"WE OLD SOLDIERS"

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22714, 28 April 1937, Page 10

"WE OLD SOLDIERS"

In the Governor-General's cordial greetings to the Returned Soldiers' Association 011 its twenty-first birthday is a timely appeal for the strengthening of its position and service. Lord Galway wisely calls attention to the changing circumstances that have increased the need for making its organisation effective, while adding to the difficulty of doing this. In the presence of a younger generation unable to appreciate keenly the part played by the men who left New Zealand's shores at the call of an urgent and exacting duty, ex-servicemen are under greater necessity to make the most of the comradeship to which their association ministers. Their ranks are being gradually thinned, yet among them are many in need of all the help that the association can render. To keep together, to rally to the task that brought the afterwar fellowship into being, and to keep alive the spirit of self-sacrifice in the community, these are aims to be sacredly and zealously pursued. His Excellency's phrase, "we old soldiers," has in it the fraternal note that has rung quietly yet insistently throughout the years that are gone, and must ring still if the years ahead are to see those aims fulfilled. A comradeship grown ever closer as in the coming days more must fall out will ensure a maintenance of the splendid record. The world has need of it. Influences that separate are to be feared and fought. In the practice of mutual aid the association will continue to justify its existence - and set an example widely inspiring.