[Cheers.] All the same there remains the fact that Russia was
taken at a disadvantage, and is, therefore, unable to utilize beyond a
fraction the enormous resources which she possesses to protect her soil
against the invader. France was not expecting war, and she, therefore,
was taken unawares.

What about Britain? We never contemplated any war of aggression against
any of our neighbors, and therefore we never raised an army adequate to
such sinister purposes. During the last thirty years the two great
political parties in the State have been responsible for the policy of
this country at home and abroad. For about the same period we have each
been governing this country. For about fifteen years neither one party
nor the other ever proposed to raise an army in this country that would
enable us to confront on land a great Continental power. What does that
mean? We never meant to invade any Continental country. [Cheers.] That
is the proof of it. If we had we would have started our great armies
years ago. We had a great navy, purely for protection, purely for the
defense of our shores, and we had an army which was just enough to deal
with any small raid that happened to get through the meshes of our navy,
and perhaps to police the empire. That was all, no more. But now we have
to assist neighbors becoming the victims of a power with millions of
warriors at its command, and we have to improvise a great army, and
gallantly have our men flocked to the standard. [Cheers.] We have raised
the largest voluntary army that has been enrolled in any country or any
century--the largest voluntary army, and it is going to be larger.
[Cheers.]

I saw a very fine sample of that army this morning at Llandudno. I
attended a service there, and I think it was about the most thrilling
religious service I have ever been privileged to attend. There were men
there of every class, every position, every calling, every condition of
life. The peasant had left his plow, the workman had left his lathe and
his loom, the clerk had left his desk, the trader and the business man
had left their counting houses, the shepherd had left his sunlit hills,
and the miner the darkness of the earth, the rich proprietor had left
his palace, and the man earning his daily bread had quitted his humble
cottage. There were men there of diverse and varied faiths who
worshipped at different shrines--men who were in array against each
other months ago in bitter conflict, and