tary, Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, desired to see the whole of South
Africa under the sovereignty of England, and Mr. Cecil Rhodes had no
objection to making the effort to realize this wish, because the scheme
would have proved as profitable to himself as to the Government. That to
accomplish his purpose he had to crush the Boers, and drive them out of
their own country, was nothing to him; he did not hesitate at anything
that was to be for the honor and glory of England--and the subsequent
enriching of Cecil Rhodes.

The scandal over the Raid brought the idea of federation to the front
again, and when the Jubilee celebrations took place a move was made to
secure it.

Eleven of the colonial premiers, or prime ministers, attended the
Jubilee, and during their visit to London they held a conference to
discuss the project.

At this meeting the Colonial Secretary took the old ground that the
matter was of such vast importance that it must not be approached
hastily.

The Canadian premiers were, however, anxious that some step should be
taken, and Sir Wilfrid Laurier, from Canada, voiced the sentiments of
his brother premiers when he stated that the time had come for the
colonies to draw more closely to the empire, or separate from it
altogether.

England found herself in a dilemma. While she had been careful to bring
up her colonies to be independent of her, she had not realized that one
day they might become too independent, and seek to break away from her
rule altogether. She had repeated none of the mistakes of oppression and
greed that had cost her the American colonies, and she had supposed that
her other colonies would be satisfied to belong to the British Crown.

Sir Wilfrid Laurier's hint was enough for her.

She was well aware that the tie which binds Canada to her is so slight
that it might easily be broken, and realizing the danger of the
situation, she determined to throw aside her old foreign policy, and
adopt new measures to bind her colonies more closely to her.

Sir Wilfrid Laurier, who is a statesman of a very high order, had
foreseen what England's answer would be, and last winter prepared the
way for the breaking of the German and Belgian treaties.

He engineered a tariff law, offering about twelve per cent reduction the
first year, and twenty-five per cent thereafter, of tariff dues to all
countries admitting Canadian goods on certain favorable terms.

It was thoroughly understood at the time that