THE Pukekohe and Waiuku Times PUBLISHED TUESDAYS AND FRIDAYS FRIDAY, MAY 14, 1915. NEW ZEALAND AND THE WAR.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 4, Issue 37, 14 May 1915, Page 2

THE Pukekohe and Waiuku Times PUBLISHED TUESDAYS AND FRIDAYS FRIDAY, MAY 14, 1915.

NEW ZEALAND AND THE WAR.

" We nothing extenuate, nor let down auaht in malice."

The graphic account of Mr Ashmead Bartlett of the superb gallantry acd magniheent achievement of the Australian and New Zealand troops on the Callipoli Peninsula must have been read with interest and pride from one end of the Dominion to the other. Tbe boatlanding over a tire-swept zone, tbe dash through the shallow water, tbe rush across the open beacb and the fiery bayonet charge on the first line of entrenchments, all are reading calculated to make the nerves of all of us tingle with pleasurable excitement. Tben tbe halt under cover for a moment tn get into touch with one another and to load their magazines, the scaling of the crumbly cliff, the overwhelming of the second line of Turkish entrenchments, and the final securing ol their position by digging themsevles in sounds more like the work of seasoned regulars than of raw colonial civics. And we are told the men went to it [cheerfully, quietly and confidently, and showed no aigna of nervuua excitement. Coming so hard upon the heels of the story of the gallant steadiness of tbe Canadians at Ypres, where, outnumbered five to one, and exposed to a murderous fire upon front and flank, they turned what according to all the text-books should have been a disastrous defeat into a glorious victory, the feat of our New Zealand and Australian lads in tbe third great theatre of the war disposes for ever of the sometimes hard statements that the scions of our race deteriorate by being transplanted. For whether born on the fringe of the Arctic Circle, within the sweltering zone of the tropics or upen the climate-favoured isles which constitute the furthest-flung outpost of our Empire, we seem to inherit in equal measure the steadfast courage and fioe military spirit of our fore-fathers,

It is good that we have been able to aid the Empire, and incidentally the whole civilised world, for the success of Germany in this war would mean the set-back of the progress of humanity towards light, freedom and justice by centuries. But we must not now sit down with folded hands complacently feeling that we have done all that can be expected of us. There remains yet much to accomplish before Prussian militarism is so utterly brcken that it can never again become a menace to the world's peace. The great struggle s still being waged upon the soil of our Allies, and the snake, if scothed, is not vet killed. There is yet room in the depleted ranks of our infantry f*r every young man who can by any possibility be spared to I

go. and the intantry is still, as ever, the indispensable factor of the army. Oar fore-fatheis trum this little island home built up the greatest and most powerful Empire the world baa ever seen. They have ruled it with such wisdom and sympathy that every part of it has rallied to the flag in the hour of need. To the colours then, those of you wbo are fit to go but have not yet gone, and justify the faith of your fathers by doing your duty to-day. Aid to preserve your great and glorious heritage and you will be remembered with pride, exaltation and gratitude by the countless generations to come. We cannot end better than by quoting a stanza or two from a poem we published a few months btfore the war began, which, read in the light of after events seems redolent of the spirit of prophecy, "Fight boldly on, ye scions Of the race that holds its sway, Where the bones of our sires are lying Half the globe's girth away. And down your long generations Guard as a sacred flame The thought,—'We are Sons of the Sea Queen, And Heirs of the Sea Queen's fame.' "