NEW ZEALAND'S SHARE

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 2267, 29 September 1914, Page 7

NEW ZEALAND'S SHARE

"THE MEN SHE, IS. SENDING TO ":, HELP;US." . V /V (By Godfrey Turner; in the "Pall, Mali Gazatte.") r The little Dominion of Now' Zealand,' with' its population of' some few'hundreds, more than a .million, is Bending eight ■ thousand men to Europe to help the British Empire. And the Dominion will care neither for cost in men or money or horseflesh—and it js'.. said that the -horse is its idol. But it would be good to be back there now; 'already the most of the eight thouaand men will be under canvas, and waiting merely for tho troopships. ".Rather more than three years of compulsory military training have tiuiglit, the men how easy it is.to mobilise without fuK or fuming, and to know what gear to leave behind. Of course, each will have his uniform and equipment to baud, and in order. He will be. ready for tho road. ■ The' only trouble .wji] bo to select which oight thousand to send first. -, . ■..'■"• About: them .there-will bo nothing L consciously spectacular.-' But they would open the eyes of many. Our footmen will tramp on and on, rather bigger men ihan your London torials, with a spring in their step that tells of constitution poworhil enough .to. bear the heat'and-'burden of the day, and tho cold and unrest - weary nights. .About eighteen months ago I rode beside, I think, three thousand of them on a nine-mile walk. Not one of them fell. out' ; .by the way. The steady, even ranks of the Ist Regimont—oity-bred men and boys —were going as strongly as those of the 2nd and the 12th,- or the 13th. The last two regiments were such as- yon could not understand. Some came from far towns and villages, others from nameless-armlets of the. sea. A city was new to them. In til their lives no man had given them orders, nor had they recognised any will save their own. The "wide spaces had , made them free men. Discipline was no sweet thing to them. A finer quality than discipline held them together. It was patriotism.