is called the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland-would this people, if their ancient separate existence should be once more, for some purposes, recognised, be content to take their place in an Imperial Federal Union on a par with Canada or Australia? It would be a considerable sacrifice perhaps, but it would not be such a concession as Victoria makes to Tasmania in the Australian federation. Or, again, would India, Ireland, or the great mother State-England-would England accept these conditions? Yet, in all probability, something of the kind would be claimed when, in the next century, Canada and Australia shall have attained to the population and proportions of great States, outnumbering Scotland or Ireland, and probably not far from equalling England itself. This is the sort of prospect we have, if there is to be an Imperial Federal Union. My ideal, however, for a reconstructed British Empire runs rather, I must confess, in the direction of a frank admission of the potential independence of Canada and Australia, and a good working alliance on that footing. For the rest, there are no signs recognisable, by the outward vision, of the decadence of England. With her commercial empire, her splendid but scarcely sufficiently appreciated dominion in the East, with Ireland really reconciled and united by a larger liberty, Great Britain and Ireland can hold their own against any odds likely to appear in arms against them. With Canada federated and Australia federated, what has the British Empire to fear? It would be as great as ever-nay, even greater, for young nations such as these would be the best allies which could be had. When we colonists read in some of your newspapers of a decrepit and a worn-out England, we sometimes fancy that we know more of England than England knows of herself; at any rate, we believe in that immense reserve of power and of resources which Disraeli sometimes used to speak of. Nor can it be believed that America, the United States of America, could or would remain indifferent to a combination of European Powers against the British nation. Blood, after all, is thicker than water. We row in the same boat. It is scarcely possible to conceive that America, bound as she now is by so many ties of interest and of intercourse to the mother country, would willingly submit to the humiliation of Great Britain by the despotic Powers of Europe. Her cause is still the cause of freedom.

But if, according to this showing, there is no necessity for a greater Britannic Parliament, there is every reason to conclude that a Federated Australia would willingly work out, in combination with her Majesty's Government, some great projects in which they may be mutually concerned. There is the Pacific annexation question. An importance has been attached to it which does not really belong to it on its merits. So long as the Australian people maintain the integrity of their institutions on the continent they already inhabit, we need fear but little from either French or German expansion. It

should not be forgotten that America has always been content with her continental development. Even now Cuba or Jamaica or San Domingo would be considered very doubtful acquisitions. Why should Australia be so keen for the Pacific? Or why, perhaps, it might be more correctly said, should Victoria? It involves much trouble in dealing with the island labour question, and her Majesty's Government could deal with it most effectually. The labour traffic as now conducted should be put down-resolutely put down-by her Majesty's Government, acting in combination with Australia, and with France, Germany, and America. It is a wicked traffic, and like to slavery.

Let another work be cited which ought to be done on the Federal Union principle. Another telegraph cable is very much required. It should be laid either across the Pacific, or from Perth, in Western Australia, to Plymouth, viâ the Cape. The tariff should be at the rate of a shilling a word. It may be assumed with safety that, taking into consideration the vastly increased business which would flow into it, such a cable would pay; and it should be laid by the Governments in combination. Nothing at present would draw England and Australia more closely together than cheap and regular telegraphic communication. At present we depend solely on the Eastern Cables Company, at a tariff which is practically prohibitory.

Or, to add another example of what might be done by England and Australia on the Federal Union principle, the Suez Canal might be bought up and duplicated. It may be confidently stated that, whether as a national or an international undertaking, Federated Australia would gladly accept her share in the responsibilities involved in making this great oceanic highway what it ought to be. This no doubt is a big question, but it is referred to here simply to illustrate what really big questions might be practically approached without waiting for the convocation of a greater Britannic Parliament.

The conclusions, therefore, which may be drawn from the present position of the British Empire, as interpreted from an Australian point of view, seem to be all in favour of the concentration of power and of administrative intelligence where countries or colonies can be grouped together for mutual support. Canada has thus grown, and has become a source of strength. Australia will grow in like manner, and will also become a source of strength. Of Africa it is difficult to speak with the same confidence, because the presence of a large coloured population there makes it doubtful if the principles of self-government will be found to be as effective there as in Canada and Australia.

But whatever may be the ultimate destiny of Canada or Australia, no Australian believes that either the power or the prestige of Great Britain would be in the least diminished by the absolute independence of his own country. Great Britain, as the great commercial power

of the world, as the possessor of India, as the holder of an unrivalled chain of settlements in the East-settlements most insufficiently appreciated-has a very grand position among nations, even the grandest. She has a great prestige, and colonists know full well what strength she has to act, if need be. In this she is, and will remain, an Imperial Power, and we colonists know full well-none better-what capacity she has to act up to the correspondence of her greatness if the necessity arose.

