MR BRYCE’S SPEECH AT THE WELLINGTON DRILLSHED.

New Zealand Times, Volume XL, Issue 6887, 18 May 1883, Page 2

MR BRYCE’S SPEECH AT THE WELLINGTON DRILLSHED.

The speech of Mr Brtce last Thursday week, at the annual distribution of prizes at the Volunteer Drillshed, was specially suitable for the occasion, because it showed that volunteer corps in this colony are not merely ornamental, but useful. In all the Australian Colonies, hitherto, there has been no practical need of the services of the volunteers; no foreign enemy having landed on the coast, and the natives being of too low a grade in the scale.of civilization to defend their rights, still less to make aggressive attacks. In New Zealand the case has been different, and the last of the Maori wars was finished by the volunteers. But this is not all the service which they may justly claim to have performed. In Te WhitTs attempted insurrection at Parihaka a year and a-half back, as we know, their prompt response to the call of duty and display of overwhelming force, prevented what might otherwise have been another Maori war. Nor, has the utility of the volunteers ceased. As Mr Betce pointed out, on two occasions quite recently, on his journey through the "Waikato District, the promptitude of the volunteers prevented other fanatical outbreaks on the part of the natives, which might easily have caused the capture, or, perhaps, the death of some of the enterprising explorers. Judging by what our volunteers have already done, there is every reason to believe that if any attempt were made to land a hostile foreign force on our shores, they would again be promptly to the front and do their duty to the best of their ability. There seems good ground, therefore, for our Government to treat them with all possible liberality. In one respect this liberality seems to be only a matter of ordinary prudence. We tefer to the supplv of ammunition allowed. According to Sir Garnet Wolselet, our greatest British military authority at present, it is not the practice to allow a sufficient quantity of ammunition to make marksmen, and, in consequence, in every action a large amount of ammanition is actually thrown away, to say nothing of the far greater evil of the firing being ineffective for the purpose designed. When the British weapons were of a ruder description than at present the loss in powder and lead was even greater than it is now. It has been said that at Waterloo every man left dead on the field required his own weight in lead

to kill him. Sir Garnet Wolseley thinks that if the soldiers were all marksmen, coolly taking aim, 1000 of them would accomplish as much as 6000 at present. Whether our volunteers at Wellington and elsewhere in the colony would be sufficiently cool under fire to take good aim, we have no means of knowing. But we are glad to learn that they are really good shots in prize-shooting, and that already they are better in this respect than British soldiers of the line. It is quite true that the British volunteers also far surpass the soldiers of the lino in shooting with precision. But that does not in the least degree lessen the credit due to our own men. It is well that they are skilled marksmen, for as it is generally admitted that war is sometimes a necessity, we ought to be prepared for it, and if wo fight, should fight well.