2nd December.
Tue primary duty of every journal list is unquestionably to seek first the kingdom of his constituents and their interests, and then to take stock of all other things that may be added unto them. In other words, first care must be to look after the wel of his locality, and only after that has been well served to devote his surplus strength to imperial matters, Shoulil the two come into conflict there is no need to tell any capable main on which side his duty lies. But it ix 1 to 1 against. the dang which besets strong and strenuous natures hedged about by local limitations. 'There is a danger that such men wherever they inay be will their own little locality for the hu' of the universe and thus be blind to the wider outlook. They not infrequently giveevidenc> of a desire for the subordination of the interests' of an empire to the well-being off their little section of it, It is well tu resist the tendency so easily seen in others, so difficult to recognise in one's self. Broad outlines must necessarily occupy the minds of the whose duty itis to watch over the affairs of a great nation. In th: imperial games of chess constantly in progress, there are occasions when apparently reckless sacrifice is necessary in order to lead up to th commanding position which master player has in view. A goes here and there; anon a knight, Bishop, or castle is swept away, and were they sentient beings, it would be easy to imagine the anger and contempt with which their bosoms would be filled against the hand thit doomed them to destruction. So in war. The competent general hesitsecures the end in vie In the survey of such a wide-spread domain as the British Empire there cannot be wanting many points to which considerations such as these fully apply. We have points of contact with France, with Russia, wi h Germany, with the United Stites,: and with other countries, The bus ness of our government is a0 to cons duct our affairs that the greatest possible amount of good shall result to the British Empire, and this without prejudice to the interests of other \Stutes.. There should be no desire \to overreach, there should be no surrender to overreaching. Imperial affairs in times of peace should be matters of discreet bargaining, both sides having their own interests in view in precisely the same way as two merchants have in buying from, or selling to, each other. Give and taxe should supply the needed elastic city.
World Empires necessarily require the exercise of a greater amount of this commercial tact than do those more self-contained, It is part ut the price to be paid for our wid spread Empire that we should com into contact with our American cousins under Arctic snows, with Brazil beneath the tropics, with Russia in Manchuria and the Persian Gulf, with France in a dozen different places, and in consequence of our sea supremacy with everybody every: where. We need not be surprised mistakes are made at times, Sull less should we wonder at delays, apparent inattention, We have had occasion to regret not once has many times the fatal facility with which thanks to the telegraph, everything can now be referred home, 14 pre-telegraphic days the Minister was enough of a plenipotentiary to be able to settle all but the most vit questions "off his own bat." He now wires for instructions, and as colleagues everywhere do the lik delays are necessarily very prolong d at umes when delay for any reason is dangerous, Swill, on the" whole, it is perhaps as well that the government at home should be able to see at a glance th: position of the Empire's affairs from day to day. The dispatch of a squadron to Koweit might of itself mean little or nothing, but in conjunction with certain action in Peking, or the movements of troops in Indi: it might bear a construction wie the Foreign Office never into +i. Complaisance over the abrogation ut a Clayton-Bulwer treaty-may well reciprocated by equal complaisance elsewhere on the parc of Brother Jonathan.
rarely" that both sides to a bargain of this nature ave entirely satisfied, and this may perhaps be taken as general evidence of the substantial justice of the exchang>. Whenever. such awards have been made between ourselves and other nations, as fur example in the exchange of Heligsland, the settlement in West Africa, and the agreement respecting Tunis, growls of a more or less angry nature have arise. in the Press on both sides. Very largely these have come from the aforementioned conflict between legal and imperial affairs) and in
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.