THE WOMAN BEHIND THE GUN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LV, Issue 16823, 13 April 1918, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE WOMAN BEHIND THE GUN.

A VALUED AUXILIARY.

BY M ATA NO A.

Edward Cahi-enter's ardont book "Love's Coming of Ago," described the woman of this generation as moving, sad eyed and uncomplaining, in the petty sphere, of household toil, or else twisting herself into a ridiculous mime of fashion and frivolity, that she might find some use for her empty head and some favour with her domineering lord. " Her brain drafted and her outlook upon life marred by falsity and ignorance," she suffered, this typical woman of his description, a serfdom of shame, in pitiful silence. Maybe, where ho did his thinking and when he ran amok with his vitriol flask, twas partly so. But that was "before the war," and certainly not in Auckland in the week of the Women's Patriotic •League soldiers' gift effort. This week I was not many hours old before a great. I company, gathered in our Town Hall, was applauding the graceful speech of tho president of that league, a woman gifted to lead its enterprise of practical svral"itiy. And all through tho week, from "jrly mom till dewy eve and long after, the women of this league have been hurrying hither and thither on the errands of that enterprise. Thev have, without our knowing it, been given gladly the freedom of the city, and have used it in a way that would make Edward Carpenter rub his eyes. No household drudges they; no narrow sphere this; no uncomplaining wl-flffaci-mcnt theirs. Would ho dare to repeat that, "little noticed and less understood thev have accepted oblivion as inevitable? Their bold invasion of our business houses and offices, their brisk bombardment of our pockets, and their swift levying of tribute, all prove his picture false. Even where this Walt Whitman of the British Isles wrote his dirge it is now far from fact, so rapid and complete has been the change wrought by war.

Gj>ne forever are tho conditions that made tho homo woman's onlv sphere whether as drudge or queen. With a million more women than men, England before the war was compelled to cede woman a larger place in industries; and the Emj pire s newer lands were bound to feel the I same pressure of facts. But the war has .Drought a phenomenal demand for woman s labour, and bravely has she answered it.

In the Homeland fire million women nave been doing their share, and the share of the absent men, in the essential occupations of the country. A fourth of that great host has been engaged on the making of monitions and on other national work in this way relieving as many men or the firing-line. The magnificent aid thus given has been praised br Cabinet Ministers, and has won a decision from the House of Commons to give women the Parliamentary franchise. Military leaders have, acknowledged the value of this home service, rendered bv those to whom much of it was naturally rcpellant and of whom every one in five 'was totally new to the accepted task. Woman's Part In War.

The Empire ought never to forget what it owes to the woman behind the gun On occasions our women have fought, Boadlc.e» 1S J 0I! S since dead, but the spirit of the British warrior queen has survived Many a frontierswoman has had to draw trigger against Cherokee, or Sepoy or Zulu. The Flying Stool of Jenny Geddes is histono evidence of a feminine ability to resort to force, and tho hammers of the .suffragette sisterhood bear witness to like possibilities, latent but alive, to-day. But all the evolution of our race has" failed to provide our army with an Amazon reiment. *

In the navy women have served A century or 80 ago that was possible. Un the Victory, at Trafalgar, a Maltese sailors wife, whose sex was unsuspected, aid good work as a 'powder-monkey ; and at the battle of the Nile many women undisguised, "carried the powder" and ' behaved as well as the men." At Nelson's crowning victory a petty-officer's wife, a very big woman, was employed in the cockpit of the Tonnant, and when the wounded men were operated on she lifted them bodily from the table into their temporary berths. But these things are rather curiosities of history than instances in a chain of national development. The Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, formed last year under instruction of the British Army Council, comes, however, close to the idea of the worn in soldier. It has done eery fine work it tho front, as well as at home, not merely by the substitution of its voluntary members for soldiers doing clerical duty, but by their employment in the motor transport, telephone and kindred services, and in the technical branches of the Royal Flying Corps. Still, these occupations are doubtless incidental to an unexampled emergency created by a colossal war. It abides true that "woman is not undeveloped man, but diverse." Man for the field, and woman for the hearth, Man for the sword, and for tho needle she. It will be a decadent, not a dominant race, that forgets this deep-based truth. Invisible Supports.

Yet there remains, in every fight of consequence, as a force to bo reckoned with, the woman behind tho gun. She suffers, but she strives as well. Sho is, in such a conflict as to-day's, not far from the front. Behind the warrior, in most cases, a selfless mother stands. The heroism of his sacrifice is .at least matched by hers. His very facing of tho foe has caused already a sword to pierce through her o*n soul. She has not winced, it may be. That is her great heart's victory. Our Empire is full of such stricken mothers to-day. Proud they are, too finely proud to acknowledge the pang.

That you. my son. go forth to fight Is very fair and meet: And it's I shall be the Proud Lady When you ride down tho street; There's none shall hear me brave a sigh When you ride down tho street.

That you, my son, are stout and brave No man will dare gainsay: But it's I must smile with tho sword at my heart To see yon ride awayProudly must bear the heavy pain To see you rido away.

Comrades-in-arms henceforth arc we,

For I (urn warrior too; To England 1 i«1111 v you lend your life But it's I eve Englnnd you: Ah costly sift of a Proud Lad?, The cilt, my dear, of you!

As he goes, she gives. When he falls she suffers but & deepening of the wound already made in her fine sacrifice of him. So is it with wives and lovers and friends. A devoted womanhoods sacrificing and noble, stands unseen behind our army. The entraining drafts that went down our be-bannered thoroughfares in recent yesterdays marched to the drumheats of fond hearts whose tattoo was bravely muffled. Those leave-takings at the railway station on moro than one night of this week were felt most by tho women there or out of sight. Tho gifts to the Empire's cause demanded by tho hurrying to-morrows will bo grieved so, but ungrudged. The women of our Empire aro inseparably identified with this conflict. Many a man at the front has his chivalry inspired by thought of womanhood as bo has known it. Someone to him is worth more, though unseen, than even "tho angel at Mons." So he dares and endures, that womanhood everywhere may bo safe and sweet. And when thero reach our men the parcel-gifts whose arrival tells of the unfailing thought of tho women behind the guns, they, remembering as they are remembered, go on nerved anew for tho grim struggle. Tho League's effort of this week is an endeavour to ensure for our men the arrival of more than creature comforts. It will make sure the coming of their invisible supports* j