The Evening Star TUESDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1873

Evening Star, Issue 3323, 14 October 1873, Page 2

The Evening Star TUESDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1873

We cannot agree with the remarks in the Guardian of this morning, recommending that no steps should be taken in New Zealand to resist aggression in case of war between Great Britain and some maritime nation. The whole reasoning in the article is based on assumptions opposed to the evidence of the best military and naval authorities, and to the experience of the last ten years. The argument is somewhat paradoxical. We are told that first “If our towns are unfortified, they will be free from attack by hostile cruisers,” because, “according to the rules of civilised warfare, unfortified towns are not attacked.” Now this is only a partial truth. It is true that unfortified towns arc not bombarded, as a rule; but forbearance is not carried so far as to include defenceless shipping in the list of unfortified towns, and being moveable articles, they are usually considered worth possession of; neither should wo imagine there would be any scruple on the part of the commander of a privateer in doing a little profitable buccaneering of the Dampier class, and laying a smart contribution upon (he inhabitants of any town, however defenceless, as the price of immunity from pillage. This, at any rate, is the opinion held by military and naval men, and expressed before Parliamentary Committees in Australia and, perhaps, New Zealand: we say perhaps, because, although knowing the first to be true, we only surmise the last, as evidence on such subjects is seldom published. Next we are told that there is little to fear from attack, so long as British squadrons are able to keep afioat in the Pacific and Indian Oceans. Has our contemporary so soon forgotten the Alabama and the Shenandoah ? how they roamed the ocean, escaping capture, destroying shipping, and compelling neutral ports to supply their needs ? Is it not notorious that special cruisers were despatched to follow those two vessels in their solitary wanderings, and that in spite of every effort neither of them was taken until Captain Semmes accepted a challenge given by the Kearsage, and had his vessel sunk in the duel? Nor had the Northern States so wide a sea-board to defend as has Great Britain, whose ships, in case of war, would have to be distributed so as to endeavor to defend continents and islands, and vessels passing to and fro in every quarter of the globe. The Guardian may be, and we think is right as to the uselessness of the construction of forts and batteries of masonry. Stone walls and light ordnance are of little avail against guns throwing hundredweights of iron at high velocities, and the torpedo presents more certain and powerful means of destruction should an enemy venture within its range. There is no danger of attack on a large scale by numerous fleets accompanied by large land forces, and therefore it is only single ships, or at most two, that might have to be dealt with. But, while not coinciding in the opinion expressed by the Guardian, that under present arrangements there would be no danger of attack in case of a British war, we cordially agree that an effort should be made to bring all nations to consent to except Colonies and dependencies' from spoliation and robbery, should war break out between two nations. One main inducement to war, in times past, was the hope of plunder. The spoil was divided, when ascertainable, in certain specified proportions between the Crown and the captors, according to rank. No doubt plunder of a town was excepted, because impossible to be known ; but even this has generally been included when it has assumed the shape of a ransom. Now that the tendency is in the direction of peace; that the principle of arbitration has been affirmed as a preventive of war, it will scarcely be considered humiliating to narrow the field of operations in case of hostilities, within the smallest limits. We have often urged that steps should be taken to exclude the Colonies from becoming involved in European or Uhl World Avars, and avc are glad at last to have the aid of another journal in advocating that principle. Our mis-

fortune in the Colonies is that truth is acquiesced in, hut no stops are taken to give effect to it. The people are silent, Corporations arc silent, Provincial Councils are silent, and Colonial Governments are silent on such subjects. Newspapers can but recommend, but unless their readers act, their efforts are useless. Those avlio have the welfare of the world at heart should stir in the matter ; the first step is petition. Petitions should go from churches, lodges, men, women, and children, and then the work would stand a chance of being done. It is a work of mercy : will onr clergy remain passive?