^, ,^.^a. f^^. *.>.'^. IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 ^1^ u& = am m 1.1 11.25 ^ 13* MBII 2.0 1.4 i i m ^. '/^ /. Photographic Sciences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580 (716) 872-4503 \^ \ l\ •S^ N> 1^ ^:*A^ •<^lls' 'Ht'- CIHM/ICMH Microfiche Series. CIHM/ICMH Collection de microfiches. Canadian Institute for Historica! iViicroreproductions / Institut Canadian de microreproductions historiques Technical and Bibliographic Notes/Notes techniques et bibliographiquea The Institute has attempted to obtain the best original copy available for filming. Features of this copy which may be bibliographically unique, which may alter any of the images in the reproduction, or which may significantly change the usual method of filming, are checked below. n n n Coloured covers/ Couverture de couleur I I Covers damaged/ Couverture endommag^e Covers restored and/or laminated/ Couverture restaurie et/ou peiiicui^e Cover title missing/ Le titre de couverture manque Coloured maps/ Cartes giographiques en couleur Coloured inl( (i.e. other than blue or biacit)/ Encre de couleur (i.e. autre que bleue ou noire) Coloured plates and/or illustrations/ Planches et/ou illustrations en couleur Bound with other material/ Reiid avec d'autres documents Tight binding may cause shadows or distortion along interior margin/ La re liure serrde peut causer de I'ombre ou de la distortion le long de la marge int6rieure Blank leaves added during restoration may appear within the text. Whenever possible, these have been omitted from filming/ II se peut que certaines pages blanches ajout^es iors d'une restauration apparaissent dans le texte, mais, lorsque cela Atait possible, ces pages n'ont pas 6t6 film^es. Additional comments:/ Commentaires suppi^mentaires: L'Institut a microfi!mA le meilleur exemplaire qu'il lui a 6t4 possible de se procurer. Les ditaiis de cet exemplaire qui sont peut-Atre uniques du point de vue bibliographique, qui peuvent modifier une image reproduite. ou qui peuvent exiger une modification dans la methods normale de fllmage sont indiqute ci-dessous. I I Coloured pages/ »/ D n Pages de couleur Pages damaged/ Pages endommag6es Pages restored and/or laminated/ Pages restaurtes et/ou pellicul6es Pages discoloured, stained or foxed/ Pages d^coiortes, tachettes ou piqu6es Pages detached/ Pages ditachtos r~7 Showthrough/ Transparence Quality of prir Quality fndgale de I'impression Includes supplementary materii Comprend du materiel suppl^mentaire I I Quality of print varies/ I I Includes supplementary material/ Only edition available/ Seule Mition disponible Pages wholly or partially obscured by errata slips, tissues, etc., have been refilmed to ensure the best possible image/ Les pages totalement ou partiellement obscurcies par un feuillet d'errata, une pelure, etc., ont 6t< filmtes A nouveau de fapon d obtenir la meilleure image possible. Th to Th po of fill 0/ be th( sic OtI fir sic or Th sh Til wl iVIi dif en be rig re( m( This item is filmed at the reduction ratio checked below/ Ce document est filmi au taux de rMuction indiquA ci-dessous. 10X 14X 18X 22X y 26X 30X 12X 16X 20X 24X 28X 32X The copy filmed here hes been reproduced thenkt to the generosity of: Library of the Public Archives of Canada The images appearing here are the best quality possible considering the condition and legibility of the original copy and in keeping with the filming contract specifications. Original copies In printed paper covers are filmed beginning with the front cover and ending on the last page with a printed or illustrated Impres- sion, or the back cover when appropriate. All other original copies are filmed beginning on the first page with a printed or Illustrated impres- sion, and ending on the last page with a printed or illustrated impression. The last recorded frame on each microfiche shail contain the symbol — ^ (meaning "CON- TINUED"), or the symbol V (meaning "END"), whichever applies. Maps, plates, charts, etc., may be filmed at different reduction ratios. Those too large to be entirely included in one exposure are filmed beginning in the upper left hand corner, left to right and top to bottom, as many frames as required. The following diagrams illustrate the method: L'exemplaire film* fut reproduit grflce 6 la ginArositi de: La bibiiothique des Archives publiques du Canada Les images suivantes ont MA reproduites avec ie plus grand soln, compte tenu de la condition et de la nettetA de Texempiaire film*, et en conformity avec les conditions du contrat de filmage. Les exemplaires origlnaux dont la couverture en papier est ImprlmAe sont filmte en commenpant par ie premier plat et en terminant soit par la dernlAre page qui comporte une empreinte d'impression ou d'iilustration, soit par ie second plat, salon Ie cas. Tous les autres exemplaires origlnaux sont filmAs en commenpant par la premidre page qui comporte une empreinte d'impression ou d'iilustration et en terminant par la dernlire page qui comporte une telle empreinte. Un des symboles sulvants apparaftra sur la dernlAre image de cheque microfiche, seion Ie cas: ie symbols -** signifie "A SUIVRE". Ie symbols ▼ signifie "FIN". Les cartes, pisnches, tableaux, etc., peuvent 6tre fllmte A des taux de reduction diffirents. Lorsque Ie document est trop grand pour Atre reproduit en un seul clichA, 11 est film* d partir de I'angle supArieur gauche, de gauche A droite, et de haut en bas, en prenant Ie nombre d'Images nAcessaire. Les diagrammes sulvants illustrent la mithode. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 ■ " L E T T E I{ Til TllV. KKfflT HON, iJENJAMlN DISRAELI, M,P. UN Till. PRESENT RELATIONS OF ENGLAND WITH THE COLONIES. BY THE JilGHT HON. C. B. AllDlvliLEY, M.P. WITH AN APPENDIX OK FXTUACTS FROM EVIDExNCE TAKEN BEFORE THE SELECT COMMITTEK ON COLONIAL MILITARY EXPENDITURE, 1861. LONDON: EDWAUD STANFORD, G, CHARING CROSS, S.W. ,.*i(*r« LETTER, &c. t» Dear Disraeli, I address myself to you, in writing on the subject of our present colonial relations, not only because you are the Leader of the politit^^l party to which I belong in the House of Commons, but still more because you are the last leading Statesman there, who has openly shown a due appreciation of the naked and disastrous truth— to which I am anxious to draw attention,— that England has lost the right estimation of her special art, and vital interest in colonization ; and has sub- stituted for her former national oifspring, a semi-dependency, looking to her for protection, instead of sharing with her in universal empire. We became aware, late last session, that Her Majesty had engaged the service of the largest steamer in the world, to convey additional forces from home to Canada, which we were told was agitated by the first sound of civil strife across its borders. Lord Palmerston vented his most heroic indignation against Sir James Fergusson, who remonstrated against this forestallment of assistance. Nothing but ignorance of the history of our Colonies could have enabled the Premier to ado^ . the civis Ramanus tone in his defence of a proceeding which, if he knew anything of the spirit of our Colonies in former times, must have indicated a conviction in his mind of the degeneracy of his countrymen. You replied by the coun- ter question, " Are there no inhabitants in Canada— are there " not a numerous and gallant people there ? If not adequate, " on this occasion to depend wholly on their own energies, do *' they require our men to set them the first example ? Taking " so early an opportunity of letting the Canadians know that " we are prepared to assume the monopoly of their defence is B *' calculated to damp thoir ardour, and make them feel that it ** is not thoir business to protect their hearths and homes and ** national honour. The transmission of f^,000 troops cannot be *' meant as an adequate means for baffling an invasion of Canada. ** If then is suspicnon in the minds of the Government of a *' misundf rstanding with the United States, it cannot be politic *' to intimate that opinion by taking inadequate means of vin- " dicating the honour of this country." The present conjunc- ture of affairs only adds force to your reply. If the time is near when the strength of the empire must be brought to their support, doubly re(iuisite is it that the Colonists should have put forth their own strength. Even though it should prove to have been a happy accident that a detachment of English troops anticipated a quarrel of our own in America arising in a season impracticable for transport, nevertheless, the mischief of our undertaking the primary responsibility for the defence of Canada appears clearly, above any such advantage, by the fact that Canada has but 30,000 ill-trained militia ready, which, moreover, we have to arm, for her own defence. She would have had 200,000 but for our garrisons. I spent my first ten years of Parliamentary life in co- operation with the men who succeeded, against an opposition which rendered the legislation imperfect, in restoring self- government to the Colonies, but without its correlative respon- sibilities. The result has been, in many cases, the production of an unprecedented anomaly — the freest possible government, responsible to legislatures based on universal suffrage; yet equipped with the sinews of war, in some cases the means of internal police, and part of the cost of civil establishments from another community, in the distant centre of the empire. Complete democracy impels these Colonial Ministries in their course of local policy, while supplies from another quarter enable them to deal with wars, and tumults, and ev^en with governmental opposition without reference to the people ; having their defence provided, and the needful costs defrayed by an all-suf&cient pr xy. The Colonies asked for the control of ^ *i* ' > Mnv^HKiAvmf I i y 8 their own taxation : we gave them the use of a good deal of our own besides. On the other hand, while we gave them self-government enough to enable them freely to direct their own affairs, we retained enough of the theory of protecting them to render them irresponsible for the consequences of their own actions, or the security of their own interests. "We cannot trust to the mere economists of the House of Commons to disembarrass us of this confusion. If they would take the subject in hand even in its least important aspect — the heavy burden inflicted on our tax-payers without a shadow of compensatory benefit to any one — we might wait in expecta- tion of some help from them. But though Mr. Bright tells the people of Birmingham every year that the House of Com- mons, as now constituted, is lavish and wasteful, especially in military expenditure, yet he balances the weight of his theoretic grievance by an abstinence from action, which gives a practical sanction to it. His uniform absence from the House of Commons on supply nights is a fair composition with ministers for his tirades in town-halls against their extravagance. His silence in their presence gives consent to all their yearly squanderings on useless colonial fortifications, and on the perpetual transport of our troops wasting their strength in .scattered detachments, preventing all the rest of the empire from drawing out its own resources, and need- lessly burdening ours. If I look to the present occupants of the treasury bench, I see there a Minister of first-rate ability, in charge of the Exchequer, thoroughly conversant with colonial questions, in all respects most eminently qualified to deal with this subject. His masterly treatment of it in his evidence before Mr. Arthur Mills's late Select Committee on Colonial Military Expenditure, furnishes me with my best materials in writing to you. But I derive no hope from all his knowledge, and all his ability, while he continues to lament over our growing national expenditure, and only points his moral with this repeated illustration. b2 Allow me, then, to profess publicly my own oxpt^ctatiouH as resting solely on yourself. I feel assured of your grappling with the subject, and acknowledging its immense importance. I am confident, this being the case, that you will neither treat it rashly, nor neglect it. The interests of the Crown in a great colonial empire will not be trifled with by you. The hazard to these interests resulting from unsound colonial relations, enervating the colonies, and diminishing the aggregate power of the empire, you will keenly discern. You have a parlia- mentary following which will enabla you to give effect to awakening public opinion, and restrain it from the rash haste to which a sudden vision of such public mischief might be likely to impel it. 1. — Only two possible Colonial Relations. There are onl}' two essentially distinct principles of re- lationship between a mother country and colonies : the one, that of subserviency and dependence, the other of community and partnership. On the first principle the mother countr}-^ treats a colony as a dependency, to be made conducive to her own interests, and entitled to her protection : on the other, an equality of rights and duties is mutually recognized as between the citizens of a common empire. It is useless to ransack the records of antiquity, or those of contemporary nations, for illustrations of colonial relations. Manners, and the structure of society differ so essentially, that we arrive at this fundamental distinction before any feature presents itself for useful comparison, or example. The Greek Colonies most nearly resembled our own in the principle of their first foundation, and the relation of alliance which they maintained with the mother country: and like ours, their rapidity of growth to wealth and greatness, from the first moment of their release from home, exceeded all other instances of national increase. But whatever the difference i " of typo may hi hdwvxnx u Tyrian, Roman, Grcciuii, Vonotiaii, Spiinisli, En principles of rclacionsliip with their mother country, as long as they main- tain any connexion at all, namely, that of suhserviency and dep(!ndence, or that of connnunity and partnership. 