, Alice. Wasn’t it great being able to buy Murphy’s place in Garden Street? You will be close to everything now even to Mary and Les across the road. The fact that it only became vacant last week, and now Giles has it all teed up for help with you and the children to shift you in at the end of next week. The sale went like a song dear Alice, and I will feel relieved to know that that you are not away from all the essential services. The one and a half acres there is just enough room for you to have Daisy there, and she’ll give out plenty of milk, as it won’t bother her to be a townie cow for a little while.”
“ Giles and Lillian have been a wonderful support, dear, and yes it will be a lot better to cope with things, and I can get to church a lot easier. The children can now go to the convent school now that we will be close to it. Already there is rationing books for clothes buying, and Monica will be the next for a school uniform. There will be more rigid rationing with petrol, and meat, cheese, butter, and cream will be unprocurable if the Government has it’s way, so we are told.”
”Well don’t tell old Daisy, and she will see you right.” He had tried to lighten up his beloved Alice. There were to be more restrictions, and the rationing was a part of the way to enable the Government to send more food to Great Britain, her allies in Europe and North Africa, and the large amount of troops in the Pacific.
”Did you read all the letters that I put out for you that James wrote, Edward?”
”Yes I did. He’s trying to make light of the terrible time they are experiencing in the sea of sand. blazing by day, and freezing by night. Chasing Rommel around North Africa, and all they have to really look forward to, is to have a break on their measly two days off in Cairo”.
“Those photos he sent are good aren’t they? They call Rommel the Desert Fox, and he sure is foxy and sly.” Alice had no idea of the conditions of the troops in North Africa, until she had taken Lil’s and her children to the movie of ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, and a news reel had shown the actions of war all around the various places. She had looked to the children to make sure that it was not disturbing them, and had seen Ross Lysart pull Monica close to him, and as she buried her head in his shoulder, he had tenderly covered her face in his two hands so that she couldn’t see the chaos. She had thought that that lovely boy had such a chivalry about him, he was almost like a shinning knight, in all that he said and did, and he did it so naturally.
“We have seen Rommel’s troops on the movie news Dear, and he had put a wooden framework and canvas top covering on a couple of hundred Volkswagen cars, and masqueraded them off as tanks. The aerial photos couldn’t distinguish them from the smaller numbers of genuine tanks, ” said Alice.
” James’s heart is not in fighting, Alice, I know him well, and neither is mine. I do so with the thought uppermost that if any proclaimed enemy thinks that they can impose their will on our children and country, then they do not reckon on our Down Under Countries. Australians and New Zealanders have the true blue blood of honour running through their veins, when it comes to defence of our lands. We aren’t doing it for a breeze of a cruise on the blue waters of the Pacific! The Japanese Emperor, can never make our rules!” Alice was crying now, and she couldn’t answer. Edward pulled her close to him and held her in the safe circle of his two arms.
”I’ll be home for good, next time, Darling girl. Let’s turn off the light, you’ve made an appointment for a studio photo of us all in Invercargill, and we shall have to be up by five o’clock sharp.”
“You are away on the train at ten o’clock, and I thought it a good idea. It would be best for the children, dear. They are isolated from you at the time that they need you most.”
On the road to Invercargill the sun came up and the children also woke fully, in the back seat of the car. Alice passed around egg sandwiches to them and gave out small bakelite beakers of cocoa. She had a suitcase of neat freshly pressed clothes for them to change into at the photographer’s studio in the city. There was a couple of bulk lime sowing trucks that they had passed, and the early bus that was on it’s way up to Queenstown. Edward slowed the car to go around a sharp bend in the road, and the car halted as he gazed to his right.
“What is it you see there” asked Alice.
“It’s James waving to me, ” he said hoarsely, pointing to the empty fence line on the right of the road.
“Oh Edward! Are you all right? You know that James is in Egypt Dear, in the Army. Chasing Rommel!”
“Well, he’s not going to have to do that any more! He’s gone to his true home, now, and my parents took him, dear Alice, ” he said seriously. “I saw him, and he waved me a good-bye for now, and he was smiling, and so were my parents smiling.”
“For Goodness sake Edward!” Alice shuddered.
