MASTERY OF THE SEA

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16317, 18 April 1927, Page 2

MASTERY OF THE SEA

MR, BALDWIN ON 110W T IT CAME T(> BRITAIN. UNCONQUERABLE SPIRIT. LONDON, Feb. 16. The Prime Minister was the guest of honor at the jubilee year banquet of the Chamber of Shipping of the United Kingdom in the Hotel Victoria, Loudon, last night. Replying to the toast of “His Majesty's Government,” proposed by Mr. A; Shaw, president-designate of the chamber, Mr. Baldwin said he could not help being struck with the motto on the outside of the chamber s programme, and he would render it into English rather freely: “The safety of this realm lies in the mastery of the seas.” He added: “I would use that word mastery in two senses—the mastery that intends that men who go to sea in pursuit of a ’living shall do. so without fear; and consequently the mastery of the seas by the English steamer. “With the memory of the Great War fresh in our minds, many of us cannot have failed to ask ourselves whence has co,me the mastery of the seas to which our very presence pays tribute?” Mr. Baldwin went on to show how

it had developed from the days of the Norsemen with their long boats with high bows and single sails, down to the Elizabethan age. After that the fame of this country on the sea was held by the Royal Navy. (Applause,) . Great as were, the sailors of the'Royal Navy during the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, great a,s were the Vikings, great as wove the Elizabethans, there has been nothing in our past ages more calculated to stir the blood of future generations than what happened on the seas of the world' from 1914 to 1918. (Loud and prolonged applause.) And the Merchant Service was akin to tho Elizabethan sailors. The Merchant Service in those days was full of Sir Richard Grenvilles and they werb found in every class. HEROIC MERCHANTMEN. Heroic deeds of merchant officers and teamen in armed liners and mysteryships were described by the Premier, who added that when thtfv remembered that these men were generally- without military training and their opponents were. invaiio.blY more heavily armed than they, what- a fund of courage 1 they could see was manifested, of that spirit that- we showed of old.

Not only those sailors but tlip fishermen of the country who went out minesweeping, and the quiet, wonderful heroism of the merchant sailors who returned time after time after they had been torpedoed, recalled this old spirit, “Such heroism as this wq landsmen,” went on Mix Baldwin, “and particularly, may I say lik'o myself, an inland man, makes us feel prouder than ever of ail those tha,t go down to tho sea in ships." I think that no firmer hope of tho future of this country and of the confidence to which she might look to emerging from all Her difficulties—social, industrial, and commercial —can be found than iii this', that we, have with us a leaven of men of such quali-