STANDING SERENE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 1 November 1940, Page 2

STANDING SERENE

IN SPITE OF STORM SHAKING WORLD BRITISH COMMONWEALTH. SPEECH BY LORD CRANBOURNE. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, October 30. A tribute of grateful thanks to the daughter nations of the Commonwealth was paid by Lord Cranbourne (Secretary for the Dominions), speaking in London. He contrasted the old type of empire, a shocking example of which was exhibited by the Third Reich, with the new type as represented by the British Commonwealth. Whereas the Nazis were holding down Poland, Czechoslovakia, Norway, Denmark, Holland and Belgium by force, Britain was receiving magnificent and freely-offered help from the Dominions. Against the Italian foe, soldiers from South Africa, Rhodesia, Australia and New Zealand were massing alongside their British comrades. Because they were not founded on a solid basis of goodwill, such empires as the Greater Reich could not last. “In this storm which is shaking the very foundations of the world,” said Lord Cranbourne, “the British Empire stands like a great rock on which the winds and waves break without weakening its essential strength. Other great nations have crumbled into ruins. The British Commonwealth remains unshaken, undismayed and serene, guarding the civilisation which, without it. would already be a thing of the past.”