DEFENCE.
IN beginning his elaborate study of the Empire and its capacity
for defence, the author of 'The Problems of Greater Britain'
says:--
'The danger in our path is that the enormous forces of European
militarism may crush the old country and destroy the integrity
of our Empire before the growth of the newer communities that it
contains has made it too strong for the attack.' In closing he
says: 'The result of this survey of Imperial Defence is to bring
before the mind a clearer image of the stupendous potential
strength of the British Empire, and of an equally stupendous
carelessness in organizing its forces. ... Our ambition is not
for offensive strength, and not only home-staying Britons, but
our more energetic colonists themselves, decline to accept such
organization of our power, with the temptations that it would
bring. We wish only to be safe from the ambition of others, and
the first step towards safety must be the arrangement of
consistent plans for supporting the whole edifice of British
rule by the assistance of all the component parts of the Empire.
As all have helped to raise the fabric, so may all combine {60}
to secure it by the adoption of a settled plan of Imperial
Defence.'
The defence of common interests has been, in the past, the
primary bond which has held federations together. It must be put
in the very forefront among the arguments for British unity.
Taken by itself it seems to furnish more than sufficient reason
why Great Britain and her colonies should present a united
political front to the world.
Common interests so vast no nation or union of nations has ever
before had in the history of the world. The foundations of
British greatness rest in the creative power of industry, and
that interaction of industry or exchange of products which we
call commerce. Industry and commerce have combined to make our
nation the richest in the world. We are a race of workers and of
traders. It is in virtue of our working and trading instincts
that we hold today the foremost place among the nations of the
world. In following them we have won Empire; it seems capable of
proof that to satisfy their necessities we must maintain Empire,
for what we have been in the past such we are manifestly to be
on a much larger scale in the future.
Transferred to Canada, or Australia, New Zealand, the Cape, or
to foreign lands, the Briton is still the eager worker and
trader, and the field for the exercise of his qualities is ever
enlarging. As the standard of living rises with increasing
prosperity, as the comforts and luxuries of distant lands come
within reach of even {61} the labouring man, commerce is
stimulated anew; its safety becomes of greater concern. In the
strength of the British flag to give security to the infinite
army of workers who carry on their toil under its protection, is
involved the welfare and prosperity of the greatest aggregation
of human beings that ever was joined together in one body
politic.
It is when we consider the extent of British commerce, of what
the nation constantly has staked upon the security of ocean
trade, that we realize the vastness and importance of the
problems involved in national defence, the supreme necessity
that British people should be in a position either to command
peace, or to face with confidence, so far as trade is concerned,
the risks of any war that may be forced upon them.
To most minds figures perhaps convey but an inadequate idea of
what they represent, but it is only by figures that the extent
of the stake which British people have upon the ocean can be
indicated. The rapidity of expansion is as striking as the
actual extent, and they may usefully be put together. In 1837,
when the Queen ascended the throne, the annual value of the
sea-commerce of the United Kingdom, together with that of the
colonies and dependencies, was estimated at £210,000,000. That
commerce has now, in a little more than fifty years, expanded to
nearly £1200,000,000. Every year British people have afloat upon
the ocean wealth represented by this enormous sum. Nothing like
it has ever been {62} known in the history of any nation before.
The marvellous expansion still goes on. In the case of the
colonies and dependencies, with their unlimited possibilities of
development, it is manifest that we see but the beginning of
their commercial career. For them, as for the mother-islands,
the safety of trade, the security of the ocean waterways, must
in the interests of industry be the supreme object of
statesmanship. And I believe that there is a well-nigh
unanswerable line of argument which goes to prove that
statesmanship will find that security most certainly and most
effectually by maintaining intact the actual unity of the Empire
through such further political consolidation of its various
parts as will make united action possible and most effective. On
the other hand, there are the strongest reasons for thinking
that the separation of even one of the great colonies might
produce for the colony itself, for the United Kingdom, and for
the Empire at large, a fatal flaw in the capacity for defending
interests which are vital to the general prosperity and to the
greatness of the nation.
The outline of this argument may be shortly stated.
The vast magnitude of the Empire, and its dispersion in the
various quarters of the globe, have hitherto oppressed the
imagination of those charged with its defence. Vulnerability has
seemed the natural concomitant of magnitude. The impression
might have been correct fifty or seventy-five years ago; it is
not so today. It seems a proposition fairly capable of
demonstration that under the changed conditions of {63} modern
communication and naval war the vast area of the Empire and the
wide dispersion of its parts, so far from being a cause of
weakness, are really elements, under proper organization, of a
strength greater than any nation of present or past times has
ever enjoyed. It is a strength, too, which particularly
recommends itself to the national mind, since it is effective
for defence rather than aggression.
To understand how magnitude and diffusion may be sources of
strength we must recall the fact that for all purposes of trade,
intercourse, and naval power, the introduction of steam has
re-created the world. Before Trafalgar was fought Nelson was
able to keep the sea for months, the staying power of a ship of
war depending almost entirely upon its supplies of food, water,
and warlike stores. Now it has become chiefly a question of coal
endurance. Removed from the means of renewing its supplies of
coal, the most powerful ship afloat within a very limited number
of days becomes a helpless hulk.
'The striking distance of a ship of war is now on an average two
thousand miles,' are the words used by Lord Salisbury not long
since to indicate the nature and extent of this change in the
conditions of naval defence. What he means is, we may suppose,
that when a modern ship of war has filled her bunkers with coal,
she can go two thousand miles, do the work assigned her, and get
safely back to her starting-place. High naval authorities have
told me that Lord Salisbury's average is fixed at the outside
limit.
{64}
'Our fleet must be present in sufficient force to protect
adequately the whole commerce of the Empire, wherever it is,'
says the Secretary of the Admiralty in a last year's speech, and
the press almost unanimously unites with Chambers of Commerce
and other representative bodies in echoing the sentiment as a
national resolution.
In discussing a considerable event in naval construction in the
beginning of the present year the _Times_ said: 'So far as human
effort can attain its end, the country has now definitely
resolved that the naval history of the future shall not be
unworthy of its past.' It added: 'There is no finality to naval
policy. ... Its only sound basis is not the cost of the fleet in
the abstract, but a rational estimate of the conditions of naval
defence at sea.'
But the world is 25,000 miles round, and the commerce of the
Empire is upon every sea. The striking distance of a ship of war
is 2000 miles, and practically every ship of war we have
operates under the limitations imposed by the use of steam. The
figures certainly give us the necessary data for calculating
what naval bases are necessary for adequate naval strength.
