“ALIEN’S” LETTER FROM ENGLAND.

Otago Witness, Issue 3212, 6 October 1915, Page 71

“ALIEN’S” LETTER FROM ENGLAND.

“The nation that prays as well as fights will be the deciding element in this great conflict.” This statement, which was made from the steps of St. Paul’s to the great congregation of soldiers at the intercession service, was repeated by the Bishop at the service held yesterday within the Cathedral on the anniversary of war with Germany. This service was attended by the King and Queen of our great Empire, and representatives of its every clime were gathered together under its vast dome. Not in this historic fane alone, but in every cathedral throughout the Britishspeaking land, prayers ascended for the victory of honour and justice, for the living, fighting, and sorrowing, and for the dead. “Almighty God, with Whom do live the spirits of them that depart hence in the Lord, and -with Whom the souls of the faithful, after they are delivered from the burden of the flesh, are in joy and felicity, we give Thee hearty thanks for our brothers who have laid down their lives for their country.” How those words rang through the vast aisles ! That was the keynote of the anniversary of the war; thanks for the men who love honour more than life, and take pride in country more than in personal possessions ; “the souls of the faithful” to their ideals and to their trust for posterity ■who live their faith. Those beautiful words of Stephenson on prayer, that if striving and being beaten back, falling, and rising to his feet again and again, be prayer, then he had prayed, is the prayer of the nation to-day. The great intercession of deeds, of courage, of patience is ascending with the incense of pain and selflessness from millions of lives; the tears of the widowed and fatherless, the needs of the suffering; the giving, the doing, this is the great intercession of reality and truth that is rising from the soul of a great nation; that will keep it great. “Give us this day our daily bread,” not “my” daily bread; the bread of the nation, the good of the nation, the good of the generations to come; the victory, not over our enemies, but the enemies of the progress and peace of the world, the victoryover the captivity of freedom, and the bondage to dishonour and thraldom to pride. For this we fight, for this we sacrifice and suffer, not alone that Britain may not be crushed by Germany and become first power. “Wo needs must love the highest when we see it,” and the highest that our Empire sees is not German rule. Yesterday the Empire solemnly renewed its vow to its high purpose. St. Paul’s at the heart of the Empire throbbed with the freat purpose that vibrated throughout the )ominions, to do and die if need be; to renounce, to suffer, to forego all save honour. And the King and Queen and Queen Mother came without ceremony and pomp, save that of the hearts of their people, to pray and give thanks with the people—thanks that the soul of the nation is alive to its uttermost parts; thanks for the men and women who have proven its strength and revitalised the weak. The crowds lined the approaches from Buckingham Palace to St. Paul’s. Hundreds of massed thousands cheered their Majesties all the way, for, although, there were no outriders and gorgeousness of uniforms, the grave-looking gentleman and lady rid ing in the open carriage represented so much, and represented it so well that if the Huns had been approaching London instead of Warsaw affection and loyalty would have been expressed. Outside the Cathedral tens of thousands who could not be admitted waited their Majesties’ coming and through the service joining in spirit. Admission was by ticket only, and in an hour the vast Cathedral was filled to overflowing, men and women from all the Dominions being among the great congregation, and, as among the crowd in °the streets, many men wore khaki. It was a crowd of much solemnity. Men and women were there who had suffered much. Many -were suffering agonies of mind and of loss; many men had come from the awfulness of many battlefields. It was at 11 o’clock, after the arrival of the civilians, that the wounded soldiers entered, and' the band of the Royal Artillery, on the left of the high altar where shone the cross, the symbol of our faith, played Sullivan’s “Light of the World,” and those mourning irreparable loss or bearing heavy burdens were touched immeasurably by the sight of the men who had been shattered for country’s sake. It was observed that as they filed down the aisle and spread from north and south they took the form of a great blue cross (their hospital garb is blue). After the soldiers came the Red Cross nurses, officers’ wives, and mothers of the wounded men. The soft playing on the organ of the “pathetic sympathy” seemed to intensify the dramatic moment. After the soldiers and their atendants the City Corporation passed wearing the robes of office, the Ministers of State, the Diplomatic Corps, and representatives of the Allies and Empire. In the midst of the group the purple velvet cushioned seats waited for the Royal Party, the cheering of -whose approach was now heard in the silence of the Cathedral, a silence which grew to intense stillness as his Majesty, wearing khaki uniform, walked to his place between two of the clergy, followed by the Queen, the Queen Mother, andother Royal ladies. No fanfare of trumpets announced the King’s coming, but his subjects have not been bo deeply touched by his presence since he passed to his crowning. After his Majesty’s silent prayer the service began with that grand old hymn, “Rock of Ages,” -which rose to the vaulted roof in tho vital irppenl . . . ’While the nearer waters roll, While th- tempest still is nigh. Tho Archbishop of Canterbury, in his address, said: “To the men and women

(Specially Written for the Ladies’ Page.)

