1940-04-22 — Page 23

Monday,

HONGKONG TELEGRAPH

April 22, 1940.

bary, Seprane Court

MAGAZINE

Princess Elizabeth was 14 Yesterday: St. George's

Birthday of a fairy princess

PRINCESS ELIZA-

TBETH was 14 years old

yeatorday. One day she may be Queen of England. It sot me thinking.

I recalled an earlier Princess, little Victoria Alexandrina of Kent, who at 17 came to the throne from the modest obscurity of Kensing- ton Palace; a palace, as somebody said, "very pleasant to drink ton

in,"

This little girl began her educa- tion at Ave with writing and French, going on to "Moral Stories" and the "Concise History of Eng- land."

At seven she was tackling Latin, and had learnt almost by heart a book on British trades.

She was the heiress of England, but she did not know it. Her mother, with an Imaginativeness rare in any walk of life, thought the burden of such knowledge might be too much for the child.

Victoria, writing in after years, said that she was about 12 when aho came

me to understand her posi- tlon, adding that the thought of responsibility to come made her very unhappy,

It was possible to keep Princess Victoria thus immorant of her status. Princess Elizabeth has long been aware of what the future holds for her. It is difficult to dis- cover from her beautiful behaviour in public whether or not the thought distresses her.

Fairy Tale Stage

to

MY own daughter is still in the fairy tale singe with regard Queens. To her they are all, and always, happy and glorious.

But the Princess must, being a quick and senalble child, have observed that her mother does not have much time to call her own. She must already be aware that Mummy has to do many things which fatigue or bare her. And she must sometimes say to herself:

"Mummy is only Daddy's wife. When I'm the Queen I shall have far more

to do, because I shall haye all Daddy's work as well-as things like visiting exhibitions and giving parties to hundreds of people."

And it is no wild guess that sometimes with that picture of the

future in mind, the child of 14 may Icel little wistfulness, little

fear.

打

Most of us accept without re- sistance what we are brought up. to expect, and the Princess is brought up to this Job of being Queen of England. She does not go to school with ther girls. Perhaps a school would not be able to cram in the special know- ledge fast enough.

Languages are important, a lot of time must go to them. History is important, if you are to bear a crown 500 years old.

And this

being a commercial age, no doubt she, too, like the earlier Princess, studies a book on British trades,

Play with other children? Not much of it, and not often. Do what you will to level things out, there can be, for this little girl, no chance to drink delight of battle with her peem.

She has no peers, in the sense of equals. To assert that she is a child like other children ia the merest pretence. She has a toy house, but it was an official gift. She is taken to the pantomime, the Tournament; but always in special box, always apart,

She rarely sees a man with his hat on.

Her whole childhood is, and must be, a childhood of years only. Each one of these public appearances, while it is partly a treat, is also parily a discipline.

n

She must

accept it with all its implica- tlons, the hus- band as

soon

possible,

tho tho

children, eternal

which

the disciplino

must

never fall.

My daugh

tho on

ter,

other hand, may

chango her mind and her plans o dozen .times between now and 10. At sho present wants to be a vet. But if,

when school is over, she decides against that, the skies will not fall. She can take her time about murrying. She can have a scho- lar's life or a farmer's.

She can, and must, acquire ex- perience of the world by knocking her tense and her wits against the sense and wits of other people. If she wants money, she

will have to earn it. If she wants power, she will have to fight for it. Her life will be flexible, and her

her future very much of making.

Own

In other words, the will go through life as a man in a baby car goes darting freely here and there, taking dangerous corners on

It Was

NORWEGIAN— THE ruthless war the Ger-

mans are waging against the Scandinavians to-day is not the first attempt by Ger- many to establish herself in the north. With occasional and momentary success it has been going on for centuries.

The Huns came pouring from the Steppes, to be broken 'at Chalons; the Turks came riding into the West, to be hammered by came In Charles Martel; Islom arms, to be routed at Granade and shaltered at Lepanto; the Sublime Porte sent its armies through the

Balicans, to bo held and put to flight at Vien-

па.

But

before

these great raids from the

two wheels, running out of petrol; obeying the rule of the road (1 hope) and seeing some beautiful country by the way. -

By State Coach

THE Princess must do her Journey through life in slato cooch, keeping On unchanging pace, surrounded by guards, mak- ing her own rule of the road, travelling along routes already policed and beflogged; Buckingham Palace to the Abbey, Buckingham Palace to St. Paul's, Buckingham Palare to St. Stephen's.