Surely Canada, resting on the North Atlantic and North Pacific;
South Africa, commanding the passage around the Cape; and
Australasia, in the centre of the vast breadth of the Indian and
Pacific Oceans, are not merely useful, but, under the conditions
which have been stated, essential. But when we have realized
{65} that under modern conditions they are essential to widely
extended sea power, we are in a position to understand the
addition which they make to defensive strength. A nation which
commands the great naval and coaling stations at these essential
points could practically paralyze any enemy which sought to
attack her, by simply closing the ports of coal supply to
hostile ships.
Let me ask the reader to turn to the map of the world which
accompanies this book. In it an attempt has been made to
emphasize, though not unduly, a few of the main facts connected
with our national position. The chief routes of British commerce
are indicated--the arteries along which flow the life-blood of
the nation. On what is now the principal route to the East, that
through the Mediterranean and Red Seas, we note the fortified
naval and coaling stations in a connected chain: Gibraltar,
Malta, Bombay, Trincomalee, Singapore, and Hong Kong. At each of
these stations British ships find themselves under the shelter
of strong fortifications. Most of them are practically
impregnable, and are supplied with docks for the repair of
ships. All are points of storage for coal. Besides these
stations of primary importance there are subsidiary ports,
Kurrachi, Colombo, Calcutta, and many others.
Whether this remarkable hold on the greatest route of Eastern
commerce is the outcome of a grasping militarism, or the natural
result which arises from supreme commercial interest, may be
judged from a {66} single fact. Of the 3800 steamships which
passed through the Canal in 1891 seventy-eight out of every
hundred were under the British flag, leaving only twenty-two
divided among Frenchmen, Germans, Dutchmen, Austrians,
Spaniards, Americans, and all the other nations of the world. Of
the whole tonnage eighty-two per cent. was British.
Follow, again, the alternative route to the East and South
around Africa. Here we find Sierra Leone, St. Helena, Cape Town,
and Mauritius at intervals singularly adapted to the necessities
of steam navigation under conditions of either peace or war.
Other nations occupy parts of Africa, but none have naval
stations of corresponding strength.
Terminating these two great Eastern routes we have in
Australasia King George's Sound, Thursday Island, Melbourne,
Sydney, and Auckland, which may be regarded as positions of
primary naval importance. Some of these are already fortified,
others have their defensive works in progress. Secondary, and
yet important, are Hobart, Adelaide, Brisbane, Wellington,
Lyttleton, Dunedin, and other ports.
Westward across the Atlantic, Halifax, Bermuda, St. Lucia, and
Jamaica furnish adequate naval bases for the protection of the
vast British commerce which traverses this ocean. The harbours
of the Gulf and River St. Lawrence and Newfoundland, and of
several West India islands, supplement these strongly fortified
positions.
On the Pacific Coast Esquimalt and Vancouver {67} furnish
stations from which may be protected the new route of trade and
travel opened to the far East, and the projected route to
Australasia.
Finally, the Falkland Islands, to which it has now been decided
to give adequate fortifications, furnish a coaling place for
ships in times of urgent necessity, and a point from which trade
can be defended in the long voyage between Britain and Australia
by the Cape Horn route. They also serve as a base of protection
for our large trade with the Western coast of South America.
It will be seen that the map illustrates another group of facts
which we must consider before we can fully grasp the relation of
this geographical distribution of the Empire to naval power in
an age of steam. On the Pacific and Atlantic coasts of Canada,
in New Zealand, Tasmania, New South Wales, and Queensland, in
India, Borneo, and South Africa, coal is noted as among the
products of these countries, and in them all, there are, in
fact, great coal deposits forming in each corner of the globe, a
wonderful complement to those of the mother-land.
Here, then, is the outline of a maritime position such as no
people ever enjoyed before. North and South, East and West, we
bold the great quadrilateral of oceanic power. It is not an
undue strength of position, for it has to match the greatest
commercial expansion that history has known. The security of
each part of the system seems essential to the security {68} of
the whole, and therefore should be guaranteed by the united
strength of all. And it is clear that under modern steaming
conditions it is this very diffusion of the Empire over every
part of the world which constitutes its greatest advantage for
giving safety to a world-wide commerce.
The conditions, however, under which this maritime position is
maintained, and the vast and growing commerce of the Empire now
enjoys security present some anomalies which cannot possibly
have in them conditions of permanency.
Let me summarize the facts as placed before the House of Commons
(March 2nd, 1891), by Sir John Colomb. The annual value of the
sea-borne commerce of the United Kingdom is, roughly speaking,
about £740,000,000; of the colonies and dependencies
£460,000,000. As the latter has increased ninefold and the
former but fivefold in a little more than fifty years, it is
clear that at no very distant time the sea-borne commerce of the
outlying empire will become equal to and gradually surpass in
value that of the United Kingdom.
The portion of the whole colonial trade which consists of
interchange with the United Kingdom, and in the safety of which
presumably the United Kingdom has a close and direct interest,
is £187,000,000. This leaves £273,000,000 of independent trade
carried on with foreign countries, or between the colonies and
dependencies themselves. Compared with the sea-borne trade of
great foreign powers which support {69} large war navies, Sir
John Colomb finds this independent trade to be 'about four times
as much as the whole sea-borne trade of all Russia; about equal
to that of Germany; about three-quarters that of France; two and
a-half times that of Italy; and nearly half that of the United
States.' The whole of this vast and rapidly increasing
independent trade has precisely the same guarantee of protection
from the naval power of the Empire as the trade of the United
Kingdom itself. Yet, while the net expenditure (1890) incurred
by the United Kingdom in the Naval Estimates is £14,215,100, the
whole contribution of the colonies and dependencies for the same
purpose only amounts to £381,546, of which India alone provides
£254,776. In other words, out of every pound spent for the
protection of the nation's commerce at sea, the United Kingdom
contributes 19s. 53/4d., the outlying empire 6 1/4d. This
comparison is made even more striking when combined with the
statement that the united revenues of the colonies and
dependencies amount to £105,000,000, against the £89,000,000
which represent the revenue of the United Kingdom. The vast
capital sum invested in ships, armament, and naval
establishments, believed to amount to more than £80,000,000, is
paid wholly by the taxpayers of the United Kingdom.