“Cross my heart Alice, and may my eyes fall out in my hand here if I’m lying to you Alice dear it is what I’ve just seen.” Alice broke into a soft cry, and made the sign of the cross, and she whispered some prayers.
“We’ll see dear Edward. It’s probably quite all right, and I do hope that you are well enough to be traveling, let alone going back to the jungles of war.” She looked at Edward’s serious profile. He didn’t say that James was lying there all bloody and gory in the chaos of battle and dead, he said that he was smiling and waving – so how could James be dead, she reasoned. James was killed in the battle at El Alamein, on the October day that Edward had seen the vision.

The soldiers camouflaged in their uniform of jungle greens, wearing small branches of leaves on their helmets, and their skin painted, were absolutely exhausted by the humidity. It had been six days, this mission, and during that time they had run out of nutritious food two days ago, and had scavenged the jungle floor for whatever it could offer. What they had eaten, did not pay to remember. Their canteens held just a dribble of clean water. The tropical rains, humidity, and their heavy packs had created riverlets of perspiration streaming down their bodies, making their uniforms soaked again and again. Their joints were on fire, and their muscles had about as much energy as a limp rag.
Edward watched carefully the auric light around each man, and the colours showed him which man was angered, despairing. He had asked immediately of his own spiritual guide to ask the guide of the individual man to replenish their physical energy by infusing their auric body and their etheric body, with infinite love and healing, help, hope, and happiness. Remarkably, not one man had expressed any vocal comments of despair, and he gave his heartfelt thanks to the Holy Creator, as the men’s auras had re-charged, brightened and shone.
When night fell, they had arrived at a destination where an American ship would rendezvous with their group and the majority of the men would sail away with their information. As the moon went behind the clouds, the breeze stirred the leaves in the coconut trees nearby. Every man’s ears strained for the tell-tale signs of enemy. As was a matter of second nature, they each counted their group, and Edward reassured himself that all were present.
The Japanese had mastered quickly, their own particular type of sniper attack in the jungle. They utilized their knowledge of martial arts to compensate their body size being usually shorter and lighter than the Anzacs. Fox-hole living they had perfected, being able to stay long periods of time in a tiny restricted area, because they had self-hypnotized their oriental mind to succeed at any price, on their Emperor’s orders. Their tranced state had made them oblivious to pain, agony, despair, the elements, hunger and thirst, the fear of being killed themselves. When they killed a person, they saw it unemotionally as having contributed to the honour of yet another number of an obstacle passed to the greater glory of the Land of the Rising Sun.
The signal from the convoy boat flashed, and four men took to the beach stealthily, to join her. Edward and two others had other work to do, and they would make their way at sun-up to approach the village in the hills.
“Close your eyes fellows and I’ll take the first watch, and I’ll wake you Dave for the second stint before dawn breaks, ” Edward said in his quiet reassuring tone.

Dave knew that the third member Allan would need the time to recuperate by sleeping the extra hours as the red head from Geelong had been the subject of the bloody mosquito recently, despite the quinine tablets. Dave let his body sink into his scooped out hole in the sand and noticed that Alan was already half asleep. He studied the outline of the nearest body, the watchful Edward.
This Kiwi bloke did not have an ounce of fat on his torso, tall, muscle taut and raw boned. His penetrating deep blue eyes had made Dave wonder if the Lieutenant Gilroy could see into the very thoughts of their minds. He was certainly an enigma. Last year they had hastened his very ill body back to New Zealand for heart surgery, and the unit had grave doubts that they would every hear his B.B.C type voice again, or see him lift his dark though greying hair skywards and be silent for about two minutes, before making the right decision. He had the knack of picking up the lingo anywhere, though he had never been here before. In fact he said that he was a cocky from the back blocks of the most southern part of New Zealand. He had surprised them all for Edward had turned up a month later, and he was given extra responsibility and promotion. Not that he had ever pulled rank, Dave smiled a bit as he thought of the quick quips the Kiwi had made to lighten a tight situation. In the mess they had passed many a good hour on their well deserved R and R as he had joined them in telling his share of blue jokes, while they had the odd bottle or two or three.
