ANZAC DAY AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 203, 25 August 1916, Page 4 (Supplement)

ANZAC DAY AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE.

WHAT LONDON SAW IN IT. "A foreigner,'' says the "Saturdiv IlevieV," "descril>ed the Greater Jubilee of Queen Victoria as a pageam in devout patriotism. On that splendid day, when the Empire marched with her chosen men through London, a chivalry of armed youth attending the aged Queen-Empress, the crowd was a poet in feeling, und a difficult ceremony passed through pomp and triumph into devotion. Who can weigh and measure the permanent good!- A creed is nothing until it builds a fane for itself, and the creed of Imperialism had no august presence in fane of visible certaint.' until the Jubliees of Queen Victon. male it real as a bond of union at millions of local celebrations. Then it was that the Empire became conscious of her unity in the world's affa : rs. Lead ers everywhere perceived distinctly tor the first time that the Empire, like r. masterpiece of art, must l>e preserved as a whole. And on Anzac Day the spirit of the Greater Jubilee .returned ,tt> London. Once more the crowd was a poet in feeljng, and a public ceremony became an act of devotion. "A wounded Now Zealander, after the service in the Abbey, related ho'v the troops trned their eyes towards the altar when the first notes of the National Anthem were heard: 'Thev saw there the s'mple khak : -clad figure of the only man in our Empire who does not stand when the Anthem is sung And they wondered what he thought Surely he saw, as they did, that every man in whose company he worshipped would lay down lus life to uphold his sovereignty. The service closed with .1 quiet almost uncanny, and then the sil-ver-throated trumpets rang out the soldier's saddest notes—tho "Last Post." I do not know who wrote that call, but whoever it was, he put into it all the pathos, all the hope of resurrection, and all the triumph that man knows." It ended, and for a while longer there was silence.' "Could any words show more clearly that the spirit of Anzac Day was--and should remain—not a festival for the living, but a commemoration of the dead? Thackeray used to complain—and Gardiner after him, in a noble passage of history—that the rank and file who died in war were ft)T£oX#ien at once; that their names were never recorded, even on monuments. The publichas changed greatly during the present war; it is far more grateful than it has ever been to its soldiers and sadors; it is learning to appreciate discipline and self-sacrifice. But the spirit o£ Anzac Day has to be extended to all the brave men who have passed from life into the undying traditions of the : r regiments. Evrey British country should commemorate the deeds of 'its troops once a year."