WELLINGTON AND KITCHENER.
[TO TEl EDITOR OF TER " SPEOTATOR.”1
Sra,—In a letter headed " Save or Serve the State "' which appeared in your issue of July 8th there occur the following words : " I have often wondered at the fact that, so far' as I have seen, Tennyson's fine ode has not been remembered in connexion with the death of Lord Kitchener, to whom I should have thought many of its lines applied. Is it so little known It may interest the writer of those words and strike you as a curious coincidence that on the evening of July 13th .I was giving readings from Tennyson to a Literary and Debating Society in this far-away and little-known corner of the Empire. Among other poems, I read the " Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington,"` and remarked how interesting a parallel could be drawn between the character of the Duke and that of Lord Kitchener, each of them "in his simplicity sublime," each of them a " statesman-warrior moderate, resolute," each of them " great in council and great in war."' No, Sir, Tennyson is not forgotten yet. Can any one tell me of words more nobly descriptive of the present soul of the Empire than these hem Maud ?— " Let it flame or fade, and the war roll down like a wind, We have proved we have hearts in a cause, we are noble And myself have awaked, as it seems, to the better mind ; It is better to fight for the good than to rail at the ill ; I have felt with my native land, I am one with my kind. I embrace the purpose of God, and the doom assign'd."
It might be added that this little Colony, with a population of only forty thousand souls, has sent no fewer than five hundred and twenty. eight of its sons to fight for King and Empire.—I am, Sir, he., British lionduras. ROBERT WALTER, Colonial Secretary.
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