“Bloody hell! I’ll get some shut eye. What the heck am I doing letting thoughts chase through my mind one after the other?” He felt a peace of mind that let him think for the moment that it was almost like the luxury of comfort. His breathing changed as sleep overtook the tired man, with the fine thick locks of dirty blond hair over one eye, and his tin hat beside him on the sand. Before he closed his eyes Dave could see the silhouette of the aquiline nose, the noble features, the comical biggish ears as Edward raised his head to look at the stars above them.

At dawn they picked their way gingerly through the dense jungle and cut the tough vines with one well aimed practiced blow, keeping the noise to a minimum. Eventually the destination village was in sight, and the head man was scanning the distance for their arrival. With the accepted gesture of good will from these strangers, the meeting took place in the old man’s hut. He had felt a confidence swelling in his breast as never before with the other strangers who had taken over his territory. The others had given them chewy stuff that had stuck to the roof of his mouth, and they had an accent that had made his ears weary. But with their boyish smiles they had been there and they had sung as they had left his domain just nine sleeps ago.
These three men had a look about them that meant his security would not be in doubt nor would their eyes take in the bodies of the females too greedily in his extended family. He was sure with these men, so he told them more then he told the GI’s. The days of the last quarter of the moon had seen a whale spout that was not made of nature in the ocean below and it had resurfaced several times. With his fingers he had made known to the leader now that it was a fury maker, and this day held up two fingers there was a different manner with its churning of the waters. Edward’s conclusion was that the Japanese had back tracked after the GI troops had left this long thin peninsula and they planned some landing offensive. The picture given to him from spirit was that it was early days yet, and that the unit could make their due appointment with the planned ship and radio for the air attack which would clean out the enemy’s landing plans. The machinery of the enemy which was hidden in the dense undergrowth did not escape these wise peoples’ eyes. He knew that the old man was right, that to dodge the chance of their presence being discovered that he and the other two would have to detour away from the planned track back to the safe beachhead. The old man had impressed on him the danger of the detour has a treacherous swampy like area of quicksand, and he told them that with rains that it is a tricky lure, so to watch every step of their way. Edward had touched the area between his own eyebrows in a reverent gesture and the old man had immediately smiled toothlessly in recognition and his pleasure was written all over his gnarled wise face.
They had fed the hungry soldiers all through the meeting in the old mans hut. Shy young women had plied trays made of woven hardened leaf. With their fingers the men had hungrily eaten the pro- offered fish pieces. The warm potatoes mushy and soft, and charred skins discarded. The old man had looked quizzically, and as Edward ate his charred potato skin, he realized that there must be some value in the native custom of eating charcoal. Fruit of eight varieties had been brought into the hut, and it was already cut into bite sized pieces. Some of it was bitter-sweet, and others had a delicious vanilla flavour. The paw paw and mango was really ripe and juicy, while an opened coconut shell beside each of them quenched their thirst.
The native people had very dark skin which emitted a blue shine, out in the sunshine, and their close cropped curly black hair had adornments of feathers shells and small animal bones. The old man’s headdress was elaborate, while the other members of his village had scaled down versions. All men wore a shiny mother of pearl wide shaped shell in the small tissue area between their nostrils. They had a loin cloth of finely woven fibre covering their genitals, but baring their buttocks, and were showing proudly the raised scars of previous initiation ceremonies. The soldiers had noticed that the eleven other men around their chief, were solid and wary, and very protective.
The women looked not once into the stranger’s eyes. They were tall and slender, with the same fibre loin cloth, and they carried not the slightest self consciousness of their bare pear shaped swinging breasts. They had bracelets, anklets, and earrings of threaded small shells, and they all wore a single large tropical flower of a magnificent perfume, in a luminous lavender blue. They had no obvious marks of scarring on their smooth skin.
After accepting leaf wrapped packages of food gratefully, and filling their canteens with coconut milk, the three men bid their farewell. They could see that the whole village had seemed to come out of their houses now and into the open compound, and they silently watched. The soldiers waved their arms in the air, as they approached the edge of the jungle.
