COMMONWEALTH CELEBRATIONS.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 11925, 25 December 1900, Page 5

COMMONWEALTH CELEBRATIONS.

THE IMPERIAL AND INDIAN CONTINGENTS. No. 2.

[All Riciits Reserved.]

(By Our Special Corespondent, Geo. Cathcakt CEAfG, author of. "Federal Defence of Australasia," Sydney.)

We will our youth lead on to victory, But draw jicTsworcls but what are sanctified. We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not breaths; In feelings, not in figures on a dial. —Bailey. Swift' her glance of scorn fell on them. England arose, spoke, and calmly said: "Nay! I am mistress still." —Ouida. The sending Homo of Australian continH'ents to lake nart in the historic march on tho occasion of the Queen's Jubilee was a

happy thought, which has resulted in

the union of all British and. colonial hearts, firm and true as steel to each oilier. Australian soldiers received the warmest welcome and the mo.st lavish hospitality from " oor am folk." That union of race and aspiration has been doubly and heroically intensified by tho numerous and gallantly-won victories by our Lancers and Rough Riders fHitinp; alongside of the British Grenadier. Highlander, and Irish Fusilier in South Africa. They fought and bled as nobly, and with that steady ardour which, marked the heroes of Marlboroiigh and Wellington. ONE WITH BRITAIN, HEART AND

SOTJL. Events march so rapidly and the manufacture of history is so electric that few soldiers who marched from Buckingham Palace to St. Paul's and back thought they would livo to sec such victories at Paardeberg and Diamond Hill, and such a gathering representative of Imperial and Indian soldiers marching through tho streets of an Australian city in honour and celebration of our Common- ! wealth birthday. But the event is for the con- \ solk'ation of Empire, the development of Australia :mtl New Zealand, and the expan- j ninn'of the race, as Kroude says, "amongst tho thousand isles of Southern Oeeana." Therefore, let all the sons -uid daughters of , Mother England born under the Southern '• Cross liqaL time, sound the drum, and play t!u> pipes to the martial airs of England. ! How? IScrawe. whilst the Indian and Im- ' prrial troop; are landing, or marching proudly with ba-.iner and drum down George and Maequnrie streets, a large contingent of Aus- ' tr^asinns. frojh from South Africa, with the lu;ht of battle and sunburnt face ot victory ■ upon them, wiil 1)0 marching through Temple . Bar and down Constitution Hill, amidst the j r,i.ml,vhi" cheer,, of the Mall and Whitehall. !

The whole thing is si wonderful coincidence, in the'blending oT race and unity of Empire. The ciders of Sydney and London will cross ouch other like the flashes'of Marconi; dashes of love and ylTa-iion over 16.000 miles of ocean, as sp-.u-kliug as the dashing waves that render ;.i>.y Athos and Ida. The Cnmmonwoalth Bill iia-sp.l the Imperial Parliament amidst (ho sounds of victory.