CORRESPONDENCE.

Taranaki Daily News, 15 November 1915, Page 7

CORRESPONDENCE.

SHIRKING. To the Editor. Sir, —In reply to "Shirker," lie says he is willing to go to the front if I. will support his wife. Pity he didn't think of that before. It's hardly the thing for "Shirker" to call others cowards. I am not quite so dense as he thinks. England and France encourage marriages for their '■' soldiers." Quite right. We want the future generations to be brave men and women, but he gives the show away by quoting the Germans, but the Germans wouldn't tolerate shirkers, and no true Britisher would hold them up as an example at this time. Another thing, he evidently doesn't know that there are other countries in the world who know how to make butter and cheese, and would be glad to do it fit the prtee. We old folk and the children can milk the cows. I would go to the front on any terms if they would take me, but I am far past the age limit, and it hurts badly to see young men who have the chance to strike a blow for Right and Freedom not taking it. The old blood rouses in us, and we long to fight—aye, and die, too —but we can't. I heard of the £IOO voted at the general meeting, and I watched the papers to see it acknowledged, but somehow missed it. I don't doubt that "Shirker" has given handsomely to the fund, but there are other people at Tariki besides the farmers. Registration papers don't make it compulsory for anyone to go to fight. I still hold that factory hands are free men, and not the farmers' property, and no one has a right to stop them enlisting by appealing to the Premier.—l am, etc. ONE WHO KNOWS. Tarikir November'll.

CENSORSHIP. (To the Editor). Sir,—T notice in your columns from time to time cables appearing which should have the censor's pen through them. I do not wish to individualise your paper, as all the papers are in the same category. The fault mostly lies at the other end. Take, for instance, Mr. Ashmead Bartlett's criticism, of our Empire war management, An attack such as his ought surely to be strictly persued and forbidden by a' responsible censor before it is allowed to reach Renter at all. Had Sir Joseph Ward's motion been carried six years ago, when he advocated a Council of Oversea Dominion respresentatives to meet and discuss from time to time the affairs of the Empire, such reflections would not appear in print in lands under the British flag. The wonder is that the Editors' Association does not stop these unpatriotic cables at the other end or have a competent board to deal with them, even in this Dominion, Of course, I am not conversant witli the pros and cons of an editor's powers in this respect, but it seems to me there must be a screw loose when stuff can be circularised through the civilised world which tends to solidify our enemies and some of it penned by one of our own kith and kin. Perhaps Mr. Bartlett is doing it at his own expense by way of advertising his coming lectures.—l am etc.. D. J. H. [All the cables appearing in New Zealand papers are ilrst of all despatched to Australia, where the New Zealand agent transfers them (before they appear in print) to New Zealand.' This arrangement gives the public here a wonderfully complete system of European and American news, but it has also its disadvantages, in that we are unable to pick and choose between the items forwarded. Ashmead Bartlett's communication is no doubt part of a scheme to advertise his coming lectures in Australasia.—Ed.].