“Keep looking, as it is expected that we will do this, ” said Edward. The chief raised his long curly wooden staff which was stone and shell decorated staff. He had kept it in his right hand during the entire meeting. Now he pointed it as high as he could, and with his left hand he was pointing to a spot on the mud of the compound. The entire crowd of others had formed a circle around the old man, and with arms around each other’s waists, they were moving the circle slowly in silence.
“What was all that bit of ceremony about?” Allan whispered in the jungle’s cover.
“I don’t suppose we will ever know,” put in Dave, “but it was different to their often reported fierce ways.”
”The chief was manifesting power and safety for us by asking the Sky Spirit above to be present upon Earth. The circle the people joined in, was the continuing sign of the cycle of the Universe, and the powerful universal energy of Love was distributed in one direction, toward us three guys. The joining of arms together at waist level, was in unity of all with a common purpose to strengthen the one intention, which was love and protection for our safe return to our own homes, ” explained Edward.
“Cripes! Are you telling us that it was a blessing, then?” spluttered the astonished Allan.” Fancy you figuring that out!”
“We’ve always thought the blasted jokers heads were full of crap! I’ve got to see them in another light now!” said Dave, still confused from it all.
“They haven’t seen a missionary up here yet.” said Edward simply.
With the down hill terrain it was much harder going, as they slipped on the damp slopes, they clutched onto some vines only to find that they had sharp painful barbs, that tore into their flesh. They were in single file, and within a shoulder of each other. Edward had offered his heartfelt thanks to the One Holy Creator, for the helpful information, the food, and had asked that they all be guided by their own individual spirit guides, and be safely aboard the contact cutter at the appointed time. With trust that help was always forthcoming he added, ”I ask that my brothers on the hill village be given the knowledge of our deep appreciation of their love and kindness, and may the same heavenly light that flows the light of the sun to, flow to the entire population of this planet, for peace of mind, body, and spirit, in the all abiding love of your Absolute Love.”

As the sun was going down they turned into the swampy area, and the quicksand was within the vicinity. The sun was giving it’s last burst of glory for the day now, and soon it would be pitch black. As they put a quickened pace into their step, a sound of a muffled cry alarmed them all. It came from about fifty paces ahead of them. There it was again, and it definitely was a muffled cry, but the words ‘help me’ were heard by all three soldiers. The sound had come directly in front of them, and they were in single file, and moving towards the quicksand patch. There it came again, and it was an all eerie sound of the repeated call for help, and the voice was coming from the quicksand.
“It’s a guy over there, a soldier! Look at his tin hat on the side of his head!” Allan at the head of the three, had spied the owner of the voice. They hacked saplings as they ran toward the area, and together, working in unison and wasting not one action, they built a makeshift pontoon to reach out part way to the guy, who was stuck up to his neck, and slowly sinking, by the second. They had tied the pontoon as securely as they could, but there was no time to loose. The two Aussies formed a human chain, and Edward crawled out over them while they held on to his ankles
“We work together, on the count of three, when I say “pull”, then move Heaven to Earth, Pals. Okay?”
“Okay Mate” came two voices in reply. Edward called out to the stranded bloke,
“We haven’t got much time, Friend, every second counts. Do exactly what I call to you, with all your might Friend!” Edward instructed
“Okay Friend, now with all the power you can muster, push forward, come now with every part of your body!”
As he was calling to the stricken man, Edward was stretching out to what seemed almost twice his length, and the two other men who were the anchors, now found their own bodies were being painlessly, effortlessly, elongated in the same manner. The soldier was buried up past his neck by now, with his head at a broken angle, and he was moaning incessantly.
“Take a deep breath, as large as you can possibly take to fill up those lungs completely with air, that’s right now close your mouth, and keep it closed!” The sun had almost disappeared completely, and darkness was rapidly falling.
“Okay Friend, now you can picture yourself in your bathroom at your own home. That’s right, do that now! Okay, you’re getting out of that bath full of water, so push yourself against the water in the bath there. Lean forward, now clutch the side of that bath – here you go! Good!” The man’s shoulders had suddenly moved forward. Two muddy limbs shot forward, and then up. Edward’s body had given a gigantic lunge forward. The two anchormen felt themselves being stretched as taut as a violin string. Now Edward was gripping the man’s wrists as if they were in a vice.
