CANADIAN VOLUNTEERS.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 241, 14 November 1914, Page 10

CANADIAN VOLUNTEERS.

READY TO FIGHT FOR THE MOTHER COUNTRY. 30,000 IN MODEL CAMP. [By Robert R. McCormick, Special Correspondent of the ' 'Chicago Tribune.V] MONTREAL, Quebec, September 26. •Special. —Quebec has been captured by the European war. Its eighty-odd thousand inhabitants are either ministering to the needs of the 30,000 troops in Valcartier camp 1 and an apparently equal number of relatives and admirers who have followed them to.-Quebec, or else unostentatiously following their private affairs. In public one sees only soldiers and '' war fans." Amused Americans often say Canadians are more English than the English. They might say so now! Hair-splitting, lawyers and staid young, bank managers (Canadian bank managers ate all young) tell of the ' 1 duty to support the Empire,'' t-hc menace of Imperial militarism," the "violation of neutrality," with all the force one would expect from an English diplomat or ship-owner. Volunteers Well Trained. It seems strange, but the Canadians are going into the Servian-Austrian quarrel with as much enthusiasm as if it were their own, and they are going into it effectively. " : ' Col. Samuel Hughes, the Mxhister , ; of Militia, as the head of the Canadian military is called, appeared to make a 1 serious blunder in passing over the regular-forces and calling for volunteers to make .up Canada's contingent, but lie lias gone, far to rectify the mistake. " r ' : •>' If his men do not give the appearance Of regulars, no one would take them.fpr r.e : cruits. Their camp has been warmly coihmended by Gen. Crozier, of the United States regular army. It is perfectly drained, has a running water system from a nearby river, and even electric lights, tapped from a passing transmission line. The camp is kept scrupulously <?lean. There., is. a i;o,tal absence of. tliie jtlispase epidemic in the, American camps in/1898, and among the English volunteers in l the Boer war.

The varied nature of the surrounding country furnishes a fine opportunity for manoeuvres, and the most complete rifle range ever constructed is used to teach the men to shoot. Keep Clean and Well. Remarkable as is the camp and the organisation ability displayed by the commandant, it is overshadowed by the personnel of the men —that they are all voluntarily enlisted accounts much for their earnestness in learning not only how to shoot and drill but how to" make camp and keep clean and well. That they have had to pass a physical examination accounts for their uniformly spl'endid physique; that they are exalted by a realisation of the ordeal ahead which raises them above their natural selves, is shown by the fact that they have acquired, a degree of discipline and subordination unusual in Americans —yes, in Canadian Americans, too. Yet they are only 'human and are not free from the foibles inherent in men newly invested with uniforms and furnished with loaded rifles on formal picket duty. There have been a few uncalledfor'shootings. Unoffending citizens have been threatened with charged bayonets. But the surprise is how little of it there has been.

Soldiers Police Soldiers. Soldiers on leave in uniforms have been soldiers on leave in uniform. They have" rebounded from the strict discipline of the camp with the usual liquid assistance. The police of Quebec early-admit-ted their inability to handle theiii, and now soldiers' are detailed to police soldiers. Hence, Bill on duty to-night will arrest Jim with all the zeal, that last week Jim arrested Bill. But to get due .perspective, , Quebec has never been more disorderly than an average college town the night of a big football game. . • The college parallel is carried out in the Chateau Frontenac, Quebec's chief hotel. This is the rendezvous of the officers and the families that have followed them this far. . . : . There is a great deal of social life m the hotel. Mixed luncheons and dinners are much in order. The parlors are crowded. There is dancing every night. Soldiers are predominant, chief among them the officers from Montreal and Toronto. The Western contingents, with their sombrero hats, are more in evidence in the billianl-room, as are the Highlanders. 1 ; . The Highlander^are Canadian artisans and clerks, and Highlanders iiv name only. They are quite conscious of their lilywhite knees. One can generally find them With a spatted foot, reposing on a brass rail! No German Wines Served. No German wines are served in Quebec -—whether to boycott the enemy or to avoid offence"'to 'a .patriot who has been patronising the home product, mine host saith not.

One is struck by the number of young officers, boys almost, whose mothers have taken them to this training camp of death, just as freshmen are often taken by their mothers to the college training camps for life. The boys act more as. boys going to college, embarrassed by maternal attention in public,undoubtedly teased by their more. fortunate unmothered .companions; • < ' ! They will cry'at paHiiig, -they will yearn for the dear face many times before they see Quebec again, or find Belgian graves; but now they are impatient to assert their new found manhood. Their only fear is that they will

not behave well in action —the only danger from which they are immune. Tragedy of the Mothers.

But the mothers, how different from the proud women having sons to get the higher education which the father possibly lacked, to receive the benefits of a number of feminine deprivations forgotten now, but once so hardly foregone. Sad eyed, grey haired, perhaps in the last week they lean heavily on the son who was a baby such a short time ago whom they fondly expected to scold and caress while their lives should last. ■ Why should he be killed in a quarrel between the savage, the Servian and the greedy liabsburg? * Truly, you say, give us women suffrage and war will end. Town Full of Girls. But more than the cabled message, of the British Ministers, more than the appeals of the Press,"or the flamboyant posters, more than the spirit of adventure inherent in youth, girls are filling the ranks with fighting men. , The hotel is full of girls* the town.is full of them. Every soldier has.a girl, but there is no girl for the man in; mufti. The girls certainly do not want the men to go to this-war. But; their attraction to the. man in uniform is filling recruiting offices, ; so the sergeants say. , so many wives appear to. have accompanied 'their' frusbaiids, as mothers have followed sons.; Perhaps they have' staged at libhie with their 1 children, perhaps"'"the older i men of responsible raiik. feel that thfiy should 'hot be' diverted from- their • work or reminded of the sacrifice th'ey 'are making; ; to< the coun : ; ; ! liike Eve of Waterloo. \ 11 Que does- not; feel .-such; hon*.or. at these mafur,e: men - .walking into the javrs of death as one does at the holocaust of youngsters.. The firm, mustached under the graying-liair make no appeal, to sympathy. These men have gone .well on their way to the inevitable end; then there are old merh,. professional soldiers, on. the verge of retirement. One hoi>es with them that, their strength may lpt to , carry them, to a bullet or shrapnel ball to crOwii, their career. ,

Quebec has. .perhaps,, {something of the, atmosphere of the Duchess of Richr mond's ball before Waterloo. Reason tells us of. the horrors ! to contp, but the imagination casts it off. How can tliese peaceful, polite men be killed and killing in a short two weeks? Yet the transports are in the harbour and life is prolonged only until the equipment of killing is complete and the training finished. The Canadian contingent will'be only a very small fraction in the army it goes to join, but I am sure that, man for man, regiment for regiment, and brigade for brigade, it will be equal or superior to any troops engaged. * It combines with that discipline and training which has distinguished the European soldier tlie independent initiative and individual self regard that is created only in America.