nizance that in South Africa, through the medium of
the telegraph, they were able to know what was taking place in
England within twenty-four hours? Geographical considerations,
indeed! that might have been all very well some years ago, when it
took three or four months to reach the Cape, but now it took only
two or three weeks, and that time would even be probably reduced as
time wore on. Such being the case, geographical considerations had
nothing whatever to do with the matter. He had no desire to speak
unfairly of the gentleman who occupied the position of Prime
Minister of the Empire, but he felt sure the time would come when
Lord Salisbury would think that Imperial Federation was something
more than a word of ten letters; and that his geographical
considerations would vanish also, as having no reason in them. In
contrast to Lord Salisbury, he would read a short extract from a
speech, made only a few months ago at Leeds by Lord Rosebery, when
he said: "For my part, if you will forgive me this little bit of
egotism, I can say from the bottom of my heart that it is the
dominant passion of my public life. Ever since I traversed those
great regions which own the sway of the British Crown outside these
islands, I have felt that there was a cause, which merited all the
enthusiasm and energy that man could give to it. It is a cause for
which any one might be content to live; it is a cause for which, if
needs be, any one might be content to die." Lord Rosebery was at
this moment the President of the Imperial Federation League, and
only recently he addressed a letter, on behalf of the League, to
Lord Salisbury, asking that the Government would summon another
Conference like the one which took place with such wonderful
results two years ago, and which Lord Salisbury had said he hoped
would be the first of many more. The answer he gave, however, was
something to the effect that he did not think it desirable that the
Government should move in the matter, but that the Colonies should
take the initiative. With all humility he would ask how anything of
this kind could be moved, except by some motor? There must be
something to move the colonists, and who could do that so well as
Her Majesty's Government, by inviting, in a courteous and
sympathetic spirit, the C