156 
THE BRITISH ARMY ON THE CONTI1T.NT OF EUROPE. 
victory of tlie age.” Thus the ancestors of the paltry little Englander 
in 1815 on the plains of Belgium. He should buy the Histoire de la 
Guerre sous Napoleon if he has any children. I hope he has not any. 
It's time his line was exhausted. 
My timo is up. 
I can only refer to the Crimea hastily. On tho offensive did not our 
troops do well at the Alma ? did the Prussians do one whit better be¬ 
tween Gravelotte and Point du Jour? At Balaklava did not our 
Highlanders resist a charge of cavalry with as steady a heroism, though 
not in square, as any Roman legion or Macedonian phalaux, in those 
actions which our ingenious youth is obliged to study to the neglect of 
our own story so far above “ all Greek, all Roman fame.” Was not 
Scarlett's heavy cavalry charge a brilliant example of skill and courage ? 
if the light cavalry charge was a tactical mistake was it not to the full 
as magnificent in its daring as the death ride of Bredow ? was not the 
action of the soldiers at Inkermann as fine an example of victorious 
resistance to surprise as any in history ? Thus, gentlemen, I have 
hastily traced the outlines of the campaigns of our race in Europe, 
some as exiles serving under foreign flags, most of them bearing aloft 
the standard of St. George. I believe that no other race has such an 
uninterrupted record of glory for 300 years. I say our system of 
education is scandalously defective. It lacks romance, it lacks imagi¬ 
nation, it ignores our records. I hold that every Briton should know these 
historical facts and that all our remarkable battles should be regularly 
celebrated. We have not yet reached the millenium or anything 
like it. At a time when all the other nations of Europe are devoting 
all their energies and directing all their efforts to military efficiency 
regardless of cost, we should at anyrate let our young men know what 
their forefathers were capable of doing. We ought, by studying the 
past, to feel ourselves worthy of our ancestors, and inspired to do our 
duty to our descendants, to prepare ourselves for critical emergencies in 
the future, to be worthy of our birth, to be careful of our heritage. 
“ The soul that riseth with us, our life’s star 
Hath had elsewhere its setting; it cometh from afar, 
Not in entire forgetfulness, and not from utter nothingness, 
But clothed in clouds of glory did we come ” 
Into our island home. (Cheers). 