“Okay, great work, now move those knees, one at a time, go like you are peddling a bike. Go man! Faster! Okay, keep it up! Now you get those legs moving right of the edge of that bath! Go on !Move it!” There was a sound of suction coming from a depth in the darkness now, and the two Aussie guys felt now that they had been electrocuted, so tense was every fibre of their being!
“Okay, now you are waking out of that bathroom, right now walk, left, right, left, right. You can run to that door. Go !!Edward took a breath in.
“Big effort Mates, on the count of three.” They took in as much air as their stretched body could, and listened to Edward.
“One, Two Three, Pull!” In unison they moved as one. From the quicksand, there was several suction sounds, which became successively louder, and of longer duration. There was a tremendous movement as they heaved their greatest. The human chain hauled the man out of his slowly sinking tomb, Finding more strength still, they continued the gigantic pull, and the man was on solid soil, in a heap of mud.

“There you are fellow!” said Dave, taking time to verify what he thought he was seeing. He took in another look, yes he was a Negro all right. The man had a big Negro nose, and other features. The whites of his big eyes stood out in the darkness.
“Well get some of this weight off you, ” said Edward softly, as the mans eyes showed terror, when he drew out his jungle knife, and with the back of the blade ran it down over the soldier’s outer form of the soldier. Allan was amazed at the turn of events. The man was now staggering to his feet, and he looked at them and drawled,
”God help me, but you buddies just came in at the time when I had just given up! I am one goddamed lucky nigger!” then he stopped short and burst into tears. He continued softly, ”Better probably if you ole left me there in the movin’ sand!
“What is it Friend? What makes you so desolate? asked Edward quickly, he had seen more than three colours added to the aura, and it was denoting extreme anxiety. Dave put the water canteen to the soldier’s lips.
“Here take a good swig of some coconut juice, let some sweetness wash down, and don’t talk so loud Mate!” he said.
“It’s not safe to do that, ” whispered Allan to the American who was having a few mouthfuls of the mild milk.
“We’ll have to be stepping on it!” whispered Edward checking his leather covered watch.” What we will do is take our friend here, what is your name?”
“The American drawled “Yeah, ”and gave his surname, rank, and serial number.
“What’s your fist name, then Private?”
“Joe, Sir, Private Joe Sanders.”
“These men here are, the one with his shoulder under you left armpit, is Second Lieutenant David Stevens, the man on your right is second Lieutenant Allan Stokes, my name is Edward Gilroy, First Lieutenant. We are all from Strategic Intelligence unit. We’ll have to move along quickly. Right now we have a deadline to meet and we have three hours walking through the quick growing stuff, so best foot forward everyone. I’ll carry all the gear for now and lead, and we will have a safety spell every twenty minutes for two minutes. We’ll all rotate duties.”
“Okay Ed, ” said the Sydney smiler.
They kept up the routine, stopped for a breather, and changed their shouldered loads, in mutual self disciplined harmony. In as near silence as possible, they made slower progress then expected, and by now Joe was leaning so heavy on them.
“My circulation is giving up and run out, guys. Reckon I can do it alone.”
“No, ” said Edward, sensing a new problem.
“Well guys, ” said the hesitant Joe, “I got lost on the mission here, separated in the jungle at night, and I’ve been wandering and getting more messed up then ever! I just reckon if I stay here it will save my unit the trouble of stringing me up. I’m only a goddamned nigger, and I’m worth nothin!” This was indeed alarming words.
“So you want us to let you keep on wandering Joe?” said Edward.
“They’ll just never believe me! Look pal, I’m just a nigger and that means I’m not worth much. They will want to string me up as a deserter. Y’know AWOL. I’m telling the truth. I didn’t go AWOL. I’m a burden now, to you blokes. Yes sir I’m a burden to y’all!.” He was clearly sure of his fate.” I’ve been wandering for ten days, guess I went in circles. I’m so goddamned sure I’m going to be made an example of. It would cut down your time to leave me, and get out safely.” Edward silently asked for spiritual help and healing for the striken man and guidence and protection for the whole group. Brillant light then surrounded and enclosed the four soldiers bodies, but only Edward perceived the higher vibration.