2. — Community of Oitizenship is the Trik Principlf. of British Coloni/ation. Clark, our chief authority on Colonial Law, lays down a triple classification of English Colonies according t<> their mode of acquisition, {Summary of Colonial Law, p. 4,) whetluT hy conquest, by cession, or by occupan(^y. The first and second classes he considers to be dominions of the Crown, until the right of self-government be conceded to them, which concession can never be revoked. The third class are English commu- nities, with all the rights and liabilities of English citizens from the outset, as much as if they were detached pieces of this island floated off on the distant ocean. It matters little now what was the origin of any of our Colonies, whether conquered by force of our arms, as Jamaica ; or of our colonists* arms, as Nova Scotia ; or of both united, as Canada ; or ceded to us by any treaty ; or first occupied by us for commerce. As every Colony, properly so called, has had self-government conceded to it, we need not search now for charters, or records, to ascertain the original character of any. England may assume superiority, and volunteer her patronage, but the legitimate rights and responsibilities of all her colonists are to be studied in the constitution of her citizeiis at home. Our true colonial relations are, as I hold, the relations naturally existing between one part of England and another, modified only by a greater distance from the metropolis ; the distance being so great as to necessitate separate establishments. 6 English Colonies, gifted with sdf-governmont, are o£bet oommuiiitios of the English type, just an Tyrian Colonies were Tyrian ; and Qn^k Grtvk ; as grown-up sons resemble parents ; and their houst^holds resemhl(3 the parental homo ; unless by unnatural treatment, denial of rights, selfish usurpation, or oppression by force or fraud, they have lost their natural cha- racter, become alienated from their natural affinities, or in- curred the stamp of slaves ; or else, by the equal injury of over-patronage, become crippled or emasculated. Offspring nations naturally tend to stronger development of the parental characteristics. In the fresh and open field of America, the free genius of our race expanded in still freer institutions, while a more despotic government prevailed in the neighbouring dominions of France, than her ministers could ever establish at home. The English more eagerly fastened on the sea-coasts, and devoted themselves to enter- prise; the French more fastidiously sought the interior and the rivers, and were intent on military occupation. That is the best government, which gives scope to the best quali- ties of the governed. English Colonies inherit the noblest faculties for freedom; and if Mr. Mill rightly describes re- presentative institutions as the true tendency and the natural composition of free citizenship ; and the self-reliant, vigorous character of our race as specially fitted for them ; what violence it must be to our colonial instincts, to choke the natural channels of self-action, or to encumber them with extraneous help I What poison to English vitality must be the first acquired sense of dependence, especially to our couucrymen whose emigration has only indicated an exuber- ance of national spirit refusing to be pent up at home I What hope of any permanent success can attend such repr* ^ive colonial policy P Reduce a British Colony to habits of the most abject dependence — furnish it with every local requirement from its governor to its police — ^let money, drawn from English taxation, fiiow through every channel of its internal administration, until eyery feature of self-goyem- T I T i ment becomes fictitious, and eveiy spring of' action coirupt — still, through tho lowest process of decompositioTi, the vis natnne will sprout forth again. Freemen cannot live long on crumbs from a master's table. The nutm'al spirit of Englishmen is too high to let go their birthright for the ( wages of protection : their self-reliance too innate to become obliterated by any culture. If anything more than the supremacy of the Crown is to be set over colonial communities, if England desires to act as a superior' nation over them, they should not be allowed ^he forms of freedom — representative institutions — for through those forms the intended inferior must rise to real equality with the ideal superior. Despotism, congenial with Asiatic people, serves also to retaiii their incapacity for freedom, and obstructs the possible approaches of freedom. But our American, African, and Australian Colonies, natu- rally free, have also representative institutions, and the re- presentative of the Crown on the spot. They are complete transmarine Englands. They have all the equipment of English self-government , only in separate establishments, because their distance renders their representation m Westminster impossible. It is but creating confusion to give them entire nationality, and supply them with an external government besides. We at once see that community, not subserviency, is the principle of their relation to us. They have the control of supplies for their own executive; and such power includes, of course, responsibility for the conduct of their own affairs. The rights of self-control they must necessarily forego, in proportion as their own establishments are not supported by themselves. The idea of self-government involves that of self-sufficiency. The Colonies may, indeed, expect the forces of the empire to rally round them at need, and they must be expected to rally round the imperial standard themselves when needed. But the one is no more to De expected than the other. Community cannot be one-sided. The Colonies 8 cannot take the privileges, and leave to England the duties of freedom. The rights of freedom, to use Mr. ', ladstone's words {Evid. 3,781), entail its duties also, and the one can- not long Le possessed without the other ; and, in Mr. Mill's words, it is exactly in proportion as u man has more or less to do lor his country, tljut he becomes attached more or less as a free citizen to it. (J. >S. ^lill, On liepresentaiive Govern- ment.) A fref^ country undertaken for by another, is not really free. It is for the interest of England's Colonies, more than for her own, that they should lose none of the exercises of citizenship in their separation from the homo country, of its labours any more than of its enjoyni' nts. 3. — Common Citizenship was the Relation between England and her first Colonies; and they sepa- rated IN consequence of its Violation. It would Ixi impossible to assert, and absurd to suppose it likely, that this healthy colonial relationship and condition had ever been fully realizt^d for any length of time. Nothing in this world's history takes its natural course unimpeded hy crossing currents or obstructions. But the early American Settlements of the 16th and 17th centuries had at least docu- mentary recognition, from their first going out, of " a right to " the same conditions of citizenship as if they had remained " at home," and they always asserted it. Queen Elizabeth's first patent, granted to Sir Humphrey Gilbert, guaranteed to her subjects who went out with him to Virginia, " all the rights of free denizens of England." But as much as any Queen she loved management, and those to whom she delegated her power, loved it no less. James I. indulged his legislative fancy in drawing charters for colonial government, and codes of laws for the Companies to whom he dealt out the American Continent. Grahame remarks the inconsistency of this kingly legisla- tion, with his invariable "reservation to the colonists and their i\ o 9 *' children, of the same liberties and privileges as they would have "in England." {Hist, of United States^ Book I., chap, i,, p. 35.) The ascription of legislative power to the sovereign, might have agreed very well with such a reservation in a Colony of Spain, whose royal councils, and audiencias administered at Madrid as much, or as little liberty and justice to distant colonists as to Spaniards at home. But the Anglo-American Colonies speedily vindicated their national rights as Englishmen, nor did that con- stitutional spirit of independence, or of self-dependence, termi- nate in separation from England — nor the almost invincible attachment which it created finally give way — until the revival of interference under a more obstinate king than James 1. tested the greater strength of their confirmed liberty. Mr. Roebuck (in his Colonies of England) shows how they all prospered in exact proportion to their acquisition of civil rights and interests ; nor did any of tht>se Colonies, so various in origin, so constant to freedom, fail, even in the first enter- prise, except Virginia, which at first languished, and nearly expired, when treated as the subject of a London Company — the gift of a king — the plaything of adventurers. The London Company then assumed towards the Colonies very much the position of the Colonial Office a few years ago. The Colonies under it were constantly in trouble, the blame and care of which they always laid at its door, with the same helpless bitterness with which a Frenchman curses the Minister at Paris for all his misfortunes. Chalmers, whose prejudices were in favour of the Home Government, is obliged to confess {Polit. Ann.^^ook I., chap, iii., p. 63,) that " the length of Virginia's infancy, the miseries of " its youth, the disasters of its riper years, might all be at- " tributed to this monstrous government. The Assembly of " Virginia, after it had tasted the sweets of a simple govem- " ment, opposed with firm spirit all attempts to revive the " patents. They then exerted their own talents to discover " remedies. Nothing was wanting to establish their prosperity 10 " but unqualified permission to manage their own affairs. " They displayed a vigour in design and action, which men, " when left to themselves amid d.mgers, never fail to exert." Released from protection, they fortified themselves against the Indians, and even undertook enterprises against the French Port Royal, and the Dutch Settlement of New York. James, wishing to flatter their Assembly on the dissolution of the Company, oflered them military aid; but they declined it, unless placed under the control of their Governor, and paid by the votes of their own Assembly. Unlike our recent Colonists they undertook the survey of their own country, and so well, that their original plans have only been expanded as the Colony has grown. With their own legislature and administration, free as their fellow-countrymen at home, they became so loyal to the British Crown, that in that part of the empire alone Royalty suffered no eclipse, but reflected thence its outskirt rays, until, the home rebellion having cleared away, it shone forth on all again. The Navigation Act at the Restoration was a trial of their loyalty. They murmured that it was a violation of their rights, inflicted by a Parliament in which they were not re- presented. They rebelled ; and for the first time, regular troops from England were quartered on them, at their expense, to suppress, not to protect their rights. The first permanent settlement of New England was ef- fected by Independents flying from the ecclesiastical tyranny of James I., who nevertheless connived at their establishing themselves in America as a body politic, with a free constitution. Charles I., eager to rid himself of Puritans, gave a charter to a second body of emigrants {Charters of American Colonies)^ who founded Massachusetts, having a legislature to themselves as freemen, " entitled to all the rights of home-born subjects of England." Instantly on this assurance of autonomy, num- bers flocked there, and founded Boston ; and evinced still greater vigour by throwing out offset colonies, such as Comiec- ticut, each providing in every respect for its own requirements. u . '■ This first colonial grandson of England, within a year of its birth, defeated, by its own unaided power, the Pequod and Naraganset tribes combined against it under tlie famous Chief 8assacus, — burnt their