iting his
commands.

A very brief explanation, therefore, sufficed to show the Governor
that forcible resistance would not only be the purest madness, but
that it would also seriously interfere with the working of the great
scheme of Federation, the object of which was, not merely to place
Britain in the first place among the nations, but to make the
Anglo-Saxon race the one dominant power in the whole world.

To all the Governor's objections on the score of loyalty to the
British Crown, Tremayne, who heard him to the end without
interruption, simply replied in a tone that precluded all further
argument--

"The day of states and empires, and therefore of loyalty to
sovereigns, has gone by. The history of nations is the history of
intrigue, quarrelling, and bloodshed, and we are determined to put a
stop to warfare for good and all. We hold in our hands the only power
that can thwart the designs of the League and avert an era of tyranny
and retrogression. That power we intend to use whether the British
Government likes it or not.

"We shall save Britain, if necessary, in spite of her rulers. If they
stand in the way, so much the worse for them. They will be called
upon to resign in favour of the Federation and its Executive within
the next seven days. If they consent, the forces of the League will
never cross the Straits of Dover. If they refuse we shall allow
Britain to taste the results of their choice, and then settle the
matter in our own way."

The next day the Governor dissolved the Canadian Legislatures "under
protest," and retired into private life for the present. He felt that
it was no time to argue with a man who had millions of men behind
him, to say nothing of an aerial fleet which alone could reduce
Montreal to ruins in twelve hours.

After arranging matters in Canada the President returned to
Washington in the _Ariel_, which he had taken into his personal
service for the present, and set about disposing of the Ring and
those members of the late Government who were most deeply implicated
in the secret alliance with the leaders of the League. When the facts
of this scheme were made public they raised such a storm of popular
indignation, that if those responsible for it had been turned loose
in the streets of Washington they would have been torn to pieces like
vermin.

As it was, however, they were placed upon their trial before a
Commission of seven members of the Inner Circle of the American
Sect