The Daily News. TUESDAY, MAY 16, 1916. CABLE RUBBISH.

Taranaki Daily News, 16 May 1916, Page 4

The Daily News. TUESDAY, MAY 16, 1916. CABLE RUBBISH.

For the last few days the cables have been surfeited with references to the doings of the Anzacs in France. We in the colonies are all interested, of course, in the experience of our lads, and therefore always glad of news.. But we want "news,"' and not the kind of piffle that is cabled daily from Home. Evidently the cable men have no very high opinion of our intelligence. Probably they confound us with the aboriginals with their thirst for things bizarre. Otherwise, why the twaddle about our men capturing the damsels of France with their rakish hats, the Maoris establishing themselves in the good graces of the French children, the Anzacs touring England and taking everybody, especially the young ladies, by storm? Then, again, we have "skite" like this served up for our delectation:— ''A New Zealander, who is on furlough, said: 'We shall be all right. If you. hear the Germans have captured any blank town you will know that all the New Zealanders have been taken prisoner.' " Now, the average New Zealander is not vainglorious. He doesn't under-estimate the size or difficulty of the job he has on hand. He knows that to beat the Germans he must put forth a supreme effort, and he is not boasting about it. But, gauged by the efforts of the cable agents, one would imagine the colonies had sent to France an army of braggards and Don Juans. The agents certainly vary their communications. For instance, they related the story of a ploughman with white horses, which the Anzacs, suspecting the owner of being a spy, pronjptly painted red and brown! Then yesterday they told us of a "very pretty fight'' in which the Anzacs tasted German blood and made the Teutons Bit up. "A very pretty fight"—how can any mortal combat he characterised as "pretty"? War is hell, and the slaying of men can never be "pretty"; it is ahvays horrible. That it is necessary to kill thousands of Germans yet to bring about peace we all know, but that is no reason for treating the. operation with levity or terming it "pretty." It is a solemn, painful duty, repugnant to our filler and better senses, one that has to be discharged before the German national murderers are brought to book. We are , anxious to learn all we can of the Anzaas, but we are in no mood for trivialities and banalities; we desire but reliable information and facts, and, surely, have a right to expect them.