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Reprinted from The Scottish Oeograj)himl Magazine for May 1894. 
 
 ■;%■: 
 
 THE GEOGIiAPHICAL UNITY OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE. 
 
 By GiX). R. Parkin, M.A. 
 
 {Read at a Meeting of the Societij in Sdinhunjh, March 1894.) 
 
 {JFHh Maps.) 
 
 In placing before you the large map of the World which Mr. Bartholomew 
 has prepared for me to especially illustrate the position of the British 
 pjmpire, it might seem as if I had furnished you with an ocular refutation 
 of the very name which I have given to this address. In this map you 
 at once see geographical diversity and separation apparently carried to 
 their utmost extent. Parts of the Empire are found on every continent ; 
 they are in the extreme north and the extreme south ; they are in the 
 Frigid, the Temperate, and the Torrid Zones. The portion we examine 
 may cover a continent, or half a continent ; it may be a lonely island or 
 an isolated promontory ; it may be coloured deeply to indicate full 
 possession, or it may have the subdued tint which points only to pervad- 
 ing influence. There are vast areas which are practically incapable of 
 settlement or commercial development; there are others which already 
 feel the full rush of human life and industry ; and there are others still 
 which lie only waiting for the presence of civilised man and the 
 appliances of civilisation, to deal with their boundless resources, and 
 transform them into happy homes and prosperous spheres of activity. 
 There are prairies largo enough to absorb the population of European 
 kingdoms with ease; there aie deserts in whose almost boundless wastes 
 armies might be swallowed up and lost. Every ocean washes the shores 
 of the Empire ; ships are constantly making the full circuit of 25,000 
 miles around the globe without touching at anything but widely separated 
 British ports. 
 
 Population is as diversified as position and climate. While the back- 
 
 \ 
 
X 
 
 226 
 
 SCOTTISH OEOr.nAPlirCAL MAGAZINE. 
 
 bone of national strength is white, Caucasian, and English-speaking, 
 beyond this all is diversity ; every colour — black, brown, red, yellow ; 
 all races — Negro, Indian, Mongolian, Malay, Papuan, Kanaka, Maori; 
 all religions — Christian, Mohammedan, Buddhist, Parsee, and Pagan. 
 Language is even more various than race, creed, or colour. Diffusion, 
 separation, isolation, variety, every expression which contrasts with the 
 term unity is what naturally suggests itself to one who merely looks at 
 a map of the Empire, without studying the great facts which underlie its 
 history, its progress, its aims, its manifest place and work in the world, 
 the new conditions under which it exists to-day. I fear that this 
 primary, superficial, and utterly misleading impression of national discon- 
 nection still dominates great numbers of minds ; it is to modify such an 
 impression that this paper is chiefly intended. 
 
 That I have begun by placing before you this map which so vividly 
 represents the scattered state of the Empire, with its dividing spaces of 
 continent, and ocean, and zone, will be, I trust, some guarantee that I 
 wish to face my text ftiirly. 
 
 What I wish to prove is, that in spite of all this apparent diversity, 
 the territorial growth of the Empire has been not abnormal, but strictly 
 organic — the outcome of racial instincts and the fundamental necessities 
 of national life ; that each part is fitted to minister to the wants of the 
 other parts, or of tho whole, with singular felicity of adaptation ; that 
 this vast diffusion of territory is so linked together as to be fitted in a 
 very special way for the perfr mance of peculiarly high national functions; 
 that dismemberment would mean for it what dismemberment means for 
 any highly complicated and efficient organism ; that, in short, to speak 
 of the geographical unity of the Empire is no paradox, but a simple 
 truth — a truth which it is of the utmost importance that ai) British people 
 should vividly realise. 
 
 In entering upon the argument by which I hope to justify these con- 
 clusions, it seems necessary, in the first place, to briefly consider a few of 
 the most salient features in the historic growth of the Empire. 
 
 If we take the coming of the Saxons as our point of departure in 
 British history, then we may say roughly that eleven centuries were 
 passed in the manifold processes of internal growth and change before 
 our people began to get even a hint of the world-wide destiny that was 
 in store for them. 
 
 First, in this period there was for some hundreds of years that fierce 
 clash of people against which was to settle, by the survival of the strongest, 
 the prevailing strain of race. At last there emerged a population in 
 whose blood was curiously mingled Saxon force, and Celtic fire, and the 
 Berserker energy of the Sca-Kings. 
 
 Then followed some further centuries spent in internal struggles, varied 
 occasionally, but oi.ly incidentally, by continental wars, which gave 
 temper and fibre and greater homogeneity to the race, and stability, with 
 ordered liberty beyond that of other nations, to social and political 
 institutions. 
 
 But from the very first the direction of the country's history was 
 dominated by one geographical fact which differentiated its position from 
 
 at 
 
 0,1 
 
 * 
 
THE GEOGRAPHICAL UNITY OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE. 
 
 227 
 
 that of every othor European State, ami irom tliat of every nation known 
 to ancient history — the fact that it was an ishmd ; an island, too, peno- 
 tratcfl on all sides by estuaries which suggested comi...rce, and hinted at 
 the revival of the sea-roving spirit, which, during the long constructive 
 period, had slumbered, but ,was by no means dead. 
 
 By the beginning of the sixteentli century signs of a renascent mari- 
 time energy began to show themselves, and soon developed with wonderful 
 rajtidity ; as the century drew to a close, in " the spacious times of Great 
 Elizabeth," English navigators — Drake, Hawkins, Frobisher, Cavendish, 
 Sir Humphrey Gilbert, Kaleigh, and others — had given ample proofs of 
 those qualities which pointed with no doubtful finger to the sea as the 
 scene of Britain's greatest glories and greatest gains. 
 
 They had circumnavigated the globe : they had made their name 
 feared in the reniot(!st seas : they had tracked the Spanish galleons to the 
 r'aces from which Si)ain drew lier stores of wealth ; tiicy had vanquished 
 1.1 open figiit the most, imposing licet that the pride and wealth and skill 
 of man had ever put upon the sea. 
 
 But thougli tlu! force of them and the fear of them prevailed every- 
 where, as yet tliere was little thought of territorial t'xpansion. While 
 Spaniard, Krenclinian, Portuguese, and Dutchman were planting their 
 feet in many lauds, the si.Meenth century closed while yet scarce an 
 Englishman had found a fi.\ed home beyond his own narr:,w seas. As 
 yet only the pathways were Iteing found iur the Hood of Anglo-Sa.xon life 
 which was to follow. 
 
 The seventeenth century saw a change in this. The spirit of 
 adventure, the desire for wealth, the wish to free the soul from old-world 
 traditions and despotisms, conspired to kindle the colonising spirit. An 
 outlet had to be found for forces which, if pent up at home, might well 
 have wrecked the State. The; first great expansive movement of British 
 people was as natural and organic as the force which compels the bursting 
 of a bud, or the transfoimntion of a chrysalis. It is now possible to 
 present a map of the Empire abroad, as it is here before you. At the 
 end of the seventeenth century, as you see, there is a thin line of settle- 
 ment along the eastern coast of North America; trading posts or points 
 secured for the refreshment of navigators are scattered here and there. 
 Trade and settlement are the two characteristics of the period ; the 
 movements are tentative, but in each lies the germ, on two distinct 
 lines, of astonishing growth. 
 
