ALL Black captain dies

OF the losses which manly sport in New Zealand has suffered through the war, there has been none that will be regretted by a larger public than that of the death from wounds of Private Gallaher, of Auckland. As captain of the famous team of New Zealand footballers — the ‘‘All Blacks’’ — which played a sensationally series of matches in Great Britain in 1905, and as the exponent of a style of play that was regarded at Home as a daring innovation; Private Gallaher achieved a renown that may, without

exaggeration, be said to have extended throughout the whole of the British dominions where football has its devotees.

By his death in a greater and more strenuous game than that in which, during life, he performed a brilliant part, he has inscribed his name in the long, sad roll of British and colonial athletes who, cheerfully offering the sacrifice, if necessary, of their lives in behalf of their country, have now gained ‘‘the Final Honour of a simple Wooden Cross’’.

The sporting instinct which is inherent in the best of the British youth throughout the world has been an Imperial asset of incalculable value during this war. The qualities of initiative, resourcefulness, unselfishness, doggedness, and endurance are required in any man who would achieve success in the cricket and football field, and, to a somewhat less extent, perhaps, in the pastimes in which success depends more largely upon the

individual effort of the player than upon the collective efforts of a team. And these qualities; with that of personal courage, are precisely the qualities which enable the British soldier to assert, as we can well believe he has asserted, a personal ascendancy over the German soldier.