fortifications — in short, did every- thing that New Zealand, after forty years' settlement, has lately proved itself incompetent to do against Maori tribes with the aid of British troops. It was amid struggles such as these, that Massachusetts found time and means to found Harvard College — such is the living spring of home resources, compared with the languor of a distant supply. These were real colonies — not dependencies — consisting of real Englishmen, only settled in America. Charles I. had been alarmed at the vigour of Enghsh liberty ; planted out, as he had intended, for riddance. He tried to stop the emigration, and so kept near himself, Hamp- den, Pym, and Cromwell, who no doubt would have contributed to the same liberty abroad, which they afterwards promoted so much at home. When the Indians, in terror of English progress, formed a general confederacy against the Colonists, a corresponding union of colonial self-defence was formed against them. In every war after 1643, each Colony furnished its stipulated quota of men, money, and provisions, at a rate proportioned to its population. After the Restoration, Charles II. attempted to control this colonial union ; but they met his attempt by a " Declaration of Rights," (Grahame, Book II., chap, iii., p. 309,) in which they asserted that the provincial governments were " entitled " by every means, even by force of arms, to defend themselves " both by land and sea, against all who should attempt injury "to the provinces or their inhabitants," an assertion which has since changed into that of a right to be protected by England. In the treaty of Breda, Charles II. restored Cromwell's conquest of Acadie to the French, whom the Indians there- fore concluded to be in the ascendant. The Indians instantly 12 renewed their combination against the New England States. A fierce native war lasted a whole year. At length, the steaay efforts and invincible courage of the Colonists prevailed. No praise, however, did they get from Charles for this repulse of hostilities, wholly occasioned by imperial policy; but only reproach for their " seditious obstinacy in refusing to solicit " assistance from their king, and for sordid parsimony in the " equipment of their own levies ; " (Grahame, Book II., chap, iv., p. 344, and Evelyn's Diary;) by which, he said, they had protracted the war, and proved themselves unfit to be trusted with the government of the country. Charles was proceeding to revoke the charters of New England when he died, 1685. Halifax had, indeed, remonstrated ; urging that, as Enj^lish Colonists, the New Englanders were entitled to the same laws and institutions as were established in England : and upon James II. putting them under the government of a Commission, the Crown lawyers, and in particular Sir William Jones, gave an ofiicial opinion that, notwithstanding the forfeiture of their Charter, the inhabitants continued English subjects invested with English liberties, and, consequently, that the king could no more levy money on them without their consent in an Assembly, than they could discharge themselves from their allegiance. The Royal institutions were, however, says Grahame, (I., 367,) good in themselves : and amongst them we find the direction " to " discipline and arm themselves for the defence of their own " country." The Stuart king asked his Colonies to undertake the duties,, and leave to him all the rights of their government. We now give Colonies all the rights, and charge ourselves with the duties of their government. Our Revolution brought us into war with the French, who immediately set the Indians again in combination against our Colonies. Ma.s8achusetts instantly armed, reconquered Acadie for the British Crown, 1689, and proceeded to apply to William III. for aid to invade Canada ; which he refused to do, on the ground of having work enough for his troops in Europe. The New Englanders advanced to the attempt alone, and this enter- " 18 prise was undertaken by them heroically, though unsuccessful!)', only sixty years after their first settlement in America. William III. sought to retain the advantage taken by James against the Charters ; but the people of Massachusetts repeated the declaration of their right to re[)resentative government, always acknowledging the supremacy of the King. In his name they built and garrisoned forts along their frontier. "When in 1695 they lost Acadie again, and their own Fort Pemmaquid was stormed and taken by a joint French and Indian attack, by land and sea, under (Jount Frontignac, their defence was a gallant one, and only the Peace of Ryswick stopped their renewed advance. But I have heard some men allow that all this is true enough of the New England Colonies, but that no such spirit was shown by their Southern contemporaries; so completely has one of the proudest pages of our national history been for- gotten. Let us then look into the annals of a Southern terri- tory, which was given by a Stuart King to a Roman Catholic Peer, as Proprietor, with the intention of its being an asylum for Papists, and for martyrs to Royal supremacy. Surely if freedom and self-dependence found no impediment to their establishment in such a settlement as Marylaiiti, there can be no excuse for their absence anywhere. Yet, here, Charles I. only granted to Lord Baltimore power to make laws with the assent of the freemen, or their representatives in Assembly ; all the settlers were recognized as freemen, entitled to the same liberties as native-bom Englishmen ; and to the Proprietor, as Prince Palatine, was delegated the Royal authority to command them to act under his local orders in their own defence, " to repel iuvanon, and to suppress rebellions." (Bozman's Mist, of Maryland.) Not many years after its foundation we read of Maryland imposing a tax on its own exports to maintain a magazine of arms. Among the troubled days of civil and religious warfare, these early Colonies were perpetually involved in both the internal and external struggles of the parent state; yet not 14 less in those than in their own local disturbances they bore the part which fell to them without fear or question. The convul- sions of England spread tlioir agitations to the extremities of the empire ; and foreign enemies, so stirred up, often made a colony their first battle-field. Yet this was not considered any reason for their means of defence, in men or money, being sent to them from England. England broke up the Peace of Ryswick, 1702, to prevent France from seizing the Spanish succession. French hostility instantly operated in America, stirring up the Indians to re- newed conspiracies. The Colonies combined for their defence against this English war, without any help from England. They asked, indeed, for co-operation in a second invasion of Canada. Again assistance was promised, but failed to arrive, being detained by disasters in Spain ; and the colonial militia alone attacked Port Royal, gamsoned by French regulars ; but their power was unequal to their high spirit, and they were again imsuccessful. Upon this disaster, Queen Anne assured them of reinforcements, and fixed the contribution of each Colony for a renewed enterprise. The Colonies sent addresses of thanks, and largely exceeded their stipulated quota of men. The combined army assembled; but again the English withdrew to meet European pressure at home ; again the Colonists advanced alone, and finally themselves added Port Royal and Acadia to the dominions of the British Crown. At the same time, a combined force of Indians attacked 4 North Carolina, whose first warning was a night massacre of 137 inhabitants. The settlers rallied, and kept the Indians in check till succours came of men and money from South Carolina, with which intercolonial assistance, they repelled the invasion. The Indians then attacked South Carolina, which, in its exhaustion, asked aid from England. The request was dis- regarded, and the militia proved sufficient alone. The militia of New England in 1730 numbered 60,000 men, regularly drilled and organized. It IS remarkable that even the body of insolvent debtors T S I 16 who were sent out from English prisonfl in 1732 to f«)und Georgia, — the last of this group of Colonies, — wore previously to their going out regularly trained as soldiers, and, on their arrival, formed into an organized militia. Tliey were not (mly expected ordinarily to defend themselves, but were expressly meant to act as a barrier between the other Colonies and the Spanish in Florida ; and the English Parliament voted for this, their own undertaking, only a few thousand pounds in part payment for some of the first forts to be erected. On this settlement being made, France lost no time in joining her forces with those of Spain to invade both Georgia and Carolina ; and the militia of those two provinces, aided by some friendly Indians, repulsed them. Some Moravians, who came with the first settlers to Georgia, had stipulated with the English Government on religious grounds for exemption from military service ; but so indignant were the rest of the community at any such ex- emption existing when war came on, that the Moravians were compelled to leave the Colony. Even Quaker Pennsylvania came at last to a formal vote that defensive war was lawful, and formed themselves into an organized militia. Georgia greatly contributed to the resolution of the English Parliament for the war with Spain, which was fatal to Walpole's Ministry. One English regiment was then sent out to them, and placed under 0eorgian command ; and with the hearty co- operation, in men and money, of Virginia and Carolina, an united invasion of Florida was made. When the Austrian succession war drew France as well as Spain into hostilities with England, 1744, the English Colonists successfully defended Annapolis against the first at- tack; and, in return, carrying the war into the enemy's country, they took Louisburg, which was called the Gibraltar of America, and subjected Cape Breton altogether to the British Crown. For this great expedition the Colonists furnished the naval as well as military equipment — arnung twelve of their own Ifi war sloops, and hirinjj^ two privntrrrs. Tlioir Iniul forco wiw commaiidod by INpporol, ii (/oloiiol of the M»issiichuM(!ves now is cloar from the evidence of Hir (J. Elliott iKjfoix) Mr. Mills's Committee; hy which it appeiirn that Antigua, and every island from which our troops have been witlidrawn, have raised a militia for themselves ; and that they look to the lintish fleet for external safety, and to the name of Englishman, which suggests reflection to every foreign invader. What Minister would have dreamt in the last century of sending Royal Engineers under the pretence of making tho surveys and roads of a new colony, as we have just done in the case of British Columbia ? Under some excuse or other a little garrison is now deposited, as a Palladium, in all F^nglish Colonies. Their native energies are taken under tho guardian- ship of the higher power, whose ensign is hoisted, not by themselves as their own, but by the tutelary sovereignty, in chivalrous assumption of their protection, and in menace against the whole world. Our better Statesmen knew that the true defence of a small English Colony lay rather in the know- ledge of other nations that in attacking it they attacked a part of England, and came in conflict not with a mere garrison, but with a portion of tho British nation, alike circumstanced, and in common cause, with tho i )Bt. I take my leave of this part of my subject, by giving the following statistical index of the total inversion which has taken place in our colonial military relations. In the last century Wolfe conquered Canada with an army chiefly con- sisting of colonial militia. England now, in time of peace, keeps twice as many troops in all her Colonies, exclusive of military posts, as the colonists enrol among themselves. I proceed to the consideration of the still greater anomaly and novelty, of our contributions to the civil and ecclesiastical •1 eiponsos of our culoniul felluw^Bubjeota, of which I have only inoidontally given one instanoo as yet. In the beginning of the oightoonth century the annual ira- p)rt8 intci 111! the N(»w England provinccH from England wero estimated, by Xeul, at £100,000. The exports by the Eng- lish merchants curisirtted of dried cod-fish sold in Europe for £80,000, and of 13,000 tons of naval stores. In the Colonial Blue. Book just presented, I find the im- ports of Canada stated at 24,760,981 dols. ; the exports ut 33,656,161 dols.; the duty collected 4,437,846 dols.; land sales produced 469,803 dols., of which one-half came from sales of clergy -lauds : and the population amounts to about three millions ; while, in Mr. Lowe's words {Evid. 3,335), " by " the guarantee of this country in time of war, they are enabled " to apply their revenues entirely to their own local purposes." With tliis comparative statement before me of the small beginnings on which New England maintained herself, in ordinary circumstances, independently ; and the wealth of which Canada now asks us