Edward put a hand on the man’s shoulder.
”Joe I hear what you are saying. Do you other chaps?”
“Yes, we do, ” they said in unison. There is always Divine Justice and your superiors will give you all of your rights.
They had been full on for four months, and after reaching Headquarters they were due for R and R. While having a beer, and looking at a variety dance movie show, the mail call sounded. Edward was handed a small package wrapped in red paper. He opened it, and a dull silver chain, a yard long fell out. The much folded letter read, Hi there Eddie, I want to let you know, that there was a short trial and the lawyer produced the signed declarations of you, Al and Dave and the cutter’s Captain. I’m in the clear and though the AWOL thing was tried it didn’t stick. I won’t bore you with all the dirty details, but you have my eternal thanks for saving my life from that deadly swamp. Take care you guys, and may you all be out of a job soon and back in your own homes. I wish to give you Eddie a gift in rememberance of getting me out of the bath, Eddie. So here is the only thing that I have that is of any alue, my dog-tag chain. Please have it. I shall always have something more valuable than anyone else in the American Army. You guys made me feel like I am someone, and I will overcome anything life wants to dish me up. I don’t want to be disrespectful, but you guys are real men, and you all will always be in my thoughts – heroes. I do honestly hope that when these troubles are over, there is a life time of peace for you and yours. My heartfelt thanks.”, Joe Sanders.
When Edward read the letter he quickly passed it on to Allan and Dave, who each read the note in silence.
“Guess he’s doing all right then, old Joe. Another fifteen minutes and he would have been completely buried.” said Allan.
“He’d have been a gonna all right!” agreed Dave.” That night you talked him out Edward – what made you think of putting in the bath talk?”
Edward paused, he could not mention that he was following his guide then, as he was now.” The fellow was literally on his last legs, exhausted, and in absolute despair. Wasn’t he?”
They nodded listening closely.
“When I put the bath talk in, I was asking him to visualize the same actions that were required to get him out of that sinking pit. His mind was being asked to think of another scene – a much more pleasant one. That occupation of his mind being busy, for those critical seconds, was essential. The agonizing, paralyzing fear was momentarily wiped away by thoughts of comfortable security.”
“That’s right! I can see that now, ” said Allan, slapping him on the shoulder and pushing a short bottle of beer across the table.” Cheers mate.”
“So it was sort of reversed psychology?” quizzed Dave, still not certain.
Edward was dreamy looking.” Maybe. Maybe that’s what you would say it was..”

“That reminds me of a joke about this man who went to his doctor”, began Dave in an entertaining mood. Edward let his own thoughts drift beyond the confines of the canteen. This war would eventually finish. It would run its course until the collective human egos involved in the aggression struggles to the power point of preservation or annihilation. After that would birth new perspectives, and changes of direction. Along the road of future progress would be many more dodges and side routes taken. These would challenge and teach until the collective ego of the human family of man could clearly see to unburden itself as being separate from All of One and One of All. Edward’s gaze wandered slowly out of the window. The usually languid movements of the people of this very island suddenly took on a hurried and urgent note as he was shown a glimpse of the future. Not forever would these people bow to the colonial attitude on their home soil by a demanding foreign tongue from a distance of halfway around the world. They would assert their right to be themselves and their bitterly repressed anger would startle and shock an indifferent global expectancy. There ahead in time would be society’s placeboes which would be instilled as a means of making believe they were the rich rewards of progress and peace, and long after the war wounds healed, the inner scars would trouble for many years. A shiver ran the length of Edward’s back. Despite the tropical heat and stifling humidity, he knew that the coldness was pointing to something else. All of our wives, sweethearts, and children to whom we return will also be changed, just as each soldier is changed by the experience and action here. Even in months each of us at this table have changed physically, and so have our mental selves. In our absence our wives had adapted, coped and persevered also and there will be a need to acknowledge and understand that our children have grown apart from the fathers as well. Unsettling as it may seem, I know that virtues of tolerance, patience and understanding will be at straining point at home with Alice and our young ones. Tears were very close to Edward’s eyes, as he became aware that the shaggy dog story that Dave had droned on had ended with a very smart cleaver ending and Allan had spluttered a surprised reaction.
