"LOTS OF GOOD MATERIAL"

Evening Post, Volume XCI, Issue 92, 18 April 1916, Page 7

"LOTS OF GOOD MATERIAL"

INTERLUDE AT FEILDING

GATHERING,

An entertaining interlude occurred while the. Prime Minister was addressing the public at Feilding yesterday afternoon. The crowd was a very large one. and included^ a number of men who were evidently eligible for service. ■ " I am not going to make a recruiting speech now," said Mr. Massey, with a-smile. " but I feel very much tempted to do 60 because I can see lots of good material in front of me." (Laughter.) A voice :Go further north. There's more. (Further laughter.) . Mr. Massey : We can do with them all! A bystander (alluding to the crowd on the platform) .-There's a. few up there. (More hilarity.) Mr. Massey added that since the warcommenced he- had had quite a lot of experience as a recuriting sergeant. It I had been the policy of the National I Government, and the Government before it, to do its full duty in the direction of assisting the Empire in the serious crisis through which it was passing. The people must be kept going, the exports must be kept going, and all must do their level best. Money was pouring into the country. It. was so plentiful that men had actually told the Govern-t-he Government that the taxation was not heavy enough. (Loud laughter.) But no country was ever made prosperous by over-taxation. We had to look ahead, wheli prices would be very much lower, and would have to keep on carrying out our very heavy responsibilities,. . (Applause.) The longer the war lasted the more seriously we" would 'feel it. No'less than 55,000 of the cream of New Zealand manhood had. (rone or. were going to the front—many of them producers and all of them workers, and" he hopsd that when "thesa grand young fellows" come back to the country to which they belonged they would, as the result of preparations made for them, be able to become permanent settlers. (Applause.)