Besides the protection to their commerce given by the Navy,
colonists enjoy as fully as British people themselves the use
and advantage of the consular and diplomatic services of the
Empire. The colonial merchant, {70} sailor, or shipmaster finds
in every chief port of the world a consul to whom he can apply
for protection--an officer whose services are paid for by the
British taxpayer alone. The Imperial treasury maintains unaided
the costly diplomatic staff which carries on the long and
delicate negotiations in which the colonies are often more
directly concerned than the mother-land itself. If the results
of diplomacy sometimes fail to satisfy colonial expectations,
the experience is not new among nations, nor likely to be
avoided by the agencies which a colony could independently set
in motion. When the execution of treaties involves loss to the
individual colonist, the example of Newfoundland and the Behring
Sea indicates that it is to the Imperial treasury that he
chiefly looks for compensation.
This want of proportion in the distribution of national burdens
is so striking that one is impelled to ask if it may not have at
least some partial or temporary justification. There is one
consideration of much weight. The settlers in the outlying
sections of the Empire have been compelled in their short
history to face tasks of great difficulty. They have had upon
their hands the organization of vast continental areas, the
clearing of forests, the construction of highways and railroads,
the extension of the post and telegraph over immense distances,
the speedy application of the machinery of civilization to new
lands. Were it quite certain that all this would become a
permanent addition to the strength and resources of the nation,
it {71} might well be an object of national policy to relieve
them from other burdens, however fair in themselves. There
would, on the other hand, be no justification for this if they
are in the end to become independent powers or additions to the
strength of another state.
In any case, the moment that the ordinary taxpayer of the new
land is as able to pay as the ordinary taxpayer of the old, the
uneven distribution of responsibility becomes a gross injustice.
Meanwhile it ought to be possible to roughly define even now
some of the general principles which should be attended to in
distributing this responsibility.
We are fortunate in having the clearly stated opinion of one
great colonial thinker upon this point. Joseph Howe is
remembered in England, no less than in Canada, as one of the
ablest statesmen that the colonies have produced. 'The great
orator and patriot,' is the description applied to him by Mr.
Goldwin Smith. As the brilliant and triumphant champion of
Responsible Government his record places him absolutely beyond
the suspicion of subordinating colonial interests to any others.
Yet from the very outset he looked upon the attainment of
complete independence of local government in the colonies as but
a stepping-stone to the assertion of still higher national
rights, to the acceptance of still higher responsibilities; to
some form of substantial union among British people, based on
considerations of equal citizenship and the defence of common
interests. As far back as 1854 he delivered in the Nova Scotia
Legislature an {72} address, since published in his collected
speeches under the name of the 'Organization of the Empire,'
which attracted wide attention at the time, and, indeed,
embodies most of what has since been said by the advocates of
national unity. Twelve years later, when on a visit to England,
he published in pamphlet form an essay bearing the same title,
and giving his more fully matured views upon the question. If
the genesis and enunciation of the Imperial Federation idea in
its modern form is to be credited to anyone, it must be assigned
to Joseph Howe for this early and comprehensive statement of the
main issues involved. The study of the utterances of this great
colonist, this champion of colonial rights, may be commended to
those shallow critics who profess to believe that the proposal
for national unity is an outcome of Imperial selfishness, and
that its operation would tend to cramp colonial development.
Mr. Howe had none of the illusions which prevail in some parts
of the colonies about the possibility of enjoying peace without
taking the steps necessary to secure it: 'We have no security
for peace,' he says, 'or if there be any, it is only to be
sought in such an organization and armament of the whole Empire
as will make the certainty of defeat a foregone conclusion to
any foreign power that may attempt to break it.' And again, 'The
question of questions for us all, far transcending in importance
any other within the range of domestic or foreign politics, is
not how the Empire can be most easily dismembered, not how a
province {73} or two can be strengthened by a fort, or by the
expenditure of a million of dollars, but how the whole Empire
can be so organized and strengthened as to command peace or be
impregnable in war.'
After discussing the best method of securing the representation
of colonial ideas in influencing the general policy of the
country, a condition which he believes necessarily precedent to
joint expenditure, Mr. Howe then boldly grapples with the
question of provision for defence.
'By another bill, to operate uniformly over the whole Empire
(India being excepted, as she provides for her own army) the
funds should be raised for the national defence. This measure,
like the other, should be submitted for the sanction of the
colonial governments and legislatures. This tax should be
distinguished from all other imposts, that the amount collected
could be seen at a glance, and that every portion of the whole
people might see what they paid and what every other portion had
to pay.
'This fund could either be raised as head money over the whole
population, in the form of a property or income tax, or [as Mr.
Howe preferred] by a certain percentage upon imports;
constituting, next to existing liabilities, a first charge upon
colonial revenues, and being paid into the military chest to the
credit of the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury.'
Two important qualifications Mr. Howe suggests as to the
incidence of this national taxation upon the colonies.
{74}
'As the great arsenals, dockyards, depots, and elaborate
fortifications are in these islands; as the bulk of the naval
and military expenditure for arms, munitions, and provisions
occurs here, where are the great fleets and camps, the people of
Great Britain and Ireland ought to be prepared to pay, and I
have no doubt would, a much larger proportion towards this fund
than it would be fair to exact from the outlying provinces,
where, in time of peace, there is but little of naval or
military expenditure.
'In another respect a wise discrimination should be exercised.
Within the British Islands are stored up the fruits of eighteen
centuries of profitable industry. All that generations of men
toiled for, and have bequeathed, is now in possession of the
resident population here, including all that was created and
left by the forefathers of those by whom the British colonies
have been founded. Taking into view, then, the comparison which
these wealthy and densely peopled islands bear to the sparsely
populated countries beyond the sea, it would seem but fair that
they should assume, in proportion to numbers, a much larger
share of the burthens of national defence.'
He then sums up: 'If the general principle be admitted, we need
not waste time with the details, which actuaries and accountants
can adjust. Fair allowance being made under these two heads, I
can see no reason why the colonists should not contribute in
peace and war their fair quotas towards the defence of the
Empire.
{75}
'But the question may now be asked, and everything turns upon
the answer that may be given to it, will the colonies consent to
pay this tax, or to make any provision at all for the defence of
the Empire? It must be apparent that no individual can give an
answer to this question; that the Cabinet, were they to propound
this policy, even after the most anxious enquiry and full
deliberation, could only wait in hope and confidence for the
response to be given by so many communities, so widely dispersed
and affected by so many currents of thought. ... That it is the
duty, and would be for the interest, of all Her Majesty's
subjects in the outlying provinces, fairly admitted to the
enjoyment of the privileges indicated, to make this
contribution, I have not the shadow of doubt. ... Without
efficient organization they cannot lean upon and strengthen each
other or give to the mother-country that moral support which in
peace makes diplomacy effective, and in war would make the
contest short, sharp, and decisive. ... If once organized and
consolidated, under a system mutually advantageous and generally
known, there would be an end to all jealousies between the
taxpayers at home and abroad. We should no longer be weakened by
discussions about defence or propositions for dismemberment, and
the irritation now kept up by shallow thinkers and mischievous
politicians would give place to a general feeling of
brotherhood, of confidence, of mutual exertion, dependence, and
security. The great powers of Europe and America would at once
recognize {76} the wisdom and forethought out of which had
sprung this national combination, and they would be slow to test
its strength. We should secure peace on every side by the
notoriety given to the fact that on every side we were prepared
for war.'
