IN LIBERTY'S CAUSE

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 7, Issue 263, 29 July 1915, Page 3

IN LIBERTY'S CAUSE

WHAT BRITAIN HAS DONE. Some of our Continental friends are, it would seem, not quite content with what the Britain Empire has done and is doing in the war. They should be given the chance of perusing an article which recently appeared in an American journal —the DaDy News, of Chicago, to wit. It is a striking tribute to the part Cheat Britain has played in the vrar, and how she is "bending her energies to a colossal task." It is not always bad for people to hear their praises sung by others, and certainly this American newspaper's appreciation cf Britain's efforts makes "grateful and comforting" reading, after we have had to swallow such heavy doses of criticism from Heme and Continental sources. Here, says the Chicago Daily News, are some of the things Britain is doing:—

1. Holding the seas for the ships of her Allies as well as for her own. 2. Protecting the coasts of her Allies as well' as her own.

.1. Struggling, in co-operation with the French, to smash the Turks and win the Balkans for the Allied cause.

4. Rendering great aid to French and Belgian troops in resisting the terrible onslaughts of the Germans on, the Allied left wing in the west. 5. Making loans and supplying ammunition to nearly all her partners in the war.

(i. Pursuing a financial policy in South-Eastern Europe likely to promote the cause of the nationalities.

8. Guarding her own soil and people against an invasion, which, if it came —and it is believed to be far from impossible —doubtless wou?d be the most savage, the most unsparing. ever known. With how many men? Well, with enough. -To hear some people talk, one wouJd suppose that upon Britain were laid the duty of defending every land but her own, The One Sure Safeguard.

The Chicago Daily News, continues

"Britain's wealth and sea power and military power are the one sure safeguard against the triumph of Germany's Unparalleled war machine. Without Britain's help. France and Russia certainly must have been crushed. Without Britain's 'whole-hearted patieipation in the war, who will say that Ita'y would have ventured to challenge the mighty and merciless Germanic coalition? With Britain out of the struggle, would there have beer, any hope of the Balkan States daring to move?

"And Britain—never forget it —was not compelled to go to. the aid of France. Come what might, the most that ever Britain promised France was six divisions —120,000 men. She was not in honur bound to send a single soldier more. She could have stayed out of the war. Germany had begged her to stay out of the war. Disgraced she might have been —as Britons think, must have been—is she had l«ift Be>gium and France and Europe in liberty to their doom. "But she could have done this. Britain was not attacked. France and Russia were attacked. Britain might have awaited the onset —as America, is

awaiting the onset. Britain might ha\<

stood clear, might have husbanded her resources of men and money, swiftly have prepared, even might have loomed over the stricken adversaries in th end and claimd the hegemony of Europe for herself.

"Britain did not do so. All for Liberty. "She threw her trident into the scale. She threw her sword into the scale. She threw her gold into the scale—and she is incalculably rich. "She threw into the balance her impressive racial record, her prestige, her unrivalled diplomatic skid. She threw —is throwing—will throw info the balance the whole puisance of her Empire. "AM for what? For rho principle —the fruits of the principle—of the liberty of the individual against the despotism of the State. "Britain, one can believe, may be the author of some acts of which she is not proud —may have done some things io cause her, looking back upon them with fu> light, to wish they never had been done. But in this war this old and proud democracy is unfolding, applying a material strength and a moral splendour that for eount'Jess ages after this conflict is stilled will he shining undiminished amid the first g?ores of listory."