LONDON AND LADYSMITH. HEROES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2416, 28 June 1900, Page 8

LONDON AND LADYSMITH. HEROES.

BECEPTION OF THE NAVAL BRIGADE. A RECORD CRUSH. INTERESTING INCIDENTS. (Feok Otje Own Correspondent.} . LONDON, May 11. By those who have known the Metropolis for a quarter of a century London is said to have beaten its own past records, in the matter of streel crowds, on Monday last, when th<3 Naval Brigade of H.M.S. Powerful, who did such good service iivthe defence of Ladysmith, were accorded a reception worthy of the work they had performed.

There may possibly have been more eyewitnesses of a pageant, though even that is doubtful. At both the Golden and Diamond Jubilee the throngs were immense. But vast numbers saw the processions from within the houses along the line of route. On Monday, however, everyone seemed to be in the streets, and the sight of" hundreds of thousands of packed, swaying, good-humoured, and cheer.ing humanity was one never to be forgotten. Glorious weather, too, prevailed the whole of the day, so that there was not a drawback of which complaint could be made, even if anyone had felt inclined to grumble. But no one did; from the early morning till late in the afternoon all waited without a murmur to see the " handy man." Well to time at Victoria arrived the special train conveying the men — a train bedecked with laurel and the legend, " Welcome to the heroes of the Modder Eiver and Ladysmith," — every laurel leaf of which decoration was afterwards begged from the engine-driver by enthusiastic womenfolk. - , . Then, headed by the band of the Coldstreams and the 13th Middlesex R.V., the men marched to the Horse Giiarde, dragging with them the khaki-painted guns used by, them in Natal. Once out of the station what a reception they had ! And what a welcome was given to their commander, Captain Lambton, the designer of the gun carriage for the 4.7 gun. ' Victoria street to Westminster was ablaze with eolojur. At each of the Agenciesgeneral bunting was displayed, and the windows were full of colonists and their friends. The New Zealand offices were no exception, thos>e who read this may rest as&ured, while I am told that the scene in the Natal office, just opposite, almost beggared description. Marching up Whitehall the men passed on to the Horse Guards Parade, where they were inspected by the Prince of Wales, and were afterwards entertained at dinner by the Lords of the Admiralty. Still the crowd waited. Those who had scan the men once wanted to see them again, and those who hadn't seen them, to do their best to keep the places in which they found themselves, if it was a good one, or to try and get a better one if they deemed it bad. And the little artifices employed to secure a good position were as varied as they were ingenious. If only one-tenth of the stories told by young women to susceptible-looking policemen, that "my sweetheart's among them," were true, every man of the brigade must have been engaged ten deep at the least. And the " mothers" who had their boys there were as many. One of the myriads of Union Jacks broke loose from a scaffolding, and a young laboiirer, seizing a hammer and nail, climbed with it back and " nailed it to the mast." Then he stayed where he was, and had the laugh of those who had chesred him as he ascended. But one of the funniest scenes witnessed was on the Embankment at Charing Cross. In the opinion of Londoners, the Embankment is" the finest boulevard in the world. It may or it may not be, but certainly it looked beautiful on that bright May day, with its avemie of plane and lime trees just bursting into leaf. Here the crush was terrific, people standing 50 to 60 deep, and flush up to the extreme side boundaries of the broad footwalk. Noting the tree?, a petty officer in the navy saw his chance, and rlimbed one. His example was speedily followed, so that in less time , than it takes to tell of it a score or so of men and boys were perched aloft. Working their way laboriously through the crowd now came several policemen, with orders to bring the climbers down. But .they were deaf. And to see these metropolitan policemen, not made on the smallest scale, climbing those trees to chase the deaf ones out was worth 20 nights at the best comedy ever staged. And before all were well out of the boughs the brigade had passed on their way to the city, amid thunderous cheers, .which were taken up and repeated until throats were hoarse, so long as the glint of a bayonet could be discerned above the heads of the crowd. All the way to the city, where the men were entertained by Lloyd's, and then afterwards to London Bridge in the evening it was the same. The outburst of enthusiasm was as vigorous as in the early morning, and small wonder that when the roll-call was made seven men were found to be " lost, stolen, or strayed." The wonder if any was that, in the intense excitement and enthusiasm, any one of them was able to get away, or that the 4.7inch gun and Maxims were not impounded for display in the Royal Exchange. And when everything was all over and the men had entrained, everybody was asking someone else " If this is after Ladysmith, what will it be after Maf eking?" What, indeed? At the Royal Colonial Institute the flags of the colonies, including that of New Zealand, were displayed.

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