POWER AND PRESTIGE

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVI, Issue 44, 21 January 1936, Page 9

POWER AND PRESTIGE

BTRENGTH OF MONARCHY. MOMENTOUS WAR YEARS. Throughout the reign of King George V the Throne of Britain has gained beyond measure in power and in prestige. Elsewhere sceptre and crown have tumbled down, or have been politely . bowed into the background. The Monarchy is more than ever the summit of the Constitution and the core of tire Empire. The King’s people have given humble and hearty thanks that—through a quar-. ter of a century so anguished, so restless., often so ugly-tempered as this — their constitutional monarch was such a man as the King. By nature down-

right (as the ArchtNshop of Canterbury told his hearers during the jubilee celebrations), the Kinu had been constitutionally very payout. He had never been (us some ot\er Kings have been) too clever to be v.\ise. Like the Bourbons, he never fYrgot; unlike them, he was always learning. He had never been above asking advice, nor above taking it when it was sound; and by his impartiality and generositv of spirit he commanded confidence ami candour, whether from old and tried servants and friends (Lord Stam'ford : ham, for instance) whose devotion he

had won by his staunch trust, or from less familiar counsellors, whose mouths were opened by his matchless gift for putting men at their ease. No examples need here be quoted of all the occasions on which, at some critical moment, he had taken the right course or spoken the helpful word, from the first troubled years of his reign through the greatest trial that had ever befallen the nation. Only this needs now to be said of the War —that if ever a people had cause to thank God for a steady, brave, sensible ruler, Britain had cause in those dark days. From the crowded incidents of the

years from 1914 lo 1918 the King s jianie was rarely separable. Ho was always prompt ,in honouring the achievements of his troops. Their sufferings in the trenches never lacked his sympathy. His words invariably bore the full burden of his sincerity. It was a sailor speaking to sailors who, on the morrow of Jutland, wrote to the Grand Fleet:

I mourn the loss of brave men, many of them personal friends of my own, who have fallen in their country’s cause. Yet even more do I regret that the German High Sea Fleet in spite of its heavy losses, was enabled by tne misty weather to evade the full consequences of an encounter they have always professed to desire, but for which when the opportunity arrived. they showed no inclination. On his several visits to the Grand Fleet the King used the same comprehensible language. They were noticeable, too, for his keen observation ot details, large or small, of the work in hand and all its accompaniments. Proofs might be cited if they were necessary. But it was well-known that the Royal eye was, like the Royal memory tor faces, perspicacious and unsleeping. Many discovered its power

ij in the multitudinous visits paid by the King and Queen to munition factories and hospitals in England. THE KING’S EXAMPLE. While the Royal example was valuable in genera], it was eminently practical in particular. In 1916 the King made a gift to the Exchequer of £IOO,000, to be applied as the Government thought best. Others, in their degree, followed the lead. Still earlier, in the i spring of 1915, the King set an ex- ® ample of abstinence for the public j good. The output of munitions having ‘ been hampered •in some districts by 3 excessive drinking, lie resolved to give " up all alcoholic liquor Ixith for him--3 self and for his household. Here, 1 again, his guidance produced its re--3 suit. Modern sobriety, as a comprelien- ‘ sive code of behaviour, may be said '• to date from the War.

” No war labours and denials made a wider impression than the King’s visits to the fighting front. By and by film records of the King with the [ troops were available. That was the age of the silent pictures, but speech i could not have been more telling than the highly animated photographs of " the King acknowledging the cheers of j his soldiers, walking over the devastatj ed land, talking with generals and r statesmen, inspecting the trendies. No . pictures were so popular, none so ap- ’ pin tided. I The visit of October, 1915, was , seriously interrupted. As the King

