Untitled

Timaru Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 11659, 18 January 1902, Page 2

In the course, of his speech at tiia WeLlington meeting in the Tneatre Bayal lastnight, the Premier laid stress upon ths necessity of finishing the South African war as spewliiy as pcasible, aad her said that if mow men from New Zealand were wanted they would be- sent. If the necessity should aiise, he would do well to study an article by Sir Henry MeyseyThoinpsan,. in the -t Nineteenth Century," under the heading " Light Weights to Finish the War."' Sir Henry advocates the enlistment in the British army of smaller men than the present standard allows. He points out that the actual weight which the horses of the mounted regiments in South Africa are carrying is over 20st, out of which the men, stripped, average list 21b. He contends that the authorities should endeavour to get a corps of men who would not average more than 9st 21b stripped, which, with some alteration in the accoutrements, would bring the maximum weight to be carried by each

horse down to between 13st and 14st. Sir Henry Thompson ridicules the idea of starting horses to harass Boers with 20st on their backs, and declares that the present state of things is most humiliating to England. A nation which prides itself upon its horsemanship sees, day after day, its horses breaking down by thousands and its horsemen defied and derided by the enemy. " What can we think," he cries, "of the wisdom which deliberately excludes and forbids to enter the army the very men we want—the men who would not break down our horses and who could end the war by outdoing the Boers at their own game." Sir H. Thompson points out the absurdity of forbidding a large section of the British population to enter the army at a time when there is such an outcry for men that Great Britain is threatened with conscription. The article concludes as fellows :—"Give the small men their chance, and I feel confident they will prove as willing to serve their country and as capable of doing it as any of their taller fellow countrymen."