THE PATRIOTIC EXHIBITION.

Free Lance, Volume XV, Issue 817, 25 February 1916, Page 21

THE PATRIOTIC EXHIBITION.

A Capital Idea Well Carried Out. THE Free Lance's hearty congratulations to the promoters and managers of the Patriotic Exhibition now in progress at the Wellington Town Hall. The Exhibition is an excellent project carried out with vigour and spirit, and well deserving the attention and practical sympathy of the public. By practical sympathy we mean the growth of a widespread determination on the part of our citizens to buy only British or New Zealand-made goods during the continuance of the war. After the war we want to see German and Austrian manufactures permanently shut out by means of a high preferential tariff arranged by our Allies of the Quadruple Entente. * * * * Even the most rabid British Freetraders have come round to recognise that after the war Germany and Austria must not be allowed to draw hundreds of millions of hard cash every year from the Mother Country and the British Dominions for German-Austrian goods, thus supplying our enemies-—who will be more bitter enemies than ever once they are finally beaten —with the means of building up their shattered military and naval strength. In the

past John Bull and his over-seas sons have been arrant fools in feeding German industries. But this must never be again, and never will be again if Britons one and all will only determine to place patriotism before selfish indifference. To this end this Patriotic Exhibition of ours is a splendid object lesson, one which should be imitated in Auckland, Christchurch, and Dunedin. * * # # There may be still a few lines of goods which, previously supplied by the Huns, the British manufacturer has not yet been able to duplicate. But, as Mr. Dalton, the British Trade Commissioner, aptly reminded us the other day, it is only a question of time, and all these lines will be just as easily and cheaply obtainable from our own kith and kin as they were, before the war, from Hunland. Give John Bull time to pull himself together a bit. Remember that with nine-tenths of his factories denuded of workers, or turned into munition works, he is carrying on business at a big disadvantage. Nevertheless, he is doing remarkably well, and will do better still in supplying articles previously obtained from Germany. » ■ * * * How well he is doing we may see for ourselves at this most interesting and in every way admirable Exhibition. Look round the stalls, mark the variety of the goods—their excellence, their ' reasonable prices—when the increased cost

of raw material of all kinds is considered—an.d make up your mind to taboo most rigidly the purchase of anything and everything which is not of British manufacture, or' which is not made in neutral countries. And, in this latter case, give preference, if you can't get a purely British article, to goods produced in those neutral States ~nly which you think are playing the fair game with John Bull!