The Irish standard., 1901-01-05
WAR CORRESPONDENTS.
What Col. Arthur Lynch thinks Of
some of Them.

From an article by Arthur Lynch.
Colonel of the Second Irish Brigade of
the ROcr Army. written for Golfers
weekly, we take the following on war
The type of War correspondent is
undergoing Il certain change. consist
ent both with changes in the conduct
OF war operations and changes in jour
nalism. Fhe near prototypes of our
present War correspondent differ as
much from those of to-day as Hanni-
bal from Baden-Powell. MacGnhan. for
instance. was Il great man. an explorer
and Il statesman. Donovan was Il
verit;lblc hero of romance. who finish
W! Il wonderful career in the mystery
ci an unknown dcath-swallowcd up
in the eternal silence of the desert.
Archibald Forbes WAS Il great rider,
something of swashbuckler, not So
"brainy' as the other two. but with Il
good sence of the broad issues of
things.
Nowadays the great journals of both
henispheres prefer to sen,l men who
have made regulations rather in the
world of flood and fell. War talk be-
comes more "gossipy," more full per-
solell detail, of impressions of every
thing that will commend it to the or
dinary reader of the newspaper, who
sandwiches the enjoyment of a battle
at his breakfast between the account
Of a society play and the success of
the latest American Jockey i'll Eng
land.
often wonder whether, with the
immense enterprise of our newspapers
and the enormous mass of literature
provided in consequence. the boosted
enlightenment of the public on great
topics really occurs. For the news
nearly always has such a decided bias
according to the set of opinion, and
the very mass of rculing necessary to
form a Judgment is so vast that the
public eye becomes BLASTED with OK
cess of light
This is especially the case in such
Il matter of hot discussion as the Borl'
war, where AN the world is partisan.
and where preiudiceS and SympathicS
outweigh, by % to l. good Judgment
and equity. Julian Ralph says all is
black. Richarding Harding Davis says
all is white. And they both make their
statements so elOQuently, and with
such an array OF arguments, that the
average citizen generally believes one
of the other and follows him hlintlly.
However, to come to the concrete
Winston Churchill is especially inter
cSting to me. both for his achieve
mentS and his promise. He is not Il
Stcrrutypcd character; he is full of life:
he has points; he gives play; he is
abundant in human nature; he is II
type off the winning young man of
today. And to the amateur of types.
or student of character, it is not cs-
scntial that the type should conform
to a rigid model. nor that the t-Ilul;c-
ter should be capable of expression i'm
Il lapidary inscription. Churchill dis
tinguishcd himself early in the war by
being captured; and, later. still more
by escaping. lie had the courage ana
the wisdom to tell his collntrynGln
that one Boer was equivalent in fight
ing power to five Englishmcn, and he
also said in the early stage of the cam
paign, "I'hcre has been "a great deal
too much surrcnlering in this war"
There was a period when he seemed
likely to become Il Bocr symlmtlizcr.
but after his escape from Pretoria one
OF his first messages was to The effect
that the war should he conducted ill.,
cXol"hly and nlcnmlroniSilrgly. Sine"
his return to London he has taken M
the cudgrls on behalf of the Tenth
Huss;il's and lhc First and Tenth Life
Guards against Lord ItoSSlyn. who as
sulpd the public, on tire authority of
certain unnamed English officers. that
these crack regiments had taken to
fight ana had deserted their guns, nj
Slnla'S Post.
was told by one of the Beers who
was present at Sannn's Post, and who
certainly had no prejudice against the
Household Cavalry as distinguished
from any other. that what happened
was this: at wHH properly Lcmmcr's
fight" he said. but Dc Wet got there
before him. He let the English pass
through a dry SLUT, with good part
of their men and guns, his own men be
ing kept in concealmcnt in the SLUT
Then suddenly he attacked and the
English we're seized with Il panic, and
1t was only a running fight after that
We killed and captured over 1000 and
only lost two men, ! give the state
menu Tor what IL iS worm; Dull WOulu
point out that even brave men unused
to the country and unslsilled in the art
of war as it should he practiccd, might
easily fall victims to Il panic under
such circumstances. That was seen
at Megersfontein, where one of the
bravest regiments in the world ran
like frightened sheep before the sud
den and murderOus fire of CrOnje's
men hidden in their trenches.