DETERMINATION OF FRANCE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1511, 17 February 1916, Page 4

DETERMINATION OF FRANCE.

The French Army Bulletin publishes a letter which M. Poincare addressed to the officers and soldiers of France on the occasion of the New Year. In the course of the letter the former President says:—“All Frenchmen, reconciled, sustain in common the same trials. All listen with respect to the virile lesson of the dead, the lesson of courage, patience, and resolution, the lesson of coolness, confidence, and serenity. Everywhere there is the same cold, deliberate determination to hold on and to conquer. The problem does not admit of a halfway solution. Any peace which should come to us with suspicious aspect and in equivocal terms, any peace which should offer ambiguous compromises and bastard combinations, would only bring us, beneath deceitful appearances, dishonour, ruin, and enslavement. No Frenchman would have committed the crime of desiring the

war. Every Government since 1871 has striven to avoid it. Now with our faithful allies we must carry it on to the annihilation of German militarism and the complete reconstitution ot France. Any momentary faltering would be an ingratitude to our dead and a treason to posterity.” After declaring that the conquered people will be that which first grows tired, the letter concludes: —“We shall not grow tired. France is confident because you are there. Your officers say again and again that never at any period have we had a finer army, never have men been better trained, braver, more heroic than ours, . , . You will conquer.

The year which is opening will bring you pride, it will complete the defeat of the enemy, it will give you the joy of returning to your homes and the sweetness of celebrating victory by the side of those whom you love.”