. was reviewing troops his horse was „ startled and, rearing, slipped and fell, “ with the rider beneath. His Majesty was so severly bruised as to be in- . valided for weeks. 1 Memorable for a pleasanter reason was the visit in July. 1917. This was the King’s fourth; and he was accom- ‘ pan fed bv the Queen. For 600 years a , King anil Queen of England had not , been together at a seat of war. The - Queen’s particular share of. “things seen” was ''mentioned in the Special 5 Order. It had been a great pleasure to her “to become personally acquainted I with tile excellent arrangements for . the care of the sick and wounded, whose welfare is ever close to her > j heart.” Possibly, too, the Queen’s pre-

sence inspired a reminder to the soldiers that their comrades of thu industrial army of men and women at home had claims on their remembrance “for their untiring service m helping you to meet the enemy” on equal and improving terms. , , ~ At this time the King abolished all German titles and dignities in the Royal Family. In future the ruling House was to be known as the House of Windsor. To all children of the .Sovereign, and to his grandchildren mi the male line only, the style of Royal Highness” was to be restricted, the titles of “Prince” and 1 nncess were similarly limited.

LAST STAGE OF WARFARE. The next year, 1918, which proved to he the last of the War, began none too well. Though the entry of the United States seemed to have placed the ultimate issue beyond doubt, days of disaster had yet to be endured. It was towards the end of March, after the Germans had broken through the slender British line, that the King went again to the Western I'rout. He was able to realise the courage with which his “splendid troops had “withstood the supreme eflort of the greater part of the enemy s fighting

power.” Then, with the approach of the end, events moved rapidly. In April came tile first American contingent, in May the Iviiig reviewed an American regiment at Buckingham Palace; and soon, on the other side of the Channel, were started those intensive operations which forced the Germans by degrees to abandon the ground they had so long held, to relinquish Osteiid and Brussels, and to sue for an armistice. Meanwhile in July, before anxiety had yielded to -encouragement, tile King and Queen had celebrated their silver wedding. A special service was held in St. Paul’s Cathedral, and at Guildhall the King, in accepting from the Lord Mayor, oil behalf of the citizens, a cheque for £53,000 to he devoted to charities, spoke of the Empire’s whole-hearted response jo the call of duty, and rejoiced that he and the Queen, with their children, had been

able to bear a part in the comradeship of war. From the backwash of the world storm industrial unrest continued until it culminated in the general strike of 1926. The strike was the occasion of a Royal appeal for the elimination of bitterness and for unity ill repairing the mischief done. In one respect, at least, the nation had never lost its unity. The singleness of purpose which was a feature of the War period was carried into the commemoration of the dead. Al lien ill 1920 the King unveiled the Cenotaph and attended the burial of the Un-

known Warrior in Westminster Abbey he set his seal to a ceremony, or series • of ceremonies, which have never censed ■ on the annual recurrence of Armistice j Day to hind the nation and the Empire in a community of reverent senti- ’ meat. Unbroken, too, is their feeling . for Royal rejoicing and mourning. They rejoiced witji the King and i Queen on the marriages of their 5 daughter and two sons; in 1922 of . Princess Mary with Viscount Lnscell les, now Earl'of Hamvood; in 1923 of the Duke of York and Lady Elizabeth ! Bowes-Lyon; in 1934 of the Duke of ; Kent with Princess Marina, and last I vear of the Duke of Gloucester with . Lady Alice Scott. And in 1925 they 1 mourned with Their Majesties the :• death of Queen Alexandra, who for 60 , of her SO years had been beloved of ■ the people * for her perennial beauty, - grace and sympathy.

POLITICAL CHANGES. If unity is a word scarcely applicable to British and Indian opinion on Indian constitutional reform, i.t will certainly describe the aim of the Joint Select Committee and of the Bill which resulted from their deliberations and which has now been passed. One change in India, the Chamber of Princess, promised by Royal Proclamation in 1920, was inaugurated by the Duke of Conmuight®as the King’s representative, and lias played its part in the discussion of the fundamental change now staking place. The definition of the ting’s relation to his Dominions, in view of their accomplished emancipation from the control of the Imperial Parliament, was made explicit in the Statue of Westminster of 1931. None the less momentous “in the years since the Armistice have been the political changes at Home, though more in the nature of vicissitude than of departure from tradition.