WAR FACTS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVII, Issue 17665, 18 December 1917, Page 7

WAR FACTS.

LITERATURE FOR NEW ZEALAND

BRITISH GOVERNMENT'S GIFT

[From Ocr Correspondent.]

WELLINGTON, December 17

Though there is happily no doubting among New Zealanders about their d'uty in connection with the great world struggle, it ,is well to lose no opportunity of making known the vital principles which are at stake, and tho means to the great end of securing victory for the Allied arms. There has been a flood of literature on varied phases of tho creat war, and much has been sent to New Zealand. Now the British Government has forwarded to the Minister of Defence a, supply of the most important pamphlets on the war, in sufficient numbers to ensure that every public library has a collection of these valuable 'aids to an understanding of all we are fighting for. The packing process will take some time, but it is hoped to send a parcel of pamphlets to every public library in the Dominion before Ike end of this month.

The publications are too numerous to even catalogue in a news article, but it is. worth while mentioning some, which struck tho eye in a view of tho collection. Bishop Cleary, of Auckland, has written a booklet giving a vivid insight into Prussian militarism at work, and tlie British authorities evidently regard ir as of vafcio, for theio is a good supplv of copies. Bishop Cleary deals with the Prussian militarists' dor trine of " reeourso to all means," point.-; out whn! that means to the freedom-loving world, what iti has already meant in disregard of the laws of nation- Mid of Immunity, and concludes by dociarine that the alternative to defeat of the Prussian military machine is "either n triumph c'i such forms of materialistic barbarism, or that barbarism making ready for another spring. And either would bo a tragedy for mankind." "Germany's Lost Colonial Empireis the subject of a small book by John 11. Hams, who declares that South. Africa will certainly refuse to surrender its bold over German South-Wess Africa, and Australia ai*d New Zealand will take tho samo attitude over the German possessions in the Pacific. "It may be,'' he writes, " that their demands will go even further, but as certain as to-morrow's sun will set, the refusal to tolerate the German flag in the South Pacific is definite and final-' 111 an attractive pamphlet, "The Gathering of the Clans," J. Saxon Mills has summarised up to the beginning of this vear, what tho overseas dominions and dependencies have done to aid the Motherland. His introductory sentence to tho New Zealand section is the, following tribute:.— —"The true crusading spirit, the conception of the European conflict as a holv war on behalf of Christian civilisation, has been manifested m NewZealand." . .. + . ■There arc books on tm spirit of Tommv Atkins, our sailors how we have dealt with tho financial problems of the contest, the war work of tho universities, " How the English lake the War" (a clever analysis ot British character bv an American),- the German terror" in Belgium, and the war as it affects the different nationalities on"a»cd \ complete sot of these pamphlets and booklets will bring tho library war references well up to date.