ANZAC DAY

Hokitika Guardian, 29 April 1931, Page 8

ANZAC DAY

LORD BLEDISLOE’S SPEECH. Speaking at the next-of-kin service at the Town Hall, Wellington, on Saturday, the Governor-General. Lord Bledisloe, said: “This is a holiday—which means a holy day—sacred to those qualities and traditions of which we are all proud, and which we like to feel are characteristic of our British race and also of the Maori people with whom we live in such happy accord. , “ft should not lie a day merely, or indeed, chiefly, of mourning for the brave men who fell in the world struggle for freedom now many years ago,” he continued. “It should rather be a day of proud joyful mss that this young and virile nation was put to the supremo test, and emerged from it with imperishable glory, such as enables all New Zealanders to hobl their heads high among the nations of the world. Tt should also be a day of national stock-taking and of' dogged determination regarding tbo futuredetermination that the standard o r eonduet and achievement displayed at Gallipoli shall be always hereafter the datum level below which no New Zealanders worthy of the name, whether men or women, will ever allow themselves to fall. Such a standard lias in the past been established for the British race on such occasions as the charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimean War, at Waterloo, at Trafalgar, at Spion Kop, at Gallipoli—aye. and recently in Hawke’s Bay—occasions when a sense of duty called forth acts of selfless heroism, self-possession, and devoted comradeship which thrill our hearts, stimulate our imaginations, and should brace our energies for the lessor struggles of our everyday life. “These struggles, though hss dramatic and physically less perilous, are specially acute throughout the world to-day. Let it- he our fervent prayer that, whatever may happen elsewhere amongst the people of weaker moral fibre, New Zealand, inspired by faith in God and the spirit of Anzac, will maintain her steadfastness, and win through the present critical period 1o one of peace, contentment, and smh measure of prosperity as will make for her material and spiritual well-being. “At this ceremony Last Post is sounded, and also Reveille. Last Post strikes the nofe of rest and of li"o----lossness. Reveille that of reawakening and renaissance. Tot Anzac bp an inspiration to us all to bury the dead past with all its failures and ignoble deeds and thoughts, and do all that lies in our power to make the world a- better and a happier place to live in and New Zealand the brightest jewel in the British Crown.”