No change of plans allowed, because a whole limmensa organe 1841 isation hangs on the correct carrying out of these planu. No. happiness

No change of plans allowed, be- cause a whole immense organisa- tion hangs on the correct carrying out of these plans. No

hap- piness

Perhaps that goes too for. There are many kinds of happl- ness, and one of the best of them is doing a difficult job well,The Princess Elizabeth is being brought up

to undertake one of the most dimcult and responsible jobs in the world; If she succeeds in it she will know one of the most satisfy- ing of the world's joys: A verse from the Wisdom of Solornon comes to my mind.

"For she goeth about secking such as are worthy of her, show. ing herself favourably unto them in the ways, and meateth them in every thought. For the very true beginning of her is the denire of discipline, and the care of dis- elpline is love."

INANITY FARE

1

supposo Colman

when Ronald

Is a very ola man Thore'll still be thore dimples Of Shirley Timplo's.

PAGE

Day Is Celebrated To-morrow

St. GEORGE

for

ENGLAND

GIBBON has never been for-

́given for grossly libelling our patron saint. He identi- fies him with George of Cap- padocia, the Arian bishop of Alexandria from 356 to 361.

This George was born in a fuller's shop, and began his career as an army contractor. He supplled the Roman army with bad pork, and made his fortune,

This did not prevent him from being made Bishop of Alexandrin In place of the rightful Bishop. Athanasius, who had been turned put.

Aa Bishop, he resumed his pro- Ateering habits, which made hlm unpopular; and when Juilan the Apostate restored the hopes of the pagans, thoy, seized Bishop George and literally tore him limb from limb.

His unorthodox opinions pre. vented him from being canonised 15 martyr.

This disreputable person is not the patron saint of England.

♫

The authenile George was "military tribune"--that is to say a colonel in the Roman army, who was martyred during the last per- secution, in 303, and buried at

Done Before

-THERMOPYLAE

they said, as if they were speaking to-day of the Red Air Force. "So much the better," grunted Leonidas, in his short, Laconle way:" "Wê shall fight in the shinde."

*

When the armies, met-2,000,000 against 4,000-Xerkes waited for four days, expecting a surrender, He even sent a herald saying, "Give up your arms." Again Leo- nidas answered him in the Spartan "Come (or Laconic) fashion. and get them," he said.

Xerxes ordered a detachment to charge and take the Greeks alive. The force advanced and brake against the long pikes of the Greeks.

2,500 Years Ago

East, before the history of Britain began, when Rome was just a little town no one regarded, the East made its mightiest effort ugainst the West.

Two thousand five hundred and

ago-in 580 B.C.- twenty years

the

power of Asia was centred in Porsia. To the throne of the Persian conquecorn-Cyrus, Durlus, Cambyres-succeeded a megalo

Her Task Fixed manine named Xerxes, or, in Bib-

IF my daughter wants to raven- ously eat chocolate, she may,

But

the King's daughter is on show; her gloves are fixtures, and choco- Jale, if it is caten at all, decorously and in small quantities from a beautiful box.

Comics

She has never been a commoner, site.has never known the pleasures and humillations of being one of a crowl.

Looking forward another four or Ave

years I compare the probable lito of the Princess with the future of my own child. The one. will, at 18, have her task fixed. She cannot suddenly throw it away, forgot all the training of years, and decide that she will be a manne- quin or a medico instead.

lical legend, Ahasuerus. He turned his

eyes to the Went and saw the fount of our cinsler civilisation. Athens: Independent-of him and, ten years before victorious over his predecessor.

That Insult, thought the new- crowned King, should be avenged: and the Greeks, whose colonists owned his away, should also send earth to him as loken of their sub- mission.

So, for five years (a five-year plan, perhaps) Xerxes built up a army and a fleet. From India and Africa, from Meden and Kurdistan, from the Crimes, he recruited; the infantry numbered 1,700,000; the saitors mounted to nearly 600,000 (counting transports as well as warships); the cavalry was a mara

80,000. Twenty-nine separate na tions formed the forces—rather as they form the Russlun troops to-day.

After months of preparation the army of Asia began to move, Xerxes had two bridges bulit over the Dardanelles: the castward one against the current, the westward one against the wind. It took the army seven days to cross them.