Suddenly, the image of the uniformed men disappeared from Edward’s physical view, and he glimpsed a future flash of his two comrades. Dave was attired in a gaudy eye-catching suit, with a hat set at a jaunty angle. He was talking with others in a successful salesman patter, while mentally counting up the financial value both of his audience and also of his own time spent with them on this recurring spiel. His heart was racing fast with adrenaline pumped from the thought of his rapid rise of riches lately and also from the satisfaction of discovering how gullible people in general are. Allan was the example of a good fit in the mold of his Education’s Authority. Never taking risks and a believer in firm discipline of his students, he judged that teaching the youngest generation was a fitting way of contributing to the welfare of the young. His duodenal ulcer constantly reminded him of his own lacks and insecurities. He did not allow his own children the right to self-expression, and consoled himself with the safety of his placid, though dull, wife and the fact that his home mortgage would be paid off in five more years.
Edward heard the familiar voices of his parents and saw their spiritual forms standing in the night light behind his two friends.
“Every person does have their own light to follow son”, began William, and it is their own Inner Self, that “I am” within them that guides them towards their learning. You wouldn’t alter their attitude one bit by telling your friends what is ahead of them. It is your learning to fully accept them, and to respect their pathway. Every person has their own particular role in the Divine Great Plan. It is the essence of evolution, as all the parts are gradually drawn back to One. The war will finish and there will be a great rejoicing both in Australia and New Zealand, and this will bring about an optimistic rebuilding energy to strive and go forward. Positive opportunities will outweigh the negative aspects. It is fitting for womanhood that they claim for themselves the equality which was theirs from the creation of the species of humanity. It will take a period of time to adjust to their equal contribution. The male part of the human species dominance has pulled out of balance the intended delicate male/female blending. It has served to expect the male part of the species to be aggressive and power wielding, so that there is more destruction than creation, and caused the two World Wars which have occurred in your life time Edward”
“Dear Edward, your kind brave heart is in danger of taking on that which is not yours”, added Katherine with the warmth of love in her voice.
“What you cannot do yourself just hand back in trust to Divine Wisdom of the Holy Spirit to take care of. The fatigue of war is teaching you this lesson. This lesson is also filtering through on a world wide basis as well as a personal one. Within a year after you return to Garland Hill, you and Alice will be expecting another fine healthy son. He will delight all of you with his arrival and he will have an ever ready humour and lighten many a heart, especially Alice’s heart.”
“Your children are all aware of Divine Love in their hearts, and all of their children will also each in their own way will find an ever greater freedom of this knowledge. They will not go forward alone either, and by the end of this century each new soul will have telepathic understanding, and the language of the heart will be the universal one. You will see all this from where we dwell and know it to be true.”

The sun went down quickly as if a jet black blind was jerked down over a brilliant canvas of the red orange and indigo sky. To the tune of the powerful throb of several approaching aircraft, the three comrades called out a cheerful goodnight greeting to each other. Now alone in his tent, Edward fumbled with the buttons of his uniform and he recalled the poetry line from his school days books.” Yes God has a plan for every man and He has one for me.” His aching body stretched out and sunk deeper into the canvas bed and the uneven ground made it tip a little as he adjusted his body. In the flickering torch light a vision of love played on the tent wall, and he saw Alice preparing their children for bed time. They were in front of a glowing log fire, and it seemed that he was right there in their midst. Alice picked a large hand painted photo from the mantle-piece, and as she passed it to the two eldest little girls, each in turn kissed the glass and said “Good night and God Bless Daddy”. Monica sleepily yawned and rubbed her eyes. It had been her first day of school. With two hands she clutched her precious daddy in the photo and looked into his painted eyes.” I love you Daddy”, she whispered fervently. Emerald green round pools of sweetness sincerely connected over the miles. Light connected with light in that gaze and the feeling of the moment both comforted and gladdened Edward.
“I feel blessed by love dear Holy Creator and I thank you for this and for the Peace that is coming to the World, and the infinite inner peace that pervades and guides us all throughout our every journey home to You.”