WILL CONSCRIPTION COME?

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVII, Issue 1457, 9 October 1915, Page 4

WILL CONSCRIPTION COME?

“It is certain,” writes Dr Fitchett, in the October issue of Life magazine just to hand, “that the proposal to establish National Service will create a controversy which may well shake the National Cabinet of Great Britain to its foundations.” This sentence was written before conscription in Great Britain became the burning topic it is to day, and forms part of a very shrewd and interesting forecast by the editor of Life in his monthly review of the great war. No magazine that comes from abroad gives such a broad, picturesque, and on the whole, accurate description ot the fighting in Europe and the national movements behind the fighting, as does Life, and few writers possess Dr Fitchett’s gift for summing up and estimating the general situation. Dr Fltcbett’s review of what he terms “The War of the Seven Seas and of all the Continents,” contained in the October issue, does not ignore the dark spots in the landscape, but, on the whole, it reflects quiet confidence in the final victory for the Allies, and attempts something like a forecast of the way in which the ultimate triumph maybe achieved. Supplementing Dr Fitchett’s notes on the war are a review of the outstanding war novel, an informative article by Carlyle Smythe on “What I saw in France,” and a fully packed Explanation Department for the “man in the street.” The most conspicuous among the general articles in the magazine for October is one entitled “Snakes I’ve Met,” one of a series in which W. A. Somerset is presenting the adventures of that curiously erratic character, “Morrissey of the Snakes.” This article is accompanied by some remarkable photographs taken by the writer, and illustrating Morrissey’s method of “milking” i.e., extracting the venom from a tiger snake. The snake was one borrowed for the occasion from the Melbourne Zoo, and, altboug it bit Morrissey twice during the operation, he suffered no further inconvenience than a badly swollen arm, and he succeeded in extracting a quantity of venom —“enough,” as he quaintly put it. ‘‘to kill two families of the size they haxfe ’em now-a-days.” We can confidently recommend Life to our readers. If unobtainable locally for 6d., a 3s postal note sent to T. Shaw Fitchett, 376 Swanston Street, Melbourne, will bring Life post free for six months.