2nd December.
Ir the telegraphed report, "that came to us yesterday through our exclusive service, of Mr. Ba'four's speech at the United Service Club is correct, the speech itself must have been a very much after-dinner one, or Mr. Balfour's condition must be giving cerions anxiety to his friends and colleagues. Mr, Balfour, we are told, "said he believed the occasion would arise when ey have to devote his defence of his Country, He did not believe that home defence required the maintenance of a large regular army.
"Our greatest difficulty was the defence of our Indian borders against a great, and he was glad to believe a friendly, empire.
"Tf the defence of India is our great military problem, the Empire of India is the place who-e we ought to send our greatest military expert.
"Those who professed to desire eftic'ency complained that Kitchener had been sent to the Him: the Himalayas was where ought to Lo."
Unless Me. ailfour has reason to believe that the introduction of Mr. mhe 's fiscal reform will so irritate the outside world that it will come down iv a united body on our poor little islands, it is not easy to:|desery the danger that can only be averted by eight million men turning out for the defence of their country. Nor is Mr. Balfour's latest warning altogether consistent with his state. iment at the Guildhall that there was nothing in the diplomatic sky to cause overpowering. anxiety. Nor is it consistent with' his statement that home defence does not require the maintenance of a large regular army. Fully competent as a levy en masse may seem to Mr. Balfour to meet the attack of the trained millions of the Continent, it can hardly be expected that it will be better than an army of regulars. We do not believe for a moment that Mr. Balfour really believes that any such terrible danger is hanging over the United Kingdom; but when he saw tue array of grizzled, moustache, and pensioned veterans before him, he found the temptation to make their flesh creep irresistible.
His effort was evidently so successful that he decided to keep it up and go one better, so he went on to y thas a still greater danger menaced our Indian borders at the hands of a friendly empire. The man in the street might ask why it should be such a terrible difficulty to defend India against_a friendly empire, but perhaps Mr. Balfour has secret information that Russia is preparing to kill us with kindness. Seriously, it was generally understood that our native army in India, stiffened as it is by seventy-five thousand troops from the United Kingdom, is in suck a high state of efficiency, our preparations so complete, and our frontier so well chosen {and guarded, that apprehensions as to an incursion from the north have been very much diminished, even if Russia had any serious intention of invading India. Russian newspapers, wherever they think we are doing anything to thwart their progress in the Far East, like to make a diversion by threatening a Russian invasion of Thdia, but these vapourings need not be taken too much to heart. As long asthe people of India are not disaffected, they will not want to exchange British for Russian rule. There are some who hold that the Tartar strain in the Russians makes them better able to understand and rule Chinese than we are; but no such argument holds in the case of India, the majority of whose inhabitants are Aryans like ourselves; and that is why Englishmen pick up the native languages in India so much more quickly and readily than in China.
What is certain is, that there is little chance of an occasion arising when the whole adult population of India will have to d-vote its services to the defence of the Peninsula. As Mr Balfour believes that such an occasion will arise in England, it is surely logical to insist we should keep our greatest military expert in England. Lord Rosebery it is who has been urging in the interest of efficiency that Kitchener is wanted
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.