is one which might and ought Government by fervid orators to have been avoided. All and frequent elections,-no Minare agreed that the Majuba istry has the nerve to take a capitulation has much to resolute step, the immediate answer for. But what have necessity of which is not successive Governments of this apparent to the average voter, country during the last decade however imperative it may be been about in allowing the for the purpose of warding off growth of this great mil- future peril, even of an overitary Power in the midst whelming magnitude. And of one important portion of great as the peril has been, it the empire. If we did not might have been still greater. know of its growth to these It is nothing to be proud of portentous dimensions, we ought that such a race as these Boers to have known. These heavy should have hemmed us in for cannon and war material have weeks and even months at all been carried in ships, and Mafeking, Kimberley, and Ladyhave been landed either in smith. But what if they had Delagoa Bay or at the ports succeeded altogether, and carried of Cape Colony. Why was Why was out their plan of campaign, and our Government in ignorance left to us the task of reconquest of them, as Lord Wolseley of the whole dominion? We has confessed. Or if they have been within measurable distance of that overwhelming calamity; and we owe the risk of it principally to President Kruger and his associates, but partly to the inherent weakness of our system of popular and party Government, very advantageous in many respects, but frequently defective for the purpose of securing to us an efficient and far-seeing policy abroad. It seems to us most unsatisfactory that the British public should wake up in the year 1899 to find that for years past a great catastrophe has been in course of preparation, steadily persevered in with persistent malignity, and that the appointed guardians of the empire have as steadily neglected, either from the faults of their Intelligence Department, or from supine indifference to peril, to take the necessary precautions. Nothing whatever has been not in ignorance, why was their disembarkation or transit allowed? They could only be intended against a State which had suzerain rights to preserve, and was responsible for the peace of South Africa; and if stopping them was an act of war, it was as justifiable a cause of war as the closing of the Vaal drifts or encroachment on neighbouring territory. It must be recognised that the conduct of President Kruger and his associates, which no successors must be allowed to imitate, is a main reason why no resettlement of South Africa will be satisfactory which allows the establishment of independent States, Boer or other, freed from British control. A second reason of hardly less importance is, that under our system of party Government, done in past years to nip the growing peril in the bud; but at least we have to congratulate ourselves that the very efficient Government of India despatched with the utmost speed a few thousand troops to Natal, which, with the aid of marines and guns from a man-of-war, was able to stem the invasion; and also that at a distance of more than 6000 miles the necessary military preparations were more or less advanced. The moral of it all, as far as future policy is concerned, is that we owe it to the security and safety of our empire that this experience shall not have to be repeated. Fortunately public opinion is thoroughly aroused, and we hope and believe has decided that, at whatever cost in men, money, and effort, there shall be an end to Boer domination and Boer schemes of hostility from the Zambesi to the Cape. The whole of this vast expedition will have been thrown away if any vestige of an independent Boer State remains as a nucleus for disaffection and hostility to our rule. If Boer power and resources can grow in twentytwo years to their present pitch, from 1877, when they had 12s. 6d. in their treasury, were without machinery of government, and were imploring annexation as the price of preservation from destruction at the hands of Zulus and Kaffirs, to 1899, when they claim, as the greatest military Power in South Africa, to turn the English out and substitute their own ascendancy, it would be madness to conclude this war by anything short of their complete subjection to the British Crown. We had better quit South Africa altogether than leave within its limits, under the guise of independence, the nucleus of another hostile State free to become, under British neglect, another formidable foe to British dominion. We should be rash beyond description if we trusted the Boers' moderation and prudence; we should be unwise if we cast upon British Administrations in the future the duty of continued watchfulness, and, further, of opportune interference, by any decisive action. The whole genius of popular government forbids any hope that that duty would be discharged. Further, are the probable results of the overthrow of these two republican Governments such as to make any reasonable man reluctant to have them displaced? It seems to us that not merely for the reasons already given is that overthrow within our right and duty, but that overpowering necessity constrains us to make every effort in that behalf, for the alternative is a humiliation before the whole civilised world which we cannot afford to undergo. It is satisfactory to reflect that there are no substantial reasons why the Boers should have so stoutly objected to become British subjects. Their interests are precisely the same as those of the English, their rights and duties would be the same; they would be sure to have either at once or eventually, as inhabitants of an English colony, the same constitutional methods as other stern repression of the aims white subjects of making their grievances, their wishes, and interests known, and of having them secured and safeguarded. The only objections to it are the sentimental ones of dislike to civilisation and its restraints. But experience will have shown them that they cannot get away from those restraints. From the time of Sir Bartle Frere downwards it has been observed that the more experienced, the more educated, and the more progressive amongst them have the least repugnance to life under the British flag. Those who are still untouched by civilisation, whose experience for two centuries of a solitary pastoral life has given to them an absolute incapacity for commerce and industrial pursuits, who belong to a past age, and are utterly ignorant of the modern world, its social institutions, relations, and politics, are the men who most tenaciously cling to an independence, which means to them the being let alone, immunity from all claims of their fellowcreatures. But these men, in a well-ordered State, will necessarily be a declining force. The better class amongst them, when they contrast the increasing prosperity and social order which British government always brings in its train, and the liberties which it secures, with the state of things which has existed since 1881-the constant unrest, the ascendancy of a tyrannical old man and his Hollander