VOLUNTEERS AND PRESSED MEN.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXV, Issue 10713, 4 November 1915, Page 4

VOLUNTEERS AND PRESSED MEN.

It is a popular fallacy that. 011 c volunteer is worth a dirfcen pressed men. 'l'llin opinion was voiced !by the Primp Minisil-r >at Wellington. And M»" M assey lias boon promptly taken to task % tlio Quistclmrch "Press," which says:—"Tlioro never was anv theory with fess wasrraait in fact. Ir ione. jMchv Zealandcr worth half a dozen Frencilrmen or 'Russians or Italians qi." even half a dozen Germans? The armies of Franco aw-o conscript Armies, as a.ro most of tU<? armies of Europe, and tit .is wildly wrong to suaigest that the ctourago and enthusiasm of t»Jie French are inferio,<- to tlu> courage and of our British ibt'-'ethircii. If compulsion were introduced into New Zealand, tl»~ pressed men wtoiukl not ho lniwilliw** men; thoso who aflo asking for compulsion are moil who have no idea o* avoiding their duty but who feel th» f the Germans we not .much worso icf the country than those Now Zealanders who would shirk their duty and stop into the home shoe* of those who volunteer for service. Wo .arc confident that the Government, ;if they think it necessary tn' •do .so, witT propose conscription. TJ»<» lamti-oonscriptionists. In such av ©vent,, will ibo ipeoplo <we.ll worth antagonising.' But in the Meantime it i» desirable that orronttous ideas on th* general question should he promptly corrected."