GALLANT AND BRAVE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 15764, 12 November 1914, Page 9

GALLANT AND BRAVE.

BELGIAN NATION'S HISTORY.

A NOBLE RECORD.

GERMANY'S FEARFUL CRIME.

Fifty years before the birth of Christ, Julius Caesar had fought over the same Belgian territory as that which formed to-day's battlefields, said the Rev. W. (J. Mornckton, in the opening address of " Belgium Week," iu the Chamber of Commerce Hall yesterday. The Roman general had stated in his commentaries that never in all his campaigns had he met a nation so gallant, so brave, so devoted to the cause of liberty, as those people who lived in Belgium of old. A hundred years afterwards the great Roman historian

'| Tacitus said that Hhe Belgians excelled all nations of ancient time in courage and I force of character, What the Belgians i possessed in those day.*, they carried I through the dark Middle Ages—the period j when Roman civilisation was being swept | away by the barbaric Huns and Goths, j and when the pure light of the Reforms- | tion had not vet dawned. During that j period, ths civilisation of Europe, the arts, sciences, and industries, were kept alive, not by England, France, or even 'Italy, but by Belgium, in that small country which was not the size of the Province 101 Auckland. (Applause.) j Belgium and Municipal Liberty. ; We owed to Belgium, more than any '■ other country, the growth of municipal ' liberty, the growth of the idea of what j a town means, and what a government means. In June, 1315, five bundled years bi'ior" thi- o.,iu<; ot Waterloo, there i was signed that great document, known as the " Magna Cliarta of Municipal Liberty." drawn up at Liege, and signed there. It defined the rights of cities and the rights i of communities to govern themselves, and : laid down the duties of municipal officers i and council. Not only was it then a marvel of municipal liber: but it had remained ever since the one document to , which those who are interested in the I growth of cities and city organisation and j city government always refer. , Master and Man. I The speaker went back to refer to the year 1181, when Niruport, Bruges, and Ghent formed a union of friendship, and ; elected twelve judges, who were to be absolutely impartial, to judge equally between both rich and poor and both noble and commoner. Tho workers were formed into guilds, so that nearly seven j hundred years ago there existed better ! relations in Belgium between master and !

workman than had probably ever existed

lin tho world since. The master was ' called the " older brother." and the , worker tho "younger brother." and thev | joined together and woiked together as j brothers for the common good. | A Courageous Nation. I As regards the courage of the Belgians, I Mr. Morickton said that evidence on the | point would be lound in the Battle of j the Spurs, when 20,000 of the chivalry I of France, the finest cavalry in the world, 1 went down to Belgian citizens, whose only weapons were their staves tipped j with steel. They dug a huge pit and I entrapped the French host, so that of all thy thousands v. ho joined in the charge, ! none returned. Those gallant Belgians took las their motto, "Shield and Friend''—■ j they were a shield to their country and a Irietid to each other. , Not until 1830, ha proceeded, was BelI pium made a separate nation. At one : period the flags of ten different nations . had floated over the. walls of her ities. I But through it all. there remained the Belgian character, that love of liberty, that I determination to stand man by man, ! brother by brother, whi. had so marked j the Belgian people to-day. i Germans Worse than Barbarians,

; Some people said that the Germans were 1 like the Hun:,. Vet, even the great lea--1 der of those barbarians, Attila, the man who devastated the whole of Europe, spared Milan because of its art treasures, because of churches and buildings dedicated to God. Even Alexander the Great hesitated to destroy the seat of learning, arid spfrred the homo of a poet.

Bitf. the Germans destroyed {hat priceless library at Ivouvain, containing 70.000 volumes and manuscripts that could never ho replaced. Not even these wore sacred to the Germans, who did what the barbarians would never have done. The Germans not only destroyed learning, but they also desecrated Cod's palaces.. Mr. Asquith's Condemnation. ''Mr. Asquith. the trained lawyer," continued Mr. Monckton, " who is aeonstomed to weigh evidence, has said that nothing in all history could equal what the Germans have done to Belgium, save only that incident in the Thirty Years' War. th.» sacking of Magdeburg by Tilly. Of that deed, the historian said, no pen could describe, no pencil paint (ho horrois of that devastation. How women lost their lives and virtue, how children *wero found at tho breast of their dead mothers, how small babies were thrust into the flam,'-. And it. is to that scrim that .Mr. Asrpnth has likened Germany's treatment of Belgium. You havff heard of how a. woman, with a child two days' old. was made to march for miles in front of ftenuaii bavonofs. on have read how young babies have had their iaces wounded by bayonets, their eves put out, their bodies mutilated. There are many children now who shrink at the sight of a. man, because of the meniurv of hat they iiavo suffered. \ou have lead of how old men were put to death, how hundreds were burned alive, how wounded men were slain, how mothers with children at breast have been so wounded that they could never nurse a child again. "They Will be Avenged.'' We ate ii' t called here to take vengeance against these men. The Belgians '■•ill be avenged -of that you may be quite sure. (Applause!. We ran never .give bail: to Belgium what, f.he has lost. i oil cannot restore her libraries or her ( hurdles, yon can never give back to the Hi'her the dead child, to the. rhild the dead mother, to the mother and child the dead husband and father. lint, thev have made this siwrifico because, they were honourable and true, when they might have taken the German gold. They have been true to that spirit which thev showed through the. Middle Acs, when all was dark. We are asked to do something, and that something must be a sacrifice, not that which costs us lung, but only that which costs much. No matter how great your sacrifice, it can never compare with their sacrifice. They have given their lives, their homes, their country, for us, for you. They have given it to the cause of liberty, to the, cause of country, to the cause of Empire, our Emoire which we love so well. You remember how in the Battle of the Spurs their motto was "Shield and Friend." Belgium has been New Zealand's shield it is for us to show we are Belgium's friend." (Continued applause). The lecture was listened to with the greatest interest throughout by a very large gathering. The Mayor of 'Auckland, Mr. C. J. Parr, C.M.G., presided.