"Shortened Life

New Guinea Visit "Shortened Life of Gov.-General"

From Our Canberra Correspondent The interest of the late

Governor-General, Viscount

Dunrossil, in Australia’s island territories directly shortened his life.

THE decline in his health before his death from heart failure in his sleep at Yarralumla, Can berra, on February 3, began with an attack of dysentery contracted in Papua-New Guinea last October.

Lord Dunrossil had already been feeling the strain of an all-States tour when he arrived in Port Moresby.

That meant the infection hit him harder than it might otherwise have done.

Severely Affected

He was so severely affected by the illness in Papua-New Guinea that at one stage it was doubtful whether he would be able to go through with the main ceremony of his visit, the opening of the Territory Legislative Council.

Alternative arrangements were made for the Chief Justice, Mr.

Justice Mann, to perform the open ing if necessary.

But the Governor-General in sisted on going through with it him self.

Pictures of the ceremony show that he was under strain, and con trast with his relaxed attitude at earlier Territory functions.

Was the Territory programme too heavy for him?

Perhaps it was overmuch to ask a man of 67 to go into the tropics from a cool Canberra spring and undertake a crowded, rushed pro gramme.

In addition to the Legislative Council opening and the normal arrival and departure functions, the Governor-General had to: Open the Lae Show, inspect troops and police, attend a crowded recep tion, visit the Bomana War Cemetery and meet native hospital patients.

A few weeks before he went to the Territory, the Governor-General was advised by his doctor to take things quietly, to trim his official programme wherever possible.

Inquiring Mind

But such was his inquiring mind, his anxiety to know Australia and her Territories, that he insisted on keeping to as much of his planned itinerary as possible.

Before he returned to Australia

(Continued on p. 139)

MAIDEN VOYAGE. About the same time one big crowd in Noumea was farewelling a ship (see opposite), this crowd in Suva was welcoming another. The visitor was the P & O-Orient's 42,000 ton, 804 ft "Oriana", built at cost of £A17,500,000. The "Oriana" received a rowdy welcome in all her Australian ports and in San Francisco when she completed her first Pacific voyage. She will be on the England-Australia-South Pacific run in future.

Photo: Rob Wright

he told how he was looking forward to another, more detailed visit to the Territory this year.

The Governor-General had made careful preparation for his visit to Papua-New Guinea.

From the time he arrived in Aus tralia he was a regular reader of a Territory newspaper.

He read it carefully—it was one of the half-dozen newspapers he studied before breakfast—because he wanted to know what Territory people were thinking.

And he wanted to get the un official viewpoint on Territory problems as well as the official version put before him by his ad visers.

Lord Dunrossil spent only a few days in the Territory.

But he will be remembered there

for his natural dignity, his freed( from starchy formality, and for 1 warm, ready smile.

The real Dunrossil showed throu at a function in Port Moresby, wh he held out his hand to a nev paperman.

The reporter explained that was from the mainland, in Papu New Guinea for the Governor-Ge eral’s tour.

The Governor - General’s e y twinkled. “But you might be a go fellow for all that,” he quipped.

His relations with journalists—t result of a long Parliamentary 1 and 10 years as Speaker of t House of Commons—were good.

Soon after he returned frc Papua-New Guinea he was the gui of Canberra journalists at th annual dinner.

Strenuous Tour

After such a strenuous tour, could reasonably have been expect to retire early.

But he stayed far into the nig] chatting informally and all t time seeking further informati about Australia.

When he was laid to rest in Ca berra, the young city he had quiet come to love and regard as his Ai tralian home, the official mounu included one from Papua-N( Guinea.

It was the Chief Justice, who h so nearly had to substitute for hi on that day in Port Moresby wh the illness which weakened hi began.

Said the Moderator-General the Presbyterian Church, the I Rev. Dr. Alan Watson, at I memorial service: “In fulfilling his duty, he did n forget his own humanity, or t' humanity of others.”