THE CHINA MAIL, SEPTEMBER 9, 1940.
CHINA MAIL
WINDSOR MOUSE
MUSICAL MASS PRODUCTION
The British Broadcast- ing Corporation recently started a series of pro- grammes designed to bring music to the fac- tories, with the object of increasing war produc- tion. Monotony, ofi course, militates seriously against the efficiency of the factory worker, and music doubtless would help him.
It is not merely that] music diverts his thought] from a wearisome routine:
it goes, one imagines, rather deeper than that. As Mr. Adrian Stokes once wrote:-
WACKE
SYD
HM⋅A⋅S
YDNEY
Sunday
Dear Jack On Friday I sunk I an Italian Cruiser that was going very fast and when I say going very fast fast, as they
mean blue pencil,
M. Briver hate
Think how the streets spring to life. when the bolder kind of barrel- organ grinds its tune! At once the streets be- come a mise en scene, the movement of pass- ers-by and of traffic be- comes a ballet of a sort, So many things that lay in pieces in the mind and which were pro- jected into the external .world as piecemeal, rhythmless... are ga- thered together, organ- ised and drilled by the music; and so we see the street differently We see things as
new.
It is, perhaps, much the same with the factory: the routine acquires a pat- tern, and hence a signi-|
workers
Syd
say
AND NOW THEY STAY FAST ·
IN HARBOUR
Offensive-Defensive
Before Invasion
Britain again faces invasion. It
is not the Arst, nor the most. menacing, threat that the coun- try has encountered. Little over a century ago the greatest of the world conquerors hinged his vast armies upon Boulogne for the [space' of two years, and frowned. across the Channel. The French cxulted
Our Emperor
Will show himself (say they) in
this exploit
Unwavering, keen, and irresistible, As is the lightning-prong; our
vast flotillas
Have been embodied as by
sorcery;
and the
Soldiers made scamen,
ports transformed
To rocking cities casemented with
guns.
But this was not all. There were Britain's preparations for defence to be taken into consideration. These, on the material plante, were hardly such as to inspire confidence,
Against these valiants
England's means:
་
balance
Raw merchant-fellows from the
countinghouse,
By Dudley Meads MacKegg
Raw labourers
from the fields, who thumb for arms Clumsy untempered pikes forged
hurriedly,
And call them full-equipt.
It is not to be wondered at that ļa certain Mr. Green at that time talked "of the conquest of Eng- land as a thing not admitting of doubt," while Frederick Foster wrote to the Lady Harriet Caven- dish that he Intended to go into the most distant provinces in search of troops and then quietly to meet (joindre) the "con- querors."
Yet Napoleon was conquered.
*
́ ́It may be supposed that in Mr. Foster's remark there was a cer tain tinge of humour. Only a little earlier Horace Walpole had writ ten, "I have little faith in an in- Ivasion at present: the unparalleled spirit, 'activity and cleverness of our seamen will, not tempt the French sailors much to embark." Somewhat more than two hun- dred years earlier the Spanish | Armada sailed up the Channel. It was the greatest feet the world had ever seen assembled. It be- longed to the greatest military power the world then knew. To oppose it the English. had a heterogeneous collection of small craft which a pleasure boat of to-
Yet the Armada was conquered, On none of these occasions were ·
Drake played his game
*
ま
of
ficance that leaves it no The raid on the German-oc-inspired the attack on Zeebrugge tile attacks that were alone possi-day would outclass. longer a meaningless re-cupled French coast carried out in 1917 are living still and they ble at that time, what must be the on Tuesday, June 25 by British form the best assurance of Bri-effect of the present, massive, petition. Naturally, some naval and military units in co-tain's. victory. They are already nightly attacks? German morale the English people unduly alarm-
the Royal Air cannot profit operation with
Jevident in another direction, is not so robust as British; and it ed. by this experiment; for Force has a significance that is though familiarity blunts the edge is certain that a dispersion of the bowls through to the end, though quite out of proportion to its di- of our appreciation: The nightly German Fighter Command must at that moment the Armada had even the thunders of the mensions and immediate results. raids on German industrial and be taking place without material-been sighted. "1812 Overture" would be
military objectives are havingly checking the decline in pro- In September the French armies their effect. When, during the duction and morale which bomb- In the last few weeks, as the lost in the earth-shaking on the Saar front advanced into last war, General Smuts reported ing brings in its train.
prospect of invasion has grown. Germany until, by the third week to the Cabinet on the role of the As the British numbers must steadily more solid, the temper of chorus of an iron foundry: of the month, they were every-Air Force he said; the day may now be increasing faster than the the British people has been not but elsewhere employees where on German soil and were not be far off whon aerial opera- German, it seems certain they are unworthy of their ancestors' calm.
jin possession of the commanding are certain to be grateful magos ng the whole front. Butions, with their devastation of overrating the results of such But another factor has entered
enemy lands and destruction of campaign, even allowing for the into it not before apparent. to the B. B. C. for a mill by this time, Poland was defeat-industrial centres on a vast scale present disparity. Already Britain those earlier trials, the response,
ed, the offensive was halted and that, to some extent, in its the French cabinet agreed to may become the principle opera- has sufficient anti-aircraft guns to of the British was that of brave "motion like an angel withdrawal from the dominating
sings."
