OBLIGATIONS TO SOLDIERS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 11672, 12 April 1916, Page 4

OBLIGATIONS TO SOLDIERS.

SIR RIDER HAGGARD'S MISSION. HOBART, April 3. Sir Rider Haggard, on his mission to* Australia in connection with settling soldiers on the land, arrived this afternoon. He said he was out hero; ou behalf of tiio .Dominions Royal Com mission, but his principal aim/was to carry out certain investigations. .as represeiitatve of the Royal* Colonial Institute. He went first to South Africa, where the question of land settlement was hedged with some difficulties on account of political, issues. Ho had heard, however, ot various propositions that would be very suitable to the settlement of the officer class. As the result of an interview with the board of the Chartered Company of British South Africa it had offered 500,000 acres of land in Rhodesia for the settlement iof soldiers., atul offered to supply management. Now ho. had como to Tasmania, as the first calling place in Australia. Subsequently he was going to the Commonwealth and' New Zealand, and all boing well, to Canada. At the conclusion of the war several millions of men would bo disbanded, i and it was thought highly improbable that they would, all be- content to return to their old occupations, as the break in their lives had been so complete. Doubtless the'greater proportion of them would desire to give up the desk and counter and other such employments in favour of a freer life. After the Franco-German Avar emigration from Franco and Germany was very large. After the Boer it, was also large. In 1903 many people left England for America. It would be a. sad pity if all those good people were lost to the Empire. His desire was that if those people did wish to change their homes they should go to other parts of the world where the British flag flics, and not be lost in lands where by degrees they or .their children would be brought up in another nationality. It would bo unduly optimistic to suppose that the war was going to usher in the milennium. His own opinion, and ho was sorry to say it, was rather the reverse. It was quite likely that it would usher in a, oeriod of stress and strain to the Empire which would endure for years. One required to be of a very hopeful turn of mind to believe that Germany would amiably forget and forgive if defeated. It seemed to him quite possible j that Germany would for a generation nurso the idea of revenge, and do her utmost to carry it out. It was quite impossible to suppose that a great nation like Germany could bo absolutely crushed. Did Franco ever forget her defeat? Should the population of the British Empire decrease it was doubtful whether they could hold it. All the component Parts of the Empire should therefore take every possible step to ensuro an increase of its white population. The tendency nowadays was for statesmen to look merely for the year of the general election, but. they should cast their , eyes further forward than that. .