H.M.S. NEW ZEALAND.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 271, 8 April 1913, Page 5

H.M.S. NEW ZEALAND.

SPEECHES AT THE BANQUET. THE PACIFIC AS THE ARENA 'OF WAR. liy Cable—Press Association—Copyright. Melbourne, April 7. In the course of his speech at the banquet to the officers of H.M.S. New Zealand, Mr- Hughes said that he was a member of a party that dearly loved peace, but the day when it would be secured was not yet. Therefore there was only one thing to do, and they were doing it. Otherwise the Common wealth and New Zealand would be relying 011 the brotherhood of man, which, he was afraid, would be about as valuable as a silk umbrella would be to protect them from shrapnel. They would have to take an active part in the defence I of the Empire, Captain llalsey declared that if, in the future, any foreign nation came to weigh up England's chance of defending herself, the Dominions would have to go into the scale, and tliey would carry down the whole weight and cause the foreigner to think better of it. Mr. F. M. E. Fisher said tliev could not expect for one moment to hold what they already Lad without a common effort on the part of the Empire to make itself so impregnable that war would be so fearsome a thing that an enemy would not attempt it. Touching on reciprocity, lie declared that he had come over to Australia to do something which should be delightful to Commonwealth Ministers to form a trades union.

Mr. Hughes, responding to the toast of the chairman, said tlie balance of the world would be. shifted when the Panama Canal was opened, and it might lie that the equilibrium would be so upset that in the Pacific tlie decisive battle of the Empire would be fought. If so, there would he a wide field indeed opened upon them—perhaps too wide for the potential possibilities of Canada, Australia and New Zealand. TITE DOMINION ITINERARY. MESS ACE FROM CAPTATN HALSEY. By Telegraph—Press Association. Oliristchurch, Last Night. Mr. Cyrus Williams, secretary of the Lvttelton Harbor Board, has received the following reply to his message forwarded on Saturday to TT.M.S. New Zealand: "Not, arriving Lvttelton until after visit to Auckland in May. Will communicate further concerning entering Port Lvttelton,—TTalsey, New Zealand."