Canada and Australia are outworks of that power-independent outworks they ought to be, and must become-and if so, then it follows that the policy of the empire should be based on their present voluntary adhesion, and on the recognition of their potential independence. Nevertheless, as Lord Rosebery has pointed out, there is a greater question even than the franchise, though the franchise question is uppermost just now. That question is the unity and security of the empire, the essential security of the citadel and its outworks. There are those who think that this may be best effected by the creation of a supreme Federal Government and a supreme Federal Parliament. There are others again who look rather to the growth of the imperial principle acting in accord with a recognition of a healthy but loyal spirit of colonial independence. My experience, at any rate of Australian affairs, leads me to conclude that British interests in the world will be best served by as little divergence as possible from the principles of government which have of late years been recognised and applied to the great self-governing offshoots of the British Empire. Their growth has been healthy and natural. Let it continue to be so. Australians, I believe, desire more and more to become united with one another, and thus they may learn to 'perfect the union and autonomy of peoples of the same origin.' JOHN DOUGLAS.

POSTSCRIPT.

Since the above was written, the Conference on Imperial Federation, held at the Westminster Palace Hotel, has thrown some hopeful light on the subject. The League thus formed does not talk of an Imperial Parliament. It is satisfied, in the meantime at any rate, with devoting its attention chiefly to the organised defence of common rights.' So far as Australia is concerned, the practical outcome of the League's efforts will probably be to sustain and to increase the efforts now being made to render our defence organisation more efficient, and to bring it more and more into unison with what may be called the scheme of Imperial defences. Beyond this I think it is scarcely to be expected that the Australian Governments will

move. But even this means a great deal, and probably a considerable expenditure. Up to the present time the Australian Colonies, in the matter of defences, have accepted and have acted up to the recommendations of the Commissioners appointed by her Majesty's Government in 1878. They would go further, I believe, and, if deemed desirable, would form an arsenal and establish factories for war material. It may be doubted, however, if they would contribute to the fortification of Aden or Singapore, very essential as those fortifications may be. They would very probably say, 'We will fortify coaling stations on our own territory at Newcastle on the Hunter, at Thursday Island, and at King George's Sound, but more than that we cannot undertake at present.' Such, at any rate, is my estimate of the share which the Australian Colonies are likely to take in contributing to Imperial defences.-J. D.

THE EXPANSION OF GERMANY.

Ar the Berlin Conference of 1884 Germany, for the first time, takes her place in the ranks of the colonising States of Europe. France has recently exhibited new fervour in the same direction, and everywhere in Europe there are signs that national expansion beyond national frontiers is to be a leading feature of the coming era.

In thus recognising a wider application of Professor Seeley's now historic term, one cannot but recall that passage of his admirable book in which he sums up the historical origin and character' of the Empire of Greater Britain:

It is the sole survivor of a whole family of Empires which arose out of the action of the discovery of the New World upon the peculiar condition and political ideas of Europe. All these Empires were beset by certain dangers which Greater Britain alone has hitherto escaped, though she, too, has felt the shock of them, and is still exposed to them; and the great question now is, whether she can modify her defective Constitution in such a way as to escape them for the future.

Whatsoever these dangers which the British Empire alone has survived, it cannot be doubted that other European nations, other States of the Old World,in spite of the previous losses of colonies, are again reaching a period of redundant population, capital, and energy. Europe, like some mighty human volcano, is again giving signs of a great periodic eruption.

The effort, following close on the discovery of the New World, which Europe made to extend European dominion over large areas of the earth's surface collapsed, after three centuries of toil, in the severance from Europe of all the States so set up. The whole of America had been colonized, but the whole of America, with what was then considered the trifling exception of a narrow strip of inhabited territory in the extreme north, broke the bonds of its European connection. Spain ultimately retained a hold only on her two West Indian islands of Cuba and Puerto Rico. France lost all she had acquired on the mainland of North America, and soon the great West Indian island of Hispaniola; Portugal lost her dominion over one half of South America; and her long chain of factories and garrisons, which at one time had given her the monopoly of trade along all the coasts of Africa, Arabia, and India, away to the islands of the Far East, fell into a feebleness which allowed most of them to VOL. XVI.-No. 94. 30