SOLDIERS AND SAILORS

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5656, 29 August 1896, Page 6

SOLDIERS AND SAILORS

It is a remarkable thing that life in the two services will, after a certain time, change exactly similar characters. The surroundings are so completely different that they mould the temperament and alter the habits of men who are very much alike in individuality when entering the respective services. Tommy Atkins and Jack Tar have their peculiarities, but there is one thing that belongs to both, namely, a happy indifference to the future and a qtiick seizure of every opportunity to get away from the fearful monotony of a daily round of peace duties, but When the guns begin to play, as Rudyard Kipling says, both respond to the call of duty, without a flinch. The boatswain pipes his whistle and the drummer beats to quarters, or the bugler sounds the advance, and at it these veritable tigers for fighting go, whether dressed in blue or red. But in peace, how different is the jovial, gay, light-hearted tar to the stiffbearing of the redcoats. No one ever saw two soldiers riding on one horse ; but this is one of Jack's highest ideas of fund. Nelson, Drake and Rodney obtained for England the supremacy of the sea, without torpedo boats or ironclads. Wellington gained immortal victories without Maxim guns and quick-firing breechloaders that could kill at 1000 yards. So it is with other things. The old clay pipe and the cheroot are discarded as obsolete, and now Old Judge Cigarettes are, figuratively as well as literally, in everybody's mouth.