associates, the public plunder, the and wishes of the progressives amongst them, the military tyranny, the enforced service in the field, with its losses of life and its desolation, all for no practical, as distinguished from a sentimental, good-will be forced to the conclusion that they have profited by the change. But it is when we turn from them to the white colonists that we perceive the absolute impossibility of again falling short of the obligations of empire. With the whole civilised world looking on, and after having made gigantic efforts and sacrifices, we cannot terminate this contest without providing the British and other white inhabitants of South Africa security from further inroads and hostilities by their troublesome neighbours. Confidence in British power must be established: it cannot and must not be again betrayed. The Orange Free Staters were abandoned by Lord Aberdeen, the Transvaal inhabitants, white and black, were abandoned by Mr Gladstone. The colony of Natal also has its claims. It shared in the general disaster caused by the Majuba capitulation. When Zulu power was thrown, in no small degree owing to the help given by Natal, the Boers were allowed, of course by Mr Gladstone's Government, to raid over all northern Zululand and there to establish an independent republic, the union of which with the Transvaal was accomplished in 1887. over But not merely that. Natal has borne the chief brunt of the disastrous neighbourhood of a hostile and encroaching Power. It must have been the consciousness of the impossibility of living under or in relations with the Transvaal Government which has kept Natal so loyal to the mother-country, for she has had little cause for gratitude. It is Natal which, directly war broke out, had to bear the brunt of the war and to feel the full force of our inadequate preparations. Nevertheless, the colony at once and without hesitation threw in its lot with the Imperial Government, assisted it in every way, and sent a powerful body of volunteers a large proportion, in fact, of her male populationto the battlefield. Her carrying trade to the Transvaal—a chief source of her revenuehas in consequence been arrested, and her sufferings have been great from her territory having been made the scene of war, and her farmers exposed to the raiding attacks of the Boers. These sacrifices and services place her in a position of a valuable ally, who cannot be deserted and left to the tender mercies of her exasperated neighbours without mortal injury to the credit and honour of the empire. Fortunately the arrival of Indian troops prevented her from undergoing immediate subjection and annexation by the Boers; but it did not prevent the whole of the northern territories from being subjected to all the horrors and miseries of war. Her claim is manifest to com pensation rather than neglect. Probably confiscations of the properties of disloyal subjects, and charges on the Transvaal revenues, will form an adequate fund for that purpose; and if a regular and civilised government is established in the Transvaal, her neighbour will attain to a prosperity in which she will necessarily share, both from extended markets for her farmers and an increased carrying trade over her roads and railways. The special correspondent of the 'Times' recently drew attention to her claims and the grounds on which they rest. "What Natal wants above all," he says, "is such an addition to her limited territories as will afford an opportunity for her expansion in the future, and when the dominion of South Africa is at some future date realised, will secure her influence in its councils which she has so well merited in her stormy halfcentury of existence." The encroachments of the Boers will have to be cancelled, and Swaziland, together with pieces of the Transvaal and the Free State, be given to Natal, which has in the past and present established claims upon us, and will in time to come be an important constituent of the future settlement. But our present consideration is the impossibility of contemplating any other result to this war than the establishment of British supremacy in South Africa, at whatever cost in men, arms, and money. It is always the tendency of war to become unpopular as time goes on; but we trust that the general public has so completely grasped the full bearings of the situation, that they will resolutely persist in the present struggle until the only result is attained which is consistent with the security of the empire, our debt to those who have fallen, and the claims of our loyal colonies and colonists. We have had reverses in the course of this struggle, and we may have some more, but there must be no faltering in the accomplishment of our purpose. We cannot afford to fail. The interests which we represent will not admit of another concession to the Boers. If we make any settlement with them on any other terms than our recognised ascendancy, we shall have to fight it out all over again, possibly on worse terms, and with a still more powerful foe; the only other alternative being, in the terms of the ultimatum, to quit South Africa. In the present war, at all events, having regard to those terms, no foreign Power could attempt to intervene as a friend. Intervention would be tantamount to a declaration of hostility, especially after Lord Salisbury's speech at the Guildhall; and whatever temporary successes the Boers may achieve, under conditions favourable to their peculiar methods of warfare, all will admit that we are undisputed masters of the ocean ways. Further, there is the great question of the future of the black population, which is not allowed to take part in this contest, but whose sympathies are, there is every reason to believe, very generally on the side of the British. They have never had considerate treatment at the hands of the Boers, who evidently regard them with the contempt and disdain natural to a race which is physically stronger, but in point of intellect and mental cultivation is little if at all superior. The Boers' one mode of dealing with the natives in the Transvaal, over and above the usual mode of political oppression, is to raise revenue from a deleterious drink which they encourage them to consume, knowing that it utterly incapacitates them. Mr Bryce says that the more thoughtful men in the colonies agree in the magnitude of the issues which are involved in the native problem. They hold "that the three chief things to be done now are to save the natives from intoxicating liquor, which injures them even more than it does the whites; to enact good land laws, which shall keep them from flocking as a loafing proletariate into the towns, as well as just labour laws; and to give them much better opportunities than they now have of industrial education." It would be in vain to expect that this great native problem could ever be solved or helped to a solution by the blundering incapacity which in the Transvaal drove an industrious, prosperous, revenue-contributing population like the Uitlanders to a frenzy of discontent and rebellion by sheer perversity of mismanagement. Slavery or extermination would |