to guarantee her safe possession, under the pledge of a constant gariison ; I proceed to look into No. 5 of our last Oivil Service Estimates ; and I find that, not content with relieving the strength of such a Colony of the task of defending its wealth, we further cont-ibute to its wealth, by paying Canadian Bishops, Rectors, and Archdeacons, al- though the Crown has given up the sales of clergy-lands, which were expressly reserved for that purpose. "We give a small salary to the President of a College ; and pensions, and blankets for aged Indians, and other charitable donations. Writing of New England, Grahame says (Book II. chap, i.) " To a community of men thus assembled the formation of " their Church appeared the most int^^resting of all their con- " cems, and it occupied, accordingly, their earliest and earnest " deliberations." I have related how, in the midst of their first struggle^ for existence, they founded their own Colleges : 82 and as to missionary labours among the Indians, so far from having English taxes voted to them for the purpose, their early history is tilled with such nanes as Elliott, and Mayhew, and hundreds* of American Missionaries whose work was amply supported by liberal colonial subscriptions and endowments ; and, kindling missionary 8)Tnpathie8 at home, gave birth to the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, which is now apart from its purpose, in partnership with our Treasury, subsidizing the colonial church. Australia is just beginning to legislate for the endowment of its own Churches. The fourth item in our last colonial estimates is £17,800 for British Columbia, the detail of which would be wholly un- intelligible to countrymen of our old colonies. What would the members of Congress say to a demand from a newly formed State for £1,800 a year from the central Treasury for its governor's salary — £1,200 more for 8urve)ring its lands — £11,000 more for the pay of a standing federal force to act as its police, and that of the costliest kind, as any equivalent to the Royal Engineers sent out to Columbia would be — ^£1,800 more for an Assay Office — and, as a last freak of impudence, £2,000 more for imexplained contingencies ? What would the English Parliament in the seventeenth century have said to any one of these demands from a new colony ? Wb vote, in the fifth item of our estimates, £25,000 for governors, and £15,000 more for magistrates of the West Indian Islands, whose police expenses occupied a previous estimate. The vagaries of English legislation with regard to those islands have certainly violated all ordinary rules of policy : entitling their inhabitants to make, and exposing us to meet, any sort of anom- alous claim. The bygone spirit of territorial acquisitiveness, and the magnanimity of universal philanthropy have left us an inheritance of liabilities in that part of the world which we might be glad to compound for by the sacrifice of every possible imperial interest we have there, even including the right to cut 33 logwood in Honduras, and the special privilege of protectorship over the mosquitoes. Our colonial connexion with all that part of the world, including the Isthmus, produces literally no other result to this country but frequent embroilment with foreign American powers, and a frightful mortality among all the men we send there. Should that mortality, however, seem insignificant to any one, let him look at the next item in our estimates, and he will find £15,000 a year more devoted to no other object than the maintenance of those pest holes in the name of Colonies on the deadly western coast of Africa, of which, when in 1785 it was proposed to send convicts there, Burke said " that the conse- "quences of transportation were not meant to be deprivation of **life : and of Gambia it migl t truly be said, that there all life " dies, and all death lives." Whether these, and the valuable possession of St. Helena, which stands next on our list, aie kent at all as Colonies, or in what light they present their strange contrast with our former foreign possessions, it is diffi- cult to say. "We occupied Sierra Leone for the purpose of im- porting free blacks, and Gambia for exporting slave blacks under the Assiento Treaty, and we continue to sacrifice Englishmen there in hopes of discouraging Slave Trade. In the possession of St. Helena we have no apparent object. The ninth item of these estimates exhibits another novelty — ^the cost of abandoning territory ; in spite of which the last accounts from South Africa intimate an intention of fresh annexation, in the modern manner of colonization, in the same quarter. The last item I will notice in the Colonial Estimates for this year, and not the least remarkable, is the 10th, which devotes £27,000, a reduced vote from £40,000 in previous years for "improving Kafirs." The imagination of a similar charge upon the English Treasury, for enabling the Governors 64 of the New England Colonies to make their own experiments in the great work of civilizing the neighbouring Indians — which ^hose Colonies themselves undertook — would be an ob- vious nioonsistency with the spirit and history of those times. But in no instance do the features of our existing colonial system contrast more violently with those of our first system, than in what are called Convict Colonies. How we arrived at such an idea at all is a question belonging to my next topic for consideration — the procpfs of deterioration. The indignation with which certain attempts to send convicts to America were met by our old Colonists is well known ; and their proposal to return cargoes of snakes. But the idea of a Convict Settlement would scarcely come within the comprehension of the descend'^ ats of Raleigh's adventurers, or receive a moment's toleration tTom the inheritors of the spiiit of the Pilgrim Fathers. We have lately seen advertisements of the prosperity of Western Australia; and it is said that that settlement has been benefited by the receipt of convicts. Much in the same way a gaol is benefited by the receipt of prisoners ; as it would otherwise be empty and useless — a mere abode of paid officers without any service to be paid for. Western Australia lives merely on Government service. Its very neighbourhood is hated, and all communication tabooed, by every decent colony ; its name is a reproach; and its whole idea not so much in contrast with, as absolutely antagonistic and injurious to, all colonization. ' A convict colony is the strongest instance possible of the entire subversion of this country's fundamental principles in colonizing. The colonial relation of equal rights must have become obliterated, before the mother country would seek from a colony the service of scavengers. "Moab is my wash-pot," was the expression of Hebrew poetry for the utmost degradation in subserviency of one community to another. The gauge of this baser theory seems to comprehend all that has startled us within its compass. The long denial of con- 35 stitutional government — the retention of protection even after that has been conceded — the language of some of our statesmen who gave evidence before the Committee, often complimentary to the " liberality " of any colony which has begun to pay anything towards our expenses in maintaining it — ^the pitifiil attitude recently assumed by the Cape and New Zealand — all is intelligible on the wide principle of colonial subserviency and dependence, which embraces a convict colony. But that there may be no doubt about the colonial theory which this country now adopts, Lord Grey, the best authority, and, as a Statesman, high-minded, and habitually taking the largest views, even in explaining his own recommendation that we should "return to our former and sounder colonial system," lays down this as his basis: — " I think that the very notion " of a colonial relation between this country and om- pos- " sessions implies protection on the one side, and obedience on the " other, within certain limits." — {Evid. 2,531.) Lord John Russell, as Prime Minister, in 1850, made a great oration in the House of Commons, on colonial policy, on introducing a bill for the government of the Australian Colonies. (Corrected Copy, Ridgway, p. 17.) He explained his benevolent object to be " to promote their capacity for self- " government;" and his argument was, "that it is our bounden " duty to maintain the Colonies which have been placed under " our charge ; we cannot get rid of the obligation to govern " them for their benefit." Of this view of the subject, Mr. Gladstone said {New Zealand Government Debate, 1852) : — ** An administrative estabHshment, effected by legislative " enactments, or by the executive power of the Crown, and " by the funds of the people of England, is the root and trunk " around which we now expect a colonial population to grow, " under which, by degrees, that population is, according to our " modem and most unhappy phrase, to he trained for freedom^'' A leading weekly paper thus confidently anticipates the judgment of its readers on the present claims of New d2 36 Zealand to protection, by this general proposition — "that " the common sense view of colonial policy is at all events " not to abandon a community of Englishmen to their own ** guidance, until there is a fair probability that they will " be safe from external interference during the difficulties " which belong to the early stages of constitutional govem- '* ment." {Saturday Review, September 21st.) Thus widely far have we wandered from the constitutional recognition of the common rights, powers, and liabilities of Eng- lish citizens at home or abroad, till we have arrived at a theory of '* protecting obedient " colonies, " promoting their capacity for selP-govei . ^\'' nevertheless continuing to "maintain and govern the^i is committed to our charge;"" and even after self-government is given them, taking care not to " abandon them to their own guidance," nor suffer them to cope with their own difficulties. 6. — The Causes and Process of the Change which has taken place in our colonial relations. Lord Grey says, in his work on Colonial Policy, and repeats, in his recent Mvidence (2,529), that he believes " it " was not till the time of the great revolutionary war with " France, that nearly the whole burthen of the defence of " the Colonies was undertaken by this country." That war and this folly, no doubt, occurred about the same time; but they had little to do with each other. After the separation of the American Colonies, our present chief Colonies dame into a relation with us which had a very different original character from that of the colonization of New England. Canada was conquered shortly before the loss of the thirteen provinces. The attempt of the English Parliament to recover from those provinces its share of the cost of that joint con- quest, and to establish the right of taxing those Colonists T i If 87 where they were not represented, precipitated their resolution to hold even to England less tenaciously than to English rights. England, perhaps fortunately for the rest of the world, was unable to appreciate their value in common citizenship with herself; and she got in exchange for her American territory an old French military occupation, inhabited by French Roman Catholics, with manners and habits, socially and politically, the reverse of her own. This was the turning point of our colonial relations. Into Canada we at first introduced the civil law of England. All offices were conferred on the British military and traders ; but they treated with such contempt the French noblesse, that it became necessary, for peace and quiet, to restore the Coutume de Paris, and a Legislative Council was constituted by the Quebec Bill, 1774, reserving taxation in the hands of the Government, h la Ftangaise. We soon had to fight with our vigorous old Colonists for the possession of our new Colony, and should inevitably have lost it to them, had not those recent changes brought the only true defence of any country on our side — the goodwill and co-operation of its inhabitants. On the termination of the American war, Mr. Pitt obtained for Canada the external form of representative assemblies, but withheld their life — the control over taxation. The fretting of the English part of the Colony under a Constitution English in form, French in spirit, and the general incompatibility of the two races brought together in Canada, encouraged, in 1812, another American invasion, which, how- ever, the Canadian volunteers themselves, in the first instance, repelled. Even under so imperfect a Constitution it had not yet occurred to English Colonists to look to England to defend them " in their first difficulties." Four battalions of militia, the Cana- dian Voltigeurs, a fine corps esp*^ cially suited to the country, were organized, equipped, and officered by the young Canadian gentry. The troops of England were fully occupied elsewhere. mmm 38 From th(^ peace of 1815 there were constant struggles between our Government and the Canadians for the command of their purse, complicated by the differences of