WAR NOTES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 168, 22 December 1914, Page 6

WAR NOTES.

GERMAN v. BRITISH SHELLS. It is well understood that the German shells are not inoO'ective, aa is pretended by some. They can commit terrible ravages, though they are not so deadly as the English or French shells. But a certain number of them are inexplicably harmless even when they do explode. 1 have an authentic story (writes Mr Ashniead-Bartlelt in the London Telegraph), from an officer who was wounded liy a shell in the knee as he ' was crawling from one trench to another. After he was wounded, he was grazed by a second shell, which struck him in the ribs just under the right arm. | lie felt the impact just as if someone | had elbowed him. It exploded within i less than a yard of him, and yet it failed | to do more than simply roll Mm over ; on to the other side. Near the same j trench, a young volunteer of only nineteen was hit hy a shell in the small of the back as he was stooping down. It exploded and threw him forward, but beyond a mere temporary stunning he felt nothing. These stories, incredible as they may seem, I would not mention had I not heard them from officers and men, whose word is certainly rcliablo. Things like this lead to a common belief in the trenches that the majority of the < German shells are harmless, and the men I have become accustomed to hearing them explode over their heads with absolute umMl'ercllce. FATHER VAUGHAN ON THE KRUPP LIE. Preaching at Warwick street Church, London, Father Vauglian said that only ', a few days ago lie had read in the Times which hail kept them so well posted with war news, that the president of the Prussian Diet, Count Schwerin, shamelessly declared: "We have honorably striven j for peace, and have been forced into war by envious and jealous enemies." Not I satisfied with standing sponsor to ti | little monster of iniquity, the Presi- | dent presented to the Assembly its twin, 1 saying: "We are not fighting for a great- I or sphere of power, the enlargement of ] our Empire, or base commercial profit, ! but to defend our homes and families." I It was possible to fight the Krupp gun, . but it was impossible to do anything but lift up your hands in wonder at the Krupp lie. , If England had wanted war and Ger- : many only peace, they had each adopted ingeniously stupid methods to attain their ends. While England had reduced her insignificant, but not "contemptible" army by 30,000, Germany had increased hers'by leaps and bounds. If that strong but modest Field-marshal of whom now a whole Empire was so proud had been listened to in a day gone by, there won!, have been no war. ' About the final result he had no more misgivings that he had about the sacred character of the cause in which they were engaged. There was a widespread belief among the British forces that their light was a crusade out of which would come victory, with lasting peace and blessing to civilisation. AUSTRALIAN PHYSIQUE. The physique of the (Australian Army, now in Egypt is said to command general admiration. That is not surprising. Australians generally are a clean-limbed strong race of people, and the recruits for the expeditionary force were carefully selected. The facts are the same with regard to the thousand men who went to New Guinea. It was said of them, by men with military experience, that a thousand men taken in a lump from any European Army, would not physically be so fine a body. The sojourn in Egypt, perhaps with a fighting campaign in it, >s ns goutr a thing that could have happened to the Australian Army. Men and horses alike, reaching England and Europe during the winter, would have suffered badly in attempting to become — acclimatised. Lord Kitchener, a master of method in the organisation and distribution of armies, recommended the halt in Egypt very strongly. The Australians now share the defence of a territory which is one of the key-points of Imperial strength. From a military point of view, they are already more useful than if they were undergoing training on British or French soil, remote from the front.