Cairo: General Birdwood has addressed the following words of warning in a specially prepared circular to the Australian and New Zealand troops:
‘‘Since the Australian and New Zealand Forces left their respective countries, you have made for yourselves a national reputation as good fighters, which has earned for you the esteem of our comrades, alongside of whom we will shortly be fighting.
‘‘The training that you have had will, I hope, enable you to utilise your fighting qualities to advantage. But, in addition to these two qualities, there is still a third which is essential to success - discipline; and it is the greatest of the three, for without discipline the best fighting troops in the world will fail at the last to achieve success.
‘‘That you will respect the women I have not the slightest doubt, because I well know how absolutely repugnant the idea of any offence against a defenceless woman is to every Australian and New Zealander. It is against drink, however, that I particularly wish now to warn you, and to implore you to take hold of yourselves, and in the case of every man to absolutely make up his mind and determine for himself that he will not give way to it and that he will remember that the honour of either Australia or New Zealand is in his personal keeping. In saying this you all know that I am only referring to a very small proportion indeed of your numbers.
''The great majority of you want no such warning, for I know you will already have made up your minds on the subject and all such I earnestly beg to do what is in their power to look after their comrades, who may not have the same strength of mind as they have.
‘‘Remember that a few black sheep can give a bad name to a whole flock, so let there be none such among us, and let us make up our minds that the Australian and New Zealand Forces are going to prove themselves second to none in the way of discipline, as they have already done where sheer hard fighting was concerned.''
■The attempt to establish the teaching of aviation in Auckland will witness an important development this week, a new aeroplane arriving from America for use at the Kohimarama Flying School.
The machine is a copy of the Curtiss flying boat now in use in the United States Navy (says the Star). It will be equipped with a 100-horse power motor, its plane-spread is 33ft, and it is built to carry two passengers.
Since the commencement of the war the Imperial Government has ordered from the Curtiss Aeroplane Company, of Buffalo, who are the makers, about 500 machines of exactly similar pattern, so that it will be seen that one result of the introduction of the new machine will be to acquaint those who are taking up the study of aviation locally with a type of machine officially approved.
The machine has been purchased by a small private syndicate of Auckland men, which has subscribed an amount of approximately £2000, and which proposes handing the machine over to the local school of aviation.
The Harbour Board arranged to place special facilities for immediately removing the machine at the disposal of the owners, and on arrival at Kohimarama the parts will be assembled, and the aeroplane will be ready for use in the course of two or three days.
- ODT, 5.5.1916.
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