One more quotation is necessary to place before the reader the
full breadth and courage of Mr. Howe's reasoning:--
'But suppose this policy proposed and the appeal made, and that
the response is a determined negative. Even in that case it
would be wise to make it, because the public conscience of the
mother-country would then be clear, and the hands of her
statesmen free, to deal with the whole question of national
defence in its broadest outlines or in its bearings on the case
of any single province or group of provinces, which might then
be dealt with in a more independent manner.
'But I will not for a moment do my fellow-colonists the
injustice to suspect that they will decline a fair compromise of
a question which involves at once their own protection and the
consolidation of the Empire. At all events, if there are any
communities of British origin anywhere, who desire to enjoy all
the privileges and immunities of the Queen's subjects without
paying for and defending them, let us ascertain who and what
they are--let us measure the proportions of political
expenditure now, in a season of tranquillity, when we have the
leisure to gauge the extent of the evil and apply correctives,
rather than wait till war finds us {77} unprepared and leaning
upon presumptions in which there is no reality.'
No apology seems needed for placing before the reader at such
length the views held on this crucial question of national
defence by one of the great fathers of Responsible Government in
the colonies, a man whose whole life was marked by absolute
devotion to the principles of popular government and to colonial
interests.
Joseph Howe spoke and wrote of conditions existing before that
great period of Canadian development and expenditure which
followed upon the confederation of the different provinces. This
probably accounts in large measure for the different view of the
situation taken and the different solution of the question
suggested by his distinguished successor, Sir Charles Tupper.
The right and duty of the colonies to contribute to the general
strength of the Empire which guarantees them security is
admitted as fully by Sir Charles Tupper as by Joseph Howe. Of
the most expedient method for utilizing the young energy and
growing resources of the colonies he takes a different view. In
an article recently published in a leading magazine[1] he
says:--
'Many persons, I am aware, both in the colonies and here, have
looked upon the question of the defence of the Empire as best
promoted and secured by a direct contribution to the support of
the army and navy of this country. That I regard as a very {78}
mistaken opinion; and I believe that there is a much more
effective way of promoting the object in view. In my opinion, no
contribution to the support of the army and navy of England on
the part of Canada would have contributed to the defence of the
Empire in a greater degree than the mode in which the public
money in Canada has been expended for that purpose. We have
expended, in addition to an enormous grant of land, over a
million pounds sterling per annum, from the first hour that we
became a united country down to the present day, in constructing
a great Imperial highway across Canada from ocean to ocean; not
only furnishing the means for the expansion of the trade and the
development of Canada, but providing the means of
intercommunication at all seasons between different parts of the
country,'
After pointing out that the construction of the Transcontinental
Railway enabled Canada in 1885 to put down without England's
help the half-breed rebellion, while the previous outbreak in
1870 had required the services of General Wolseley and the
Imperial troops for several months, Sir Charles Tupper goes on
to say:--
'We have, therefore, not only provided the means of
intercommunication, the means of carrying on our trade and
business, but have also established a great Imperial highway
which England might to-morrow find almost essential for the
maintenance of her power in the East. Not only has Canada
furnished {79} a highway across the continent, but it has
brought Yokahama three weeks nearer to London than it is by the
Suez Canal. I give that as an illustration that there are other
means which, in my judgment, may contribute much more to the
increased strength and the greatness of the Empire than any
contribution that could be levied upon any of the colonies. ...
The expenditure by the Government of Canada that has
successfully opened up these enormous tracts of country in the
great North West of the Dominion, which promise to be the
granary of the world, is of itself the best means of making
England strong and prosperous, as it will attract a large
British population thither.'
Sir Charles Tupper can also speak of more direct contributions
which the Dominion makes to the national strength.
'Canada has in addition expended since confederation over forty
millions of dollars upon her militia and mounted police, and in
the establishment of a military college, which, I am proud to
know from one of the highest authorities, is second to no
military school in the world, and of nine other military schools
and batteries in the various provinces, of which the Dominion is
composed. In 1889 Canada expended no less than two millions of
dollars on the militia and North West mounted police, which
anyone who knows the country will admit is a most effective
means of defence. It is true we have a comparatively small
permanent force, but {80} we have established military schools,
and we have such a nucleus of a further force as in case of need
would enable us to develop the militia in the most effective
manner, consisting of 37,000 volunteers who are trained
annually, and a reserve of 1,000,000 men, liable to be called
upon should necessity arise.'
Once more: 'One of the most effective means adopted by the
Imperial Parliament for the defence of the Empire is by
subsidizing fast steamers built under Admiralty supervision,
with armament which can be made available at a moment's notice.
These steamers could maintain their position and keep up mail
communication in time of war or be used for the transport of
troops. Canada has contributed £15,000 a year to a splendid line
of steamers, such as I have described, now plying between
Canada, Japan, and China, and has offered no less than £165,000
per annum to put a service like the Teutonic between England and
Canada, and a fast service between Canada and Australia. All
these splendid steamers would be effective as cruisers if
required for the protection of British commerce, and the
transport of troops and thousands of volunteers to any point
that the protection of the Empire demanded.'
It is on grounds thus stated that Sir Charles Tupper concludes
that, 'Instead of adding to its defence, the strength of a
colony would be impaired by taking away the means which it
requires for its development and for increasing its defensive
power, {81} if it were asked for a contribution to the army and
navy.'