The city states of democratic Greece were, like Europe to-day- incapable of forming united front. Half the states wanted to leave Athens to fight it out alone. But Sporta forgot

traditional her rivalry and made common cause with Athens, and, as the military leader of Greece, assumed the ini tiative. One of her two kings, Leonidas, was given the' command.

He determined to hold a pass (much no Hornitus determined to hold the bridge) in the mountains. This was called Thermopylae-the Hot Gates. The force Leonidas controlled numbered 300 Spartans and about 4,000 mixed. tribes second-line fighting men. Splen came to him with tales of the ar- horseback: chers who fred from "Their arrows darken the

Bun,"

Three Limes

Xerxes jumped from his throne a8 he Bow his army repulsed by this "con- temptible" little force. Finally, he ordered the Royal Bodyguard-the pick of the Persian force, nicknamed "The Im- mortals"-to charge. They rode headlong up the pass but the Spartans did not move.

The next day was a repetition of the first. Leonidas managed his rellefs with genius, But--Persia was wealthy and Greece was poor. One Greek, Ephialtes by name, sold a military secret: there was - other, hidden, difficult

pass, by which the Persinns might take Leonidas in the rear, A largo de- tachment came round.

Grecks warned the Spartan of his danger, and he ordered the bulk of the allled troops away. 'The Thesplans volunteered to stay. The Spartans never retreated.

Leonidas led the little remnant of hls force into the open ground, and charged headlong into an advancing force. They turned the vanguard into the sen. Levaldos, mindful of an ornele which prophesied that either Sparta or her King must foll, was sinin.

Tho battle of Thermopylae was Jost-but Greece, and with Greece, Europe, was saved.

Lydda, where a sixth century church erected in his honour still stands.

For some unknown reason he was called "the great martyr," and legends, soon gathered round his name. He was provided with a dragon as early as the sixth cen- tury, and with a horse in the thirteenth, after the Fourth Cru- side. The horse in his statute at

snople, in the Imperial

used to neigh violently when a hostile army approached the city.

He was adopted as patron saint of England by the Normans in re cognition of the assistance which he gave to the Crusaders by ap- pearing among their hurling javelins at the Paynims. In the fourteenth century the Order of the Garter was placed under his patronage and his feast became a red-letter day In the Church Calendar.

I have not heard that he helped us in any of the battles on the Western Front. Perhaps be felt that his equipment was rather out of date. So much for St. George.

M

Are we really a patriotic people? Foreigners think we are.

The Germans are fond of sny- ing that the Englishman's motto is "My country, right or wong" I

used to think that this precious epigram was spoken by an Ameri- can, but have run it to earth as a toust given at Norfolk in the year -after-Waterloo-by-u gentleman-of--

the curious name of Decatur.

I do not think it is true of our countrymen that they defend their country's actions with a bad con-

science.

We are not so demonstratively patriotic as most other nations,

We have an unusually large number of anil-patriots who, more or less sincerely, believe that Eng- land differs from other misguided rascals, in never being in the right even by accident.

But there In another reason. In Rudyard Kipling's "Stally and Co," there is a scene where n weil- meaning

ning visitor tries to rouse en- thusiasm among the boys by far- boyant talk about "our country.” It fell absolutely flat. That kind of thing, the boys thought, is in bad taste.

Kipling was quite right. The Englishman loves his country as n man loves his wife.

Privately he is convinced that she is the best and most charming woman in the world. But as to boasting about her perfections, it is simply not done.

* *

Again, a good deal of patriotisra consists in hatred of other nations. We.. I am thankful to say, are bad haters.

We were worked up into hating Germany during the last war, and we proved that Lowell's words about the national character are still true. "The Englishman is not quarrelsome, but he has an inde

him durability of fight in

"That we have aliort meineries is illustrated by the following story:

An American and an English- man met casually and got on very well together. When they parted "Well, sir, E the American said, "W

I like you very well; but I must tell you that I hate the English. I can't get over the burning of Washing- ton." (This unfortunate incident took place in 1812. As an act of

burni reprisal, our troops public buildings in the American capital.)

"No. Did we?" said the Eng- lishman in surprise.

"Yes," you did.".

some

"Well, that is really disgrace- ful. I know we burnt Joan of Aro, but I thought Washington dled to his bed!"

-W.R.I.

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