14 DECEMBER 1918, Page 2

Come what may, military responsibilities cannot be wiped out, though

they may be, and we earnestly hope will be, enormously reduced. In these circumstances it is surely the part of every good denlocrat to admit that the service which a man renders to his country with his body is an obligation of citizenship. It cannot be ruled out on the strength of an unhappy remark in a General's private letter. For our part, we should like to see compulsory military training of a moderate kind—of such a kind as would not interfere with any man's occupation in life—enforced as an essential part of the scheme of democratic responsibility. No impartial person will pretend that the young men who have passed through a military training, with its reasonable discipline, its regular hours, and its physical culture, do not come out much better men in every way than when they wont in.