A NATION AT PRAYER.

of the Empire to-day has come a trust not laid in like degree upon any of our sires. . . . Every month adds proof that we said and judged aright when on this exact day a year ago, after exhausting every effort which could honourably bo made to avert the conflict, we unsheathed the sword in a cause we can with a clear conscience commend to God—the cause of fealty and of resistance to the dominance of force and force alone. Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide. . . • To our common life at this grave hour the women of the Empire are contributing service which manhood cannot rival. The men, with dauntless courage, are offering their lives with simplicity and even gladness for their country and its cause. A year has come and gone since we put our hands to the work. . . . The well-being of the world in centuries yet unborn may turn upon the right use of this momentous hour.” The National Anthem closed the service, sung with the passion of a prayer : ! Maks him victorious, I Happy and glorious, Long to reign over us: i God save the King. Save what that grave gentleman represents to us; that for which have poured all the tears of the Empire’s mourners; for which these sleeves of khaki and blue hang empty, and men go on crutches; for which they enter the flame and burning; for which women are dressed in black and wear veils of mourning; for which men lie in lonely graves making “British dust ” on foreign shores. Send him victorious, ! Happy and glorious. The voices of the Empire mingle with the drums and violins to the arched roof as soldiers and civilians, statesmen, and the men and women in the street implore: i Long to reign over us Of imany faiths, of no faith, England can sing that prayer, for of all faiths and of no faith alike there is no hesitancy about the horrors and desolation of a conquered England. I At the London Opera House in the evening the war anniversary meeting was another rally of the Empire, and the immense audience, among which were many from the dominions, gave Sir Robert Borden, the Prime Minister of Canada, a most enthusiastic hearing. The audience was not of one class, but men and women representing not only all classes in London, but the Empire; and, as everywhere now, there was a number of men in khaki present. “For those who have fallen in the struggle we shall not cease to mourn,” said Sir Robert Borden, “ for the cam e to which they have consecrated their lives we shall not cease to strive.” Mr Balfour, who received a great ovation, said, “ The resolve of this great nation to pursue this struggle is sti-onger than it was, and our confidence in victory is oven greater than it was a year ago.” The Archbishop of York, speaking in Hull, addressed himself to the slackers of the nation, and said we had a right to ask of our Government to have the courage to test the real strength of its people—what was its capacity of sacrifice; in other words, compulsory service. “There are still thousands of men,” said the Archbishop. “miserably shirking, and he heard in different parts of the country that some were not ashamed to say that it mattered little to them whether or no our enemies won, so that they were sure of their wages. These are the sort of skunks one would like to put in the forefront of tho battle, with the bullets for deserters at their back!” But the Archbishop did not say that. Among the things the war has taught us is to know brave and manly men from cowards and idlers. “Another lesson we have learned,” the Bishop of Birmingham said, “ is how miserable were all our petty squabbles before the war”; and the Dean of Manchester said that in one year Germany had lost her commerce, colonies, and the confidence of the world, and had become a moral leper. Another stinging statement was by Earl Spencer at Northampton. He said that “ we are fighting against a man who has degraded himself to an equality with the cannibals of the Southern Seas. But one may say beneath them, for the cannibals boasted no cul ture, neither Christianity.” George Reid, at Bow, declared that “any Briton who talks of peace at this time deserves to be stamped with the everlasting badge of in f amy. ’ ’ But the talk is not of peace. We lift cur heads and brace our hearts for the long, long way to go. j August 10. I For some time past England has been free from raids and the rumours of raids, and this week the newspapers are silent regarding the raids on Dover and other places of the south-east coast and of London. In the absence' of reliable information regarding the other places, I cannot affirm whether the raids were real or imaginary; but that which occurred last .night “ somewhere ” on the south-east : coast, a mile or so from where I was , sleeping, or, rather, retired to rest, was real enough, and the explosions of the four bombs which the Zeppelins dropped were heard and their reflections seen. It was between 12 and 1 o’clock, a glorious night, : with a heaven full of stars. All along ! the peaceful coast the waves came softly 1 in, and the shipping lay at anchor. In j the villages the folk were sleeping the sleep of working men and women, with their children beside them. The visitors j and their littlo ones from the hot, jaded towns, tired, too, after bathing and pad dling and sand-digging, were also fast asleep, forgetful that England is at war with an enemy, ever wakeful and watch ful to our hurt. But our watchers are wakeful, too. and presently tho signals

