TWENTY-FOURTH WAR : WAR IN EGYPT. 49 



TWENTY-FOURTH WAR: WAR IN EGYPT. 



A separate article on this War, and of the history of England's 

 intervention in Egypt, appears subsequently in this volume. 



CONCLUSION. 



Twenty-four Wars waged by Great Britain during fifty years of 

 Queen Victoria's Reign ! Wars declared and waged by the Royal 

 sanction and authority of Her Majesty the Queen, who solemnly 

 declared on her accession to the Throne in 1837 : — 



" I rejoice that in ascendmg the Throne I find the country in 

 amity with all Foreign Powers ; and while I faithfully perform 

 the engagements of my Crown, and carefully watch over the in- 

 terests of my subjects, it shall be the constant object of my 

 solicitude to preserve the blessings of peace." 

 During the fifty years Reign of our beloved Queen Victoria we may 

 rejoice that many great and beneficent measures have been placed on 

 the Statute Book of the Realm, legislation that has conferred lustre 

 on the Crown, honour to Parliament, and that has largely tended to 

 the furtherance of the welfare and prosperity of the people. 



Such was the great act of justice and humanity of Negro Emanci- 

 pation in the Colonies of the Crown, by which, on August ist, 1838, 

 800,000 of the coloured race passed from a state of human serfdom 

 into the brighter and better land of human freedom. 



Such was the legislative measure devised and promoted by Rowland 

 Hill for the adoption of a uniform rate of Postage, which in spite of 

 opposition, passed into law January loth, 1846, and that has become, 

 by the enormous impetus to correspondence, a valuable source of 

 revenue to the State, but has also largely extended the fraternal 

 relations of Nations, and thus silently but effectually increased the 

 happiness of millions of the human race. 



Such was the legislative measure for the Repeal of the Corn Laws, 

 the abolition of that colossal injustice, the Taxes on Food, won after 

 a great free trade struggle, seven years of untiring efforts by 



