8o QUEEN'S QUARTERLY. 



We can find ideals to help us in Britain and in the United 

 States even if we do not send P.B. delegates to London or P.A. 

 delegates to Washington. We can strive to secure the personal 

 honesty that marks British politics while avoiding its class-graft; 

 we can learn even more from the attempt of our neighbors to shake 

 oflf their incubus of corruption, because their problems and their 

 stage of advance are more nearly ours. Here I think lies Mr. 

 Thomson's greatest service to his country, in his attempt these 

 twenty years, culminating in his Many-mansioned House, to make 

 us understand that we are heirs to the memory of Lincoln, just as 

 the men of Massachusetts may share with Britain and with us Milton 

 and Cromwell. You agree, fully and frankly, that in the efforts of 

 to-day the United States has much to teach us; but you differ in 

 your " We'll take your lesson and be hanged to you " attitude. 



You advocate Imperial organization, following or concurrent 

 with our national development, and find hope of its practicability in 

 the analogy of the task of uniting the American colonies a century 

 and more ago : " the physical obstacles to American federation in 

 1787 were greater than the physical obstacles in the way of Imperial 

 federation to-day." True, the British Empire has shrunk, thanks to 

 cables and steamships, but it has not yet become contiguous and the 

 rest of the world has shrunk with it ; we are ten times nearer Mel- 

 bourne than of old, but we are also ten times nearer Paris and nearer 

 San Francisco; relatively, the Empire is as scattered as ever, and a 

 straight line between Toronto and Cape Town still runs through 

 New York. When after-dinner orators talk of the Empire as one, 

 I sometimes feel I should like to set them a simple examination on 

 elementary Imperialism something as follows, whereon I hazard I 

 might score 3 scratch pass, having the privilege of picking the ques- 

 tions : 



1. Name six statesmen in Australia — politicians will do. 



2. In what state is Brisbane? 



3. Who is the premier of Natal? 



4. What is the present status of New Zealand's experiment in 

 compulsory arbitration? 



Or, to come to topics nearer the great heart of the people, 



5. What slang is current in Johannesburg to-day? 



6. What are the particulars of the murder or divorce trial 

 which is filling the Sydney newspapers? 



And even after we get that inter-imperial cable service which is an 

 absolute necessity I doubt if, for lack of the background knowledge 

 that comes only through personal travel and contact and newspaper 



