MILITARY DISPLAY.

Otago Witness, Issue 3117, 10 December 1913, Page 36

MILITARY DISPLAY.

CADETS AT FORBURY PARK. In addition to 100 territorials, about 150 of the local cadets are going up to take part in the big military tournament to be held in connection with the Auckland Exhibition on January 3 and 5. To help to defray the expense that this will involve, a comprehensive display by tho senior cadets and a number of other Dunedin companies was given at Forbury Park on Saturday afternoon. The attendance of tho public did not number many hundreds, and the exhibition given was worthy of a much larger audience. Just before three o'clock between 600 and 700 cadets filed on to the .ground, and were massed in the centre after marching through tho bog that covered a great part of the field. They were headed by their bugle band, which was making its first appearance in public. It played at intervals during the afternoon, and won a groat deal of favourable comment. Tho Fourth Regimental Band also lout its assistance to enliven tho proceedings. The companies taking part in tho very interesting programme that was carried out were tho Fifth Mounted Regiment, tho B Battery, tho Engineers, the Field Ambulance, and tho Fourth Otago Regiment. The opening item was a contest in the construction of barrel pier rafts, in which two squads of the Engineers went through the work with great skill, speed, and precision. Wrestling on horseback provided a number of very stubborn and amusing contests, and some of the competitors won hearty applause by the ingenious determination with which they warded off the combined attacks of several opponents. The Field Ambulance Corps gave exhibitions of stretcher drill and of methods of treating tho wounded, and companies of the cadets went through their rifle exercises with credit. Ihe best of tho cadets’ work, however, was done by a picked squad, which was put through a great variety of exacting physical exercises. ’lite uniformity ami exact precision of all their movements made their work very pretty to watch. One of the most spectacular events of the afternoon was the section alarm by the B Battery, which, after taking the guns to position, fired blank volleys that made the hills re-echo The Battery men also gave an exhibition of neat and intricate driving. The speedy manner in which destructive mines can he laid and fired in actual warfare was twice effectively illustrated by a squad of the field engineers. Probably nothing on the whole programme pleased the spectators more than the Hussars’ Rescue Race, over two flights of hurdles and back again. Most of the men were excellently mounted, and tho determination of some of tho spirited beasts to ignore their riders in the proceedings added a spice of uncertainty to tho contest. Tho spectacle of one of the rescuers dropping his “man right on a.post of the 'last hurdle proved irresistibly amusing. The big programme of. events was put through rapMly and with admirable military regularity, with tiro result that the grand march past winch brought the meeting to a close was reached practically at the scheduled time. Just before tins some* 300 territorials arrived on the field, and were massed with the cadets in the centre prior to leading offi in the march. About 1000 in all filed past Colonel Buuchop. D. 5.0., who took his stand at tire saluting base. The marching of the territorials was very pretty to watch, and the whole display made a fitting cle.sc to an instructive and excellently-planned afternoon’s entertainment.