 Let us here mark the philosophy of this growth, while we are at its 
 very beginnings. That philosophy, in one of its main aspects, at least, 
 has been admirably stated by Lieutenant Mahan, of the American navy, 
 i?i his profound work upon The Groivth of Sea Poicn; now everywhere 
 accepted as the al)lest study of the question yet written. He says : 
 
 " As a nation, with its armed and unarmed shipping, launclies forth 
 from its own shores, the need is soon felt of points upon which the ships 
 can rely for peaceful trading, for refuge and supplies. In the present 
 day friendly, though foreign, ports are to be found all over the world ; 
 and their shelter is enough wliile peace prevails. It was not always so, 
 nor does peace always endure. ... In earlier times the merchant seaman. 
 
 aun^'jiiL'M.^^^^ . 
 
228 
 
 SCOTTISH GEOGRAPHICAL MAGAZINE. 
 
 seeking for trade in new and unexplored regions, made his gains at risk 
 of life and liberty from suspicious or hostile nations, and was under great 
 delays in collecting a full and profitable freight. He therefore intuitively 
 sought at the far end of his trade route one or more stations, to bo given 
 to him by force or favour, whore he could fix himself or his agents in 
 reasonable security, where his ships could lie in safety, and where the 
 merchantable products of the land could be continually collecting, awaiting 
 the arrival of the home fleet, which should carry them to the mother- 
 country. As there was immense gain, as well as much risk, in these early 
 voyages, such establishments naturally multiplied and grow until they 
 became colonies ; whose ultimate development and success depended upon 
 the genius and policy of the nation from which thoy sprang, and form a 
 very great part of the history, and particularly of tlie sea history, of the 
 world. . . . 
 
 " The needs of commerce, however, were not all provided for when 
 safety had been secured at the far end of the road. 
 
 " The voyages were long and dangerous, the seas often beset with 
 enemies. In the most active days of colonising there prevailed on the 
 sea a lawlessness tlu; very memory of which is now almost lost, and the 
 days of settled peace Ix^twcen maritime nations were few and far between. 
 Thus arose the demand for stations along the road, like the Cape of 
 Good Hope, St. Helena, and Mauritius, not primarily for trade, but for 
 defence and war; the demand for the possession of posts like Gibraltar, 
 Malta, Louisburg at the entrance of the Gulf of 8t. Lawrence — posts 
 whose value was chiefly strategic, though not necessarily wholly so." 
 
 The territorial expansion, then, of the seventeenth century was the 
 natural result of forces working in the national life. 
 
 We pass on to the eighteenth century. All is now again changed. 
 This is for Britain the period of storm and stress. The century opened 
 in comparative quiet, save when broken by continental wars which we 
 now know were but a mere prelude to what was to come. Its middle 
 decade was marked by a contest of which the brilliant American historian, 
 Parkman, has said : 
 
 " The Seven Years' War n;ade England what she is. It crippled the 
 commerce of her rival, ruined France in two continents, and blighted her 
 as a colonial Power. It gave England the control of the seas and the 
 mastery of North America and India, made her the first of commercial 
 nations, and prepared that vast colonial system that has planted New 
 Englands in every quarter of the globe. And while it made England 
 what she is, it supplied to the United States the indispensable condition 
 of their greatness, if not of their national existence. " 
 
 The century closed in another Titanic struggle which shook the 
 whole civilised world — a struggle for national life or death. 
 
 It was in this latter half of the eighteenth century that for the first 
 time in her long history Britain learned the secret of her destiny ; that 
 she began to fully understand " the meaning of the riddle of her might." 
 Against the most colossal military genius and the most tremendous military 
 combination that the modern world lias known she matched her sea- 
 kings* blood ; the might of the waves against the might of the land. 
 
 i 
 
 nil 
 
 tiii 
 nil 
 
THE GEOGRAPHICAL UNITY OF THK BRITISH EMPIRE. 
 
 229 
 
 it risk 
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 when 
 
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 so." 
 
 was the 
 
 changed. 
 
 opened 
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 England 
 
 condition 
 
 shook the 
 
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 er might." 
 us military 
 her sea- 
 the land. 
 
 Have you ever reflected upon the tremendous odds against us when wo 
 entered upon our struggle with Napoleon — odds so overwhelming that 
 without our ocean power nothing apparently could have saved us? 
 
 "In 1789" ([ quote from that remarkable book on Soiiul Erolulion, 
 lately written by Mr. Uenjamin Kidd) " the population of Great Britain 
 was only 9,000,000, the population of France was 20,700,000. The 
 aunual revenue of France was £24,000,000, that of Great Britain was 
 only £15,050,000. 
 
 " At the beginning of the nineteenth century the French people 
 numbered some 27,000,000, while the whole English-speaking peoples, 
 including the Irish and the population of the North American States and 
 Colonies, did not exceed 20,000,000." (The population of the United 
 Kingdom at this period was only 14,000,000.) 
 
 Lieut. Mahan's statement upon this period of British history is also 
 most effective. 
 
 "When war broke out with Spain in 1739, the navy of England was 
 in numbers more than equal to the combined navies of Spain and France ; 
 and, during the quarter of a century of nearly uninterrupted war that 
 followed, this numerical disproportion increased. In these wars 
 England, at first instinctively afterward with conscious i)urpose, under a 
 Government that recognised her opportunity and the possibilities of her 
 great sea power, rapidly built up that mighty colonial empire whoso 
 foundations were already securely laid in the cliaractoristics of her colonists 
 and the strength of her fleets. In strictly European afl'airs her wealth, the 
 outcome of her sea power, made her play a conspicuous part during the 
 same period. The system of subsidies, which began half a century before 
 in the wars of Marlborougli and received its most extensive development 
 half a century later in the Napoleonic wars, maintained the eflbrts of her 
 allies, which would have been crippled, if not paralysed, without them. 
 Who can deny that the Government which with one hand strengthened 
 its fainting allies on the Continent with the life-blood of money, and with 
 the other drove its own enemies off" the sea and out of their chief posses- 
 sions, Canada, Martinique, Guadeloupe, Havana, Manilla, gave to its 
 country the foremost n>h in European politics ? and who can fail to see 
 that the power wliich dwelt in that Government, with a land narrow in 
 extent and poor in resources, sprang directly from the sea J " 
 
 This desperate struggle, long hanging in the susi)ense of doubtful 
 issue, was decided at Trafalgar, for to Trafalgar AVaterloo itself was but 
 a sequel — a corollary. 
 
 We came out of the conflict bleeding at every pore ; with one gioat 
 fraction of the Empire wrenched from tlie parent stem ; with a national 
 debt such as had never weighed down a country before ; with social and 
 industrial dangers of the gravest kind. But it left Britain unqiu'stioned 
 mistress of the sea, and with the foundations of a new empire — the 
 material for working out a new history — more wonderful than the old. 
 
 In this second map you may see where we stood in the early years of 
 the nineteenth century. 
 
 Now, let me say that the vast growth of this period also — a period of 
 dire struggle euding in victory and conquest — was once more inevitable 
 
230 
 
 SCOTTISH GEOGRAPHICAL MAGAZINE. 
 
 ^■1 
 
 and therefore organic ; it was in a contest for very existence that the 
 empire was so widened by accessions of territory in India, America, and 
 at minor points. 
 
 If these vast territories, liowevcr, had remained as simple conquests, 
 if they had not become grafted into the very life of the nation, they 
 might easily have come in time to be looked on as mere excrescences, 
 and so to be got rid of as opportunity ofi'ered. 
 
 But what are the facts t The work of conquest had barely ceased 
 when the process of complete assimilation began. A new era now opens 
 upon us. A few years were required to collect our shattered forces, to 
 steady political institutions, to get our new bearings in the world, and 
 then it might be truly said of our national life that " old things have 
 passed away and all things have become new." Our history for the last 
 lialf-century may for our purpose to-night be summed up in a few words. 
 It is a national life expanding, and ever more and more expanding, 
 abroad ; intensifying, and ever more and more intensifying, at home. 
 
