Slowly, but surely, a change is coming over the national outlook on sport in New Zealand—and Australia. In these countries, cricket and football have long been the national sports; Rugby football in New Zealand and Rugby League in Australia. But the change is coming.

The introduction of faster sport is but a sign of the times. It would be heresy to suggest that baseball will ever take the place of cricket in the heart of Australians, but the game has made such headway in New Zealand that such a change is not beyond the bounds of possibility.

No other game has made such headway in New Zealand in such a short space of time. Two years ago the game was almost unknown—apart from the newsreels which people could not understand. Last summer the baseballers in New Zealand totalled more than 2,000 and are increasing all the time.

Credit for the introduction of “softball,” a modified form of baseball, to New Zealand must go to missionaries of the Church of the Latter Day Saints—Mormon missionaries. Of these, Elder Toronto, stationed variously at Wellington and Christchurch, has been a live-wire.

And, in alliance with the Y.M.C.A., these same men have had much to do with the boosting of basketball in New Zealand.

The average New Zealander would class basketball as a “girl's game” …. until he had played it. Introduced into New Zealand by the recently-deceased R. O. (“Dick”) Jarrett, who also introduced physical exercises into New Zealand schools and was the first athelete to use the crouch start in this country, basketball has languished for years.

To-day it is thriving and gaining new adherents weekly. Many star footballers have found it to be the ideal sport to achieve physical fitness; some have used it as part of their Rugby training, others have forsaken football for basketball.

And ther is wrestling! The introduction, in America, of flying tackles and drop-kicks brought the sport into the headlines and each year sees some new phase of the mat-game exploited.

New Zealand's patronage of wrestling has been so consistently good that the world's best wrestlers are now brought to these shores. Much of this is due to the improvement made by “Lofty” Blomfield, the Wellington-born athelete who forsook a Rugby career to concentrate on wrestling. Blomfield drew with the world champion last year and is now in line for a world title match in New Zealand this season.

Wrestlers are great users of the railway service in New Zealand—and great boosters for it, too. In America they prefer to travel by their own cars—find rail travelling irksome—but in New Zealand they stand firm by the railways.

And this praise for New Zealand is not confined to discussions in New Zealand. Paul Boesch, making his second visit to New Zealand, took the opportunity of addressing organisations in America when he returned home three years ago—and told them about God's Own Country. Ed Don George, a former world champion, also wrote articles—syndicated throughout America and Canada—telling of the beauties of New Zealand and its wonderful fishing and shooting.

Wrestlers see the world—and tell the world about New Zealand. Next time you see wrestlers in action, remember that most of them leave these shores as boosters for our country—and help to send tourists this way.