MR FOSTER FRASER.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2624, 5 October 1909, Page 7

MR FOSTER FRASER.

VISIT OF THE FAMOUS AUTHORa TRAVELLER. VIEWS ON THE CHINESE QUESTIONS. 'Mr John Foster Fraser, whose globetrotting experiences, pourtrayed with a capable pen, have taught the present generation a lot about other lands, is paying New Zealand a visit. The famous traveller —he prefers to call himself “a writing man” —landed in Wellington last week and after a few hours, during which the citizens took an opportunity of giving him a public welcome, departed for Dunedin. He will return and lecture to the Wellington public on October 17th. One.does not see (says the “New Zealand Times”) the visible marks of his life-long hobby in Mr Foster Fraser. He appears to be just a quiet observant Englishman, until he begins to ask questions, when the practised journalist with an extensive knowledge of the world and its people becomes at once apparent. He can back most of hi s theories with facts gleaned first hand, and his conversaton makes excellent “copy,” as his readers will realise. One had only to mention the “yellow peril” to hear a most interesting statement on that subject. He was asked if, in his opinion, the Chinese or Japanese were likely within a generation or so, to become a real source of anxiety to’ Australasian statesmen, but he did not think so, and was quite positive so far as the Chinese are concerned. “So far as there is any yellow peril,” remarked Mr Fraser, “it is purely an industrial peril because a Chinaman works for so little, and works long hours. When I wanted to send letters a long distance in Western China I engaged a man to carry them. He covered thirty miles a day for eight days, took four days’ rest and then returned, and for that I paid him twice as much as a Chinese would have done. I paid him fourpence a day!”

WILL THERE BE WAR? “Do you think the Chinese would make the restrictive legislation a cause of war if they became strong enough, Mr Fraser?” “No, the Chinaman, in a way, is too civilised to be a fighter. He is not aggressive. He is one of the finest men I have ever come across. I admire his independence for he is a man who doe s not believe, as the Jap does, in merely imitating Western ways. It is of no use talking to him about civilisation as represented by the things we have to show, such as our big steamships, electricity, and railway trains. You might just a s well compare the man who builds a model of Westminster Abbey out of corks, and claims your admiration. The Chinese say, ‘lt is very clever, but you are only mechanics. We are educated people.’ They have as large a contempt for the European evidences of civilisation as an Oxford don has for the man who makes a model of Westminster Abbey out of corks.”

THE IMITATIVE JAP. The Jap, though more enterprising, Mr Fraser does not admire, He concedes that it is wonderful how they have got ahead, but he frankly admits to a prejudice. “They are not servile as the Eastern nations usually are,” he says, but after all, their progress is only imitative. They are wearing body else’s clothes, and it is not an evolution of the national character. Their commercial morality is nothing compared to the high morality of the Chinese. The chairman of the Hong Kong and China bank will tell you that it has never had a bad debt with the Chinese. They are keen bargainers, and will get the utmost half-penny, but once the bargain is made, the Chinese are straight. My investigations into the Japanese industrial conditions lead me to the conclusion that they are throwing away all their beautiful national life that is really characteristic of the East, and are becoming imitation Europeans. Whether we are going to see a real wonder in the world, that of the Japanese grafting on to their Eastern characteristics European civilisation, I would not like to express an opinion. Perhaps they are, but they will do something that the world has never seen before.” ENGLISHMEN OF THE ANTIPODES

“Yes, I have been asked many times whether I felt that the Australians were a separate type from the Home countryman,” continued Mr Fraser in answer to a question. “I have said ‘No. They are a transplanted British people, and I don’t see the slightest difference.’ The Canadian is very much like the man of the United States, but the man in Australia is like the man in England. You could be landed in one of the big Australian towns, and if you were not told where you were, you would say, ‘I am in a big English provincial town.’ I have only been in New Zealand a few hours, so that I ought not to express an opinion about New Zealanders, but so far it seems as if the same conditions apply here too.” Australians are proud of their country of big distances, but Mr Fraser is never impressed by distance now. To go off to New York or Canada seems to him, he says, no more than a journey from Wellington to Lyttelton would concern most people. “I have also exhausted my appreciation of scenery ; I have seen so much,” he remarked. “What I am now interested in is people, institutions, social developments, and particularly Imperial affairs.” When Mr Foster Fraser gets hack to London he will enter the political arena, and it is his intention to contest Leicester against the Socialist M.P., Mr Ramsay Macdonald, as a Unionist.