 The growth of population, with the astonishing organisation of 
 industry and application of manufacturing power within ; the steady 
 flux of population from our shores to form new centres of national 
 strength abroad : these are the characteristics of our time which chiefly 
 concern us. 
 
 You have before you the map of the Empire at this last decade of the 
 nineteenth century. It presents an entirely new sot of problems, problems 
 which we must fact- resolutely and study with what accuracy we can. 
 
 Observe that the comparatively small province of Quebec, which we 
 won by conquest, has now, under the impulse of settlement, expanded 
 into the great Dominion ; a country covering half a continent, and an 
 area well-nigh equal to Europe. 
 
 The two or three penal settlements of Australia have .spread out into 
 the vast provinces which cover a whole continent — again nearly as large 
 as Europe. 
 
 New Zealand is comparatively small, and yet even it is nearly as 
 large as the United Kingdom. 
 
 From the Cape of Good Hope our purchase from the Dutch has 
 spread, and is spreading, over the most habitable parts of Africa. 
 
 The complete spontaneity of this expansion no man who studies the 
 facts can question. It has taken place in the very teeth of Government 
 opposition. The rulers of this country, for instance, long hesitated about 
 laying any claim to New Zealand, but were driven to it unwillingly at 
 last ; they liad no thought of taking possession of the whole of Australia ; 
 tliey interposed to prevent Australia occupying the islands around them ; 
 their hands are even now being constantly forced in Africa by a restless 
 energy which resistance seems only to stimulate. 
 
 No impulse from our rulers led to the opening up of the vast 
 Canadian North-West; it was simply the push of Canadian energy, 
 pioneering the way for English, Scottish, Irish, and other emigrants. 
 Taking the countries I have mentioned as a whole, the expansion of the 
 Empire has consisted in the rush of a national life, powerful beyond all 
 precedent, along the geographical lines of least resistance. This spon- 
 
THE GEOOIIAPIIICAL UNITY OF THE URITISH EMriRE. 
 
 231 
 
 that the 
 lica, auil 
 
 onquests, 
 ion, thoy 
 lescences, 
 
 •ly ceased 
 low opens 
 forces, to 
 vorltl, and 
 lings have 
 or the last 
 few words, 
 expanding, 
 home, 
 lisation of 
 the steady 
 )f national 
 lich chiefly 
 
 ;cade of tho 
 IS, problems 
 we c!\n. 
 c, which we 
 b, expanded 
 lent, and an 
 
 eiid out into 
 uly as large 
 
 is nearly as 
 
 13 Dutch has 
 
 iica. 
 
 studies the 
 
 Government 
 sitated about 
 luwillingly at 
 
 of Australia ; 
 iround them ; 
 
 by a restless 
 
 of the vast 
 idian energy, 
 ler emigrants, 
 jansion of the 
 tul beyond all 
 This spon- 
 
 taneous rush has not even been confined to the Empire, but has contri- 
 buted (laito as much to building up tho United States as well. The 
 force of which wo are spealcing, so wonderfully penetrating in influence 
 abroad, has its genesis in tho homos of this country. I venture to say 
 thiit tlnTo is not u person in this audience wlio luis not found or will not 
 find it in operation by his own fireside. A lady beside whom I sat a few 
 evenings ago at a London dinnor-tal)lo told mo tliat she liad peven brotiiers 
 abroad in the Colonies, and, she added, all doing well. Multiply such a 
 fact as that by what each of you knows of the circumstances of the homes 
 willi which he is familiar, and you can judge for yourselves whetlier the 
 expansion of the Empire is or is not a vital process. One statistical fact 
 will bring vividly before your minds the vastness of its operation during 
 the last hundred years. I liavi; mentioned that at the opening of the 
 last decade of the eighteenth century tho population of Great Britain 
 was 9,G(J0,000, as compared with the 2G,700,OOU of France. At the 
 opening of the last decade of the nineteenth century, tho English- 
 speaking peoples, excluding subject races and the Negroes of the United 
 States, number 101,000,000, while the French people number less than 
 40,000,000. 
 
 But besides this expansion by colonisation of which I have spoken, 
 another well-nigh as wonderful has taken place. 
 
 Tlie needs of commerce fir.st carried us to our great Eastern Empire ; 
 tiiey have combined with other forces to keep us there. The few trading 
 ports of the seventeenth century, the fringe of dominion won in the 
 eighteenth, have steadily spread during the nineteenth, until our posses- 
 sions reach the Himalayas, and push out west and east far beyond the 
 Indus and the Irrawaddy. Here we have come, not to colonise, but to 
 trade and rule. 
 
 This, you may say, is not normal and spontaneous growth ; it is the 
 mere aggregation of conquered provinces, such as built up the Roman 
 Empire. A study of history soon modifies this judgment. 
 
 One thing at least we can say with certainty : that this great growth 
 was not intentional. Ruler after ruler was sent out to India with the 
 strictest orders to avoid the annexation of territory, and one after another 
 seems to have gone with the sincere purpose of carrying out these instruc- 
 tions, only to find himself in the grasp of a destiny which he could not 
 control. 
 
 When once we had expelled our only European rivals, the French, 
 from India, when once our hold on the sea-coast l)ecame essential to our 
 commercial position, we found oursolves coming under the operation of a 
 law which seems to hold whenever highly civilised man comes in contact 
 with the less civilised races — he ends by ruling them whether he will or 
 no. At any rate, under the impulse of some force which statesmen and 
 people alike could not control, we rule to-day 280,000,000 of [)eople in 
 India ; and so closely have its commercial interests become bound up in 
 our own, so vital is the link of industrial connection, that in addressing 
 the London Chamber of Commerce five years ago Lord Dufi'erin could 
 with truth affirm that " it would not be too much to say that if any 
 serious disaster ever overtook our Indian Empire, or if our political 
 
 •t-ItiSi^*- 
 
232 
 
 8C0TTI8II UEUGUAPUICAL MaOAZINR. 
 
 rolations with the Peninsula of Hindostan were to bo even partially 
 (listuibed, there is not a cottage in Great Britain, at all events in the 
 manufacturing districts, which would not be made to feel the disastrous 
 consequences of such an intoleralilc calamity." 
 
 The unity, then, even with our great dependencies, is vital. Every 
 year brings out in more vivid relief some striking illustration of the 
 close industrial dejjcndence, based, you will observe, on geographical con- 
 ditions — in other words, on geographical unity between different parts of 
 the Empire. Lot us take a few conspicuous examples. 
 
 Sixty or seventy years ago the woollen industry of this country, 
 which had for centuries given employment to a considerable number of 
 people, took a new start, through the application of machinery, and sijice 
 that time its development has been prodigious. The manufacture of 
 wool is not only the chief industry of the great Yorkshire towns, but is 
 also found givhig wide employment in the south of Scotland, in the 
 Stroud valley, and in oth«;r parts of England. Altogether some millions 
 of people depend upon it. Now, in this country, upon Scottish moors, 
 Welsh mountains, and English pastures, wool is raised with much expense 
 and difficulty. But at the very time when this woollen industry began 
 to advance by leaps and bounds, we also began to occupy those milder 
 climates to which our people have gone in New Zec'.and, Australia, and 
 South Africa. ±u these countries the conditions tor raising wool inex- 
 pen.sively are almost ideal. The mild climate, the wide extent of lands 
 unsuited to anything but pasturage, the possibility of managing vast 
 flocks with little labour, entirely changed the conditions of sheep-raising. 
 The result is that the enormous demands made by the newly invented 
 machinery and the growing industries of this workshop of the M'orld 
 have been met without difficulty. 
 
