• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

The Institute of Australian Culture

Heritage, history, and heroes; literature, legends, and larrikins

  • Home
  • Articles
  • Biographies
  • Books
  • Ephemera
  • Poetry & songs
    • Recommended poetry
    • Poetry and songs, 1786-1900
    • Poetry and songs, 1901-1954
    • Rock music and pop music [videos]
    • Early music [videos]
  • Slang
  • Timeline
    • Timeline of Australian history and culture
    • Calendar of Australian history and culture
    • Significant events and commemorative dates
  • Topics

Compulsory military training [letter to the editor, from “Mary…”, 11 February 1911]

31 March 2023 · Leave a Comment

[Editor: This letter to the editor, about the compulsory training of Australian teenage males as military cadets, was published in The Observer (Adelaide, SA), 11 February 1911.]

Compulsory military training

From “Mary Had Another Little Lamb”:— “The Rev. W. Shaw quotes some beautiful lines by the poet James Russell Lowell on the above.

I, too, am a poet:—

Mary had a little lamb,
It’s fleece was white as snow;
Somebody whispered “Discipline,”
And the lamb refused to go.
Mary had always tended it —
It thought its thoughts were right —
So she wrote some lines to the papers,
And got other lambs to bite.

There are some beautiful thoughts in these lines.”



Source:
The Observer (Adelaide, SA), 11 February 1911, p. 47

James Russell Lowell = (1819-1891), an American poet, critic, editor, professor, and diplomat; he was born in Cambridge (Massachusetts, USA) in 1819, and died in Cambridge (Massachusetts, USA) in 1891
See: “James Russell Lowell”, Wikipedia

Filed Under: letters to the editor Tagged With: 500x500, army cadets, its (possessive with an apostrophe) (grammar), its (possessive without an apostrophe) (grammar), letters to the editor, military cadets, poem, soldier-cadets, SourceTrove, year1911

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Australian flag, Kangaroo, Wattle, 100hThe Institute of Australian Culture
Heritage, history, and heroes. Literature, legends, and larrikins. Stories, songs, and sages.

Search this site

Featured books

The Man from Snowy River and Other Verses, by Banjo Paterson A Book for Kids, by C. J. Dennis  The Bulletin Reciter: A Collection of Verses for Recitation from The Bulletin The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke, by C. J. Dennis The Complete Inner History of the Kelly Gang and Their Pursuers, by J. J. Kenneally The Foundations of Culture in Australia, by P. R. Stephensen The Australian Crisis, by C. H. Kirmess Such Is Life, by Joseph Furphy
More books (full text)

Featured lists

Timeline of Australian history and culture
A list of significant Australiana
Significant events and commemorative dates
Australian slang
Books (full text)
Australian literature
Rock music and pop music (videos)
Folk music and bush music (videos)
Early music (videos)
Recommended poetry
Poetry and songs, 1786-1900
Poetry and songs, 1901-1954
Australian explorers
Topics
Links

Featured posts

Advance Australia Fair: How the song became the Australian national anthem
Brian Cadd [music videos and biography]
Ned Kelly: Australian bushranger
Under the Southern Cross I Stand [the Australian cricket team’s victory song]

Some Australian authors

E. J. Brady
John Le Gay Brereton
C. J. Dennis
Mary Hannay Foott
Joseph Furphy
Mary Gilmore
Charles Harpur
Grant Hervey
Lucy Everett Homfray
Rex Ingamells
Henry Kendall
“Kookaburra”
Henry Lawson
Jack Moses
“Dryblower” Murphy
John Shaw Neilson
John O’Brien (Patrick Joseph Hartigan)
“Banjo” Paterson
Marie E. J. Pitt
A. G. Stephens
P. R. Stephensen
Agnes L. Storrie (Agnes L. Kettlewell)

Recent Posts

  • Obituary: Dr. James Edwards [31 December 1879]
  • Mothers’ Day [10 May 1909]
  • Mother’s Day [20 May 1909]
  • Mother’s Day [by Rev. Father J. M. Cusack, 25 May 1944]
  • Mothers’ Day [13 May 1921]

Top Posts & Pages

  • The Man from Snowy River [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • Australian slang
  • Rommel’s comments on Australian soldiers [1941-1942]
  • The Bastard from the Bush [poem, circa 1900]

Archives

Categories

Posts of note

The Bastard from the Bush [poem, circa 1900]
A Book for Kids [by C. J. Dennis, 1921]
Click Go the Shears [traditional Australian song, 1890s]
Core of My Heart [“My Country”, poem by Dorothea Mackellar, 24 October 1908]
Freedom on the Wallaby [poem by Henry Lawson, 16 May 1891]
The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]
Nationality [poem by Mary Gilmore, 12 May 1942]
The Newcastle song [music video, sung by Bob Hudson]
No Foe Shall Gather Our Harvest [poem by Mary Gilmore, 29 June 1940]
Our pipes [short story by Henry Lawson]
Rommel’s comments on Australian soldiers [1941-1942]
Shooting the moon [short story by Henry Lawson]

Recent Comments

  • FLC on The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • fynn's_haircut on The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • Denise on Rommel’s comments on Australian soldiers [1941-1942]
  • Richard Bennett on Waterloo: French Memorial [WW1-era postcard from an Australian soldier, 25 December 1918]
  • Allan Lowe on The Bastard from the Bush [poem, circa 1900]

For Australia

Copyright © 2023 · Log in