"JACKY FISHER."

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 4, Issue 26, 1 April 1915, Page 2 (Supplement)

"JACKY FISHER."

To the men of the lower deck he is still "Jacky Fisher." He is the embodiment of John Bull. As a young lieutenant ho foretold the coming of the Dreadnought, which is linked with his era. He looks taciturn, but preserves a keen sense of humour. A man of iron will, it is related that when he accepted the post of First Sea Lord he kept his cab at the door ready to drive away if the list of reforms which he had drawn up was not accepted wholesale. Someone asked him to which party he belonged, and he replied with this impromptu :

Sworn to no party, of no sect am I I can't be silent, and I will not lie!"

SLEEP QUIETLY IN YOUR BEDS

His most famous utterance was made at the Guildhall banquet seven years ago, on the eve of the German Em-

peror's visit to England, and has never been forgotten. "So I turn to you all, my countrymen, and I say, Sleep quietly in your beds. Do not be disturbed by these bogeys of invasion which have periodically been resuscitated by all sorts of leagues." They are words to remember to-day, together with Lord Fisher's dictum that ; 'ilie essence of war is violence; moderation in war is imbecility." Lord Rosebery once described him as "the Kitchener of the Navy," which is precisely the role lie is destined to fill now. "Full steam ahead!" is Lord Fisher's motto. The Navy will find in him a strenuous supporter of the "ruthless, remorseless and relentless" policy towards our utterly unscrupulous enemy. In time of peace Lord Fisher made the British Navy stand for efficiency as it had never done before. In time of war the nation will look to him to inspire and prove that efficiency through the great test. For, to quote his own phrase, it is a time to ''hit hard and to keep hitting."