 Of the five countries from which woollen fibres are imported, four — 
 New Zealand, Australia, India, and South Africa — are under the British 
 flag ; while the fifth. South America, has been chiefly exploited by British 
 capital. But beyond all the natural advantages which these countries 
 enjoy for raising wool, there remains the great fact that they border 
 closely upon the sea ; that nowhere do the wool-packs have to be carried 
 any great distance by land before they come in contact with the great 
 industrial uniter — the Ocean. Had these wool-growing areas been in 
 the centre of Asia, or even in the centre of Europe, how different would 
 have been the conditions of our woollen manufactures ! To-day the 
 cost of bringing a bale of wool from New Zealand or Australia to 
 London, 11,000 or 12,000 miles, is little greater than it subsequently 
 costs to carry it from London to Leeds, Bradford, or Galashiels, 200 or 
 300 miles. 
 
 Take cotton again, none of which can be grown on our own soil. 
 Our greatest supply has come from the United States, that offshoot of 
 our race which sprung from the first great period of national expansion. 
 But it now comes in large volume from India and Egypt (from the latter 
 far more freely since British influence has given security to capital 
 and labour), and it could undoubtedly be produced abundantly in our 
 Australasian and African possessions, so that exclusion from the American 
 
THE fiKOGUAI'lllCAl, UNITY (»!• TIIK IIKIIISII KMI'IUK. 
 
 233 
 
 partially 
 its in tlio 
 
 ilisastrouB 
 
 il. Every 
 on of tlio 
 )hical cou- 
 nt parts of 
 
 s country, 
 number of 
 , anil since 
 ufacture of 
 wns, but is 
 md, in the 
 me millions 
 Ltish moors, 
 ich expense 
 ustry began 
 hose milder 
 istralia, and 
 . -wool inex- 
 mt of lands 
 maging vast 
 lieep-raisiiig. 
 ,vly invented 
 )f the world 
 
 )itod, four— 
 the British 
 ed by British 
 Bsc countries 
 they border 
 to be carried 
 ith the great 
 reas been in 
 Terent would 
 To-day the 
 Australia to 
 subsequently 
 shiels, 200 or 
 
 onr own soil. 
 it offshoot of 
 lal expansion, 
 •om the latter 
 ity to capital 
 dantly in our 
 the American 
 
 supply, as in 18C5, could never again produce such disastrous conse- 
 qutnices. 
 
 The geographical fact that jute u best produced in a single district 
 of India, where under Britisli rule capital and laI)our are free to operate 
 successfully, and whence safe transit in i)eace or war is secured by the 
 flag, means not a little to the greatest industry of Dundee. 
 
 And so the argument miglit be carried through an immense range of 
 industry. 
 
 My next illustration will he found in the (juestion of food supply. 
 Tliia country imports every year twenty million (juarters of wheat out of 
 the twenty-eight million tpiarters which are required to feed its people. 
 In tlie past tiiese vast supplies have been drawn largely from the Black 
 8(!a, the Baltic, and the United States of America. But the population ot 
 the United States is increasing so rapidly that the best stati-iticians 
 estimate that consumption will soon press closely upon the food-pro- 
 ducing capacity of the country. The area of wheat productioti lias shifted 
 steadily westward from New York through Ohio, Illiii ' ■ and Kansas, 
 and then northward to Wisconsin, hakota, and Nelnvisi Now th'! 
 great North-West of Canada is adujittodly the largest undn\-;loped wheat 
 area of the world. There is also a vast extent of country suited for the 
 rearing of cattle and for cattle products, such as chee; ;.nd butter. !,ow 
 notice the geo.'.^''aplucal position of this enormoUo wheat an' ' cattle area 
 in North-Vv t'aicin Canada in relation to the consuming millions of this 
 country. The greater part of them lie far beyond tJie cjntre of the 
 continent. But here the uniting power of waterway-s again .isserts itself. 
 From the Straits of Belle Isle, where a steamship crossing the Atlantic 
 first enters the inland water of Canada, to the head of Lake Superior is 
 a distance of 2384 miles. For the greater part of this distance the gulf, 
 rivers, and lakes present an almost unbroken system of navigation. 
 Only seventy miles of canal were required to be constructed to make this 
 system complete. This canal system is already finished fur vessels draw- 
 ing twelve feet of waier. But with this the Canadian people are not 
 satisfied. Just as Glasgow has spent an enormous sum in dredging the 
 Clyde, and as Manchester has made such sacrifices to get into immediate 
 touch with the ocean, so the Canadian pecjple are resolved that their vast 
 north-western granary and ranching country shall have the full advantage 
 of the M'aterways with which nature has provided her so liberally. All 
 the canals are being deepened, and a new lock is being constructed on 
 the Canadian side of the Sault St. Marie, so that within two years a ship 
 of 2U00 tons can be loaded at the head of Lake Superior and make its 
 way on British waters directly to London, Manchester, or Glasgow. 
 
 As with wheat, so with cattle. In a single year 400,000 live cattle 
 are sometimes brought across the Atlantic. Of these 100,000 or more 
 come from Canada, and the Canadian supply will from this time forward 
 be the rapidly increasing factor in the trade, as every one knows who 
 studies the Ameiican continent or watches the growth of the trade of 
 English and Scottish ports. As with cattle, so with cattle products such 
 as cheese and butter. Of the former, Canada last year sent this country 
 no less than 113,000,000 pounds. 
 
234 
 
 SUOTTlSll GEOGRAPHICAL MAGAZINE. 
 
 Look once more on the map, at the vast prairies and the land areas 
 of Canada ; let your eye follow along the line of the great lakes and the 
 St. Lawrence to the sea, and you will see the most remarkable example 
 of geographical unity in the world ; conditions under which the greatest 
 supply of human food can be produced at a minimum of expense, and 
 then again transported at a minimum of expense along a vast waterway 
 which leads tlirectly to the .greatest artisan ti.id consuming population 
 Lliiit the world has ever known. A late leader in the Tunes says : 
 
 " It is remarkable that mere mileage should tyrannise over the human 
 imagination as it undoubtedly does, in days when science has done so 
 much to annihilate space. A man can step out of Canada into the 
 United States, while a broad ocean separates the Dominion from England. 
 It is ai)parently almost impossible for many people to recognise the 
 triviality of the circumstance. Neither country is concentrated on the 
 frontier line. We have to deal with both as we deal with masses in 
 physics — i.e. we have to reckon from their centres of gravity. The 
 Canadian centre of gravity might be much nearer to that of England 
 than to that of the United States, even if the nature of the attraction in 
 both cases were the same. The sea unites far more than it divides, and 
 the sea runs into the heart of the Dominion. If we measure by the 
 scale of conmiercial dynamics, Liverpool is nearer to the St. Lawrence 
 than to the Thames." And again : — " Freight, not mileage, is the true 
 mercantile measure of distance, and it will soon not be always easy to 
 say whethei' Toronto lies nearest to Manchester or to New York or 
 Chicago." 
 
 To take a still more distant i)oint, the same illustration may, in the 
 matter of food supply, be extended to New Zealand, whence we last year 
 got upwards of 1,500,000 frozen carcases of sheep, which, so far as cost 
 of production and carriage is concerned, ought to be supplied to the 
 consumer here at a little more than half the price of the home-grown 
 mutton. Anything beyond this goes to the middlemen. 
 
 Turning now to another article of common consumption — once con- 
 sidered a luxury of the rich, but now become the luxury of cottage and 
 palace alike — tea, we find some facts of a very surprising character. 
 
 In 1883 the United Kingdom imported from China 150,000,000 
 lbs. of tea; from British India 59,000,000 lbs., and from Ceylon only 
 2,005,000 lbs. 
 