race and re- ligion ; which partial concessions, and Lord Durham's mis- sion, only served to mitigate. Rebellion, and rebellion losses charged on England, were the process by which, at length, responsible government, and its own control over its own revenue, were won by Canada. Halting at this stage of con- stitutional revival, our colonial government then entered its present anomalous phase, in which a colony is possessed of free representative institutions, and England retains to herself its garrison duties, as a trophy of her supremacy. It is significant of the confusion which was already intro- duced into our Statesmen's minds, at that time, on colonial relations, that in a celebrated despatch to Lord Sydenham, Governor-General of Canada, 14th October, 1839, Lord John Russell thus argued that " responsible government " was im- possible in a colony. "If we seek to apply such a principle " to a colony, we shall find ourselves at fault. The power " for which a Minister is responsible in England, is not his " own power, but the power of the Crown, of which he is the " organ. It is obvious that the executive Councillor of a " colony is in a situation totally different. The Governor, " under whom he serves, receives his orders from the Crown " of England. But the colonial Council cannot be the " advisers of the Crown of England. It may happen, " therefore, that, the Governor receives, at the same time, *' instructions from the Queen, and advice from his Council " totally at variance It would have been " impossible for any Minister to support in the Parliament " of the United Kingdom the measures which a ministry, " headed by M. Papineau, would have imposed on the Go- " vemor of Lower Canada." As if the Crown having a deputy in a colony gave it two-fold action, or made any dif- ference in the constitution. The sole point in dispute was I 39 the responsibility of the local ministry to tho coloniiil people. Lord John's difficulty was based on tho supposition that colonial legislation must in all things be made subservient to the will of the English Parliament; which was nmning on the old rock again on which American connexion split. I Englishmen will be represented in their ovm assembly. We bad to yield the point again in Canada ; and although a very imperfect form of responsible government was then given, yet this early history of Canada proves the impossibility of keep- ing down a colony, in which even any infusion of Ikitish spirit enters, as a bureaucratic dependency. Lord Durham had well replied, before, to the assertion that self-government would lead to separation, that, " on the con- " trary, cessation of undue interference on our part would " strengthen the bond of sympathy and interest ; the con- " nexion would become more durable because more healthy, " by having more of equality, of freedom, and of local inde- " pendence. Even if increased power gave increased national " feeling, it was our first duty to secure the well being of our " colonial countrymen, and to take good care that if ever they " were to separate from us, they should not be found unfit to " govern themselves.'* Canada had responsible government con- ceded in the amplest form, and has proved the truth of Lord Durham's prediction, and the error in Lord John Russell's theory. She still wants the corollary of self-government — self-defence. In the absence of the old spirit of colonization, there was no restraint upon the natural tendency of a great maritime nation to treat the rest of tho world simply as made for its own use. The first instance of such a tendency soon fol- lowed the loss of our old Colonies. America had at last sub- mitted to receive our convicts in the way of bu5ring them as slaves at £20 a head : though New England remonstrated to the last against the practice. This mode of disposing of our criminals being, in 1786, shut against us, it was proposed to empty the crowded hulks in the Thames upon the west 40 coast of Africa. The proposal was negatived in Parliament on account of the unheal thiness of the African climate. The discovery of New Holland by Captain Cook, offered a better site for the novel experiment of a penal settlement : and an English community sprung up in the Southern hemisphere, of which the governor was head gaoler, the council consisted of turnkeys, the revenue of English sakiries, and the defences of the English Governor's guard. In this I recognize the mould of the new colonial forma- tion ; and all the freedom which our present great Australian Colonies have since acquired, chiefly by the national impetus given them by their discovery of gold, has not yet obliterated its traces, nor has even the self-government of Canada fully regained the ancient type. The South African is the only other great group of Colonies which has been since attached to this empire. The mode of its acquisition, alike with that of Canada uncongenial with free colonization, is also strikingly illustrative of the weakness of mere dependencies as distinguished from what we used to call colonies. Probably Holland had wasted millions in maintaining for a century and a half the garrison at Cape Town, which in 1795 could only strike its flag to the British fleet ; and though restored at the Peace of Amiens, became prisoners a second time with equal facility on the renewal of war. The government of this Colony, which had under the Dutch been administered by District Councils, and magistrates, wa§ on its final occupation by Great Britain in 1806, committed to a military Governor sent from England. In 1835, an Executive Council was formed, consisting of the princpal Government 0£Bicers, and the Commander of the Forces ; and a Legislative Council nominated by the Crown. In 1850, wholesale constituent powers were given to the Colonists to form the perfectly free government which it now enjoys, without however losing the character of a dependency, haying all its defences still undertaken by the mother country. 41 q 1 Even tho Ionian Inlands' Protoctorato was looked upon as a colonial acquisition ; and ranked with our Colonies. Coincidently with these transitions in our colonial rela- tions, significant changes have concurred in the name and nature of the colonial office at home. Tho Hoard of Trade and Plantations was the first designa- tion of a colonial office in London ; and it is a monument of the commercial views then taken of colonies, and of the strug- gle which took place on tho part of England to maintain Navigation Acts, and on tho part of the Colonies to evade them. The appointment of a Colonial Secretary of State, 1768, marks the period of home interference which we have noted as the origin of change in the principle of our colonial re- lations. Now began the government of Colonies in Downing- street. The Secretaryship ceased on the loss of the American Colonies — " Othello's occupation " was "gone." In 1794, the business of the Colonies was carried on at the Home Office, New South "Wales having then given a police character to our colonial administration. In 1801, it was transferred to the "War Department, a change suggested by our military occupation of conquests during the war. In 1816, Mr. Tiemey moved for the restoration of the old colonial office ; but the Colonies had *not, by that time, recovered even the first step back towards former relations ; Lord Castlereagh replied, that "the policy of this country " was founded on the conviction that it would not be wise to " permit the erection of a local authority, in the shape of a " Parliament in the Colonies of which Great Britain had ob- " tained possession. Consequently the superintending control " of the Colonial Secretary of State had been augmented.'* Now that every colony, properly so called, has that " local authority," one hardly knows what there is for the re- established colonial office to do, beyond the management of 42 a few Crown Colonics. Its chief work of late has heen to present annually to Parliament a Blue Book of colonial sta- tistics — the population, number of sheep, newly erected tele- graphs, &c., of each colony — and to watch the operation oi the Passengers Act, for which it has also a separate oflRce. The War Office practically transacts all the remaining colonial government business of this country. In such manner, wo have arrived at colonial relations midway between those of former times, and the reverse into which they had fallen ; «'. e. between the freest self-government and dependence. Our colonial result is a protected autonomy. 6. — Reasons considered for making a complete Return TO former Colonial Relations, and Arguments against doing so refuted. Lord Grey, in the introduction to his Colonial Policy^ p. 10, well says, that " the abandonment of the old com- *' mercial system of this country towards the Colonies has not " diminished the inetrest of the Colonies in their connexion " with England, nor of England in the retention of the " Colonies. The possession of a number of steady allies in " various quarters of the globe adds strength to a nation, both " physically and morally, and the advantage to the Colonies is "far greater." In this sentiment I fully agree with Lord Grey ; but when he further proceeds to explain what he means by this desirable connexion,' I find that, in his view (p. 17), the " steady allies " are " to be assisted to govern themselves." He fears that some have had representative institutions allowed to them prematurely; but he would, nevertheless, make them undertake their own defence. This, he says, would be but to return to what was formerly the practice of this country, which he calls (p. 44) a sounder system. I cannot see why Canada and Australia should not be now ■ ,--^*'''iV*vhi'^-^^'-r'a\t^iS::v-)isii\-^^^^^ fn«»»w»^-*Ttf^*tir' "•^»'^f 43 as ripo oh Virginia and Massachusetts were a few years after their sottloincnt for representative institutions. At all oventa they have tlicm. To mo, therefore the conclusion comes, a fortiiyri, tliat colonial self-defence is the sounder system. It is the natural state of things that they who freely govern tliemselvcs should maintain their own goveniment. It is specially the natural spirit of Englishmen to rely on them- selves, and not to loan on others. It is the nature of our race to propagate itself by seedlings, not by suckers. It is even in the nature of things an impracticable system of government to let distant communities devise their own policy, follow their own interests, make their own neighbour wars, and from the centre of empire to undertake to maintain for them their various jjolicy, protect their interests, and fight their wars. We have not even the acquaintance with their affairs to keep our Executive concurrent with them. ITow laughable, the other day, was the exhibition of ignorance upon the strength of which Parliament resolved to furnish men and money for the New Zealand Native war, the local authors of which were almost immediately afterwards discredited ! Besides, the utmost amount of protection which in the way of garrisons we could possibly afford to all the Colonies, must bo wholly ineffectual for their security. If England ever lost the command of the seas in a war, no one would expect those garrisons to supply the means of local defence with which a spirited and devoted people accustomed to the use of arms could supply themselves. Those very garrisons have displaced and superseded the first and best defence. In Mr. Lowe's words {Euid. 3,405), "every English soldier in a colony prevents a hundred colonists from taking up arms and drilling." If we would make our colonial protection in any degree re- place the strength it has displaced, we must first, according to Sir J. Burgoyne*s Evidence (App. No. 7), spend £1,000,000 in completing colonial fortifications. To garrison those fortifica- tions would occupy an increasingly large proportion of our array in the most precarious kind of service. For our home-defence we must then have much more recourse to mercenaries, and if we are to be ready to take our proper part in such wars as we have been recently involved in, foreign legions with all their hi^zardoiis enlistment, and (German regiments with their expensive terms of disbanding, must be our substitute for the English troops, which we have scattered over the world. It seems enough to condemn the present system that during the late war we should have sent our troops to Eafraria, hired a German Legion in their place for Ijome-servico, and finally disbanded the Legionaries by settling them as colonists in Kafraria ; or that, as the Duke of Newcastle tells us he be- lieves (Evid. 2,952), five supplementary regiments were sent by us to Canada in 1856, in anticipation of differences with the United States about our recruiting among them, — that is, that having first scattered our own troops abou' \e Colonies, we made a fresh enemy in an attempt to nxre foreigners to fill their place, and then had to increase the colonial detachments to confront that enemy. The conclu- sion to which the Select Committee came was, "that the " tendency of modem warfare being to strike blows at the •' heart of a hostile power, it is therefore desirable to con- " centrate the troops required for the defence of the United " Kingdom as much as possible, and to trust mainly to naval " supremacy for securing against foreign aggression the distant *' dependencies of the Empire." (Report, s. 19.) In fact, tBvery part of the Empire should raise its own means of defence at home, and at the sound of danger all should be ready to rally round the threatened point, the ocean being our proper medium of national intercommunication, and every enemy being made aware that on his temporary success in any quarter, the vengeance of the whole Empire waits. I recollect the late Prussian Minister, De Bunsen, who was well acquainted with our affairs, remarking that it was '■«».