SIR DOUGLAS HAIG’S RELIGION.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume VI, Issue 285, 17 November 1916, Page 2

SIR DOUGLAS HAIG’S RELIGION.

A STAUNCH PRESBYTERIAN. The Tablet quotes from the Paris Figaro a description of General Haig, which says:—"lt’may interest those who are constantly pointing to the wrfr as a mark of the failure of Christianity to know that General Haig, like so many capable generals on the Western front, is a man. of strong religious faith and deep piety —in his case, of the Presbyterian evangelical type. On the whole, he is sombre; but he has humour, nevertheless, and he sometimes reveals it through the medium of an apt citation from the Scriptures, which he reads diligently. His intellect is remarkedly Scotch apd metaphysical, and his favourite poet is affirmed to be Robert Burns. It is said of him that he never reads a novel. As a soldier his real opportunity came in the South Afr, rm War, for it was his work with the cavalry that brought him under the notice of General French and turned the tide of British disaster. Here is was that his piety especially came to the front. Haig does not swear or gamble or dance all night at re vels or affect the dress uniform of his rank.; This asceticism has always been understood, for he has the Presbyterian temperament markedly. The officers’ mess was not. all the same, prepared for his replv to the quarter-master who asked him, during the Colesberg operations if, in a brush with the Boers, he had lost anything. ‘Yes,’ confessed Haig solemnly, ‘my Bible !’ Not once did his countenance, relax its gravity as he gazed at grinnigg faces in his vicinity.. To this . day Haig is grimly Scot in his spirituality, attending Presbyterian services every Sunday at the front, revelling in doctrinal sermons that are not at all brief.”