 In 1892, only nine years later, China sent us but 57,050,708 lbs., 
 while the supply from British India had risen to 111,711,261 lbs., and 
 from Ceylon to 60,041,030 lbs. 
 
 That is, whereas in 1883 China su[)plied about 72 per cent, of oar 
 lea, and countries under the Hag 28 per cent., in 1892 our dependencies 
 sup])Iied 76 per cent., and Ciiina only 24 per cent. 
 
 The proportions have still further changed within the last two years, 
 but the i)recise figures are not at the moment available. It is to be 
 observed, also, tiiat the immensely increased consumption of this poor 
 man's luxury has been due to a lowering of price traceable chiefly to the 
 ease and security with which British capital and British industrial skill 
 have been applied to production under the flag in India and Ceylon. 
 
THE GEOGRAPHICAL UNITY OF THE BRITISH EMl'IRE. 
 
 235 
 
 land areas 
 tea and tlie 
 )lo example 
 the greatest 
 xpense, and 
 it waterway 
 ' population 
 
 says : 
 
 r the human 
 has done so 
 ^da itito the 
 ■om England, 
 ■ecognise the 
 rated on the 
 th masses in 
 jravity. The 
 t of England 
 ; attraction in 
 t divides, and 
 leasure by the 
 St. LawreJico 
 ge, is the true 
 always easy to 
 ;Sew York or 
 
 on may, in the 
 ,ce we last year 
 ,, so far as cost 
 applied to the 
 le home-grown 
 
 Aon— once con- 
 ^ of cottage and 
 character, 
 na 150,000,000 
 om Ceylon only 
 
 57,050,708 lbs., 
 '11,261 lbs., and 
 
 per cent, of our 
 jur (lepeudeucies 
 
 he last two years, 
 ble. It is to be 
 tion of this poor 
 vble chiefly to the 
 sh industrial skill 
 and Ceylon. 
 
 The reverse side of this illustration is equally striking. Of all 
 Ceylon's exports of tea in 1893 — amounting to 84,387,650 lbs. — more 
 than 83,000,000 lbs. went to the United Kingdom, Australia, and other 
 countries within the empire, and only about 1,000,000 lbs. to foreign 
 countries. 
 
 The geographical fact that populations which consume tea and others 
 which produce tea are under the same flag, manifestly produces a unity 
 of commercial and industrial interest such as few people imagine. 
 
 If we follow this thought to its conclusion and study the facts with 
 ^care, we shall find that nothing more astonishing has occurred in our 
 industrial position than the degree to which the areas of production of 
 raw material and food have shifted under the flag during the last few 
 years, and the increasing tendency shown to still further do so. The 
 geugrai)hical unity of the Empire is, in short, asserting itself in the most 
 jtractical form. But before we can grasp the situation fully, we must 
 turn from the extraordinary picture of expansion which we have studied 
 to the equally wonderful process of contraction which has gone on during 
 the last half-century. First, the world has, for most practical purposes, 
 been recreated, and on a smaller scale, by the applications of steam. 
 
 The man is still alive in Canada who was stoker on the first engine 
 George Stephenson built to run between Stockton and Darlington. 
 
 Since then — that is, well within a man's lifetime — £800,000,000 have 
 been spent in the United Kingdom alone on railways : in all countries 
 the amount is estimated at between 5000 and GOOO millions, or one 
 quarter of all the invested capital of the world. All this has been si)ent 
 to give contiguity to places once remote from each other. But railways 
 are not all. If the ocean was a uniter before, how much more has it 
 become so since steam has been applied to navigation ! In measure (jf 
 time weeks of separation have been changed into days. The facts that 
 three-fourths of the world's commerce is carried on in steamships, and 
 that the whole of the power used by all the nations of the world for the 
 defence of commerce depends upon the use of coal, have become to British 
 people primary facts which touch upon their very existence. The 
 security of the seas has become a necessity, and the security of the seas 
 depends upon the geographical distribution, or rather the geographical 
 continuity, of coaling-stations and coal-supplies all around the world. It 
 is a i[uestion of coal endurance. 
 
 We have lately had stated in precise terms, by une of the highest 
 living authorities on the subject, what the conditions of coal endurance 
 arc for our ships of war. Speaking before the Iloyal Institution on 
 March 9th last, Mr. W. H, White, the Director of Naval Construction 
 and Assistant-Controller of the Navy, stated tliat a first-class battle-ship 
 built in 18G1 carried 750 tons of coal, and, with the engines then in use, 
 could keep the sea for six days, steaming at the rate of ten knots an 
 hour. The limits of such a ship's endurance at sea would therefore be 
 orly 1410 knots. Pointing out how great an advance had been made 
 in this respect since 1801, he added that a first-class battle-ship of the 
 new Naval Defence Fleet could leave port with nearly twice as much 
 coal on board, and, partly on account of improved engines, could steam 
 
 
236 
 
 SCOTTISH GEOGRAPHICAL MAGAZINE. 
 
 continuously at ten knots an hour for twenty or twenty-one days without 
 exhausting her coal. That is to say, the limits of a battle-ship's coal 
 ondurance at sea still remain under 5000 miles at the very best. 
 Observe that this is not suflicient to enable her to cross the Atlantic 
 and return without renewing her supplies of coal ; not enough to carry 
 her from St. Helena to Australia ; barely sufficient to carry her from St. 
 Helena to Mauritius. For a nation whose very existence depends upon 
 keeping open the pathways of the sea, what volumes of meaning are con- 
 veyed in the statement of a single fact like this ! But you will easily 
 understand that ten knots an hour, which gives this minimum of coal 
 consumption, and the maximum of steaming distance, is not likely to be 
 an ordinary steaming speed for either commerce preservers or commerce 
 destroyers. The additioiial facts which Mr. White gave in connection 
 witli this further aspect of the question are very striking. A first-class 
 battle-ship, for instance, is driven ten knots an hour by 2000 horse- 
 power. At fourteen knots, 5500 is necessary ; at eighteen knots, 
 13,500 horse-power. These more rapid rates, therefore, mean a greatly 
 increased consumption of fuel, and therefore a lessening of coal endurance. 
 
 Keeping these conditions thus accurately stated in mind, look at 
 the distribution of our national coaling-stations along tho great trade 
 routes : Gibraltar, Malta.. Aden, Bombay, Trincoraalee, Singapore, 
 Hongkong ; Sierra Leone, AsceJisiou, St. Helena, Cape Town, Mauritius ; 
 the Australian and New Zealand ports ; Halifax, Quebec, Bermuda, St. 
 Lucia, Kingston ; the Falkland Islands and Esquimalt. After that con- 
 sider the deposits of coal on tlie east and west coasts of Canada, in South 
 Africa, in India, and Australasia, and you will find that for a nation 
 whose commerce is all round the world, little more could be done to 
 make geographical unity complete ; little more to give the fullest effect 
 to the contraction of distance which is effected by steam. 
 
 But this is not the only contraction. That the whole world has 
 becon'.e in our generation one great whispering gallery we all know. The 
 same idea is expressed by a difl'erent but sufficiently exact metaphor when 
 we say that a ?iew nervous system has been given to the world. The land 
 telegraph and submarine cable have changed the whole conditions of 
 national life ; above all, they have revolutionised the meaning of the terms 
 geographical unity and geographical dispersion. Especially is this true 
 of the British Empire. Tiie circumstances of our national existence have 
 brought it about that we have been compelled to take the chief part 
 in creating this new nervous system for the world, from which, moreover, 
 no other nation, nor indeed all nations put together, derive a tithe of 
 the practical advantage that we do. Out of the 152,936 miles of sub- 
 marine cable in existence, above 102,656 miles have been made in 
 British workshops, laid by British vessels, and now pay their dividends 
 to British shareholders. The amount of Britisli capital invested in 
 British lines is stated to be £26,530,580, as at piesent standing, and 
 not including such debentures as have been redeemed. This also 
 excludes the cost of the lines under Government administration. But 
 this is the merest fraction of what they mean to us. The transac- 
 tions of finance and commerce, the regulation of demand and supply, the 
 
THK GKOGKAPHICAl, UNITY OF THE BRITISH KMPIRK. 
 
