"LION AWAKES."

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 84, 9 April 1940, Page 7

"LION AWAKES."

PRESS SATISFIED.

Frenzied Rage In Berlin

Expected.

BOLD BUT NECESSARY STEP.

British Official Wireless.

(Received 1 p.m.) RUGBY, April 8. "To-day the Allied Governments make perhaps the most significant pronouncement of the war," says the "Evening Standard," commenting 011 the mining of Norwegian territorial waters. "Britain requires only that technicalities of law should not provide a case for bestial depredations."

Under the heading "The Lion Awakes," the "Evening News" says the decision is a bold but necessary step. "No doubt there will be frenzied and baffled rage in Berlin," it says. "Hands stained with blood and treachery will be lifted in gestures of sanctimonious horror. But the nations of the world will see that the British Lion has awakened at last, and with a welcome roar.

"To-day they will know we have the strength and the will to use our overwhelming sea-power for the restoration of order and reason in Europe." The "Star" says that for us, it is an inevitable action; for Germany it is the writing on the wall.