"STUDY IN FOG"
positions won,
initiative,
soil was
-By- "STRATEGICUS"
In
the
give, with the assistance of her people, but secular. That is alter- fighters, very useful protection to ed now. The deepening. of danger in a remarkable really essential objectives. She has resulted
of has also secured a definite super-strengthening of the sources From that time the
iority of personnel in the air. poetry. And this poetry has been even in raiding activity, was al- lowed to fall almost entirely into]
What Britain lacks is numbers; almost uniformly conditioned by and these are being turned out in an increasing trust in religion." German hands. Lapped in a false,
British home and Dominion, as This has appeared even in the sense of security, the war came
well as American, factories at verse that has been published in to be regarded as one "without a
constantly increasing acceleration, the press. One such, taking up the In "Mein Kampf," battle", a "drole de guerre", £
From the events of the week, words of a phrase first used by The "phoney war". Adolf Hitler complained
ripe for the terrible harvest of tions of war, to which older forms is then evident that Britain is to the Archbishop of York, asserts: of the inability of imper- the last month.
of military and naval operations wage a fighting defensive until she It all depends on me, a nobody, If nobody I can and dare to may become secondary and sub-can actually take the "offensive.
bet ial Germany to compre- The British raid shows that ordinate.”"
In much that is obscure since the French surrender, this is as clear
Effaced of self, dependent on the hend British character. there is no intention of adopting
TAL Invulnerable though That inability would seem a strategy which involves in its He was driven to this conclu-as a beacon. Another thing that very essence the beginnings of sion by the fact that after a few can no longer be doubted is the
heavens fall. to have remained a legacy defeat. Wars, as. Mr. Churchill attacks by No. 3 Naval Wing in tremendous effect of the British
That shines through Following the same thought to the Third Reich. For by fighting; and Britain has be- of the powerful steelworks union every word Admiral Lutzow uses that the trust of men is not to be
has frequently suggested, are won the summer of 1916, the president blockade. faced with Britain's re-run. The daring, the skill and of Dusseldorf telegraphed to the to show that it no longer exists, placed in things of the earth, one It is impossible to prove to a newspaper quotes Browning: from fusal to be frightened or
the downright fighting spirit that German High Command that:
"The perpetually increasing cur-man that he is not blockaded. Ha "Instans Tyrannus": tallment of night work due to either is or he is not; and he? So, I soberly laid my last plan bought off by Herr Hitler's
well how things. To extinguish the man. "peace threats,”
along diplomatic lines.these raids not only results in an knows quite some
with The German deductions average decreworks but per stand. The mers Invocation of Round his creep-hole,
cent, of the output, but logic proves that the facts require never a break publicists in Germany are thus focus attention chief-it-is feared that night work may explanation. It may be that Gen- Ron my fires for his sake;- attempting to trace Bri- ly on Germany's continusoon have to be entirely suspenderal Smuts was right in thinking Overhead did my thunder com- tish resistance to special ing lack of capacity for thority spoke of the breaking Air Power: but, if he is, it will encouragement by Pre-understanding the British down of the moral resistance of only be in conjunction with effec- sident Roosevelt.
tive sea power, and, so far this point of view. This is a de-
is still in British hands. Hardly Most of us will feel that ficiency that Herr Hitler The result of this and similar a day passes without some drama-]'.
complaints was that the German tie incident such as the arrival the reasons for British; once - wrote down, as) Conimand had to allocate num-of Australian- and New Zealand firmness are clear enough cause of grave mistakes in bers of fighters to various centres troops from the other side of the dotted over the country. If that world-providing a proof that without "inside" analysis German policy.
was the effect of the petty, infan- none can challenge,
ed" and a German milltary au-that, victory is possible through
the nation."
bine
With my underground miné: Till I looked from my labour
content mahit To enjoy the event.
Do you see?. Just my vengeance
complatej „The man uprang to his feet, Slood erect, caught ut God's
skirts, and prayed! So I was afrasdi