 237 
 
 lys without 
 -ship's coal 
 
 very best, 
 tie Atlantic 
 5I1 to cany 
 ^er from St. 
 pends upon 
 ing are con- 
 1 will easily 
 (lura of coal 
 likely to be 
 or coranierce 
 1 connection 
 
 A first-class 
 
 2000 horse- 
 hteen knots, 
 ,an a greatly 
 »al endurance, 
 aind, look at 
 ^, creat trade 
 B, Singapore, 
 ■n, Mauritius ; 
 
 Bermuda, St. 
 iter tliat con- 
 iiada, in South 
 t for a nation 
 id be done to 
 le fullest eifect 
 
 iole world lias 
 all know. The 
 metaphor when 
 jrld. The land 
 } conditions of 
 ng of the terms 
 lly is this true 
 existence have 
 the chief part 
 irhich, moreover, 
 ■rive a tithe of 
 6 miles of sub- 
 been made in 
 their dividends 
 lital invested in 
 it standing, and 
 led. This also 
 inistration. But 
 The transac- 
 1 and supply, the 
 
 direction of our commercial fleets and of the armed navy which defends 
 them, all now depend in great measure upon the far-reaching influence 
 of electric force. More important still is the unity of thought thus 
 gained. It is no flight of imagination, but a simple fact, to say that by 
 the agency of the telegraph, backed up by the diffusive power of the 
 press, in a few short hours the heart of our nation through all its Avorld- 
 wide extent may be made to be^t with one emotion — from Montreal to 
 Melbourne, from London to the Zambesi, from the Ganges to the 
 Saskatchewan. 
 
 Think of the singl*^ fact that more than £1000 per day is spent in 
 telegraphic communication between the United Kingdom and Australasia 
 alone, and in that fact we have some measure of the value put by our 
 people upon this new link of unity which has been added in the latter 
 half of the nineteenth century. 
 
 But this nervous system is not as complete as the geography of the 
 Empire makes possible; one may say that it has defects which might 
 prove fatal if not remedied in time, and at this present moment are 
 fraught with no small dangers. The greatest gap consists in tht; 
 lack of connection between Canada ai;d Australia. Eeflect upon 
 what this means. There is, perhaps, no responsibility which states- 
 men feel more deeplj' than that connected with the maintenance of 
 our position in India and the East. The financial and commercial 
 interests which we have at stake there are simply enormous, and practi- 
 cally reach every home in this country. For purposes of trade, as well 
 as for defence, both military and naval, instant communication with the 
 East has become almost a necessity. But it would be almost certainly 
 broken at once in the event of our being engaged in a great European 
 war. There are at present many routes of telegraph by which we can 
 reach India and Australia : across the Continent by way of the 
 Mediterranean and the Red Sea, around Africa, and even across Siberia. 
 But all these lines either pass through possibly hostile countries, or 
 through shallow seas where they could easily be fished up or destroyed 
 in time of war. A cable across the Pacific would be free from both these 
 fundamental objections. That this cable should be laid has become a 
 matter of imperial necessity. The Home Government has been asked 
 to give it financial support. But even if no such aid is given, it now 
 seems probable that the work will be carried out by the united efforts of 
 Canada and Australia. A conference to deal with this and other questions 
 of inter-colonial connection is to m* ^t in Canada during the present 
 season, and I think there can be little doubt about the result of its 
 deliberations. The meeting of such a conference will t'lu-nish another 
 striking ihustration of the organic unity of the Empire. 
 
 The second important flaw to which I have referred in the cable com- 
 munication of the Empire is in the lack of direct communication with the 
 West Indies. At present our important colonies and naval stations there 
 can only be reached by wires passing through the United States, and in 
 some cases touching at islands belonging to foreign Powers. This missing 
 link in our cable system could be supplied with comparatively little 
 trouble and expense. Two years ago a line was laid from Halifax to 
 
 vj^ 
 
"a 
 
 238 
 
 SCOTTISH (JROOKAPHIOAI, MAfSAZTNK. 
 
 Bermuda, connecting those two important naval stations. The extension 
 of this line for a few hundred miles would give us an independent means 
 of communication with our West Indian possessions. The question of 
 granting the lino a moderate subsidy is now under consideration of the 
 Imperial Government, and it is to be hoped that its construction will not 
 be long delayed. 
 
 Tliis new set of nerves will undoubtedly change the whole conditions 
 under which the naval wars of th(i future will be carried on, quite as much 
 as t'lic change from wooden and wind-driven shi)>s to those built of iron 
 ami iniiKilled by steam. Once more we may .say that, as with steam, this 
 chang(3 has resulted in a reconstruction of the world, a reconstruction 
 which creates a practical unity out of what was before separation. 
 
 One point is worthy of special illustration as showing what unity 
 and concentration of action in defending commerce a widespread erapiro 
 gives. 
 
 For our immense trade in Eastern and Southern waters we liave a 
 choice of route inward and outward ; by the Cape of Good Hope ; by Cape 
 Horn ; for passengers, trooi)s, sailors, and even the less bulky kinds of 
 (expensive freight by the Pacific and trans-Canadian route. For our 
 j)rcsent purpose, it will be better to leave out of consideration the Suez 
 Canal route. 
 
 Now, when our Pacific cable line of telegraph is completed, this 
 variety of route gives us a wonderful means of attaining security for our 
 trade. The method maybe explained as follows : — Those responsible for 
 the defence of the Empire fix long beforeh.:.iid certain routes, to be known 
 respectively as, say, the A, B, C, D routes. These mry not only vary in 
 passing around the different points I have mentioned, but also by a varia- 
 tion of the latitude and longitude of sailing a hundred miles more or less 
 north or south, east or west, as the case may be. These routes, planned in 
 secret but communicated in sealed orders to the authorities of the great 
 outlying parts of the Empire, are thought out carefully beforehand. 
 Then, on the outbreak of war, the whole machinery of our vast commerce 
 may be directed over different routes, known to ourselves but unknown 
 to the enemy, with perfect ease. One week, for instance, every ship which 
 leaves Australia or New Zealand would be ordered to go by a special 
 Cape Horn route ; another week the B or C route might be selected 
 according to the exigencies of the naval jirotecting force. Thus our own 
 naval authorities would know precisely at what point and at what time 
 to e.xpect every ship of commerce which required convoy, while an enemy 
 would be left to find out these facts as best he could, under circumstances 
 of the utmost difficulty. Such a system would certainly mitigate 
 greatly the terrors and dangers of the much talked-of commerce 
 destroyer. It .seems to ma clear that in this way any serious risk to 
 British commerce could be avoided until our ships had reached those 
 narrow seas nearer our shores wliere the full protecting force of the navy 
 could be put forth for their defence. 
 
 Nothing proves the reality of unity in any body more than the vigour 
 of the living circulation which goes on throughout its various parts. 
 And what a wonderful flow of circulating human life there is constantly 
 
 
THK CKiMiRAI'HK.'AI. TNITY OV THK HRITISTI KMPJRi:. 
 