ran from post to post that a Zeppelin was approaching, and the searchlights from Dover Hill and Harbour swept their great white arms across the summer sky, paling the distant stars, worlds far remote from the turmoil of our little planet and its inhabitants and their contentions. The village grew tired of watching, and ■with the chiming of 10 o’clock from the church tower the stragglers grew fewer. One could hear the shooting of bolts m cottage doors and the closing of windows. A heated discussion of neighbours over a dividing hedge as to whether the evening star, now high in the heavens, was a star or a lighted and stationary balloon came to an acrimonious end, one side of the fence maintaining that it was a star, because the clouds drifted over it, and the other affirming that clouds never drifted before the face of stars, which was a weak argument, because our earth-born clouds do hide the stars from sight. And the stars shone and the searchlights flashed, and when the church clock chimed 11 all the hamlet was asleep, except for the watchers at their post of duty at the military hospital among the trees, and an ocscasional swift-passing car, grey with dust of the road, from Dover or from London. The searchlights and the stars became blurred, faded, when suddenly I was awakened from sleep with the booming of guns that shook the bed and rattled the windows. The expected Zeppelin had passed over Dover, and was dropning bombs a few miles away, four in all, which missed the aeroplane factory they were evidently trying for, and, so far as is known, did no damage. From the hospital and by the inhabitants and visitors of Deal and Dover, who held open-air receptions of vigilance, the engines of the Zeppelins could be heard approaching, stop as the ship anchored, and then in quick succession the exploding of the bombs and see the flashes of fire. Gun after gun reverberated through the night; but the Zeppelin escaped. The sight and sound of airships passing overhead from their base at Shorncliff, scouting the east and south-east coasts, has become one of the daily occurrences that have ceased to be events. As I write I lift my eyes above the dark belt of trees to the cloudless bine of a perfect summer day, and there are two humming birds, not too high to distinguish their pilots from the animated machine that would scare the ghosts could the occupants of the churchyard over the wall 100 yards away rise from their ancient graves. But the world has progressed ('!) far since the names on the moss-grown tombstones were living men and women, and all the news of' the world came along the London road by coach to Dover. There passes another aeroplane, humming like a great bee. But not all of to-day’s growth are enraptured of the discoveries of science; not all, even among those whose interests and lives are set among the wonders of modern inventions, love the world any the better for their perfections. The other afternoon—the occas on was a cricket match between the convalescent patients of the military hospital across the road and 11 of ho officers of the Third East Surrey Regiment, stationed at Dover, who, with their colonel and major and captain, were the guests of the afternoon, —seated in the grounds at tea, the wife of a distinguished officer said to me—and she was not oldfashioned, but a “smart” woman : “I think these wonderful inventions have robbed life of its poetry. For every mile that the motor cars rob distance, they rob also the traveller of the charm of the way. . . . And in battle men of the finest individuality and noblest courage, who in a close fight would distinguish themselves, are mown down, nonentities, under the science of asphyxiating gas and liquid fire.” We sit these nights of 1915 either in darkness or b -hind darkened blinds and closed shutters, because our enemy from the sky may not see the lights of our homes. Ah Arab Weeding*. How an Arab wedding is arranged Is described by Beatrice Ellis, in an article in the Girl’s Realm. It is generally known in the neighbourhood when a girl is of ago to marry—the average age being 16 years, but some marry at the age of 14, or even 13. When a man wants to marry he sends his mother and sister to see diffierent girls, as he himself is not allowed to see hia future bride. If the girls seems suitable, the bridegroom, accompanied by the father of the bride, goes to the Cadi, and they discuss the price to be paid. Half the money, or, more often, three-quarters, goes to the father, and the rest is given in jewellery to the girl. The price varies according to the young girl’s accomplishments and charms. If she is pretty and a good housewife, a higher price is paid. A wife can be bought in Algeria from £25 upwards. When all the business part is arranged on paper and duly signed and witnessed, the two men go back each to their house to make preparation for the wedding fend, which lasts three days and nights, both the man and woman feasting

with their friends at their respective houses.

A girl is never asked among the Arabs if she would like to marry, or whom she would like. Her opinion counts for nothing, so she has no voice in the matter. One may easily understand the bitter dis appointments those marriages bring. But is it not often so in Europe ?