SOUTH AFRICA.
THOSE who claim that the separation from the Empire of any one
of our three groups of great colonies would inflict a serious if
not a fatal blow on our national greatness and the prosperity of
British people--point with no slight interest to the
illustration of their argument which is furnished by South
Africa. Here, again, we have under the British flag a country of
vast extent and favourable for European occupation. The
institutions of self-government are already established over a
wide area, and are being gradually extended. A confederation of
all the South African provinces is already in the thought of
practical statesmen. We have here, then, the probability of the
formation of another power, so large that a merely colonial
position cannot be expected to satisfy its ultimate political
necessities. Though at present far inferior to Canada and
Australia in population, and behind them in fulness of
constitutional development, it is moving along the same lines of
political growth, and circumstances may at any time lead to a
rapid increase of population. Most of the arguments, therefore,
which are used, in, {233} favour of Canadian or Australian
separation apply to South Africa as well. If an independent
government, a separate foreign policy, a distinct system of
defence, an individual diplomatic relation to the rest of the
world, is a political necessity for Australia, New Zealand, or
Canada, it is clearly an equal necessity for South Africa. The
internal impulse towards independence might even be expected to
be exceptionally strong, since a considerable fraction of the
white population is not British by descent, and has been led by
circumstances to feel a peculiar sensitiveness in regard to
political rights.
Is then the retention of South Africa under the national flag,
and within the national system, a matter of indifference to
British people either at home or abroad? Is the separation of
South Africa, its freedom to associate itself with any power it
pleases, or even its being placed in a position where British
people could only enjoy or be granted neutral rights in its
harbours, a condition of things which can be discussed with
equanimity by Australians, New Zealanders, East Indians, nay,
even by Canadians with their great ocean interests, to say
nothing of the people of the United Kingdom itself? The test
which South Africa applies to separatist theories seems to me a
crucial one.
Once more I cannot do better than quote from the 'Problems of
Greater Britain.'
The author says: 'Considered from the Imperial, from the Indian,
and from the Australian point {234} of view, as an aid to our
maritime power, no spot on earth is more important to us than
the Cape with its twin harbours Table Bay and Simon's Bay.' And
again: 'While a general hostility to our rule would be
sufficient to make us part with almost any other colony, it is
impossible for us to give up the military station which we
occupy at the extremity of the African continent and which
itself cannot be held unless we hold at all events a portion of
the country round it.'
No one who considers the geographical position of the Cape, and
its relation to the greatest trade route of the Empire, can
regard these utterances as exaggerated. The Cape is, and must
always be, one of the greatest turning places of the world's
commerce. Between St. Helena and Mauritius for the Indian bound
ships, between St. Helena and King George's Sound for those
going towards the Southern seas, the Cape is the only sufficient
resting-place that European ships can find.
'As a vessel steaming from British ports for India, or China, or
Australia, in time of war begins to approach the point of
exhaustion of its coal supply it finds itself in a region of
storms, far from any shelter except that at the Cape of Good
Hope. The position of that refuge, and the certainty of being
able to deny it to an enemy, combined with the command of the
Red Sea route, even if only for the purpose of stopping it,
draws therefore, on behalf of England, an almost impassable line
on this side of the globe {235} between the Eastern and the
Western Hemispheres. The difficulty which our ownership of the
Cape places in the way of possible opponents, even more than the
refuge afforded to our ships, constitutes in war the supreme
advantage of the possession of the Cape of Good Hope as a naval
station[1].'
Such being the relation of South Africa to the Empire, such the
importance of its remaining under the British flag, we may well
ask, with some anxiety, whether the feelings of its people and
the interests of the colony point in the same direction.
The attitude of the leading men of South Africa towards the idea
of national unity is clearly defined. Mr. Hofmeyer, the leader
of the Dutch or Afrikander party, at the colonial conference of
1887, brought forward, and earnestly pressed upon the assembled
delegates, a scheme for 'promoting a closer union between the
various parts of the British Empire by means of an imperial
tariff of customs.' His words indicate the temper of mind in
which he addresses himself to the question: 'I have taken this
matter in hand with two objects: to promote the union of the
Empire, and at the same time to obtain revenue for the purpose
of general defence.'
