unless there should be a singular change in opinion at home, or unless, indeed, the Russians' should be beforehand with us in the matter. To say this, is not to settle the disputed question of whether in the present improved state of feeling, and with the present control exercised over our Eastern officials by a disinterested press at home, and an interested but vigilant press in whether (India and the Eastern ports, government of China by Britain might not be for the advantage of the Chinese and the world, but it is at least open to serious doubt whether it would be to the advantage of Great Britain. Our ruling classes are already at least sufficiently exposed to the corrupting influences of power for us to hesitate before we decide that the widening of the national mind consequent upon the acquisition of the government of China would outweigh the danger of a spread at home of love of absolute authority, and indifference to human happiness and life.

Although the disadvantages are more evident than the advantages of the annexation for commercial purposes of such countries as Abyssinia, China, and Japan, the benefits are neither few nor hard to find. The abstract injustice of annexation cannot be said to exist in the case of Abyssinia, as the sentiment of nationality clearly has no existence there, and as the worst possible form of British government is better for the mass of the people than the best conceivable rule of an Abyssinian chief. The dangers of annexation in the weakening and corrupting of ourselves may not unfairly be set off against the blessings of annexation to the people, and the most serious question for consideration is that of whether dependencies can be said "to pay." Social progress is necessary to trade, and we give to mankind the powerful security of self-interest that we will raise the condition of the people, and, by means of improved communications, open the door to civilization.

It may be objected to this statement that our exaggerated conscientiousness is the very reason why our dependencies commercially are failures, and why it is useless for us to be totaling up our loss and profits while we wilfully throw away the advantages that our energy has placed in our hands. If India paid as well as Java, it may be shown, we should be re

ceiving from the East 60 millions sterling a year for the support of our European officials in Hindostan, and the total revenue of India would be 200 or 250 millions, of which 80 millions would be clear profit for our use in England; in other words, Indian profits would relieve us from all taxation in England, and leave us a considerable and increasing margin towards the abolition of the debt. The Dutch, too, tell us that their system is more agreeable to the natives than our own clumsy though well-meant efforts for the improvement of their condition, which, although not true, is far too near the truth to allow us to rest in our complacency.

The Dutch system having been well weighed at home, and deliberately rejected by the English people as tending to the degradation of the natives, the question remains how far dependencies from which no profits are exacted may be advantageously retained for mere trade purposes. At this moment, our most flourishing dependencies do not bear so much as their fair share of the expenses of the empire :-Ceylon herself pays only the nominal and not the real cost of her defence, and Mauritius costs nominally £150,000 a year, and above half a million really in military expenses, of which the colony is ordered to pay £45,000, and grumbles much at paying it. India herself, although charged with a share of the non-effective expenses of our army, escapes scot free in war-time, and it is to be remarked that the throwing upon her of a small portion of the cost of the Abyssinian war was defended upon every ground except the true one-namely, that as an integral part of the empire she ought to bear her share in imperial wars. It is true that, to make the constitutional doctrine hold, she also ought to be consulted, and that we have no possible machinery for consulting her a consideration which of itself shows our Indian government in its proper light.

Whether, indeed, dependencies pay or do not pay their actual cost, their retention stands on a wholly different footing to that of colonies. Were we to leave Australia or the Cape, we should continue to be the chief customers of those countries: were we to leave India or Ceylon, they would have no customers at all; for, falling into anarchy, they would cease at once to export. their goods to us and to consume our manufactures. When a

British Governor of New Zealand wrote that of every Maori who fell in war with us it might be said that, "from his ignorance, a man had been destroyed whom a few months' enlightenment would have rendered a valuable consumer of British manufactured goods," he only set forth with grotesque simplicity considerations which weigh with us all; but while the advance of trade may continue to be our chief excuse, it need not be our sole excuse for our Eastern dealings-even for use towards ourselves. Without repeating that which I have said with respect to India, we may especially bear in mind that, although the theory has suffered from exaggeration, our dependencies stil form a nursery of statesmen and of warriors, and that we should irresistibly fall into national sluggishness of thought, were it not for the world-wide interests given us by the necessity of governing and educating the inhabitants of so vast an empire

as our own.