- '1 ^^ t 't^r^rKVgauMH'Miaih\-.i : w 46 fortunate for other nations that England suppressed us she did the dr)V(4opmt'nt of her strength throughout the world. It may he fortunate for others, hut I am not content myself to see England presenting herself among other nations, when any emergency arises, as the weakest instead of the strongest of the world's powers — contributing subsidies of money inst«.'ad of men to her allies — as a tributary' rather than co-ordinate in war. I cannot rejoice like a Prussian, in seeing England employ a portion of her forces in preventing the sorWco of four-fold more, while she reduces herself to bo an applicant for mercenaries from other countries to enable her to fulfil her obligations. If, like Athens under Themistoeles, we received quotas of men or money from a confederacy, to furnish in return a common defence — or if, like Spain, England reserved a feudal tribute from all the ]' oducts of dependent colonies in lieu of personal service—or if, like the Dutch, our Government em- barked itself in the colonial commerce, and made a revenue from it which it would bo their business to protect — in any such cas'^ we might fairly bo expected to bear the burthen of our own undertaking. But why should all the autonomous communities which now make up the British Empire — from vigorous Canada to the golden Englands of the south — quarter themselves on the deeply-mortgaged patrin ony of the mother-country, to which they bring no other profit than any foreigner brings, with whom she may have commercial dealings ? Can youth or poverty be their plea? or is it the pride of old England on which they impose, which makes her reckless of an extra million of annual expense, to treat her family as she thinks becomes her dignity? Mr. Lowe told the Committee {Uvid. 3,411) that the Victorians are wise enough to see that even paying English soldiers is their cheapest mode of providing themselves with a police. But it is not so easy for the English tax-payer to see why he should reduce the police expenses of Victoria. 46 We have recently hoard that the Attorney-General at Mel- bourne made his fortune on his first arrival, as counsel for the Ballarat rioters, being then an English Barrister of one year's standing. Cannot a Goveniraent afford to pay tor a police in a country where the rioters can pay 1,000-guinea-fees for their Counsel P But against all these reasons for colonies contnbuting their own strength to the common stock, it is urged that we should lose all remaining connexion with the colonies if we withdrew our constant protection from them. Mr. Roebuck asks {Evid. 3,787), would not a colony, allowed to do what it likes, and to protect itself, be independent ? The answer is, that the con- nexion with a colony on the same terms of citizenship with ourselves must be stronger, because healthier and more natural, than on terms of dependence. National affinities, and com- mercial interests, and partnership in a great name, are strong ties with us, which would not be weakened, but strengthened, by a Colony taking its full share with the rest of the Empire in the distribution of responsibilities, the habit of fulfilling which especially constitutes the national character. I agree with Mr. Lowe [Mvid. 3,407), that the constant presence of imperial troops in colonies tends to shorten, instead of prolonging, their connexion with the parent state. In time of peace there should be 'no imperial troops in any colony (3,370). If it has the least disposition to separate, a few troops will not restrain it, but, on the contrary, may very likely commit it in hostilities. The handful of troops which England sends is not the inducement to a colony to adhere to her, but her vast power which is unseen behind them (3,402). Mr. Fortescue, however, representing the Colonial Office on Mr. Mills's Committee, suggests {Evid. 1,368 —72) that we should take warning from the examj'-e of our first American ColoL-ies, now become foreign powers, anu possible enemies. 1 'i 1 47 But, if he must allow that giving every part of the Em- pire free exercise of self-action, i. e., the habit of acting for itself, and looking to itself for the safety of its own affairs, is the only way to secure health, and vigour, and civic virtue throughout its length and breadth ; surely even if the ultimate separation of distant governments from the central sovereignty were a possible result from this process of de- velopment of vigour, he would not thence infer an argument for checking that development, and crippling that vigour. He would hardly propose clipping the young eagles' wings because former broods had found escape from torment by flight. I have already given proof enough, that it was not their independent conduct of their own affairs which led to the separation of the American Colonies. When they raised their own forces like the rest of the Empire, and fought like other Englishmen, and other Englishmen fought with them at need, their attachment to England grew so strong that the best judges denied to the last the possibility of our change of treatment ending, as it did, in separation. If Canada now raised an adequate militia for her own requirements, and garrisoned her own forts, and ceased to look for men or pay from England, until the occasion of war might call the forces of the Empire together, would she feel less inclined to remain in her allegiance by an increased sense of equal treatment and common action with her fellow-subjects at home ? Should we feel afraid of her consequently becoming a foreign power, and possibly an enemy ? Is this why we are afraid to trust her with arms, and continue to treat her as a dependency P Lord Russell, in a recent speech at Newcastle, took pride to himself, in reflection on his past career, that he had not been as other Ministers in less happy countries who " consider " it a part of the duty of government to fetter and bind the " talents and abilities of men." Is he sure that this has not been his " colonial policy " all his life ? Is he content w^ mmmmmmmmmmmm 4d with such abstinence from medfUing only at home, and does distance lend enchantment to what seems to him so offensive in a nearer view ? But there are others who, granting that every part of the Empire ought to act alike, and, controlling its own affairs, should vote and furnish its own equipment, ^n'ge on us the unfairness of throwing particular charges which properly belong to the whole Empire on any one locality. Let it pass that that is the very unfairness of which I am complaining on the part of England ; let us see how it may be urged on the part of a colony. The Duke of Newcastle says {Uvid. 2,961), that Nova Scotia, for instance, should no more be taxed in men or money for the garrison of Halifax than the county of Hampshire for the garrison of Portsmouth. But that is exactly the parallel I wish to establish. Let the two cases be treated alike in demand of men and money, and my principle is conceded. True it is that New England, with a smaller population, wholly defended Boston, a place of great imperial importance — ^but I will not ask the utmost application of such precedents. The taxes and men voted for our military estimates are furnished by Hampshire in common with the rest of the kingdom, but no part of the men or money which maintain the garrison of Halifax are voted and furnished by the Nova- Scotian legislature ; and even though Halifax be an imperial fortress, yet Nova Scotia is part of the Empire. The small- 4 ness of its interest is the worst of all arguments for its being overlooked. (Duke of Newcastle, Uvid. 3,021.) So also it is replied against arguments for community of responsibilities, that a West Indian Island, though self-governed, could not wholly protect itself The answer is, that though no small territory can find sufficient men or money to defend itself in all cases ; yet its being detached and self-governed does not properly relieve it, in its degree, of the duties of citizenship which it would have to bear as an integral part of England ; but its self-government demands that its share of men and 4 49 money should be raised on the spot : and that would be always sufficient for internal order ; and its general protection would be the same — whether so detached or not — namely, the com- mon power of the Empire. In fact, its self-government makes it the only judge as well as controller of its own requirements for peace and security, and throws upon it the solo responsi- bility for its own disturbance. It is a good illustration of the arbitrariness of the colonial protective principle that Ceylon, treated apart from India, has her defence undertaken by England ; treated as part of India, she would have her full share of military and other burthens to bear in common with all India; not, as Sir George Grey intimates (Question 2,564, Evid), separately by herself, but as subjects of a Government which, coterminously with its revenue, raises over its whole area the means required for its defence. But then, it is said, even if England should not undertake to protect her Colonies, still she must place a few of her own troops in each as a nucleus around which they may rally, and which would assist them in their military organization (Lord Herbert's Evid. 3,6 " ). Others say, we must send a few troops as "a guard i tlu govomors" {Evid -'^0), or as " emblems of the connexion with the mother country " {Evid. 335), which Lord Herbert called he sentii ontal new of the subject {Evid. 3,630). All these are new colonial notions br<>d from the habits of the new regime. I will consider first the necessity of a permanent nucleus of English troops, round which the ordiupvi colonial forces, whatever they may be, may organize tiicmselves. There is no Colony which it is so important for us to keep in sound relations with ourselves as Canada. I will, therefore, consider this point in connexion with that, as the strongest case for my opponents. The number of troops which the highest authorities, in- -'^^m^^f^fem^sm^' 'irfmm 50 eluding Lord Grey, Lord Elgin, and the Duke of Newcastle, agree in thinking to be necessary as such a nucleus in Canada, is one regiment of the line, which, with the Canadian Rifles, should hold Quebec and Kingston (JEvid. 2,948). The question, then, is, whether these regiments should be raised, and paid, and sent by England, or consist of Canadians, or, at least, be put on the votes of the Canadian Parliament. It is certain that our old Colonies would have insisted on this last condition as essential to their ri^rhts. I have already (p. 10) related the answer of Virginia to James I. even in an hour of peril, refusing to receive English troops on any other terms. Let Canada, however, by all means, look to England in the hour of peril, and England look to her in her hour of peril also; but if the sight of English red-coats, at all times, has become a needful support of Canadian confidence, and English pay has ceased to be resented as a symptom of dependence, we must bow humbly under the conviction that Canada is no longer inhabited by men like those who conquered her. Even in 1812 she needed no nucleus round which to organize a power- ful militia ; though then the ancient colonial spirit was so far changed that she permitted England to furnish her militia with arms and pay. But the incidence of cost is only im- portant as indicating the seat of responsibility (Mr. Gladstone's Uvid. 3,796). Mr. Merivale, who for many years was a very able Under- Secretary of State in the CoL)nial Office, told the Committee {Evid. 2,439), that the English troops in New Brunswick are meant for little else than as a guard of honour to the Governor. But he allows that being so sent they are taken as a sort of pledge that England undertakes their entire defence, and that they are thereby deterred from taking any steps or care for their own security. No wonder a Prize-Essay, wh h 1 have lately seen, emanating from the literary Institutions of that Colony, describes New Brunswick as ** a noble example of the greatness which " may be achieved by an industrious people protected by a 51 '* powerful and liberal parent state." A Provincial Governor's^ " guard of honour" would bo more creditably and safely fur- nished by those about him : and as for an " emblem of the " Queen of England'H sovereignty," a handful of troops from England serves much rather to mark a Imitation of a sove- reignty, which can only levy men at home for whatever part of an extensive Empire they may be needed, even for the mere purpose of parade. The prestige of empire would bo better illustrated by all possible varieties of race and costume parading all over the world under England's flag, and muster- ing everywhere to the sound of our national anthem. The poor idea of a reiterated display of home troops wherever our flag appears, reminds me rather of a scene in the Unequal Match, in which two or three soldiers are seen perpetually rushing from post to post to increase the apparent strength of the little army of some wretched German Grand-Duke. There are other men who, laughing at the fancy policy of emblematic and parade detachments of the army, think a few English soldiers very necessary in every Colony to keep it from commercial antagonism to the mother country. " "We should " soon have Morrill tarifls in Canada, if we withdrew our " garrisons,'* I heard one say — a singular example of that supercilious ignorance of everything beyond our immediate vision in which this imperial nation much resembles ancient Rome ; and which of itself is condemnatory of our preten- sions to govern distant colonies. That independent colonial action which, it is supposed, might result from the withdrawal of English troops is now in full exercise, in the presence of our troops, indeed under the sole protection of our troops. Mr. Gladstone replies to Mr. Ellice's question (JEvid. 