486 THE BRITISH ISLES. 



whicli link in the future. Ilis resources are no more inexhaustible than are 

 those of any other state. 



It would be bold to hazard a prediction as regards England's position as a 

 great power in the immediate future. Her interests are more complex, and through 

 her numerous colonies she is brought into direct contact with a greater variety of 

 nations, than can be said of any other state in the world, ancient or modern. Not 

 an event or commercial crisis can take place in any part of the world without 

 England being affected by it. No other state organism is equally sensitive to 

 outside impressions, and the fate of Great Britain depends more or less upon the 

 destinies of all those nations with which it entertains commercial relations. 



Several amongst the British colonies, such as Canada, New Zealand, and 

 Australia, are financially independent, and give weight to the material and moral 

 influence of the empire of which they are members. Colonies such as these are an 

 accession of strength, and can never become a source of danger. But this is not 

 the case as respects India, where a handful of Englishmen have succeeded in 

 imposing a government upon millions of natives. English forts and settlements 

 dot the southern shores of all Asia, and English politics are thus interwoven with 

 those of Arabs, Persians, Burmans, Malays, and Chinese. And as India affords no 

 natural base of operations, it is absolutely necessary to keep open by sea and land 

 all those routes which connect it with the great natural focus of British power. 

 No other nation disputes the free use of the ocean highway around South Africa, 

 whilst the route through the Mediterranean, the Suez Canal, and the Red Sea is 

 sufficiently protected by the fortifications of Gibraltar, Malta, and Aden. In 

 taking possession of Cyprus and assuming a kind of protectorate over Asia Minor, 

 England keeps her eyes upon those routes which will one day join Constantinople 

 to the Gulf of Persia. But farther north there are other roads, which join the 

 Black Sea and the Caspian to tho passes leading through the Hindu-Kush, and 

 by means of these, it is feared, it will be possible to threaten and intercept the 

 routes leading to India. Russia, a great military power, naturally seeks to secure 

 an outlet towards the south, and looks to the acquisition of ports in the Archipelago 

 and on the Gulf of Persia. England's task has been to put up a barrier against 

 Russian encroachments. Will she be sufficiently strong to keep Russia to the north 

 of the huge mountains which stretch from the Balkans to the Himalayas ? Upon 

 this depends her future, not indeed as a nation, but as the preponderating power 

 of the Mediterranean and of continental Asia. England boasts that for several 

 generations past the revolutions which have convulsed other countries have stopped 

 short of the narrow strait which separates her from the continent. Whilst the 

 nations of continental Europe and of America have been violently shaken by civil 

 wars and revolutions, England has experienced only gentle waves of transmission. 

 But the future is pregnant with great events, and England, like every other nation, 

 will be called upon to pl:iy her part in this new drama of the world's history. 



