PATRIOTISM?

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 53, 27 March 1909, Page 6

PATRIOTISM?

THE TEItIUTOIUAL FIASCO. A MELANCHOLY SPECTACLE IX I ENGLAND. Until universal training for defence is adopted in Xew Zealand the people of the Dominion will always be liable to the degradation which is now the unhappy lot of the British, says the London correspondent of the Post. A week ago it looked as if the absolute failur« of the voluntary system of defence wa» going to be remedied by a liberal distribution of potted patriotism, it seemed possible that by slobbering sentiments in all papers simultaneously, by waving the flag and banging the big urum, by clashing the symbals aud showing the Highlanders in the highways and byways, a certain number of estimableyoung men, too bashful to conie forward and do their duty without much persuasion, might be caught on the hop aud hustled into the force before they got their second wind. METHODS OF ENTHUSIASM.

Leagues of ladies encouraged by the i demand of Lord Fisher thai no girl should marry a man who had not joined the Territorials, put leading questions to the young manhood of their acquaintance, worked fancy enrolled amateur nurses, and toiled with downright enthusiasm. Mr llaldane passed solemnly from dinner to public meeting, and from public meeting to tea-light, exhort iflg those who were- not present to join the army of his creation. Employers came forward and offered their employees three weeks' holiday on full pay on condition that they spent two weeks of it in camp. Suburban mayors took the platform at variety performances, and urged the shrieking; crowds to defend their hearths; the well-to-do flocked to Wyudham'a Theatre and emerged solemnly, drawing awful morals from "An Englishman's Home/' Strong men, with an eye to the main chance, offered free physical culture to all young men who enlisted. The Government came forward and besought recruits not to think that they were making sacrifices, assuring them that they would never have to go abroad to fight. Bands blamed " Rule Britannia " and " Tommy Atkins." A young girl dressed in military uniform, stood about the Horse (Jnards and Trafalgar Square, recruiting for the nursing yeomanry. THE FAILURE.

But, alas! for .such pious hopes. A few young men, dazzled by the bare leg* of tlie Highlanders rushed down and enlisted. Two thousand live hundred applications for enrolment were received —the force in London being 11,000 below atrength. Now, it is to be feared, the enthusiasm is spent, and England, to her mortification, sees bribes openly oll'eivd to .jwcll the ranks. A halfpenny newspaper -which lias been at the heart of the movement —the larger papers almost held aloof—is now advertising, as the police do, rewards of money for the greatest number of headbrought to the colours. It i-, all very deplorable, but it has a lesson for the colonies that they ought to profit by. The lesson is that while defence is allowed to be the paid profession of the few, instead of being the duty of the masses, there will be no defence at all. Heeause the English worship an old legend about the liberty of the subject they are the only uotrnincd nation in Kurope. Their young men shriek oil the rails at football matches, while all around them the youth of Europe are learning to shoot.