"BOBS."

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 173, 9 December 1912, Page 4

"BOBS."

Lord Roberts has been figuring largely in the public eye since he made his famous speech about the unpreparedness of Britain from a military standpoint. "Bobs" may have gone too far in his strictures, but that" Britain is running a grave risk in not at any rate impart ing the rudiments of military training to her youths there is very good reason to believe. Apart from its value in time of trouble, individual training would be a national boon. Up to now. the public of Britain has been against compulsion in any form in the defence of the country, relying solely upon the power of the navy, hut conditions have been changing so materially of late, that what sufficed a few years ago is totally inadequate now. There is no doubting Lord Roberts' sincerity or patriotism. His life of eighty years has practically been devoted to the service of his country. "It seems more than a lifetime since the name of Roberts first came up as a star in India," wrote a correspondent of a London journal on the occasion of his last birthday (September 30). "There are not many men now alive who read those despatches which told of the little gunner, transferred from the Bengal Artillery to the immortal 'Field Force,' who was one of the first through the gate at Delhi, who marched with the column to Cawnpore, and who planted our flag on the roof of the Mess House at Lucknow under a shower of bullets. His superior officers at this time marked out the young lieutenant because of a courage which defied all risks, and seemed guarded by a charmed life. In the Abyssinian expedition of ISOB Roberts did sturdy work as assistant-Quartermaster-General, and at the outbreak of the Afghan war he commanded a division and drove the natives from the famous peak of Peiwar Kotul. Then came his famous expedition to Kabul to avenge the slaughter of the British mission. It was on August 9, 1880, that Roberts set out on the evermemorable march through the heart of Afghanistan to the relief of Kandahar, with 10,000 troops, 8000 native followers and 11,000 animals; and it was twenty days later, after a march of 313 miles over mountain ranges, that he fought a heavy battle under the walls and saved the garrison. It was on a litter that he was carried into the city, exhausted by fever and fatigue, and it was from his bed that he roused himself to write his message to the Queen which gave to England the news of victory. The rest of his fighting career is within the memory of us all. The noise of the cheers which bade him 'fiod-specd' to South Africa and 'welcome home' after that masterly campaign, when, with Lord Kitchener, he retrieved all our disasters in South Africa, still ring in our ears, and will echo in our hearts to-day."