THE VOLUNTEERS.
WITH the King's fine Message, which was printed in the papers of Wednesday, the Volunteers may be said to have finally come into their own. All the clouds of doubt are dissipated. Men who are over military age, but are fit to bear arms for Home Defence, have nothing to do now but to join up. The trumpet has sounded ; the need is urgent. The old excuse that the Volunteers " don't seem to be wanted " is utterly out of date ; the melancholy age when even Volunteers themselves half thought that they were a " wash-out " and a " nah-poo " force is ended. The King's Message, which urges the Lords-Lieutenant to raise and organize Volunteers for Home Defence, is worded with perfect wisdom, because itputs the matter on the only right foundation and relates the Volunteers to the proper tradition. From a glowing appreciation of the work of the Territorials, who were raised as a Home Defence Force, but went to fight the battles of their country abroad, the Message passes on to point out that the place at home left empty by the Territorials must now be filled. Every able-bodied man of fighting age is required abroad ; therefore the men who are over forty-one but are strong enough for the easier duties of Home Defence are needed in their thousands. The county authorities who so capably created the Territorial organization ate naturally appealed to by the King to undertake the new organization. They are asked to repeat their former success. And we cannot doubt that they will do it, for they are asked to do what they have learned from experience exactly how to do. The Volunteer Force will consist, of course, almost entirely of part-time soldiers. That means that an enormous reservoir of man-power will be required for the discharge of duties which cannot be allowed to lapse for ,single day, for when service is rendered by rota• a very large number of iTyMjs needed to maintain a .compittatively small force at a fired strength. It is clear, however, from the character of the King's Message that in future the Volunteers are to regard themselves, not merely as a body to release Regulars by taking over from ;hem sundry guard dutieS and trench construction, but as a fighting force in the proper sense. The men will be required to fit themselves as soldiers by serious musketry practice, by bayonet exercises, and by learning the arts of the bomber. This prospect is all, and even more than all, that the most enthusiastic Volunteer hoped and prayed and worked for. The fit man over the military age is to stand in the true line of British Volunteers. He is to be exactly what the Territorials were before the war drained our ordinary resources. It is a very proud moment for those of us who have laboured for tips solution. Looking back, however, we are bound to say that the action which the King has now taken with characteristic generosity of phrase, and with a real power to kindle enthusiasm, was postdated by the con- ditions from the very beginning, provided that the war lasted more than two years. It always puzzled us how rational men could really go about saying that it was useless to join the Volunteers, as they never received the least encourage- ment. It ought to have been obvious that if the drain on our human resources continued long enough the Volunteers must be wanted. No Government could possibly ignore the exist- ence of a body of two or three hundred thousand men who had already made themselves more qr less trained soldiers, and who were ready to the hand of the War Office when the supply of men in the country eligible for the Array began to run short. The decision now taken by the King and the Government has been published in s striking a manner in the King's Message because it is aal decision upon which there can Li) be no going back. The uke of Connaught has not been appointed as Colonel-in-Chief of the Volunteer Force for nothing. We do not mean that the Duke of Connaught is necessarily to are part in the training of the Force, but his appointment is a pledge of the great respect and serious- ness with which the King and the Government henceforth wish to treat the Volunteers.
Let us look now at two of the more pertinent questions which will probably `presexit themselves to every man over the military age who is asking himself the question : " Shall I join the Volunteers at once I " To begin with, he will probably ask himself whether he can afford the time. He will have read in the papers that the Volunteers are to be appealed to to give up more of their leisure than ever before, and to forfeit the old legal right of the Volunteers, under the Act of 1863, to retire from the Force at a fortnight's notice. He may tell himself that he cannot take the risk of wrecking his profession or occupation by pledging: himself to more military (hides than he has time to perform. The answer to this doubt is plain. It has already been announced that those Volunteers who can fulfil regularly the standard of duties imposed by the War Office will earn a capitation grant, but it has been explicitly declared that those who cannot afford the time to join what is now to, be called "Section A " will not cease tie be Volunteers. They will belong to " Seption 0," which will give as much service as it can, but will not be subject to pains and penalties till embodiment takes place. Of course a man who has not yet received any training would have to find enough time to qualify himself as a Volunteer by attending a good many drills.tiff he reached the standard of efficiency. But that would not take him long ; and, having once reached efficiency, he could be a member of " Section C." It is most important that this distinction between " Section A " and " Section C " should bo understood, and that the reality of the value of "Section C " as an essential part of the Volunteer Force should be appreciated. If once we . recognize the fact that the Voluoteer Force is to be a real fighting body, the importance of " Section C " cannot bo underrated. For if there should be a raid or invasion by the Germans, " Section C" would be embodied for service on exactly the same terms as " Section A." All distinctions would then be at an end. With the enemy on our soil, every patriotic man would let his business go by the board and never give it another thought till the enemy had been driven into the sea. We take this fact as elementary. Even if the sentiments of every reasonable man did not impel him to postpone all things to the task of instantly removing the German enemy from the face of Britain, it should be remembered that service for that purpose can be exacted under the Constitution, The man who refused to help to repel the King's, enemies when called Vigil to de_so would be, in the wee of the law. a felon. Thua nobody who can join " Section C " need worry himself about the ultimate implications of membership.. In this respect he is really in the hands of the Government in any case. In fine, no man should hesitate for a moment about joining the Volunteer Force because he may not have enough spare time to become a. member of "Section A." Of course no one should -he content with menibership of "Section 0" who can possibly join "Section A." We believe that it will be found that the duties of " Section A " can be performed more easily than is generally supposed, or than appears at first sight. Before we leave this part of the subject, however, we may point out that the man in " Section C " is the essential bed-rock Volunteer. The " Section A" man is an improvement on him if you will, a kind of super-Volunteer, but the plain ordinary Volunteer or " Section " man remains a most useful soldier. He is well worth keeping in the Force, as Lord French has told us over and over again.
The second question which will present itself to the hesi- tatiag mind is this : " Now that Mr. Neville Chamberlain is organizing Civilian Volunteer Service, had I not better wait And see if my services would be more useful as a civilian than as a military Volunteer ? " The answer to this question is decidedly No ! " The more important part of the labour „found by Mr. Chamberlain will be permanent, not part-time, labour. And even as regards part-time services, it should be remembered that a military Volunteer can always be drafted on to any sort of work. He will be all the more useful for every kind of labour from the very fact that he is a Volunteer. Men who know their drill are more easily handled and moved about, and being in formations they can be more quickly assembled when the need for them arises. To join the Volun- teers is not to deprive Mr. Chamberlain of any labour on which he has already cast his eye. The one system is com- plementary to the other.
Finally, we hope that the new era of the Volunteers may be marked by a Royal Review. Nothing would popularize the movement so much as the presence of the King at a great review. Volunteers themselves know very well the impetus that was given to their movement by the great review in Hyde Park when the London regiments marched past Lord French. But that effect would not be comparable with the effect of a Royal Review. It is undesirable of course that the railways should be heavily taxed by large movements of Volunteers. But if there were, say, one review in the North of London for the Volunteers of North London and the Northern Home Counties, and another review in the South of London for the Volunteers of South London and the .Southern tome Counties, the troops could march from their headquarters. Even if those who came from a con- siderable distance took from Saturday to Monday for the whole operation, the practice of shifting for themselves, finding themselves billets, or going into temporary camps would be excellent practice. Volunteer battalions do such things often enough as part of their training. Why then should they not combine training and review for the purpose of receiving the highest encouragement and best advertisement that could possibly be bestowed upon them I
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