The argument, which may be applied to all the colonies, amounts
to this, that it would be true national economy to leave free at
present all the energies and resources of these young countries
for local defence and for carrying on the mere processes of
growth. Obviously the fairness of this arrangement, for which
there is much to be said, depends entirely on the assurance that
the colony is to remain permanently a part of the Empire. There
is no reason why Britain or any other mother-country should bear
any part of the natural burdens of a colony if the colony is,
nevertheless, left free to mark its adolescence by declaring
itself independent, or by annexing itself to another and perhaps
rival state. It is equally obvious that such an arrangement
could in no sense be final; and that it only shifts the question
of more normal adjustment of national burdens to a time not very
far remote. It could therefore in any case only be looked upon
as a temporary compromise. For instance, the whole volume of
colonial trade (including India) is to that of the United
Kingdom now in about the proportion of four to seven: judging
from the relative rate of increase before referred to the day is
not far distant when they will be equal. The proportion of
population is also changing rapidly. The anomaly of one half of
the national trade and one half of the population bearing the
direct naval expenditure of the {82} whole would be very great
indeed. This method, too, would seem to conflict rather
seriously with a principle which has become a very fundamental
idea in the British mind, viz. that a bearing of burdens in some
very direct form must go hand in hand with representation. Till
direct responsibility in general defence is undertaken, direct
representation in determining general policy can scarcely be
conceded. To fix the point at which any colony should become a
direct instead of an indirect contributor to the nation's
defensive strength would be a manifest necessity. To these
criticisms Sir Charles Tupper can fairly answer that he deals in
his proposition only with actual and not with prospective
conditions. In fixing new and permanent relations, however, for
an empire which is changing as rapidly as ours, the future must
be kept in view as much as the present. Doubtless the true
settlement of the question lies in a compromise between the
present and the future.
Not long since one of the most prominent of English statesmen
put the matter to me in this way: 'We in Great Britain know very
well that while you in the colonies are engaged in organizing
great continents and furnishing them with the machinery of
civilization we cannot expect you to contribute for common
purposes in proportion to us, who start with the stored up
resources and appliances of centuries. But we know that as you
complete your docks, harbours and lighthouses, your railroads
and canals, your schoolhouses and churches, as society becomes
{83} settled and the needs of civilization supplied, then you
will gradually become ready and willing to bear your full
proportion of those burdens which are the token of full and
equal citizenship.' With him, as with Joseph Howe, the
settlement of the central principle of national unity was the
main point; the determination of the details of expenditure was
a matter for friendly negotiation--for actuaries and
accountants.
We may now ask, as did Joseph Howe, whether the great colonies
would be willing to accept, either immediately or by gradual and
progressive steps, any further share in the responsibilities of
the nation. It may be assumed that this decision will be based
on the facts and arguments of the case.
'Reason shows and experience proves that no commercial
prosperity can be durable if it cannot be united, in case of
need, to naval force.' This remark of De Tocqueville is so fully
proved by the facts of history that its truth may be accepted as
axiomatic. It is a truth for the colonies to consider. Highly
commercial already, their desire and manifest destiny are to be
still more so. Canada's commercial navy, as has been said,
already ranks fourth in the world. She is a first-class shipping
power. Australia's trade is perhaps greater in proportion to
population than that of any other country. Alone among all the
people of the past or present, British colonists have not had to
accept the full responsibilities of increasing commercial
greatness. The {84} little republic of Chili, with a trade of
£26,000,000, and a population of about 3,000,000 maintains
40,000 tons of armed shipping, at a large annual expense. The
other republics of South America bear like burdens. Australia,
with its much larger volume of sea trade and far greater of
revenue, pays only £126,000 for naval defence, strictly confined
to its own shores. Canada, with its remarkable tonnage of ocean
shipping, its great interests at stake on its eastern and
western coasts, leans almost entirely for defence of commerce
and fisheries upon British ironclads paid for exclusively by the
people of the United Kingdom.
The deceptive argument, drawn from the example of the United
States at some periods of their history, that a degree of
isolation gives immunity from such burdens, has now lost its
force. The policy of the Great Republic has been sharply
reversed, and the creation of a powerful navy has become an
object of national ambition, and is apparently the outcome of
national necessities developed by the widening of commercial
relations.
Judged, then, by all historical precedent, the great colonies
must in the natural course of events accept naval defence as a
part of their ordinary burdens. That they have escaped this form
of expense hitherto is manifestly due almost entirely to the
fact that as parts of the empire they have been so fortunate as
to enjoy without cost the protection of a supreme naval power.
Will they secure the most effective defence, the best return for
the money they spend, within the {85} Empire or without? Within
the Empire they would have the advantage of naval bases in every
important corner of the world. The portion of force contributed
by themselves would have the prestige of the whole to make it
most effective. They would have the advantage of all the
stored-up skill and experience of the greatest school of naval
training that the world has ever known. They would have the
direction of naval experience absolutely unique. They would be
able at once in spending their money to avail themselves of the
best results of naval experiments carried on by the United
Kingdom at enormous cost. Alike in cheapness and efficiency they
would enjoy the advantages which come from co-operation on a
great scale.
There is, of course, an opposing view. Stated in its extreme
form it was put thus, three or four years ago, to the
Legislature of Quebec by Mr. Mercier:--
'Up to the present time we have lived a colonial life, but today
they wish us to assume, in spite of ourselves, the
responsibilities and dangers of a sovereign state, which will
not be ours. They seek to expose us to vicissitudes of peace and
war against the great powers of the world; to rigorous
exigencies of military service as practised in Europe; to
disperse our sons from the freezing regions of the North Pole to
the burning sands on the desert of Sahara; an odious regime
which will condemn us to the forced impost of blood and money,
and wrest from our arms out sons, who are the hope of our
country and {86} the consolation of our old days, and send them
off to bloody and distant wars, which we shall not be able to
stop or prevent.'
Probably Mr. Mercier's auditors were well enough acquainted with
history to detect at once the obvious fallacy of his argument.
Still, it is worth while to remind colonial writers and speakers
when they assert, as they sometimes do, that a union of defence
with Britain means the dragging away of Canadians or Australians
to fight in Europe or Asia, that Britain is the one country in
the world that has never, in modern times, been compelled to
resort to conscription; that no one is asked to fight in the
ranks of her army or in her fleet except those who wish to, and
that on these terms she has been able to put into the field and
on the sea all the soldiers and sailors she requires. This is as
true of her large native Indian armies as it is of her English,
Scotch, Welsh, or Irish regiments. Britain knows nothing of the
conscription which prevails in Germany, France, and Russia,
which even the United States found necessary in the War of
Secession. The men whom Australia sent to the Soudan she sent of
her own accord, and not at Britain's request, much less her
command; the numerous Canadian officers now holding commissions
and in the active service of the Empire are there by their own
individual choice. There is not the slightest reason to suppose
that the British system of a purely voluntary service would be
changed under any new political conditions imposed {87} by
closer union. The career of a soldier is one which has for many
minds a great attraction. With the progress of military science,
it now offers in many of its departments, as never before, a
field for the highest intellectual qualities and scientific
attainments. To say the very least, to be a defender of one's
country is a not unworthy ambition. It is therefore extremely
likely that into the great career offered by an Imperial service
many colonists with military predilections would be drawn. Even
if their sole object were to prepare themselves for the service
of the particular part of the Empire to which they belonged, the
wider training to be obtained in the highly organized system of
a great state would be invaluable. But once more I repeat that
the service would be purely voluntary. If Mr. Mercier and those
of his compatriots who think with him have lost what was once
supposed to be an instinct of their race, they have the
opportunity within the British Empire, which they could not
depend upon having in France, of following their inclination.
