ANZAC COMMEMORATION

Taranaki Daily News, 26 April 1932, Page 5

ANZAC COMMEMORATION

"CONSECRATED GROUND."

WAVERLEY MEMORIAL SERVICE. *We cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate this ground. The great men who struggled here have consecrated it far beyond our power to add or detract. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated to the unfinished work which • they who fought here have so far advanced.” With these words of Abraham Lincoln, uttered on the historic field of Gettysburg, the Rev. C. Dobbs (Wanganui) prefaced his address at a wellattended Anzac service at Waverley yesterday. , . (Back there in the ghastly years of war, he said, they who from farm, office, shop and factory heard and responded to the clarion call, consecrated the ground. In the fullness of man’s vigour they went forth with glad hearts for God, King and country. As man read the history of those days he marvelled that any returned to tell the tale. But many did and some were there that day to remember those who came not back, but whose names were writ not only on stone but also in many human hearts. Mr. Dobbs urged his hearers to remind those who made holiday on Anzac Day that their liberty, freedom and happiness, and even life itself, were bought at the price of the blood of New Zealand’s glorious dead. May never regret their sacrifice. May they ever be able to say proudly with Rupert Brooke, “Think only this of me, that there’s some corner of a foreign strand that is forever—-not England, but New Zealand. . Then there were those who gave their sons, husbands and fathers at the cost of a great pain, a great longing and a great loneliness. Succeeding generations remembered them and thanked God foi them. Sympathy for them was too deep for words, but men’s hearts understood. There nes One who understood and • would comfort them better than their fellow men could. The Rev. H. C. Stuart, who presided, offered prayer. The Rev. E. W. Coles read a Scripture passage, and a choir with Mrs. Eames at the organ,,led the singing of hymns and the National Anthem. At the conclusion of the service there was a parade of returned men to the war memorial, where wreaths were laid and “The Last Post” was sounded.