ANZAC DAY

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIII, Issue 9955, 26 April 1918, Page 6

ANZAC DAY

COMMEMORATION SERVICES

HONOURING THE DEAD THAT DIED FOR FREEDOM

WORDS OF GRIEF, PRIDE, fiWD STERIN RESOLVE

The passing of the third anniversary of Anzac Day—a day that will bo honoured in the annals Of the British race tor centuries to come —took place yesterday. The public functions and memorial services were markqd with a solemnity and soberness befitting the occasion and tho present crisis in the history of the Empire. Men ox all creeds for once united in bowing their heads beneath a common flag, which, after all, stands amongst other principles for the Brotherhood of Man. The memory of the heroes of Maoriland, who have passed into Valhalla., was honoured in words of stern resolve by statesanpn, in plaintive and poetical diction by churchmen, and by , tho citizens in the quiet, reserved manner of men of their race. Sentiment is seldom articulate in the British people—but it is there nono the less. The poetry ox tho deeds of the Anzacs, perhaps little apparent to the men who laid down their lives on the slopes of Gallipoli, that Justice, Truth, and Democracy might' not perish from tho earth, has stirred the hearts and brains of their countrymen. These men had their faults; they not deem they were heroes; they were men of prosaic habits, simple faith and ordinary humdrum lives- But they stood the test when the call came —they loved the ideals of their race better than life, and they hold sacred the deep abiding sense of Bight and Wrong implanted in their hearts by the Supreme Being. While tho British peoples endure as societies of free men their memory will be honoured with those vfho fell for Freedom’s cause down the ages. The Dominion honours the fathers and the mothers and the sisters and the brothers of the Anzac Dead: unborn generations will speak their names with pride and reverence and gratitude.' And so a fourth, year rolls on and the ‘Future hides in its sorrow and tribulation, hut also hope. When the fourth Anzac Day dawns, may the dark shadows of war and racial hatred flee away and Peace extend her olive wand over a chastened world!