YOU MUST FIGHT.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXIV, Issue XXIII, 9 June 1900, Page 1077

YOU MUST FIGHT.

Although we alone of the Eurojieau Powers have not yet the conscription, we have an Act of Parliament by which every man or youth between the ages of eighteen ami thirty can be forced to join the Militia. It is known as the ballot Act of 1860, and although it has been suspended year after year by the Army Act, it can at any tinv l.e out iu force by the authorities. There is every reason to suppose that it will be put into operation very shortly, as the outcome of the present troubles. The only alternative is conscript .cu. which is the curse of the Continent. Ii Fiance, for instance. 300.1'00 Frenchmen annually arrive at the age of twenty years. They are forthwith weeded cut under certain hard-and-fast regulations, by means of which all men under sft. 2in. in height; all physical wrecks, stammerers, shortsighted, and lame persons, and all convicted felons, are considered ineligible. The remainder have next to ballot for the number of places which will la.’oome vacan(t in the French Army during the coming year. The period of service is three years with the colours and ten years’ reserve setvice. The fourteenth year so. s them drafted into the territorial army for six years, whilst the twentieth year passes them into the territorial army for a similar period. In this way the Frenchman is always liable to active service between the ages of twenty and thirty-three, whilst from thirty-four to forty-five he is equally bound to defend his country against invasion. The German is bound under very similar conditions to serve his country until the age of forty-two.