3,785) " whether the old Colonies were not more independent than the present," that " on the contrary, it would undoubtedly not " have been peiinitted to those Colonies to exercise any power " to legislate adversely to the mother country, whereas we " have recent experience in Canada that even that power e2 ■■■«■■ mmmm 58 " may be oxcrciaod hy our present Colonies with a view of " raising up a protected interest against the commerce of the ** mother country." The truth is, in Mr. Godley's words, (see Report, Appendix 321) — " political conditions have little to do ** with such matters ; they are mainly governed by economical " considerations, i.e., by the varying productions and wants of " the people." Our present colonial relations are no prevention against commercial antagonism. ' Some are ready to recognize an equitable claim on the part of colonies, to protection from the metropolis, in whose councils they are not represented, or have no actual voice ; inasmuch as they are, or may be, involved in wars over which their Assemblies have not as much control as the Home Parhament. If this be a fair principle, our historical application of it has been certainly capricious. Mr. Gladstone observes {Evid, 3,784), *' that the primary responsibility for self-defence, (which is all that m contended for,) was borne by our old Colonies under circumstances when they were almost certain to be drawn into entirely English quarrels, and to be made, directly, the subject of contest among European powers — a state of things to which, with our present ideas, we can hardly have a " parallel." Does England now draw her Colonies, or her Colonies draw her, into most war ? If England were a foreign power to them, instead of being their shield against the interference of all foreign powers, they would soon learn how they might be more involved in war. They have, on the other hand, themselves the chief influence in Imperial implication in war. It is their being spread over all the world which brings us in contact, at so many points, with the sensibilities, jealousies, and cupidities of other nations, and which makes a war so wide a concern to Though the Irish temperament enters into but one-third Lr national composition, we cannot help our skirts of em- about the earth, on which (( (( ti u « us. pire being spr( any may 58 tread his challenge. What brought us to the verge of hos- tilities on the Maine boundary, or, more lately, on the Mus- quito shore, or at St. Juan's, or about the Newfoundland fisheries ; or why are we now sending trooi)8 to Canada ? As the Times says, in reflection on present events, " If Canada had " not been a British possession, there would have been no " reviling of England, no warlike demonstrations against Eng- " land, and no outrages committed on the English flag." I say nothing of millions of our taxes consumed in Kafir and Maori campaigns. Little interest or control has the British Parliament had in the incurring of any of these costly liabilities ou behalf of Colonies. Far be it from me to deny that the practical exclusion of colonial legislatures from immediate control on the supreme Executive demands some fair consideration ; but is there not a compensation in the partnership with a nation which few dare threaten, and which will never fail to rally round its own when danger comes P The fear that colonists may expect to have the command of troops which they raise or pay for, is more specious than real. If they pay for the troops tliey command, they may safely be allowed to command the troops they pay. Their forces will chiefly consist of militia. Even the United States, at the breaking out of the present war, had about 3,000,000 militia to 12,000 regulars. That colonies, should assume a different foreign poHcy from that of the mother country, would be less likely in proportion as they took a real part themselves in maintaining the same policy. If the supposition be not altogether chimerical, at all events the mere withdrawal of an English regiment will not give it probability. Lastly, there may perhaps exist a lurking misgi-v-ing in the Ministerial class of minds lest the Crown should lose some patronage, when every Colony assumes its individual action as a component part of the Empire ; and that it is as well for the Crown to hold fast remaining shreds of patronage, in demo- ^iii*« 54 cratic days, rather than speculate on the increase of imperial power which a developed policy might ^ve. But the concession of self-government, which is already past retracting, was the real hazard of colonial patronage ; and if Victoria, for example, still continues ungrudging — nay, lavish — of her salaries to the Crovm's representatives, she is not likely to dispute that, or any other appointment, merely because, as a corollary of her free Constitution, her military expenditure, as well as her civil list, should be voted among the Estimates of her own Legislature. On the whole consideration of the question between com- pleting the return to our original colonial relations, or halting half-way, where we are now — retaining the duties, having conceded the rights, of colonial government — I think every man's deliberate judgment must incline towards the completion of the policy, on the course of which we have, by the force of national tendencies, been led to go so far already. 7. — The Manner in which a complete Return to our ORIGINAL Colonial Relations might be safely and 8ATISFAC1Y)RILY EFFECTED. Though the step to be taken is but the complement of a reform half effected already, yet no change whatever in re- lations so important, as those between our Colonies and our- Belves, should be made abruptly. It^ is not from any want of appreciation of the value of colonial connexion that I advocate the completion of colonial self-government, but because I consider no interest this country has is more impoi-tant. Besides the pride and natural sym- pathy which makes us hold in high respect our relationship with countries peopled with our kindred, of the same qualities and habits which we value in ourselves, and brought into a community of policy by the same allegiance ; there are ma- terial advantages also on both sides, which prompt a due 66 jogard and coiisidomtioii for the maintenance of mutual friend- ship. It is because I conceive that wliilo the Colonies depend on England for the means of their ordinary administration, they can never, even though they hiivo free Constitutions, be on e(iual terms of fellow-citi/enship with ourselves, that I wish our relations with them to be made sound, in order that they may bo cordial and lasting. Even if Canada, or Australia, may become ultimately so great and flf>uriKhing, by means of self-reliance, that their partnership in government with us may be no longer possible, I would prepare for a transition from fellowship to alliance no less friendly, by removing every cause of jealousy or incapacity by which the process of transition might take the form of rupture, or the subsequent intercourse be tainted with any bitter recollections. My fear is, that the imperfection of our existing colonial relations has greatly perverted the feeling of the colonial populations. I find a proof of this in the answer I have already cited from the Canadians to our proposition for build- ing more forts on their frontier, which answer amounted to " what have we to do with that ? ** (See p. 26.) On the other hand, the necessity for correcting this evil has not yet taken hold of the public mind of England in any degree commensurate with its grave importance. Therefore, I say, borrowing Mr. Gladstone's words {Evid. 3,829), •* we " have now so long maintained the system of providing for the " ordinary purposes of colonial defence, and even of police, by " means of a British force, and at the cost of the British ex- " chequer, that, when we take into consideration the fact that " all political modes of thought are very much connected with " habit and tradition, I am not sanguine enough to believe " that a sound state of opinion could be established in a day." There is this advantage in the gross inequality of our present treatment of various Colonies relatively — our taking payment for military assistance from those who are willing to pay, and asking for no payment where we anticipate refusal — 56 that it will fjicilitato a gradual and occasional mode of reform— " keeping it," as Mr. Gladstone suggests (Uvid. 3,793), *• in ** view, prosecuting it with great steadiness, as op]K)rtunitie9 " shall offer, and bringing it before the attention of this " country." The silliest mode of proceeding would be, one suggested by some, that we sliould wait for the colonists to express their own readiness to give up our assistance. What my proposition would ultimately amount to would be the withdrawal of all English troops from Canada, Aus- tralia, New Zealand, South Africa,, and the "West Indies, in time of peace, excepting such English troops as any of those Colonies might be allowed to take upon their o^vn establishment temporarily ; and the entire removal of all votes for colonial civil services from our own Parliamentary Estimates. I would have the Canadian Government, in the right time and manner, informed that after a certain date, unless war were going on, they would have to provide for their own garrisons, as well as all their requisite peace establishments, as they might deem fit ; and that they should be prepared to hold their own in case of foreign attack, at least till the forces of the Empire could come to their aid. The Australians should likewise be cautioned that war alone could, after some future day, bring any more English forces to their shores ; that if their gold diggers again want to drive Chinese away from a place like Lambing Flat, they must settle such a point with their own Government ; or if riots recur like those of BaUarat, they must provide for their sup- pression. No one will complain of the withdrawal of English troops except the public-house keepers, commissariat con- tractors, and young ladies. (See Mr. Lowe's £vid. 3,410.) In New Zealand the Imperial Government must abandon its control over Native policy; and, having ;laid the basis of an impartial management of affairs with reference to both, races, leave the Colony to defend its own. E f^Ustt d7 \f Tho South Afri(!nii (/olonists HhouUl bo prepared to lose the eighty-one Kngliwh noUliers who are now (supposed to liold tho whoK' Ciipe Town Dihtvict lor them; and the Dutch hocrs to h)ok after their own euttUs or not expose tliem U> Kafir depre- dation. Th(» primary responsihility for the safety of their prop(»rty being thrown on them, they will not rush careh'ssly into war ; war liaving arisen, they may look, as ICnglish sub- jects, for English helj) — but only for help ; and England must alike abstain from voting ,iJ40,000 a year for their Governor to make expeiiments in civilizing Kafirs, and £400,000 a year for shooting them. The Governors of West Indian Islands must bo instructed to call on the proprietors to form their own police, no less in Trinidad, for instance, than th(»y already do in Antigua ; and to liberate English troops from a service, of which Lord Grey quotes Colonel Tulloch (Ikid. 2,552), as saying " that " a man incurred more danger from passing one year in " Jamaica than fighting in three such battles as that of " Waterloo." All this will require time, but should be done in time. The Select Committee, in tho eleventh paragi-aph of their Meport, seem to suggest tho right mode of proceeding, namely thai of Lord Grey in 1851, when, as Colonial Minister, ho