Mr. Goldwin Smith states, though I think incorrectly, that
colonists are essentially non-military. If his view is true,
then the task of defending the Empire will naturally gravitate
into the hands of those in whom the military instinct is strong,
of whom the Empire has always as yet found enough for all its
needs.
Again, in a somewhat similar connection Mr. Smith speaks of 'the
heavy weight of a constant liability to entanglements in the
quarrels of England all over the {88} world, with which Canada
has nothing to do, and about which nothing is known by her
people. Her commerce may any day be cut up and want brought into
her homes by a war about the frontier of Afghanistan, about the
treatment of Armenia or Crete by the Turks, about the relation
of the Danubian Principalities to Russia, or about the balance
of power in Europe.' Let us put against this flight of
imagination the solid facts of history and see if Canada has had
any reason to feel this pressure of dread from her connection
with Britain. In 1812 British troops assisted Canadians in
repelling what Mr. Smith himself describes as 'unprincipled
aggression.' Since that time under the British flag Canada has
known a continuance of peace absolutely without parallel for a
corresponding' period among all the nations of the world. The
last European war in which England took part was that with
Russia, closed in 1856. The effect upon Canada of that war was a
stimulus given to her timber and provision trade by the closing
of Baltic and Black Sea ports. One of Canada's own sons, General
Williams, the hero of Kars, won in that war a fame of which
every Canadian is proud. Since 1856 there has been an
Austro-Italian war, an Austro-Prussian war, a Franco-Prussian
war, a Russo-Turkish war. No British sword was drawn, no
Canadian interest touched in all of these. The gigantic civil
war of secession shook the American union to its foundations;
Britain took no part, and Canadians along with her lived in
peace. In India {89} Britain was compelled in 1856-7 to go
through a strain of agony and effort to maintain her place of
power. Canada's sole part was to weep at the fate, to glory in
the heroism of those who suffered or who won at Lucknow,
Cawnpore, Delhi, and a hundred other scenes of conflict. With
England's numerous petty wars with barbarian tribes on the
fringe of advancing civilization, mostly undertaken in behalf of
colonists, Canada has had nothing to do[2]. When she had her
first half-breed rebellion British troops were promptly sent to
put it down. So far, then, Canada has not had 'want brought into
her homes' through her connection with Britain, but on the
contrary has enjoyed a peace and security that might well be the
envy of the world. Like the United States, Canada enjoys the
advantage of isolation from European strife, together with the
further advantage of connection {90} with a power whose flag
gives to Canadian ships and commerce on every ocean the surest
guarantee of safety at present existing in the world; a
guarantee the importance and significance of which will increase
with the growth of Canadian commerce; a guarantee which she
could not possibly find under an independent flag, nor yet under
the flag of the United States, whose one weakness, by the
admission of American authorities themselves, lies in the want
of those naval bases which are everywhere the necessary adjuncts
of extended maritime security.
But even when the extraordinary immunity from the risks of war
which the colonies have enjoyed under the British flag has been
demonstrated it seems well to give due weight to any honest
objection which exists to committing themselves entirely to the
military policy of the Empire at large, until, at least, the
sense of national unity has had time to become fully developed.
That the colonies will refuse to contribute to Imperial defence,
as is sometimes asserted, I do not believe, and facts are
themselves now beginning to disprove the statement. That they
may contribute enormously to the national strength without
offending the prejudices of even the most sensitive may also be
shown. Lord Thring has made a suggestion upon this point which
seems to me exceedingly interesting and helpful. After pointing
out the overwhelming common interest which all parts of the
Empire have in resisting attack from without, he proposes that
in each of the great colonies willing {91} to enter into the
arrangement defensive forces should be created which would be
recognized parts of the Imperial army and navy. These forces
should not primarily be under a compulsory obligation to serve
out of their own countries, or beyond their own limits, but when
called out for Imperial purposes within their limits they should
form a part of the Imperial army and navy, and be under the same
general control. But the colonial forces should be empowered to
volunteer for the common national service out of their own
limits, and on so doing they should be regarded as an integral
part of the nation's defensive force.
A national military and naval organization such as that here
suggested would appeal directly to that local patriotism,
instinctive in all, which considers no sacrifice too great if it
is made for the defence of men's own homes and firesides; it
furnishes the opportunity for that wider national patriotism
which knows that the safety of the parts depends upon the safety
of the whole; and it meets the objection which has been
mentioned before, and is often made, to young communities being
compelled against their will to take an active part outside
their own borders in wars in which their concern is only
indirect. The actual defensive force of the Empire would be
immensely increased by the effective organization of each part
under a common direction, a necessity so often and strenuously
insisted upon by Sir Charles Dilke and others who have thought
and written upon national defence; its contingent force would be
still {92} more increased in the event of a war which appeals to
the reason and sympathy of the several great communities.
Those who argue for separation in the colonies, as well as men
like the late Mr. Bright at home, rest their case largely upon
the view that the mother-country carries permanently along with
her the entanglements of a traditional foreign policy which is
chiefly European, and with which it is unfair to involve young
communities in parts of the world remote from Europe[3]. This
view seems based on past history more than on the facts of the
present. More and more every day Britain tends to become a world
power, and it is this fact rather than her European position
which dominates her policy. She faces Europe much more in the
interest of her colonies than in the support of ancient
traditions. We have only to read the news from day to day, or
the summary of national policy for a year as it is presented in
a Queen's Speech, to see that Lord Salisbury was within the
strict limit of fact when he told a deputation but a few months
since that his work in the Foreign Office had made him {93}
deeply sensible of 'the large portion of our foreign
negotiations, our foreign difficulties, and the danger of
foreign complications which arise entirely from our colonial
connections; and the effect is that from time to time we have to
exercise great vigilance lest we should incur dangers which do
not arise from any interest of our own, but arise entirely from
the interests of the important and interesting communities to
which we are linked.'
The difficulty with the United States in the Behring Sea and the
Gulf of St. Lawrence, and with the French in Newfoundland; the
complicated negotiations with Germany, Portugal, and other
powers, European and native, in Africa, chiefly entered into in
behalf of colonies or colonizing companies, are, to take the
very latest illustrations, quite sufficient to give definiteness
to Lord Salisbury's statement[4].
