THE SIKH AND THE GURKHA

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 128, 23 October 1914, Page 7

THE SIKH AND THE GURKHA

GREAT FIGHTING MEN. The Sikh and the Gurkha, two extreme types of the Indian troops, are among tlie best soldiers in the world. The first is a tall, handsome, well-built man, clean living and imposingly dignified in demeanour. He is a born soldier, hardy, brave, with a still tongue, obedient to discipline, and attached to his officers. In victory he retains his steadiness; iii defeat ho will die rather than yield. In the old days the British fought him often, and it is not for nothing that they call him tho finest soldier of the East. The Gurkha, who .has a good deal of Mongolian blood in him, is, on the other hand, what might be called the Irishman of the Indian army. He is frank, independent, self-reliant, and has a fund of humor all of his own. He is small, and strongly resembles the Jap, but is more sturdily built, and much more communicative. But if he is an "Irishman" lor talk, he is even more of an Irisnman for fight, and the record of some of eur Gurkha regiments is a truly bloodcurdling one. The national weapon —- and the Gurkha is armed with it in our forces—is the kukri, a heavy curved knife, which he uses for every possible purpose; and in a fight he is the unhappiest man on,earth, and the cause o( more or less trouble to his officers until he is allowed to use it there. Then all is well. Men who have seen a Gurkha charge declare it to he a thing altogether impossible to forget, It is curious that the Gurkha despises all other Orientals, and he admires and fratcraisea with Europeans, whose taste in sport and war he shares. There has bees a very strong bond of comradeship between the Gurkha and tlie Highlander, and he would be a brave man in India who would seek to disparage the one ■ffitlia the hearing of the other.