One of the last of our annexations was close upon our bow as we passed on our way from Aden up the Red Sea. The French are always angry when we seize on places in the East, but it is hardly wonderful that they should have been perplexed about Perim. This island stands in the narrowest place in the sea, in the middle of the deep water, and the Suez Canal being a French work, and Egypt under French influence, our possession of Perim becomes especially unpleasant to our neighbours. Not only this, but the French had determined themselves to seize it, and their fleet, bound to Perim, put in to Aden to coal. The Governor had his suspicions, and, having asked the French admiral to dinner, gave him unexceptionable champagne. The old gentleman soon began to talk, and directly he mentioned Perim, the governor sent a pencil-note to the harbour-master to delay the coaling of the ships, and one to the commander of a gunboat to embark as many artillerymen and guns as he could get on board in two hours, and sail for Perim. When the French reached the anchorage next day, they found the British flag flying, and a great show of guns in position. Whether they put into Aden on their way back to France history does not say.

Perim is not the only island that lies directly in the shortest course for ships, nor are the rocks the only dangers of the Red

Sea. One night about nine o'clock, when we were off the port of Mecca, I was sitting on the fo'castle, right forward, almost on the sprit, to catch what breeze we made, when I saw two country boats about 150 yards on the starboard bow. Our three lights were so bright that I thought we must be seen, but as the boats came on across our bows, I gave a shout, which was instantly followed by "hard a-port !" from the Chinaman on the bridge, and by a hundred yells from the suddenly awakened boatmen. Our helm luckily enough had no time to act upon the ship. I threw myself down under a stancheon, and the sail and yard of the leading boat fell on our deck close to my head, and the boats shot past us amid shouts of "fire," caused by the ringing of the alarm bell. When we had stopped the ship, the question came-had we sunk the boat? We at once piped away the gig, with a Malay crew, and sent it off to look for the poor wretches-but after half-an-hour, we found them ourselves, and found them safe except for their loss of canvas, and their terrible fright. Our pilot questioned them in Arabic, and discovered that each boat had on board Ico pilgrims; but they excused themselves for not having a watch or light by saying that they had not seen us! Between rocks and pilgrimboats, Red Sea navigation is hard enough, and it is easy to see which way its difficulties will cause the scale to turn when the question lies between Euphrates Railway and Suez Canal

CHAPTER XXII.

THE SECOND EMPIRE IN THE EAST.

It is no longer possible to see the Pyramids or even Heliopolis in the solitary and solemn fashion in which they should be approached. English "going out" and "coming home" are there at all days and hours, and the hundreds of Arabs selling German coins and mummies of English manufacture are terribly out of place upon the desert. I went alone to see the Sphinx, and, sitting down on the sand, tried my best to read the riddle of the face, and to look through the rude carving into the inner mystery; but it would not do, and I came away bitterly disappointed. In this modern democratic railway-girt world of ours, the ancient has no place; the huge Pyramids may remain for ever, but we can no longer read them. A few months may see a café chantant at their base.

Cairo itself is no pleasant sight. An air of dirt and degradation hangs over the whole town, and clings to its people, from the donkey-boys and comfit-sellers to the pipe-smoking soldiers and the money-changers who squat behind their trays. The wretched fellaheen, or Egyptian peasantry, are apparently the most miserable of human beings, and their slouching shamble is a sad sight after the superb gait of the Hindoos. The slavemarket of Cairo has done its work; indeed, it is astonishing that the English should content themselves with a treaty in which the abolition of slavery in Egypt is decreed, and not take a single step to secure its execution, while the slave-market in Cairo continues to be all but open to the passer. That the Egyptian Government could put down slavery if it had the will,

This chapter is not applicable to the state of things now existing, but that which has been before may be again in other fields.