 239 
 
 B extension 
 lent means 
 fincstion of 
 ition of th<! 
 ion will not 
 
 11 conditions 
 litp as niucli 
 uilt, of iron 
 I steam, this 
 construction 
 
 tion. 
 
 what unity 
 ircad ompiro 
 
 rs we have a 
 )pe; by Cape 
 ilky kinds of 
 te. For our 
 tion the Suez 
 
 mpleted, this 
 curity for our 
 esponsible for 
 i, to be known 
 t only vary in 
 Iso by a varia- 
 !S more or less 
 ;es, planned in 
 ,s of the great 
 y beforehand, 
 vast commerce 
 
 but unknown 
 ery ship which 
 TO by a special 
 [ht be selected 
 
 Thus our own 
 at what time 
 while an enemy 
 r circumstances 
 tainly mitigate 
 d-of commerce 
 
 serious risk to 
 
 reached those 
 
 jrce of the navy 
 
 than the vigour 
 s various parts, 
 ere is constantly 
 
 passing between the centre and circumference of the Empire in spite of 
 distance. Witness tlie lines of huge steamships crowded with passengers 
 whicli are every day finding their way to or from Canada, or the Capo, 
 India, Australia, and New Zealand. Witness the fact that scarcely a family 
 in these islands has not one and often several members in the remotest 
 parts of the Empire. Witness the large contingent of colonial and 
 Indian students always attending our medical and other colleges, some 
 V((maining to practise in this country, more going ba^rk to carry with them 
 what \vt) have to give of professional skill and liter:Ty culture. Think 
 over, again, the list of your acquaintances, and remark what numbers are 
 people who have spent years abroad in Colonial or Indian work. Notice the, 
 increase which takes place year by year in the space given by your daily 
 papers to the doings of British people abroad — space not so many years 
 since almost exclusively devoted to the affairs of foreigners. Go to 
 Sydney or Toronto, and you find much of the same woild-news served up 
 to you morning by morning that yon get in Edinburgh or London ; only 
 in Toronto the diilcrence of time makes it a little more up to date, while 
 in Australia time is slightly in your favour. 
 
 You meet a friend in London ; as he shakes hands with you in fare- 
 well, he hails a cab to catch a P. and 0. boat for Singapore, or an Allan 
 Liner for Vancouver. You see a familiar face, and you remember that 
 you last saw it a few weeks ago in Monti-eal or M«;lbourne. These are 
 not exag^"rations, but the ordinary facts of daily life to men of busitiess 
 and travel — in these days a very numerous class. In the autumn of 1888 
 I was speaking at a large meeting in your Edinburgh Music Hall. About 
 six months later, I found myself, quite casually, sitting at dinner in 
 Melbourne with four people who had been at the same meeting, while our 
 hostess mentioned that a fifth who had called during the afternoon had 
 also referred to being there. 
 
 It is very curious and suggestive to watch the play of some of the 
 forces which promote the circulation of our race throughout all parts of 
 the Empire. Britain itself is cramped in size ; it has a climate good for 
 rearing men, but not favourable to the easy enjoyment of life ; it is the 
 centre of an advanced and, therefore, conventional civilisation. Men go 
 abroad to get elbow-room ; to find a .sunny and exhilarating climate ; to 
 escape the shackles of conventionality. All this they can do on the open 
 veldt of South Africa ; in the lonely bush of Australia ; on the wide 
 prairies of Canada; or listening to the "long wash of Australasian seas" 
 upon the lonely coasts of New Zealand. That the change is a healthy 
 one no man can doubt; it gives free play to that Berserker energy of our 
 Norse blood which still clings to us ; it is what unlimited oxygen is to 
 lungs long shut up in crowded rooms. But the impulse to movement is 
 not from the centre outward alone. Sated with freedom, space, move- 
 ment, action, the man who has gone abroad longs to keei) in touch, at 
 least, with the old home, and the good things which, more than any other 
 land, it contains. He comes back as opportunity permits ; lie brings or 
 sends back his children to come under the influence of art, taste, culture, 
 refinement, historic suiTOundings ; appreciation of all these things is 
 quickened by long abstinence ; a new value is put upon them from the 
 
 
 I 
 
 * •^- 
 
 •"ffj 
 
240 
 
 SC01TISH GKOr.RAPHICA!, MAOAZTNE. 
 
 comparative roughness of colonial life. Thus you have the steady 
 pulsation of a hoaltliy life ; a reciprocal action good for both. 
 
 This movement — movement made more easy and natural by its 
 common citizenship — will one day be recognised as being for our national 
 life what the great currents are for the ocean, a preservative from 
 stagnation : on the one hand, a safeguard against that enervation of 
 wealth, luxury, power, and over-civilisation which has overthrown the 
 greatest nations of the past ; on the other, an influence, stimulating and 
 refining, for rough energy. Thus the geographical diversity of the 
 Eini)ire makes for a higher unity and harmony of national development. 
 
 The material greatness of Britain has l)een built up on the trading 
 instincts and trading habits of the British people. They are the basis on 
 which other elements of greatness rest, or have furnished the best means 
 for their development. It is very curious to observe how true this general 
 statement is when wc study the question in detail. We have had the 
 fighting energy, almost equal to that of the Romans, of a great military 
 race. Yet our military tendencies have been almost entirely employed 
 for the preservation of our commercial position. We are a naval people, 
 and have attained great naval skill and wide supremacy ; but all this has 
 been won by seeking pathways for our trade across the .seas, or in the 
 defence of that conunerce. It has ena])led us to reap the fullest advan- 
 tage from our enormous national resources in coal, iron, temperate climate, 
 maritime position, and physical vigour. The vast accumula* ons of wealth 
 in this country which have come from trade do not go aloiu to the trader 
 and manufacturer. The wealth of the aristocratic classes who own land 
 is largely due to the increment of land values arising from the growth of 
 the artisan and commercial population, and from the keen competition 
 for the possession of land among men who have made their fortunes in 
 trade and manufacture. 
 
 The prosperity and comfort of the professional classes — lawyers, 
 doctors, etc. — depends upon the opportunities offered by an exceptionally 
 rich community, made so by trade. 
 
 The leisure of our learned classes at the great universities, which 
 gives to the nation a keen intellectual life, depends directly or indirectly 
 upon trade and the industries which develop trade. 
 
 So we shall find, if we follow up the subject, the influence and benefit 
 of trade extending through all the ramifications of our national life. 
 But that trade depends on the fact of our being and continuing an ocean 
 empire — an empire which is made by the sea a geographical unit. 
 
 Once more, without any touch of national vanity, we may truly say 
 that our British people stand to-day in what one of our great poets has 
 called the " foremost files of time." We are facing, as no ' her nation 
 has faced before, the most difficult social and political probleias : how to 
 work out the highest good for the highest number ; how to give the 
 greatest measure of liberty to the individual while retaining the greatest 
 security for the community. 
 
 Consider the remarkable circumstances under which we are doini,' 
 this. Instead of working from one example and under one set of con- 
 ditions, Ave are working under a hundred. We are trying every system 
 
 vai] 
 
 pat 
 
 maJ 
 
 the] 
 
 of 
 
 broj 
 
 alisJ 
 
 EoiJ 
 
 mesl 
 
 Jewl 
 
 AJeJ^ 
 
 revt 
 
 to tl 
 
 type 
 
 baclj 
 
 moi'( 
 
 conij 
 
 civil 
 
 nurtl 
 
TIfK (iKOCJRAI'HKJAL UNITY OF THE BIUTISII EMPIRK. 
 
