SOME GERMANS.

Observer, Volume XXXVI, Issue 38, 27 May 1916, Page 3

SOME GERMANS.

British "Officers and Gentlemen."

APROPOS of a subject which has deeply interested New Zealanders, the New Zealand "Times" has the following under the heading— THE ILLUSTRIOUS GRIERSON. "Mr Allen allowed himself to become a victim to his unhappy temper yesterday when he was questioned whether Lieutenant Grierson had gone to the front. 'Yes/ he shouted at the top of his voice, 'he has gone as a British officer and an honourable gentleman.' The first part of this statement is perfectly true. Grierson has gone as a British officer. It was within Mr Allen's power to make Grierson a British officer, and he did it, and the other British officers are welcome to congratulate themselves upon this desirable acquisition to their 'exclusive' circles. But if they were aware of the admission wrung from Grierson himself at the recent inquiry that, after being in receipt of a good steady salary, he cleared out to Auckland owing his landlady for his board and lodging, and his laundry lady for his washing, and that these debts had not been paid eighteen months later, they would most certainly have something to say about the honourable gentleman. Mr Allen is setting up an entirely new and extraordinary standard of what constitutes honourable and gentlemanly conduct, and one that will not be accepted by the ordinary honest man or woman. However, Mr Allen has had his way. His protege Grierson has gone to the front as a 'British officer and an honourable gentleman.' Let us hope, in the interests of all concerned, that he has taken with him the ten 'blank cards of membership of the German Defence League, which he was treasuring amongst his possessions, merely as curiosities, and the testimonial from the German Consul written in the German as well as the English language."

The regiment to which Mr Grierson has gone will be a much , sterner tribunal than is" Parliament, the Press, or any politician. In short, it is not at all certain that any soldier who is said to be of German birth or German sympathies should not be sent to the front to "try him out." He can chow his loyalty to King George there, and there is no-

body who can deal with disloyalty like the soldiers of his own regiment. The supposition that an alleged disloyalist in a British regiment has more brains than the whole of the regiment, and cannot be watched, is rather a disconcerting one. One has merely to glance at the active and reserve lists of the British Army to find that men with enemy names are allowed in the places where they can be carefully looked after. There are in the Army List such names as Aufholz, Balbst, Bach, Backhaus, Bblek, Barff, Barsdorf, vßauer, Baumer,' Baumgartner, Bernstein, Beit, Bergheim, which are only a small proportion of the "B's," while you may continue the alphabet with the Cronbachs (and a hundred other "C's"), Daubners, Elnen.borgs, Erlebachs, Fabers, Glucksteins, Grasdorfs. Hahns, Haldensteins. and so on without end,, until you get to the Yon Brockdorffs, and the Yon Donops, the Yon Essens, the Yon Geyers, the Yon Halles, the Yon Hugels, the Yon Rammingens, the Yon Poelliritzs, the Yon Roemers. the Yon Schroders, the Yon Stieglitzes, the Yon Trueniels, and a whole heap of other British officers. All these officers are in a place where their brother officers can immediately shoot them if they show German sympathy—and it's !a very good place for ' them to be. The loyalty of the "enemy alien" who says he is not an enemy can be beet proved by sending him to face Germans, and in making him live with ' men who will instantly slay him if he shows enemy sympathy.