ST. GEORGE AND THE DRAGON.

Wanganui Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 15970, 12 November 1919, Page 6

ST. GEORGE AND THE DRAGON.

To the Editor. Sir, —I was pleased to see St. George had not altogether left this earth. I trust your paper is prepared to give equal rights to all men to ventilate their opinions, whether they agree with yours or not. Now, St. George, in my opinion, made a most uncalled for attack on Mr Cuttle (whom on his published speech I am not a supporter of) in regard to what he said about the power which the brass hats exercised in the war. ' Mr Cuttle answered fairly, and St. George may look upon himself as gone over the top and can never return. In two words, "gone west." So far as I am concerned I feel this election should be "our country for ourselves"; in a more narrow minded way, "New Zealand for New Zealanders." I regret I can see no such cry. The only cry I hear is *"Ward," "Massey," "Labour"! It reminds me of a friend I met in Paris some months ago before' the war, talking about France—a Frenchman of the French! He said to me "Libertie, Agilite, Fraternite." This was democratic France before the war, and he asked, what do those words really mean to the people of France?. He was no I.W.W. or of that sort. Pie was an able and well-educated man of the middle class. A full stop in French is "point," and point in French also means "anything or none." On many of the public buildings in France you can see "Liberte Egalite, Fraternite." He said, "We, the people of France, look upon these words more or less as a joke, simply because we know there is no meaning in them. The rich crush the poor as they did under an empire, and the poor are up to-day against the rich', as they did under the days of an Emperor or a King." However these things may be, I see no man standing in this country for his country first and the rest no where. A straight out game on the tote for our country. Some hail Massey, some "Ward, some Labour. These are all false gods. What this country wants, and there does not seem much hope of getting it this election, is "our country for ourselves, j New Zealand for New Zealanders." ' Personally, I have the highest respect for Mr Veitch; so I have for Lipton's Teas. I shall always vote for the man who was born in this country, where I was, so long as he does not'make himself a "tag" to the man who wasn't.—l am, etc., THE DRAGON, or JAMES M. SPEED.