A NATIONAL ARMY

Marlborough Express, Volume XLVIII, Issue 217, 15 September 1914, Page 3

A NATIONAL ARMY

EARL ROBERTS'S ,VIEWS

LONDON, July 31/ Field-Marshal Earl Roberts spoke at a large meeting at Bedford in support of the National Service League! He pointed'out that no great political movement had ever succeeded without years of patient work and generous persistence in financial support,, and he quoted an interesting illustration of the slow progress of great causeis. He said:— : "I have'just been reading a. ''Life of Sir Frederick Weld.' In presenting a cap which he had given for ,th© encouragement of rifle shooting, to a successful competitor, Sir Frederick Weld made one of the best speeches I have ever read on the duty of every citizen of a free country to do wotk of some kind in the defence of the State. He said: /It is the duty of the mighty Empire to which we belong to uphold her position amongst the nations of the earth, not from the mere lust of glory or of power, but because a great Nation in the full strength and vigor of life cannot stand still; it must either advance or decay- This great Empire, offshoots gird the world, has a mission and a destiny to which she must be faithful or she will fall like Rome ot Carthage; and her ruin would be one such as hitherto the world has had no example of, for even the Roman Power was chiefly military, not-essen-tially, as Great Britain is, a commer- | cial,- naval, and ' manufacturing i Power.'

"Sir Frederick Weld repudiated the idea that British colonists were

• willing to be members of petty ! States without a past' instead: of citir •;zen,s of a mighty Empire; he pointed , but that however small the ©dinmu-'

: nity was, it.-"could. <Jo tsoriiethirig ■' <'^-'- |'-wards- its own defence. He warned i the people of Tasmania of the danger of putting off wiar^traihing and r*%peating the parrot cry that 'in the ! event of war we should turn put to j a man/ 'You may be sure,' he said, j 'that there is no man w<h6 does not j better himself by gaining that self- ' control which is neceesary' for discir pline in a soldier, 7 and he added, 'if this is a lesson :t6 ' men, morally as well as physioajlly^ it is still more a valuable .training'for boys, and I \fish all our, schools would hare icadet carps.' Sir EVederick Weld had been twenty years in "his grave before the first contingent of T^ismaaiian. Cadets began it® training under, a, universal' system. But the good seed had been sown : it had taken root in the hearts of his bearers, and now it has born© fruit. 1'