COLONIAL PATRIOTISM.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXI, Issue 103, 2 May 1900, Page 4

COLONIAL PATRIOTISM.

(From Our Special Correspondent.)

LONDON, March 23

This morning's "Daily News" publishes a long letter from Mr P. J. Nolan oi" Christchureh, Ne\v Zealand, wJiieh points out what a sacrifice the loyal offering of soldiers has involved to the Colonies. He brings 'forcibly before the English public the fact that in New Zealand the Permanent Militia is but a small body in comparison with the volunteers who practise soldiering only in the. interval of respite from their ordinary daily toil' and from whose ranks exclusively the First and Second New Zealand Contingents were drawn. Mr Nolan says: "'The public of England may have some idea of what this means to us when I say that these men represent some of the best types of our scattered population, which by the last returns, numbers for the whole colony about 800,000 people, just as many, as would fit comfortably in a second or third rate city in England—that these. young- men also are drawn from all ranks and that they are not only men of industry and character, but some of .them men of wealth." He goes on to describe the origin and composition of the Third Contingent or Bushmen's Corps, and dilates on the patriotic enthusiasm that made it difficult for flic authorities to select the forces from the numbers of eager volunteers. Perhaps the most important part of Mr Nolan's letter from the English point of view is his statement that "These fighting men of ours are not adventurers or soldiers of fortune, tired of life in New Zealand, and anxious to try their luck elsewhere. There are. perhaps, a few of 'this class, but the majority are men who, having Set themselves to the great task of developing the industries of this splendid colony have cheerfully and at great sacrifice abandoned this duty and left home and kindred in order to assist the Empire in its hour of need." The sacrifices of New Zealand and the other colonies is given willingly. nay eagerly in recognition of the protection they enjoy tinder the British (lag, and without thought of reward. This generous enthusiasm ought, he thinks, to lead to a keener and kindlier interest in the colonies.

At. the end comes a 'suggestion that '' to my mind rather spoils the strain of i ■self-nbncg*ation and patriotism that'; I runs through the whole letter. "My j | own opinion," ho says, 'Ms that the ! ! most appropriate recognition Great j I Britain could make of "the loyalty of: her children at the present time jvcmlcl come in the form of a gift of muni- ! i ions of war "for the land defence of i the colonies," ; | Both the "Daily News"- and the "St. ' James;' Gazette*7 make the letter the I text of neat little sermons on Colonial Imperialism. Says the former: "Truly ; they 'come of the blood' these empire- ' builders and empire-savers :— | Not in rhe dark do we fight—haggle ana flout and jibe; j Selling our love for a price, loaning our' heart for a bribe; : Gifts only have we to-day—love without promise of fee. Mr Nolan alludes to the. forgetful- ■ ness of Colonial interests which has too often and too long marked our English Governments. 'The war ana its lessons will, we believe, cure us for- ' ever of ihis insular and self-regardin <* spirit. The latter thinks the letter should abolish—if anything could—the argument so freely used by some of our contemporaries that in pointing, to the action of cwr Colonies during this war we are using an example that can only mislead the British" tax-payer. The Colonial contingents, say our critics, are chiefly soldiers of fortune, ready for a row anywhere, ne'er-do-weels who volunteer without a thought of j the, merits of the case, men whose ac- ' tions are in no sense to be taken as a condonation of the spirit of the War i

If Sir Wilfrid Laurier has not already done something to show these perverse rea sorters their error, we beg them to road what Mr Nolan has to say about the men who left profitable businesses in New Zealand at a great sacrifice to assist the Empire in its hour of need as some repayment for the protection hitherto provided by the British flaw. Composed not only of "men of industry and character, but some of them men of wealth," the New Zealand Contingent has come out of a population of only SOO.OOO, and of that scattered i total they represent the best types.