Sir Gordon Sprigg, for many years Premier of Cape Colony,
speaking in London in 1891, strongly advocated a similar policy,
and was urgent, to quote his own words, 'that an invitation
should be addressed to the governments of the various colonies
and dependencies {236} to send representatives to this country
to consider, in a conference, the practicability of forming a
commercial union between the different parts of the Empire,'
regarding this as the most effectual way of accomplishing what
he considered should be the aim of national statesmanship, viz.
the unification of national interests.
The present Premier of Cape Colony, and the most influential man
in South Africa, Mr. Cecil Rhodes, has stated that he looks upon
the consolidation of the different colonies of South Africa as
the main aim of his political life, but at the same time his
utterances, from the beginning of his political career to the
present moment, indicate conclusively that he only thinks of a
united South Africa as an integral part of a united Empire, so
constituted as to give adequate expression to the aims of its
various members. It is interesting to find that these three men,
who may be taken as representing the different sides of South
African feeling, all eminently practical, and all above a
suspicion of subjecting the interest of the colony to the
interest of the nation at large, are agreed in the belief that
the best future for their country is close association with the
mother-land, and the Empire. And looking at the facts of the
situation, from a South African point of view, who can doubt
that they are justified? Pressing upon British South Africa on
all sides are the nations of Europe. France is in Madagascar.
Bordering on British territories are those of Germany and
Portugal. {237} The Dutch Republics, as yet only half won to
friendliness and sympathy, are close at hand. Large native
populations--which do not fade away, as in America, New Zealand,
or Australia at the approach of the white man, but rather
multiply under influences which make for peace--are all around.
The development of a great continent overflowing with stores of
wealth depends not only on the energy of the men who have the
work directly in hand, but on the confidence they feel that
behind them is the diplomacy of a powerful nation to maintain
their rights, the wealth of a rich nation to furnish them with
capital, the strength of a great people to secure them, in
emergency, from disaster.
If the British connection seems of such significance to South
African statesmen, in working out the future of their vast
country, quite as much does the Empire require the constant
advice of those statesmen in directing the difficult diplomacy
and making the critical decisions which the control of so much
of the continent necessitates. The lack of such advice, directly
and consistently sought, is probably at the root of much of the
difficulty of the past. In the long run South African opinion
must dominate national policy in South Africa. That it should be
expressed in an authoritative form, and under a due sense of
national responsibility, are the conditions which will make it
most helpful, and most reliable.
Sir Gordon Sprigg and other public men from the Cape have
pointed out to me how peculiar are the {238} problems which
arise in South African politics, how much they stand apart from
Anglo-Saxon experience in other parts of the world, how
impossible it is for anyone who has not to deal with these
problems on the spot to understand them. Here, if anywhere, the
maxim is true to which I have alluded in another place, that
'only those who know a country are fitted to rule it.' It is
only by utilizing the knowledge and experience of the best minds
of the country that adequate direction can be given to its
external relations as to its internal government.
