NEW ZEALAND DEFENCES ASP FEDERATION.

Evening Star, Issue 10872, 4 March 1899, Page 1

NEW ZEALAND DEFENCES ASP FEDERATION.

VIEWS OP MAJOR-GENERAL FRENCH. Major-general French, who has spent a month in visiting New Zealand, returned to Sydney by the Canadian mail steamer Warrimoo a few days ago. The trip was undertaken, the general says, purely with the object of recuperating. While he was in New Zealand he had no opportunity of seeing the defence forces of that colony, as no parade was held in any town while he was there; but he met the Premier, Mr Seddon, with whom he had a talk about defence matters generally, and the defence of Australasia in particular. He also inspected the defences of Auckland and Wellington. He was shown over the fortifications, at the last-named place by the Commandant, Colonel Penton. The fortifications he went over were well designed, and quite up to date, being mounted with guns of modern type, similar to those upon which Sydney I relied for its defence. The coastline of New I Zealand embraced many fine harbors, and as it was realised that it would be hopeless to attempt to properly fortify all of them, the [ Government had acted upon the policy of concentrating its attention upon the fortifica- i j tion of only four—namely, Auckland, Wellington, Lyttelton, and Dunedin. The per- i manent forces of New Zealand consisted of artillery and submarine miners, numbering in all about 300. With the few specimens of these two forces he saw he was very favorably impressed. As no parade was' held in his presence, he could not judge of them from the standpoint of efficiency, but he could see at once that the forces were composed of a good stamp of men. But considering the circumstances that higher rates of pay obtained there than is the case in New South Wales, it was only to be expected that the men should impress visitors favorably in regard to physique and intelligence. He spent most of his time in the North Island, where he travelled 300 miles by coach. He visited Rotorua, Wairakei, | and the Wanganui River, which was often called "the Rhine of New Zealand." The hot springs district he found to be wonderful country, full of interest to the tourist Colonel Smith, of the New South Wales Artillery, and Captain Dangar, were also in New Zealand, and they intended to devote some days to visiting the Southern part of the colony. The General added that he was pleased to find that during the last month a considerable amount of progress had been made with the federation movement, so that now Australia was on the eve of the accomplishment of so desirable a consummation. He understood that New South Wales was called upon to submit to some sacrifice, but he thought it was -vortb some sacrifice to secure so desirable a thing as was about to be achieved. The gain from the standpoint of defence was incal culable. And if one had regard to national developments which were going on so close to Australia, he must see that the sooner the colonies federated the better it would be. People in New Zealand were far from being indifferent to the federal movement. Although they did not see their way to coming into the kind of federation that was about to be established, they were watching the matter with keen interest.