RULERS OF TO-MORROW

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 184, 24 April 1918, Page 3

RULERS OF TO-MORROW

THE BABY BATTLE

(By "Sylvins.")

Within the next month that ambient calm which ig so typical of autumn in AVcllington is likely to 1)P very nidely disturbed. The recent rush of babies into tho world lins interested piople who believe that the timo is ripo in the interests of the Umpire for the babies to mnlto .1 forward push and moke, their presence known as a factor in tho nation. _ Important! I should say they were. AVc grown-ups arc given to boing somewhat stupid at times. Ono form of that stupidity is tho ingrowing idea that -wo will be able to grasp tho helm and pull tho lisnyard indefinitely. Our future is irrevocably bound up in the babies of to-day, for it is they who will mould this eternally plastic Impire of ours a generation hence, when, alas, many of us will, to use a vulgarism, "bo pushing up tho daisies." ... A whisper of this secret unsuspected strength leached Biibyland for the first timo since the Gontlo Ono breathed thn sweet air of Bethlehem eo many years ago. Tho babies are ([nils determined that it is up to them to "do their bit." Strangegurglings and gugglings have been heard of lato among the perambulators in tho foyers of tho picturo theatres, and one forward little chap of two, who knew enough of baby and grown-up talk to tell what the pother was about, confided to a DoniNiON representative (who was trying to get into tho show for nothing) that a meeting Lad been held by the babies at which it wns formally resolved :—

That, having up to the present been utterly neglected as a factor making for efficiency and strength in the great* world struggle, we do solemnly resolve that it is up to us to shake off this cradled lethargy and "do our bit" for King and country; and that, further, as a means of helping our fathers and the fathers of babies to be, who are fighting and about to fight for human decency in the universe, wo resolve to pit our immature charms against one another in a baby battle, every shot to bo fired to cost the sum ot one penny.

This, our informant said, was carried by a chorus of "goos" and a storm of "gaas" which meant unanimity Our informant, who is in the half-and-half stage, and therefore a competent interpreter, was selected as the emissary to carry the news to Miss Frnser, of Tinakori Road, and that is the "really and truly" origin of the Baby Queen Carnival competition, whioh has already begun quietly, but which will shake Wellington to its foundations before Empire Day (Hay 24) comes and goes.