from which he expects so much. If the present supervision of work within the department is not sufficiently skilled or intelligent, make it more skilled and more intelligent. To obtain more continuity in the tenure of office by its Parliamentary chiefs is past praying for, without revolutionary changes in our methods of government. Able Parliamentary chiefs will bring fresh minds to the consideration of Admiralty policy, and will do no little good by an intelligent and unsparing use of the monosyllable 'why'; but to imagine that the very ablest statesman can get, in a year or two, the power of forming an independent judgment upon a thousand matters of great importance to the efficiency of the navy, is a dream. That he should have absolutely free hand in the choice of his subordinates, uncontrolled by any consideration except the efficiency of the service, is indisputable.

Sir R. S. Robinson says:

I should state as my opinion, leaving others to judge what it may be worth, that in fighting power the unarmoured ships of England are decidedly superior to those of our rivals; but if the raison d'être of the French navy is, as has been frequently stated in that country, and by none more powerfully and categorically than by the French Minister of Marine, the widespread, thorough destruction of British commerce, and the pitiless and remorseless ransoming of every undefended and accessible town in the British dominions, regardless of any sentimentalities, or such rubbish as the laws of war, and the usages of civilised nations, and if at least one of the raisons d'être of the British navy is to defeat those benevolent intentions, and to defend that commerce on which depends our national existence and imperial greatness, then I fear that perhaps they have prepared to realise their purpose of remorseless destruction rather better than we have ours of successful preservation.

I have no doubt that the mischief done in this way by the French would only be limited by their power, and by prudential considerations, but Sir R. S. Robinson has omitted the obvious qualification that two could play at this game.

The foolish policy, or want of policy, which prevented our following up the Declaration of Paris by lending ourselves to the suggestion then made by America, to get rid of the abomination of belligerent rights at sea, would most grievously-if ever we had a long war-affect the interests of this country, but it would not affect us in the way that many people suppose--would not throw such multifarious duties upon our navy as is often maintained.

Great numbers of British ships would pass into the hands of neutrals, and they would drive a roaring trade, while our shipowners were being ruined; but, although I am very far from being otherwise than rejoiced to see the multiplication of our swift cruisers, the use of these would have its limits, and the main employment of the navy would be as a first line of defence, to make attacks on our own coast as difficult as possible, and to defend our various coigns of vantage all over the world.

Meantime it is consolatory to hear Lord George Hamilton say, as

he did at the Academy dinner, that the fleet which is to be gathered this month at Spithead, to be inspected by the Queen, will be the most powerful which any sovereign ever beheld in time of peace.

As, however, the next great sea-fight will assuredly have many surprises, it would be satisfactory to know that, if any of our huge machines were badly injured, they could find absolute security under the guns of our arsenals. Is it, however, at all certain that they could? Are not our fortifications still very imperfect and quite unfit for the exigencies of a sudden attack-the only kind of attack, that is, which we have occasion to fear?

Turning to the army, after giving what appears to me due weight to much severe criticism of it, the truth seems to be something like this. Up to 1868 we had really no army in the modern sense of the term. We had a large number of soldiers, but we had no thoroughly organised military body, every part of which was instinct with the life of the whole. The system of recruiting, of mobilisation, of transport and commissariat, were all to the last degree defective. It was assumed as axiomatic, that we were always unready at the beginning of a war, but that, as the war went on, our strength increased, while that of allies and adversaries was very apt to decline.

To the clear intelligence of Lord Cardwell such a state of things seemed absurd in a world which had seen the battle of Königgraetz. I remember his telling me that he was not a little startled, when he went to the War Office, by finding that there was no such thing as a plan for the joint defence of the country by the army and navy. He set to work, he made himself master of the difficult details of a subject not specially congenial to a man whose training had been that of a scholar, a lawyer, and a Parliamentary politician; he collected round him the ablest advisers, and supported them when they were collected. Amidst much ignorant abuse, he took advantage of the cannon fever of 1870 to lay the foundation of a military system calculated to hold its own on a planet in which might was destined for some considerable time to overrule both right and reason. On the foundations which he laid broad and deep, other War Ministers, on both sides of politics, among them Lord Hartington and Mr. Childers, have built. Lord Stanley of Preston and Mr. W. H. Smith deserve very especial mention, both for what they did and for the party temptations which they resisted.

The object set before himself by the last-named Minister was, if I understand his intentions correctly, to have two complete army corps and a division of cavalry ready for active service.

I am under the impression that we could now mobilise that force in a brief period, if war were to break out in Europe, although horses a very important item-would be a difficulty.

If we were a Continental Power, with only an imaginary frontier,

that difficulty, like many others, would have to be faced at any cost; but the sea, though no longer so strong a defence as it was, is at least an inestimable blessing as giving us time. We have still, however, a great deal to do that ought to be done; we have not yet got nearly so far forward with our matériel as with our men, though much has been effected in the last twelve months.

I think no expense should be spared to put these two army corps and the division of cavalry, of which I have spoken, into perfect order, and to supply them with all the appliances of every kind which they want; since, allowing liberally for all the assistance that would be derived from our militia and our 250,000 volunteers, Great Britain cannot be made safe against invasion, even by the most competent commander, with a smaller force.

