MR HUGHES.

Hokitika Guardian, 22 December 1922, Page 2

MR HUGHES.

BRITISH PRESS TRIBUTE. AUSTRALIAN AM) N.Z. CABLE ASSOCIATION. (Received this day at 8.30 a.m.) LONDON, December 21. The “Morning Post” in an editorial says a certain section of English public opinion is indecently exultant regarding the possible exit of. Mr Hughes from office, if not from active participation in Australian politics,- What a dreadful person Mr Hughes is. If he refused to stand by the Mother Country in the hour of gravest peril, if lie hac’._»' made a separate agreement with tlnf enemy; if he prevailed upon his fellowcountrymen to stay at home, then we may take it Ins health to-day would X, have been drunk nl repeated potations. Mr Hughes is assertive, obstinate, idealistic and inspired, is tbe very embodiment of the'-stuff whereof Empires nro made. He fought as hard in the great cause as those Australian soldiers \Vhtl inspired so wholesohie a dread, in the Germans. Whatever may be the' Jesuit of the elections, the vast majority of Englishmen salute in Mr Hughes a great imperialist. Australians may •iced a new administration. That is Austialian business, but Mr Hughes, —-- if he loses office, will never lose the affection and respect of the race for whose survival and' victory he fought in the hour of crisis. He was great . ill war and also great in peace niid nl- , so great in peace and almost alone '~*(l among the “minor” statesmen, saw though Mr Wilson’s pacifism, Lloyd George’s megalomania, brushed' aside, humbug, and strove hard to come into touch with the realities. If his counsels had been listened to, the world might liftve been at pekoe to-day.