To some sincere thinkers in the colonies the value of British
protection seems slight compared with the risks entailed by the
Imperial connection. They believe that the true and evident
policy for these young countries is to break off this connection
and so free {94} themselves from its dangers. Having no reason
to quarrel with anybody they anticipate with independence not
only the immunity which they have enjoyed from war, but the
further relief from the fear of war. Commerce carried on without
naval protection; internal safety secured without expense on
military organization; a neutral flag respected by all
belligerents; the settlement of all differences by friendly
arbitration, seem to them not unreasonable expectations.
The dread of some Englishmen, on the other hand, is that they
may be drawn into wars in which they have no direct interest by
the action of individual colonies.
Each of these opinions has some superficial ground of
justification; each process of reasoning has, if pushed to its
final conclusions, fatal defects. But is there not reason to
believe that the growth of the Empire is bringing us to a point
when the policy of England and her colonies may be entirely
coincident on the great questions of peace or war?
In the desperate struggle for existence which England in past
centuries has often had to carry on, in those contests which
have toughened the fibre of her children and fitted them to be
of the ruling races of the world, she has often had to make
combinations or enter into agreements with the European nations
around her from which she would gladly have kept herself free.
But with the spread of the Empire abroad England is every day
becoming more able {95} to look away from Europe, to stand aloof
from purely European disputes, and to secure all the strength
she requires from combination with communities which are her own
offspring.
Such an outcome of the nation's life would be the best
justification for all that England has suffered and spent in
building up the Empire. But it is not for colonists to forget
that she has spent and suffered much.
At Melbourne two years ago, in a lecture intended to refute the
arguments for British unity, and to point out the danger to
Australia of remaining connected with the Empire, Sir Archibald
Michie, with great apparent deliberation, said: 'As the
miserable result of her (England's) past foreign policy, as
ineffectual to any good purpose as it has proved expensive, she
is indebted to the amount of some £700,000,000 to the public
creditor, the National Debt. To what an extent does not this one
miserable fact, so disgusting to all Chancellors of the
Exchequer, cripple the strength and movements of the
mother-country, and weaken her influence with the world at
large.' Were this the thought of a single man it would be scarce
worth while to recall it. But in some of the colonies similar
reference to the National Debt is found not infrequently in
journals which must be taken seriously, and in the mouths of men
who influence public opinion. Often it is emphasized by a
triumphant allusion to the different application of colonial
borrowings, represented as they are by assets in the form of
railways, canals, harbour improvements, {96} telegraph systems,
and public works of many kinds. The criticism and comparison
seem misleading in the last degree.
We may make a liberal allowance for mistakes in British foreign
policy. We may criticise things done in the heat of national
passion, or at times when Britain was carrying on a struggle for
existence. We may leave out of our reckoning the glory of having
saved the liberties of Europe when other nations were yielding
in despair, when British subsidies alone brought their armies
into the field, and British resolution inspired them with new
courage. Yet, when all this allowance has been made, we may say
that a colonist is perhaps the last man in the world to sneer at
the public debt of England. She came out of the prolonged and
tremendous struggle which piled up her debt possessing as an
asset to show for it about one-fifth of the known world.
Professor Seeley has proved conclusively that England's great
continental wars, the chief causes of her vast expenditures,
were in large measure contests for colonial supremacy. From
those wars she gained the power to give Canada to the Canadians,
Australia to the Australians, vast areas and limitless resources
in many lands to those of her people who have gone to inhabit
them, and so to complete by industry the conquest begun by arms.
From those wars she emerged with a command of the sea which has
enabled her to supplement her gift of territory with a guarantee
of safety which has secured it from attack during the early
stages of settlement until the {97} present time. The National
Debt would seem to be a natural mortgage upon the territories
acquired by war expenditure, yet the gift of Crown lands which
was made to the colonies acquiring responsible government was
made absolutely free from this mortgage. These Crown lands in
all the colonies are sold and used entirely for local benefit,
while the whole incidence of taxation for what may fairly be
called the interest of the purchase-money falls upon the United
Kingdom alone.
The expense of the great expeditions which culminated in the
victory on the Plains of Abraham is a considerable item in the
National Debt, but half a continent now held by Canadians is no
insignificant item to set against it. If the expenditure for the
American War be put down as a mistake, it must be remembered
that the United States themselves, no less than Canada, reaped
the advantage from the previous expenditure which set the
Anglo-Saxon on the American continent free from French
rivalry[5].
Fifty years ago the French Government asked the British Foreign
Office how much of the vast unoccupied {98} areas of Australia
it claimed. 'The whole of it,' was the prompt reply. No doubt
the recollection of the Plains of Abraham, of Trafalgar, of
Waterloo, had something to do with the acceptance of that reply
as conclusive.
If the colonies are able to expend their borrowings on
reproductive works alone, this advantage is not entirely due to
their own superior prudence, but in part at least to the
circumstance that they have been protected by a great Imperial
power not afraid to go into debt for national ends. Gibraltar
and Malta, Aden, Singapore, and Hong Kong, the Cape and St.
Helena, stations in every corner of the world for the protection
of the commerce of the colonies as much as that of the United
Kingdom, are the best answers to those who sneer at the National
Debt of Great Britain.
The United States incurred a war debt of more than 2000,000,000
dollars, not indeed in carrying out a foreign policy, right or
wrong, but in remedying mistakes of internal policy. The war
brought no vast addition of territory; it simply saved the
state from disruption. No one doubts that the expenditure has
been more than repaid by the national unity and greatness which
it secured. But the very people who were crushed by that vast
outlay have been obliged, since they remain within the nation,
to contribute to the payment of the debt incurred.
They are obliged to contribute their share of the vast pension
roll, amounting to much more than 100,000,000 dollars per annum,
paid to the soldiers of the Union {99} who crushed them.
Compared with this, the magnanimity of the mother-land in
handing over to her younger communities, absolutely free from
incumbrance either of mortgage, of military responsibility, or
of commercial restraint, the major part of those vast assets
which she had to show for her national debt, seems to me
amazing. A colonist, reproaching England with her foreign policy
and the debt which it led to, cuts a sorry figure in the face of
these facts. And if we put the £30,000,000 added to the debt of
England in order to extinguish slavery beside the price paid by
the United States for the same national purification, we shall
discover reasons for thinking that there may be national
mistakes worse than those to be discovered in the foreign policy
of Britain.