 241 
 
 ;he steady 
 
 iral by ita 
 ur national 
 ative from 
 ervation of 
 thrown the 
 nlating and 
 sity of the 
 vclopment. 
 the trading 
 the basis on 
 B best means 
 ! this general 
 lave had the 
 ;reat military 
 ely employed 
 naval people, 
 at all this has 
 seas, or in the 
 fullest advan- 
 Derate climate, 
 ons of wealth 
 , to the trader 
 who own land 
 the growth of 
 Bn competition 
 leir fortunes in 
 
 isses— lawyers, 
 n exceptionally 
 
 versities, which 
 ,ly or indirectly 
 
 Mice and benefit 
 
 ir national life- 
 
 inning an ocean 
 
 teal unit. 
 
 e may truly say 
 great poets has 
 no < her nation 
 
 •oblei.is : how to 
 low to give the 
 
 ning the greatest 
 
 ch we are doing 
 r one set of con 
 ing every system 
 
 of government, from the freedom of democracy to methods whicli can 
 only he described as paternal despotism, and in each case with e»jual 
 desire to liccure the good of the governed. We are testing social systems 
 ill forms various beyond any previous experience. 
 
 In these points the Empire, iu its wide extent, seems only com- 
 mensurate with the greatness of our mission and our destiny. Com- 
 [)lexity is the mark of a higher form of organism ; of an organism fitted 
 tor the performance of exceptional functions. This is a great law of 
 nature, well known to apply to the material world, vegetable, mineral, 
 and animal. But nothing is more certain than that it applies to the life 
 of nations as well. I know of no more interesting and fascinating study 
 than that which deals with the geography of countries and continents in 
 its relation to the growth of nations and the progress of civilisation. In 
 ihe earlier stages of existence man spread out over the wide, monotonous 
 jilains of Mesopotamia, of Egypt, of Central and Southern Asia, where 
 the conditions of life were easy but curiously equal. There ininiense 
 comnuuiities arose ; maj^iiilicent and impo.sinj(, but half-developed, civilisa- 
 tii)ns were produced. The empires have passed away ; the civilisation.s 
 have, in many cases, remained, but have continued for centuries without 
 change — struck, as it were, into apathy by the wide monotony, the want 
 of variety in the surroundings and internal conditions under which they 
 arose. These great inland -plains could not develop man's higher powers. 
 He moves westward ; he comes in contact with the sea, with islands, 
 peninsulas, countries of varied scenery and conditions, which stimulate 
 his activities and open new vistas to his thought. There, around the 
 borders of the great iidand sea, we see springing up the wonderful 
 civilisations of the ancient world ; those of Palestine, of Phaniicia, of 
 Asia Minor, of Greece, of Rome, of Carthage. 
 
 Here was an amazing advance. Under the influence of contrast, 
 variety, manifold geographical conditions, and a sea furnishing an easy 
 pathway for commerce and for the interciiange of ideas, the human mind 
 made a marvellous forward spring. Language, literature, art, philosophy, 
 the science of government, all reached with a bound levels undreamed 
 of before, and in some instances scarcely retained since. Even religion 
 broke free from the shackles of slavish Eastern fear ; it became ethere- 
 alised and intellectual, if not moral. But Palestine, and Greece, and 
 Rome, with^^all their astonishing achievements, were drawn into the 
 meshes of the monotonous, apathetic, sensual, half-civilised East. The 
 Jew, hanging up his harp upon the willows by the waters of Babylon ; 
 Alexander, the Greek, unnerved and overthrown amid the magnificent 
 revels of the same great Eastern capital ; Antony, the Roman, yielding 
 to the seductions of Cleopatra and her Oriental luxury, are but types — 
 types of a higher civilisation yielding to a lower from want of moral 
 backbone. The ancient West, with all its noble gains, surrenders to the 
 more ancient East. 
 
 Once more geography, with its subtle and mighty influence upon life, 
 comes t( the rescue of mankind. Down upon that demoralised Western 
 civilisation sweej) the German, the Goth, the Vandal, the Scythian, 
 nurtured among the gloomy forests, the mountain ranges, the vast wind- 
 
242 
 
 SCOTTISH GKOGRAPHICAr, MAOAZINK. 
 
 swept plains ol' Northern Enrope and Asia, amidst those hard conditions 
 which give physical and mental and moral fibre. 
 
 The civilisation of the world, the garnered wisdom of ages, seems to 
 be swept into a hopeless abyss ; it is only that it may have a new and 
 nobler birtli. On the fierce Northern energy has now been engrafted th(! 
 moral strength of Christianity ; the capacity to win back and make usi^ 
 of the culture of Greece, the governing power of Rome. Then comes the 
 Renaissance of national life on small, concentrated spheres of action — 
 Italy, Spain, Portugal, Franco, Holland, Germany, Belgium, Britain. 
 But while the geographical area of each European nation is circumscribed, 
 the horizon of activity and effort expands. New worlds are discovered ; 
 new routes are found ; instead of the inland sea, the mightiest oceans 
 become the field of man's highest activities. Who is to take the lead in 
 this new process of new World Growth ? Who is to realise the idea of 
 an Ocean Empire united in spite of distanced Long the decision hung in 
 the balance ; now it seems clear (and let us say it with all humility and 
 sense of responsibility) that the Briton with his Teutonic basis of strength 
 must take the leading place in this great sphere of world-activity. Two 
 of the new continents, America and Australia, have fallen almost exclu- 
 sively to our race. A third, Africa, seems, in its most habitable parts, vtrell 
 within our grasp by the compulsion of circumstances and almost without 
 our conscious effort. Once more, again, as representing the civilisation 
 of the West, we go back to the East : to Egypt, to India, to China. We 
 go armed not merely with the intellectual gains of the Greek, the fighting 
 ami governing energy of the Roman, but with the moral energy of th<; 
 Christian. We go again as masters ; surely it is not again to become 
 slaves. 
 
 Not if we know the greatness of our destiny and accept it. Not if 
 Ave recognise that under this strange diversity and complexity of our 
 iTational life there is the material for a wonderful unity of effort and 
 organisation ; that wo have a marvellous opportunity to make our moral 
 and politics- impact upon the world greater even than in the past, ami 
 greater for the highest and noblest aims. 
 
mm 
 
 res, seems to 
 'e a new an*\ 
 engrafted i\w 
 lid make use 
 icn comes t\»t' 
 s of action— 
 rium, Britain, 
 circumscribed, 
 re discovered ; 
 i.rhtiest oceans 
 ,Uo the lead m 
 lise tlie idea ol 
 ccision hung m 
 ,11 humility and 
 ,asis of strength 
 -activity. Two 
 en almost exclu- 
 itable parts, well 
 L almost without 
 . the civilisation 
 'to China. We 
 ieeU, the fighting 
 ral energy of the; 
 again to become! 
 
 accept it. ^/^A 
 fomplexity of ouv 
 'lity of effort ana 
 make our mora 
 in the past, an.l 
 
 ..L SKETCH-MAi 
 
 ON "THE GEOGRAPHICAL 
 
POLITICAL, COMMERCIAL. AND HISTORICAL SKETt 
 
 UISIONBI) TO ILLUSTRATE Mil. O. R. PARKIN'S ADDRESS OM "THE CK.OO 
 
 THE BRITISH EMPIRE 1894 
 AND ITS TBADK CONNBCTIONltf 
 
 Principal RoutM of British Commerce 
 
 rVf 
 
 romgn OountrlM whan ovap 50 par eant. of thalp Tottl Import* aiM Siipoi 
 2S par oant. 
 
 : jt_ 
 
 The Eiliuljiirgli (;i- •jJraphirHl liisutulr 
 
 S<-umBh (M..>}?i'ii.u.-ni J^U^nziiu- 1H04 
 
IISTORICAL SKETCH-MAPS OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE. 
 
 CIN'S ADDRESS ON "THR OKOORAPHICAI. HISTORV or THE BRITISH EMPIKI 
 
 1 1, 0. Baitluiloaitrw 
 
 Scottish (ifo^i'iij liiral MftfjHJtiiif, IHO-l-