THE WAR MEMORIAL

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 181, 2 May 1925, Page 7

THE WAR MEMORIAL

(To the Editor.) Sir.—l am sure that the majority, of us will agree with what the Rev. Fielden Taylor said at the Anzac service in the Town Hall last week, when appealing for funds for the Citizens’ War Memorial. He remarked that he was in favour of a non-utilitarian war memorial, a monument which jvould talk to children 200 years hence of the doings of Anzac, and they would be able to say that it commemorated what the soldiers who fought in the Great War did. He also asked us to think forward, forward, forward, and this we should most certainly do, and not live merely for ourselves and the fast fleeting present. Our brave lads having made the supreme sacrifice, the memory of it cannot, in my opinion, be suitably perpetuated by the occasional chiming of bells, as has been suggested. A carillon, whether sounded by means of a cylinder or played with notes, by. a musician, would most probably in time lose its charm, and become a nuisance to some of us, just as the church bells are on a Sunday morning. Bells, as you are aware, were, as far back as A.D. 330, intended to call the faithful together, clocks not having been invented then. But in these times, when timepieces are- in evidence everywhere, the-'ringing of bells seems unnecessary, besides' being a disturbing element to those who happen to be on a bed of sickness. ; For many reasons no war memorial is more impressive and lasting—and I have been privileged to see many—than a real artistic, and suggestive group of white marble stafraary. .Barring an abortion of a statue in the Parliamentary grounds, which is meant to represent the late John Ballance, but which might be anybody but the person it was intended for, Wellington sadly lacks the attractiveness of marble statuary in its gardens and public parks. Art is occasionally referred to here, because there is so very little of it to attract and charm, but no attempt has been made to follow the precedent of other cities by beautifying four prominent places witli statuary. This would most certainly create a love of the artistic and beautiful, and an appreciative sense of the sculptor’s skilful and delicate work. It was Hazlett who said: “Wonder at the sight of works of art may be the effect' of ignorance and novelty, but real admiration and permanent delight in them are the growth of taste and knowledge.” Visit any town, however small, in Europe or America, and you will find statuary everywhere. Eminent statesmen, painters, poets, soldiers, and sailors, or their deeds, are recorded in marble, and those works of art, many of them centuries old, are scrupulously taken Care of, being looked upon as the heirlooms of a nation. Once seen they, remain indelibly impressed on the mind, and serve not only as an education, but as a tangible record of great men, and the historic times they lived in: Let us, bv all means, rise to the occasion and decide on something worthy of the Empire City and of our valiant dead.. Competent artists are' not wanting who would Willingly submit suggestions and designs, from which the best could be selected. It is hoped, however, that the committee which has to finally deal with the matter will not be influenced in its choice by the opinions of some prominent members of the community whose ideas of art are decidedly crude, and whose mental vision, in a matter of this-kind, would be limited to reinforced concrete. We should be able to say with Horace: "I have completed a monument more lasting than brass, and more sublime Ilian the regal elevation of the Pyramids, which neither the wasting shower, the unavailing north wind,, nor the immensnrable succession of years, and the flight of seasons, shall be able to demolish ” And as the Rev. Mr. Tavlor said : “Let us in the name and the memory of Anzac go’on with it.”— I am, etc., 1 . GEORGE ROBERTSON. Wellington. April 30, 1925.