Sir Charles Dilke says[6]: 'It is a remarkable instance of past
Imperial carelessness that the very principles upon which the
burden of defence should be divided between ourselves and
colonies, and the proportions in which it should be borne, have
never been settled.'
And again[7]: 'It is not the United Kingdom only but the whole
British Empire which needs consistent and united organization
for defence. The colonies should be represented on our great
General Staff, and the principle of self-preservation, applied
to the Empire, should be disentangled from the petty {100}
political questions by which the relations between the
mother-country and her children are often hampered and sometimes
embittered. ... Unfortunately, considerations of Imperial
defence, which should be regarded from the point of view of
common self-interest, are apt to become mixed up with the
individual and fleeting interests of various portions of the
Empire. If, as I hope, we are to continue to stand together as a
confederacy holding the future of the greater portion of the
world in its hands, the inhabitants of the home islands and of
the colonies must come to an understanding for mutual support
during the crisis of civilization in which we may find ourselves
at any moment.'
I have often had occasion to quote Sir Charles Dilke's opinions
on questions which have come within the range of this
discussion. The luminous and exhaustive statement of the
condition and resources of the Empire contained in the two
volumes of the '_Problems of Greater Britain_,' though somewhat
weighted by detail, and in my opinion weakened by an imperfect
balancing of the primary and secondary forces at work in the
colonies, is still by far the most valuable contribution yet
made to the study of our national position. The line of argument
by which the author proves the necessity for closer defensive
organization of the different parts of the Empire seems to me
overwhelming in its conclusiveness. His demand that the colonies
should be represented on the General Staff which is to
constitute the {101} brain of the nation in military questions,
his impressive warnings that the mother-land and colonies must
stand side by side in protecting the commerce and civilization
which both have borne a part in building up, make it very
difficult to understand the hesitating and irresolute attitude
which he takes in his chapter (vol. ii. part vii.) on 'Future
Relations' to the question of Federation, or any defined system
of political union. Military combination, even for defensive
purposes alone, must certainly mean a common foreign policy and
the joint expenditure which is necessary to make it effective; a
common foreign policy and expenditure imply some means of giving
adequate expression to the will of all the communities
concerned; and to most minds that, I think, will point directly
and inevitably to some form of common representation. Military
authorities may plan and advise, but under any British system of
government political authorities who derive their mandate
directly from the citizens can alone make the plan effective.
Mere alliance could never accomplish all that the author of the
'Problems of Greater Britain' believes essential to the safety
of the Empire. Alliance is temporary and easily revocable, and
therefore by no means a settlement of permanent national
questions. The moment that an attempt is made to remedy the
carelessness complained of, to settle the principles upon which
the burden of defence is to be divided between the mother-land
and colonies, 'to come to an understanding for mutual support,'
it will be found {102} that immediately behind the military
problem is the political problem[8].
[1] _Nineteenth Century_, Oct. 1891.
[2] While these pages are going through the press there comes,
as if to qualify what is here said, the news that a young
Canadian, Captain William H. Robinson, of the Royal Engineers,
has met a soldier's death while leading, with conspicuous
courage, an attack on Tambi in Sierra Leone. Trained in Canadian
schools, and graduated with the highest honours from the
Canadian Military College at Kingston, he had steadily pushed
his way forward in the Imperial service and had for some time
been in charge of the important fortifications in course of
construction at Sierra Leone. In the ardent pursuit of his
profession he had specially volunteered for the service on which
he was engaged when he met his end. As his teacher I had
occasion to watch over the early development of his very
exceptional powers. Britain has, first and last, sacrificed many
precious lives on Canadian soil, but in Captain Robinson Canada
has begun to repay the debt to the mother-land with one of the
most promising of the sons she has yet produced.
[3] 'I should like to ask the friends of federation whether the
colonies of this country--Canada, and the great colonies which
cluster in the South Pacific and in Australia--whether these
colonies would be willing to bind themselves to the stupid and
regrettable foreign policy of the Government of this country?
Will they take the responsibility of entering into wars which
will be 10,000 miles away, and in which they can have no
possible interest or influence, and in which they could have
been in no degree consulted as to the cost? My opinion is that
the colonies will never stand a policy of that kind.'--John
Bright at Birmingham, March 28th, 1888.
[4] A Liberal Foreign Minister has lately expressed the same
thought in other words. 'Our great Empire has pulled us, so to
speak, by the coat-tails out of the European system; and though
with our great predominance, our great moral influence, and our
great fleet, with our traditions in Europe and our aspirations
to preserve the peace of Europe, we can never remove ourselves
altogether from the European system, we must recognise that our
foreign policy has become a colonial policy, and is in reality
at this moment much more dictated from the extremities of the
empire than it is from London itself.'--Lord Rosebery to the
City Liberal Club, March 23rd, 1892.
[5] American writers admit this, 'The Seven Years' War made
England what she is. It crippled the commerce of her rival,
ruined France in two continents, and blighted her as a colonial
power. It gave England the control of the seas, and the mastery
of North America and India, made her the first of commercial
nations, and prepared the vast colonial system that has planted
New Englands in every part of the globe. _And while it made
England what she is it supplied to the United States the
indispensable condition of their greatness, if not of their
national existence_:--Introduction to _Montcalm and Wolfe_
(Parkman).
[6] _Problems of Greater Britain_, vol. ii. 522.
[7] _United Service Magazine_, April, 1890.
[8] Since the above was written a very distinct advance of
thought on the question of British unity has been indicated in
the work on 'Imperial Defence,' just published by Sir Charles
Dilke and Mr. Spencer Wilkinson. The authors say (p. 54): 'It is
enough to say, that the great question, perhaps the greatest
question, which has to be answered by the present generation of
Englishmen, is whether the British Empire is to become a series
of independent, though, perhaps, friendly states, or to make a
reality of the military unity which at the present time is
rather a sentiment than a practical institution. It is evidently
impossible to organise the defences of the Empire until this
prior question has been settled, and it is quite impossible
until it has been faced to determine properly the policy of
Great Britain. If the principle of the unity of the Empire and
the unity of its defences is maintained the greatest conceivable
degree of security would have been gained for the whole and for
every part, and the British Empire could afford, as against the
attack, of any single power, to steer clear of all alliances and
to pursue a policy solely to the immediate welfare of its
subjects. ... Before, then, the defence of the British Empire
can be placed throughout on a permanently satisfactory footing,
it seems necessary that the great political question of the
century should be settled, and that Englishmen all over the
world should make up their minds as to the real nature of
Greater Britain.' The most ardent Federationist could not wish
for a more succinct statement of the national position than
this.
{103}