announced to the Australian Colonies his policy, without making it a subject of negotiation with them. I say nothing of the withdrawal of troops from stations, whether held for " coaling," as the Falkland Islands, or for some indefinite object, as " calling-places en route for India," as St. Helena ; any obstruction to our use of which in case of war, we might at the time remove more effectually than we can by all our present garrisons prevent. This is a distinct branch of my subject upon which I need not enter. I make but one further proposition, that I would abandon all thought of expending any of the £1,000,000 which Sir John Burgoyne tells us (Appendix, No. 7) is required to com- 68 plete our colonial fortifications now in progress, excepting from his list, as not colonial, what is necessary for such places as Gibraltar, Malta, and Bermuda. I hope I may have given, satisfactorily to yonr judgment, certainly at a time when the subject is most important, if not urgent, a fair comparison between our former and existing Colonial system ; and strong reasons for restoring the fonner, all the stronger ^or the transitional character of our present position. Of our present system, I take niy leave with Lord Grey's reflection on its salient feature {Evid. 2,578). " It is " the greatest bhindor that can bo committed, that we should " on the one hand tell the Colonists that we will be responsible " for the cost of war, and take upon ourselves the bui'then of " defending them ; and that, on the other hand, they should have " the power of regulating the policy which may make a war " necessary or not." I cannot r»onclude without a reference to one, whose mind has furnished all the wisdom I may have collected on this subject, and to whom, if I mistake not, most of those who have the credit of the partial restoration of our colonial constitutions are greatly indebted — whose irreparable loss I have had to de- plore while these lines wore being written — John Robert Godley, Under-Secretary of State for "War. He was what the Greeks called (Ekist to the Canterbury Settlement in New Zealand, the first settlement that Englishmen have made in this century at all in the ie\'ived spirit of our early colonization. Its un- checked success and rapid growth in wealth and numbers is the best testimony to the soundness of its principle. The same testimony I call in favour of what its Founder considered to be the necessary corollary of that established principle. I am. Faithftdly yours, C. B. ADDERLEY. APPENDIX. I.— Extracts- from Evidence rfiven he/ore the Select Committee on Colonial Military ETpeuditiire by John Kobekt Godley, Esq., Under-Secretary of State for War, and a Member of the Depart- mental Committee which reported to Parliament in 1869, on Military Defences. [Mr. Godley's further remarks upon the Departmental Report, in the Appendix to the Report of the Select Committee, No. 19, p. 3 J 9, are well worth reading.] Evid. 2069. The essential principle of colonial defence, is colo- nial responsibility and management: the contribution of the Im- perial Government, if any, should be of money only. This was the Bystem pm-sued with the old American Colonies : Parliament having been in the habit of voting sums of money to compensate them for any disproportionate expenditure incurred by them in the common cause. 2070. Englishmen have never shown themselves slow in de- fending themselves; and, as a matter of fact, the old American Colonies, to whom the responsibility was entirely left, did success- fully defend themselves, so that there was not one of them conquered during the period during which that system was pursued. 2072. The analogy between the circumstances of the old American Colonies, and those of the present day, is complete as regards this question. 2195. They had, as an immediate neighbour, a far more for- midable po\ver, for aggressive purposes, than the United States, vi2., the French ; and on the other side, a more formidable naval and military power, the Spaniards: so that the danger to our New Ecgland Colonies from foreign aggression was infinitely greater than the danger of Canada from aggression by the United States. 2071. The plan of throwing the responsibility of defending them- selves on the colonies is the most eifeotual way of defending them, and they are less effectuallj defended by our garrisons, which are uniformly inaderjuato, whilst the fact of their presence renders the colonists unprepared to defend themselves. If the South Carolinians at the present time had been in the habit of trusting to a federal 60 garrison to defend them^ they would not havo taken half such vigorous or effectual measures of self-defence, as they have done. 2074. Very possibly a nucleus of British soldiers is an important element in the defence of the colonies, and if the colonies think so, they may carry such a plan into effect, provided England can spare the troops. 2099. If the colonies defrayed the cost, there would be less ob- jection to scattering British troops over the world ; but even then I should not think it a good plan ; but if we could spare the troops, we might acquiesce in it, in deference to the general principle of letting the colonists settle for themselves the best way of defending themselves. 2100. It would be better for them to arm and train thoir own people; the main object being to throw upon them the habit and responsibility of self-defence ; it is a secondary object to diminish imperial expenditure. 2116. It would depend on the colonists themselves whether their local forces should be confined to the colonies in which tliey are raised. In the times of the old colonies of North America, they were not so, but made war on the King's enemies in other parts of the world. 2176. The colonies undertaking the first responsibility, we should contribute our quota towards their external defences on the ground that they are involved in England's foreign policy. 2108. That is the ground of their only claim on the mother country for protection. 2177. On the other hand, England is often involved in warfare by colonial interests and relations. Within the last twenty years, we have been three or four times on the verge of war with America, upon purely colonial questions in which this country was not interested. 2076. The change I propose in the present system should be effected as lord Grey effected his change in the plan of defending the Australian Colonies, which produced no permanent discontent. If the terms on which imperial troops would be sent were simply announced, the colonists would have to acquiesce, and in a little time they would consider it, as the old colonists did, a matter of pride and privilege to defend themselves. 2,077. 2063. The action ( f imperial troops in New Zealand lately has not been satisfactory to the colonists. 2164. Mr. Fitzgerald, Superintendent of Canterbury, and Prime Minister of the colony at the time, thus writes : " Government " formally declines our offer to volunteer to the Taranaki war. The " Queen's army is hanging like an incubus on the colony, doing " nothing itself, and preventing any one else." 2188. I know that all the colonists are dissatisfied with the way the war has been carried on. * «& 61 2080. I think, if tho English Government wore to withdraw ita (rarrisons from the forts of Quebec and Kingston, the inhabitants of ( anada would undertake the defence of them. 2093. I have never seen a foreign criticism upon the power of England, witht : observing that the writer considered tho necessity of protecting colonies all over the world, as the main element of our weakness. 2691. It appears to me, that if those stations which wo keep for coaling, and refitting ships, are essential to the interests of the empire ; the better plan Avould be, if we were stronger at sea, to occupy them when war broke out ; if we were not stronger at sea, our garrisons would be ineffectual in defending them. The plan now is to scatter garrlwsons over the world, on the chance that they may be wanted. I should propose keeping the troops at home, and sending them to tlie place where they were wanted when war broke out. The Bahamas happen to be a case peculiarly in point. I find tlat we spend about 40,000/. a year on their defences : so that since tho t)eaee of 1814, we have spent nearly two millions of money, in defending the Bahamas ; and during all that time, we have never had a force there that ^ould have resisted tho crews of two frigates. 2094. The circumstancos of the West Indies are not such as to call for the necessity of our paying for their police, any more than for their roads, or their civil olficers. 2170. I think that under any circumstances, they would prefer connexion with the English, to connexion with any other power. 2117. I do not think that the entire withdrawal of British soldiers would tend to Iceisen imperial feeling in any of the colonies. 2123. If any colony deliberately desired to separate from this country, it would not be desirable to retain its allegiance by force. 2. — Extracts from Evidence given hy The Eight Hon. W. E. Gladstone. M.P. 3768. The greatest difficulty attached to the subject of our colonial military expenditure, is the uninformed and immatui*e, and generally indifferent state of public opinion upon it in this country. 3780. To arrive at a system under which the primary respon- sibility of self-defence by land should be thrown on the colonists themselves, would be not only an immense advantage to the British Exchequer, but would have many still more important and higher recommendations, independently of the question of cost. 8781. No community which is not primarily charged with the ordi- nary business of its own defence is really, or can be, in the full sense of the word, a free community. The privileges of freedom, and the 62 burdens of freedom, are absolutely associated together : to boar the burdens is as necessary as to enjoy the privilege, in order to form that character, which is the groat security of freedom itself. 3782. The system under which a colonial community itself is primarily charged with the duty of its own defence, is by far the best, both for the mother country, and for tho colony itself. I mean, such a system as did exist for a great length of time in the case of the old American Colonies. 3783. They were not a bit more independent than it is extremely desirable that all our principal colonies should be. 3784. The power of making peace or war was retained by the mother country, and the primary responsibility of self-defence was borne by those colonies at a period, and under circumstances, when they were almost certain to bo drawn into entirely English quarrels, and to bo made directly the subject of contest among European powers. 3785. They were in a state of much less independence than Canada is now : for undoubtedly it wouhl not ha-e been permitted to those colonies to exercise any power of legislation adversely to the mother country ; whereas, we have observed that even that power may now be exercised with a view of raising up a protected interest against the comnieroo of the mother country. 3787. The really valuable tie with a colony, is the moral and social tie. I cannot view any portion of the benefit resulting to England, from the connexion with Canada, as consisting in the cost of defending her. She would be just as likely to separate from us, if she thought herself unjustly involved in a British war, whether we undertook her defence or not : if her feelings are not with us, I do not think she will remain with us because we charge ourselves with the burden of her defence. 3797. In proportion as responsibilities are accepted by colonial communities, they will be more disposed to go beyond the bare idea of self-defence, and to render loyal and effective assistance in the 'struggles of the empire. 8798. As regards coloniee generally, while England has supremacy at sea, they are safe, and the fortifications and the colonial garrisons in the West Indies, and many others, are little, if at all, lequired. If England has not supremacy at sea, you are only making victims of those garrisons. 3810. Napoleon kept for a grJ State J or U'ar. ;]o()l. Wlionover thoro i8 an iniporial necoHsity to concent into trooi»H on any point, tlio roat of tlio colouioH are starved, without ro- fertneo to thoir svautu at tlio timo. In tlie llusHian war, 'vvo clonudod tho oolonicH of troopH. ii51"2 (Canada liUH within it.-iit most of them are (piito ineouiploto and inoftici75. About 0,000 troops would be necessary to defend tho island. 131.3. 20,000/. has boon voted for a citadel at Halifax. This vote was on a calculation made twenty years ago, and is not sufficient. 1319 and 1370. Those places which have luigo British population should organize a volunteer M«Rry to placu named foroi(?n poMOHRionH in a reusonabl*^ Htato of (l(>fon('o, In addition to BnmH in urttiniatus lH01-'2, and oxcluMivo of urinaiuontH and barraolcH and of Huoh ocouBional iniproveniontH an art and Hcionc^u may from time to time render neooHnary — 1,000,000/.; of which only 100,000/. in for Uiltraltar and Malta. t