“GREAT SNOWBALL’’

Opotiki News, Volume II, Issue 266, 1 December 1939, Page 2

“GREAT SNOWBALL’’

EMPIRE AVAR EFFORT LORD MILNE’S EULOGY (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, Nov. 2!>. Field Marshal Lord Alilne, who for seven years prior to 1933 was.chief of the Imperial General Staff, in a speech on the Address to the Throne in the House of Lords, declared that the great snowball of national effort of, the British lElmpire and! its military efficiency was gradually but steadily gaining weight, and, if properly directed, would crush to pieces the German menace. This confident prediction followed a survey of the ideals which inspired Britain’s, effort. Lord Alilne recalled Die unforgettable scene in Westminster Abbey at the Coronation when, in front of His Majesty, was carried the sword of mercy, flanked' on either side by the drawn swords of temporal and spiritual justice. Those emblems stood for something real and tangible for dominating the belief of this nation in the quality of mercy, and in our fixed resolution that every man should he at—•corded justice in things spiritual as well as temporal. Those were the ideals for which thenation had dlrawn swords to-day, and if they had not drawn their swordf on this occasion the swords of pageantry would have been lor ever empty baubles of no meaning. The freedom and liberty which we had fought for before were again at stake. As a soldier of 55 years’ service under five sovereigns, nothing had caused greater admiration to him than the attitude of the country in the present crisis.