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REVIEW OF REVIEWS. 



Septemher 1, 1^19. 



part, indeed, of the curriculum, so that 

 they do not experience any inconveni- 

 ence, have good instructors, and regarci 

 their drills as an addition to their sports. 

 The State schoolbo\-, on the other hand, 

 has to drill out of school hours — the 

 workboy out of office hours — as often 

 as not in the road or public square. His 

 instructors thus far have not perhaps 

 been all that could be desired, and al- 

 together he looks upon his drill as a 

 labour. 



THE CAMP QUESTION. 



Another thing which has hardly been 

 realised, and will not be until everyone 

 between 18 and 25 is in training, is the 

 great inconvenience traders and manu- 

 facturers of all sorts will be put to 

 owing to the compulsory camps em- 

 ployees must all attend. At present the 

 camps are all worked off at the same 

 time, but when the citizen force is in full 

 training they will obviously have to be 

 continuous the year round, otherwise 

 factories and shops will all have to close 

 during camp time. In any case it is 

 pretty clear that an employer will in 

 future be strongly tempted to engage a 

 man over 26 in preference to one who 

 was liable for camp and drill. 



A MILITARY DOMINATION (?) 

 A very short time in Australia shows 

 one that the majority here have very 

 little real knowledge of the question, 

 have but the vaguest idea of the power 

 they have given the Military Council, 

 and realise not at all what the Act may 

 lead to. We are so democratic a people 

 both here and in England that \\'e can- 

 not yet grasp, as the Frenchman and 

 the German have been forced to, what it 

 means to be under the direct control of 

 a military organisation. At present, in 

 the early stages, that domination is 

 light, but to our descendents its little 

 finger may be thicker than its present 

 loins. 



HOW THE ACT I S REGARDED. 

 I find that the attitude of citizens to- 

 wards the Act is on the whole one of in- 

 difference. The great majority know 

 little about it, but say a little discipline 

 is " good for the boys." Of that the 

 briefest residence in the Commonwealth 

 will convince anyone, but if the chief 



value of Compulsory Service is to have 

 military officers take over the duties of 

 parents, so far-reaching and costly a 

 measure as the Defence Act was not 

 justified. I find also a considerable 

 number of men ver)' keen indeed on 

 creating an effective army, but convinced 

 that the training made compulsory by 

 the Act is hopelessh' inadequate. They 

 regard the Defence Act as the " thin 

 edge of the wedge," which will ere long 

 enable them to add very considerabl)- to 

 the number of days' training ever\' male 

 in the land must undergo. Another 

 earnest group consists of those entirely 

 opposed to the measure on conscien- 

 tious and other grounds. The\', like 

 those just mentioned, see in the Act an 

 instrument which may ere long make 

 Australia a military-dominated country. 

 There is still another group of men and 

 women who, though strongly disliking 

 their boys having to attend compulsory 

 drill, yet consider that the future wel- 

 fare of Australia demands that adequate 

 means of defence are provided against 

 a possible enemy. 



The second group, consisting chiefly 

 of military men, is easily the most influ- 

 ential. The third, which embraces the 

 Quakers, all conscientious objectors, and 

 thousands of working men and women, 

 is the most earnest. Its official mouth- 

 piece is the Australian Freedom League, 

 which has a membership of 55,000. 



A CONSPIR-ACV OF SILENCE. 

 The newspapers have little or nothing 

 to say about the working of the Act. 

 In fact, there is what might almost be 

 termed a conspiracy of silence amongst 

 them on the subject. Editors evidently 

 regard the Act as so much a fail ac- 

 compli that the less said about dif- 

 ficulties in administration the better. 

 This silence has made it difficult 

 to know just how the Act is working, or 

 how it is regarded, and has created the 

 impression that there has been hardly 

 any opposition to the measure at all, 

 and that " all's for the best in the best of 

 all possible worlds." It is true brief 

 accounts of prosecutions appear, but in 

 such a scrappy waj' that the average 

 reader is amazed when he learns 

 that there has been great difficulty 