And an attempt at invasion is as far as possible from being out of the question. It will continue to be a great and real danger as long as France remains anything like as strong as she now is, and while a good many influential Frenchmen continue to be animated with the malignant hatred against this country on which I have already commented. To make such an invasion a disastrous failure depends simply upon ourselves, and great progress towards doing so has been made of recent years. Schemes have been prepared for the defence of all our military ports, and for operations to be undertaken, in case a landing were attempted. Every possible place where such a landing could be attempted has been carefully reconnoitred, and positions have been fixed where our troops could fight to the best advantage; but it would be mere madness to relax our preparations, and it is infinitely desirable that the freest hand should be given to the reforming element in the army and the War Office. This is really a matter far too serious to allow either party or personal considerations to stand in the way of making our relatively small army as nearly perfect, for its purposes, as anything human can be.

Such a determination has nothing to do with militarism, or Chauvinism, or Jingoism, or any other 'ism,' save the best sort of patriotism. If we are but safe from sudden attack, from disaster at the very commencement of hostilities, the chances are that we shall not be involved in hostilities at all, for the most ignorant of our illwishers knows that, of all powers on earth, England is incomparably the most powerful in a long struggle. Timor Anglia initium sapientiæ is the truest of maxims, after a war has lasted for a few months.

Of course, if Mr. Gladstone's plans for Ireland, or anything like them, were in evil hour to be carried into effect, our whole military system would have to be revised in the light of the certainty of having, at no distant period, to put down armed rebellion in Ireland, assisted, probably, by a foreign force. This would complicate not a

little all our military questions, and probably end in making the calamity of some form of conscription a necessity.

As to the questions open between Lord Randolph Churchill and his late colleagues, with regard to the efficiency of War Office or Admiralty expenditure, it is next to impossible for anyone who has not been long behind the scenes in Pall Mall and Whitehall to form any judgment worth having, but it certainly would be very comforting to that large portion of the public which considers, as I do, that the colossal armaments of the Continent force the most Cobdenic of us to approve of largely increasing our national insurance fund, to know, from authority, that that insurance fund is really being expended to the best advantage.

In the present state of Europe even vaster sums than those now voted would be voted with alacrity, if only it could be proved that we are really getting twenty shillings' worth for a pound. We are certainly not doing that; but it is quite possible that we are getting very much more than the critics of the two great spending departments say. The failure of costly experiments is not peculiar to England; but, after what has occurred, it would be to the advantage alike of the First Lord of the Admiralty and the Secretary of State for War to have the facts, in so far as they can properly be published, set forth in the reports of a couple of strong committees or commissions.

Whatever faults there may be within the departments, they are as nothing compared to the difficulties which are inherent in our system.

In ordinary times these difficulties are next to insuperable. A powerful Opposition, normally nearly equal in number to the party in power, is ever ready to say that the Government is recklessly extravagant. There is not a penny to choose in this matter between Liberals and Conservatives. Military and naval men fancy that there is, and that Liberal Governments are inclined to starve the services. That is all nonsense, as anyone, whatever be his political predilections, knows, if he has been behind the scenes. Ministers, of whatever colour, want to make their own departments as efficient as possible, in their own interest. They all hate the Treasury, the natural enemy of all. Over all of them the abhorred necessity of keeping down their estimates, often at the cost of efficiency, hangs like a plague cloud.

These, however, are not ordinary times.

All

The state of parties at this moment, eminently unsatisfactory from many points of view, is perhaps such as to make it easier to deal with questions relating to the defence of the country in a broad national spirit, than it has been for a very long time. For the present Government can rely on an amount of support outside its own ranks, of the most exceptional kind. There is every reason to

expect that Lord George Hamilton and Mr. Stanhope, both men of ability, and both with their spurs to win as cabinet ministers, will not let slip a great opportunity of doing a notable service to the commonwealth.

They would be more than human if they were not also to remember that, for years to come, the fact that they had taken hold of the skirts of happy chance, to spend whatever their best advisers think necessary for our security, will be a feather in the cap of the political connexion to which they belong.

If we who so long sat opposite them have to regret that they have obtained the credit which might have been won for us, had the laws of perspective been more regarded in the pictures put before the country by some of our leaders, whose fault is that?

In the summer of 1881 the colonies had already begun to attract a greater amount of attention than had been the case for some time, and an honourable member put upon the paper a motion in favour of confederation, on the basis of a commercial union, and under the control of a legislative assembly, in which the whole Empire, with its colonies and dependencies, should be represented.

If this motion had ever come on, it would have been my duty, as being then in charge of colonial affairs in the House of Commons, to have replied to it. I should have had no difficulty, I think, in showing that the discussion raised was of a purely academic character, and that proposals of that kind, though a natural outcome of an increased interest in the colonies, were altogether premature and visionary. During the six years that have elapsed since the motion, of which I am speaking, was handed to the clerk at the table, there has been a great deal of discussion, and a step has been taken by the present Government which deserves to meet with general approbation.

Among many advantages which will arise from the recent Colonial Conference, I consider that the better understanding established between the Colonial Office and the colonies must have a high place; and henceforward, I trust, that extremely well-organised and intelligent department will receive more credit than has hitherto fallen to its lot.

It is curious to observe how often even well-informed public writers underrate its efficiency. All agree that Sir Henry Holland presided over the deliberations of the Conference with great tact and skill; but I am very sure that he was helped in doing that, not a little, by his long training in the Colonial Office, and his intimate relations with its personnel.

No one who has been accustomed to the transactions of business, in which two or more governments are engaged, can have failed to observe the immense advantages that accrue from bringing, from time to time, the people who direct these governments into personal communication, provided always they do not distinctly desire to dis