Page 6 Advertisements Column 1

Southland Times, Issue 17656, 14 February 1916, Page 6

A recruiting officer told a representative of the Hyttelton Times that, although there was a shortage in the infantry section of the Thirteenth Reinforcements, the other units were tilled. There seems to ho no difficulty in obtaining recruits for the artillery, engineers, signallers, Army Service Corps, mounted and ambulance. The official pointed to a row of clips, in which were many attestrncnt forms, all signed by men waiting to secure places in the branches mentioned. “We have enough men to supply places in all sections except the infantry for many weeks to come," remarokd the officer. “The trouble is that a man can apply to go in any section he chooses, and the Department cannot refuse his request. It can only suggest tluft he might agree to tie placed in another section. in one case a man Ims applied for a place in a unit which would not require him for several months. This sort of thing is growing, and all the time the infantry is shorthanded.” As an indication of what is required to complete a reinforcement draft for the Christchurch area, the officer quoted the following figures, taken at random, of one draft: —Mounted 20, artillery 12, engineers 7, Army Service Corps 4. ambulance I, signallers I, infantry 110. It will he seen from these figures how many infantrymen arc required for every one needed in any other section. At present the call is for infantrymen, and intending recruits should not object to enter that section. It is the want of infantry forces that will bring about conscription, ami not the want of men for other sections. That a great political struggle will lake place this year in America between the Republican and the Democratic parties, is the opinion of Mr Henry Mayward, wlio returned on Monday from a tom - of seven months' duration in the United States (says the Mow Zealand Herald). He said that, if the fight were a straight-out one, there would he no doubt but that the Republicans would sweep the States, 1 lit the fact that that party was divided into two sections altered the position. There was the Hull Moose section, headed by Mr Theodore Roosevelt, the members of which wore the extremists, and the old Republican party, who were more moderate. It was anticipated that the means of obviating trouble between these two sections would be the acceptance by both of Mr Roosevelt for nomination as the next President. “A great many Americans," concluded Mr Hayward, are very tired of President "Wilson's ‘words without actions’ policy; both In regard to the war and to the trouble in Mexico.”