he past
and they will hold it up in the future, whatever this future may contain
of logical development, of unforeseen new shapes, of great promises and
of dangers still unknown.

It is not an unpardonable stretching of the truth to say that the British
Empire rests on transportation. I am speaking now naturally of the sea,
as a man who has lived on it for many years, at a time, too, when on
sighting a vessel on the horizon of any of the great oceans it was
perfectly safe to bet any reasonable odds on her being a British
ship--with the certitude of making a pretty good thing of it at the end
of the voyage.

I have tried to convey here in popular terms the strong impression
remembered from my young days. The Red Ensign prevailed on the high seas
to such an extent that one always experienced a slight shock on seeing
some other combination of colours blow out at the peak or flag-pole of
any chance encounter in deep water. In the long run the persistence of
the visual fact forced upon the mind a half-unconscious sense of its
inner significance. We have all heard of the well-known view that trade
follows the flag. And that is not always true. There is also this truth
that the flag, in normal conditions, represents commerce to the eye and
understanding of the average man. This is a truth, but it is not the
whole truth. In its numbers and in its unfailing ubiquity, the British
Red Ensign, under which naval actions too have been fought, adventures
entered upon and sacrifices offered, represented in fact something more
than the prestige of a great trade.

The flutter of that piece of red bunting showered sentiment on the
nations of the earth. I will not venture to say that in every case that
sentiment was of a friendly nature. Of hatred, half concealed or
concealed not at all, this is not the place to speak; and indeed the
little I have seen of it about the world was tainted with stupidity and
seemed to confess in its very violence the extreme poorness of its case.
But generally it was more in the nature of envious wonder qualified by a
half-concealed admiration.

That flag, which but for the Union Jack in the corner might have been
adopted by the most radical of revolutions, affirmed in its numbers the
stability of purpose, the continuity of effort and the greatness of
Britain's opportunity pursued steadily in the order and peace of the
world: that world which for twenty-five years or so after 1870 may be
said to