The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER THURSDAY, JULY 27, 1916. BRITAIN'S GREAT PART.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXX, Issue 98, 27 July 1916, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER THURSDAY, JULY 27, 1916. BRITAIN'S GREAT PART.

That the part Britain lias already played in the war is too big to be realised is ' the opinion expressed by Mr Hilaire Belloc, who says that : what the Mother Country has done is so astounding,, that we have not be- ' gun to realise its immensity, "We do not see the thing at all/' he says. "That we do not see it in its true proportions goes .without saying. I Repeat that we do not see it at all, any more than a man upon the surface of a mountain sees a mountain." He goes on to show that when the war began Britain was able to "put into! the field not quite ' four, divisions, | which were only made up to full strength while the early lighting was actually going on. ■"Kven the original' body of less than tour divisions, wasnot'in line until the war had been in progress upon the Continent for more than a fortnight. It was a force of professional regulars. It represented very nearly the'maximum effort'which Croat Britain was pledged to or had hitherto thought possible in case of *n Continental campaign." .Nevertheless, twenty months alter war the British Army in the fiehl numbered seventy divisions— roughly, 1,400,000 , I]on __so far as the effort of Great Britain herself was concerned. And, not only are those seventy divisions' kept at full strength during a cam-| paign of unprecedented wastage, but | they have behind them such masses of men already trained and equipped a s permit the maintenance of those units—not indefinitely, indeed, for the! wastage of all armies in this war is more rapid than their possible reel uitment, but, at any rate, for quitoj as long a time as the struggle in its present form can possibly last. That, at anyrato, i s what this great war writer believes. Mr Belloc further declares that Britain has turned to the purposes of war, direct or indirect, a larger proportion of her population than any belligerent country, with the possible exception of France.: Her achievements in providing equipment are partly visible to-day in the striking superiority which her artillery iias established over that of the enemy. In other directions than munitions, j says -Mr Belloc, "nothing is lacking, i save here and there in such things as j have been invented during, or have | been suggested by, the course of the war itself.'' That this great effort , was needed we know full we 1 ! to-day, •| unci in every part of the Empire the j stern necessity for effort is being bet- ', ier understood. -Mr Belloc's >voHr L . should help to keep the spirit alive ;! which has dene so much to lving tin j certainty of victory to the arm; el ,! t; i? T'>" n thri ■ strug- . gle for the world's freedom.