The actual and contingent stake which Great Britain, Australia
and other parts of the Empire have in the exclusive use of the
Cape as a naval station in time of war may be roughly outlined
in figures. Lord Brassey, dwelling upon the importance to the
nation of completing the fortification and equipment of the
neighbouring harbours, mentions in the Naval Annual for 1890,
that at present about £90,000,000 worth of commerce centres at
or passes this point every year, including £20,000,000 of
outward trade to Australia, £13,000,000 to the Cape itself, and
portions of the Indian, Chinese and other Eastern trade which
make up the whole. This is under normal conditions. But should
the Suez Canal be closed, and it is difficult to see how in a
great European war this could be prevented, unless England could
obtain and maintain absolute naval control of the Mediterranean,
and military control of Egypt, then at least £150,000,000, and
possibly £200,000,000 of {239} British trade would be forced to
go round the Cape. I have mentioned elsewhere Lord Dufferin's
statement, to the London Chamber of Commerce, that if anything
ever occurred to take away our control of the Indian markets
there is not a cottage in the manufacturing districts of England
which would not feel the blow at once. If this be true of the
Indian trade alone, the argument becomes much more impressive
when applied to the risks which would be incurred, alike by
Britain, India, and Australia if they were compelled to depend
for the security of the whole vast volume of Eastern and
Australian commerce upon such neutral rights as could be granted
by an independent South Africa, or if they left the Cape in such
a position that it could be seized by a hostile power. We have
an interesting historical illustration of what security on this
great trade route means in the fact, stated on apparently
reliable authority, that between the years 1793 and 1797, when
the French held the Isle of France and Bourbon, no less than
2266 British merchantmen were seized by French ships or
expeditions sallying out from those stations. So intolerable did
the situation become for British commerce that the conquest of
the French stations became an absolute necessity, and this was
effected in 1810 when a new outbreak of war had made like
disaster imminent. Yet this was before the vast trade of
Australasia had come into existence, and when our trade with the
East was but a trifle compared with its present great
proportions.
{240}
In the case of South Africa, however, the argument for national
unity is so strong that few undertake to question it. Not long
since, in the Manchester Reform Club, I met a sincere disciple
of the old school of thinkers on colonial policy. He had studied
the question under Mr. Goldwin Smith, at Toronto, and was at
first concisely and comprehensively dogmatic in his assertion
that the only plan for England was not only to permit, but to
encourage, each of the great colonies to become independent as
soon as possible. He was an honest thinker, and one could with
him afford to stake the argument on a candid answer to a single
question. 'Could Great Britain, with any regard to the safety of
her national position, afford to give up South Africa'? The
emphatic negative which, after a moment's thought, he gave, was
the only reply possible for one who acknowledged the force of
facts when presented to his mind.
THE WEST INDIES.
The present and contingent relation of the British West Indies
to the problem of national defence, and therefore of national
unity, is more direct than at first sight may appear. No portion
of the Empire was won at greater expense of prolonged conflict
than the West Indian Islands, but their relative commercial
importance was temporarily diminished by the occupation of other
tropical countries, and the substitution of the {241} beet-root
sugar of temperate climates for that of the cane. West Indian
trade, which has found out many new directions, is still,
however, important, and not for the United Kingdom alone, but
for the Canadian Dominion as well. Canada and the West Indies
are the complement of each other in natural production, and a
very large trade is sure to grow up between them as they develop
in wealth and population. The Dominion has, therefore, a deep
interest in the power of the Empire to protect commerce such as
is given by stations like Bermuda, St. Lucia and Kingston.
Halifax has already been connected with Bermuda by a telegraph
cable. The West Indian islands and Naval Stations at present
depend for communication upon lines passing through the United
States. The continuation of the Halifax-Bermuda cable to the
West Indies would give an independent electric connection
between all the British possessions in America. This might
become a very distinct addition to the resources of our naval
system.
The completion of any means of ship communication across the
Isthmus of Panama would increase indefinitely the importance to
the Empire of the West Indies. Australia would have at once the
same kind of interest in the strength of the national position
there which she now has in our possession of the Cape, or in our
control of Aden and Malta. Through this new channel would
probably flow the main flood of British commerce with the
western coasts of North and South America. It would furnish the
easiest line of {242} naval communication between the Eastern
and Western coasts of Canada.
Thus for the needs of the present and the contingencies of the
future the retention of the British West Indies under the
national flag gives strength to our general system of defence.
The completion of telegraphic and steam communication between
the principal islands has brought the question of local
federation within the range of serious discussion, but the
obstacles, social as well as physical, are naturally much
greater than in the case of Canada and Australia, and the
accomplishment of union may be for some time delayed. The
islands could not well be independent in any case, and there is
probably no part of the Empire which would lend itself more
readily than the West Indies to national consolidation.
[1] _Problems of Greater Britain_, vol. ii. p. 521.
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