RECRUITING DEMONSTRATION AT PORT CHALMERS.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 16289, 23 January 1915, Page 13

RECRUITING DEMONSTRATION AT PORT CHALMERS.

On Monday night next Port Chalmers residents will have an opportunity to enjoy jree of cost a concert programme of high merit, and at the same time be enabled to help the Empire further in its call for men. It is not that Port Chalmers has not already done this duty. It has done so, and will do it again. Many have already gone to the front from Port Chalmers, but men are not being called for only for the immediate moment. If such were the case, there would bo no need of demonstrations, the men would be forthcoming at once. Men will be required from New Zealand for months to come, and demonstrations such as will be given at Port Chalmers on Monday evening are organised with a view to strengthening and maintaining that feeling of intense patriotism, practical patriotism, which now prevails right throughout our Empire, and must not bo allowed to wane through any false feeling of security. In the Germans we have a foe who must not be despised, nor their strength underestimated. Their preparations have been carried on for maily years past, with the definite purpose of creating this war, whilst Great Britain has in a large measure been content calmly to discard such a thing as being out of the question. Now, the full truth is realised, and whatever mistakes have been made in the past, none must be made now. Thbrefore, Otago must leave no stone unturned in order to do all that is required of her, and these demonstrations are for the purpose of bringing home to our men and to our womenfolk, too, the necessity of having a continual flow of men to go forth and do battlo for the existence of our Empire. ihere is no reason to anticipate that the Garrison Hall in Port Chalmers will not be filled on Monday night and that more volunteers for service will not bo forthcoming. Mrs Hudson will sing the " Marseillaise," and Mrs W. S. Percy will sing the latest recruiting song, and will be ass:sted by a party of friends. This latter song has not yet been given on our local public platforms, but those who have heard it state that it is the best thing of its kind, and will " catch on " at once. Mr J. M*Grath has already been heard singing at recruiting concerts, and his magnificent voice is sure to be welcomed at Port Chalmers. Mr Bedford will be the principal speaker. There are few of our public speakers who can hold their audience enthralled as he can. Miss Ivy Mazengarb, who will be the elocutionist, will render a piece bearing on Lord Kitchener and the coming of recruits. Mrs J. Morgan and Mr Russell are too well known to Port Chalmers to require any formal introduction, and with the others, will place an excellent concert treat before their audience. The Port Chalmers Brass Band has placed it? services at the disposal of the committee, and tho local branch of tho National Reserve will also assist at Port Chalmers. Dr M'Nab (the Hastings correspondent of the Napier Telegraph states) has not yet received any absolute confirmation of the reported murder of his brother, Dr A. M'Nab, whilst in tho act of attending to the wounded on a battlefield in France, but ho is convinced that the worst has happened. A German named William Losche, who failed to report himself to tho police as ordered, was arrested on Tuesday at Taradale (says tho Hawke's Bay Herald), and was sent to Soames Island under military esnorh.