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Those too large to be entirely included in one exposure are filmed beginning in the upper left hand corner, left to right and top to bottom, as many frames as required. The following diagrams illustrate the method: Les cartes, planches, tableaux, etc., peuvent dtre f!lm6s i des taux de rdduction diffdrents. Lorsque le document est trop grand pour dtre reproduit en un seul clSch6, il est film6 d partir de Tangle sup6rieur gauche, de gauche d droite, et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'imagas nicsssaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la mithode. ata ilure, a : 2X 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 THE MAKIlVrx OF THE EMPIRE If Front isincce,'] THE MORNING OP I'LA.SSEY. THE ADVANXE OF THE XAWAB ON CLIVE'S POSITION. ;* [Sec iKuje 130. THE MAKING OF THE EMPIRE The Story of Our Co/oni. les m/\ BY ARTHUR TEMPLE From the Earliest Times to 1895 With Additional Chapter bringing the Record DOWN TO December 1897 THIRD EDITION mrje 130. London: ANDREW MELROSE Toronto : WILLIAM BRIGGS, Publisher ll^ESLEy BUILDINGS Montreal : C. W. COATES Halifax : S. F. HUESTIS JV/o/i. '^ First Edition piiblisltcd . ' ^ . , o • Oct obey 1895 Repriuted {with Additional Chapter bringing down the record to December \^qn\ ^°yi I ' . junuary 1898 Reprinted April iSgS CONTENTS Intiioduction , , . . . . , Tjik Stoky of Canada— kxplouatiox— colonisation— conquest , aftkr the conquest ..... TiiK Stouy of Newfoundland .... The Stouy of Beumuda and the "West Indies The Stouy of the Empike in Centual and South Ameuica — nuitisii iionduiias ..... buitish guiana ...... the falkland islands .... The Making of the Empire in Europe— gibkaltar, malta, and cyprus . The Story of the Empire in Asia — perim, aden, and socotra . . . The Story of India — TRADING ....... FIGHTING ...... CONQUERING ...... The Story of Ceylon ..... The Story of the Straits Settlemen'1"s . The Story of Borneo ' ■ • • « The Story of Hong Kong . PAQE 11 15 30 44 57 71 76 84 87 106 113 124 140 157 170 177 186 66004 8 Co7iiints I Fro TiiK Story of Nkw Ocinka The Stouy of Ai-.stualasia— C'lIAI'TKIl r. •'HAI'TKU II. Nkw ZlUr-AND AM. TI.K Isf aNPS OF TMK ]'ac Tjik Stoky of Afkica-— ciiai'tfu i. . '■HAI'TKll II. . _ ^.AUU.TIUS. TIIK SMV,,l,r,,.,.;s, sT. „,,;,.kk1. anh A.SCEXSION' Additionai, CiiAiTKii ;!iiivoivr t,..- p.. " -Dkckmiiku isor Tjik Makin.; of Till.: Emi'ihk 'Ti.mk Tai!u:' I'.V'IK 194 205 222 237 2 IS 265 275 293 LIST OF TLLUSTRATIOXS TIIK MOUXING OK PLA^SKV KWOUI* UKLONOINCt T(J (WINKIIAL AV()I,ni; TIIK (ITAIIKL, (il'KIiKi . A SKTTI.EU'.S mi' TIIK I. A IK SIR .lOlIX A. MA( DONAI,!) . I'AIIT Ol' Tin; KdL'TK of tut. CANADIAN I'ACI KT, JO'iN « iiAunoUl!, NEWFOUNDLAND NASSAir HAUnorit, liAlIVMA ISLANDS . IN A -WKST INDIAN FoKKsl" MAI' OF WKST INDIES, KTC. I'OKT OF CKOIIGETOWN, f)il DKMKIIAKA THE ROCK OF (illJUALTAU THE ITARBOUU OF VALETTA, MALTA THE I'ORT OF LARNACA, CYI'RUS ADKN THE MEN WHO SERVED UNDER CLIVE . CLIVE EXAMINING THE ENEMY's LINES LORD CLIVE .... THE ROYAL PALACE AT DELHI . PRINCIPAL GATE OP THE FORT, GWALIOR RUINS OF THE RESIDENCY, LUCKNOW . ON THE ROAD FROM GALLE TO COLOMRO IN A CEYLON FOREST . LADY BROOKE, RAN^E OF SARA^VAK . 9 lU RAI WAV rAfiR FrontinpiecG 25 27 81 37 41 53 59 62 72 77 89 95 101 107 127 131 137 143 149 1.53 161 165 181 lO L2st of Jlhist7'al7ons STJIKKT OF STKl'S IX i„)x,; kox,: NKW .;riXKA XATIVK AVAKItlOJi.S «ni MTU.IAM MACGnKOOK, k.<,m.<..' A.MmsTi. BIUTISJI NEW OUIXEA A FOKEST ROAD IX AUSTKALIA STATUE OF CAPTAIX COOK AT SYDNEY,' X.s.W.' THE "HEADS/' SYD.SEY IIAUBOU.l A SQUATTEn'.S .STA-IIOX . A RIVERSIDE SETTLEMEXT OF (^UEEXSLAXD .riuKS RAILWAY TlinoUOir THE OUTSLAND FOUEST, VDtoK, V OOVEKXMEXT ID.U.se, SUVA, FIJI 3 New England colonists have left us, the son of an agricultural labourer has given to us another continent in Australia. Peace comes at the beginning of the nineteenth century, and the tide of emigration flows strongly. Men have been leaving the old country and making homes for themselves across the Atlantic, at the Cape, and in the beautiful islands of the Caribbean Sea. " Without haste and without rest " we go on finding new places for settlement and new markets for our trade. Our population increases and brims over; splendid cities arise on the Australian coasts, explorers reveal the riches of Africa, and our merchants in India surrender to the Queen the Empire they have built up. The United Kingdom becomes Greater Britain, and more settlements and colonies are added each year. We shall note in these pages the recent rush for Africa, and we shall see how large a share of the Dark Continent has fallen to us. Then, too, we shall look in upon the Dyaks of Borneo, the Papuans in their great island of New Guinea, the Malays of the Straits Sectlements, the Chinese at Hong Kong, and the Australian settlers in beautiful Fiji. The growth and increase of all will be noted in turn. Our colonies have grown up in various ways. Some, like Canada, are the outcome of hard fighting between England and a rival power ; others, like Australia and New Zealand, are the fruits of adventurous voyages; while our great empire in India is the result of interposing with a strong arm in the quarrels of the native races. They difi'er widely. The big self-governing colonies in North America and Ocernia are continents, at present sparsely populated, and yet containing every variety of soil and climate. Other colonies and possessions are mere rocks on the surface of the sea. Some are trading settlements, where the white man stays no longer than he is obliged. Others are coaling-stations, fortresses, and strategical outposts. Their sroyernment;. •••"-'J Hke and iui- portance. To some we have granted the fullest freedom in ""^ ' 4 T/te Maihig of the Empire managing their ow„ affai,.,; to others only partial libortv Some are ruled hj British Governors chose^ by the Cro™ • others agam are eontrolled by groat Companies ; others ar.^ The story of the Making of the Empire is, in spite of many dark blots and foolish blunderi,'gs, a' ^ag.d.t:! Civis Romanns smn/~I am a Roman citizen !-was the proud boast of many a young man «.ho lived, perhaps, qu o on the outskirts of Rome's «ide dominions. With full r pr.de and sat.sfaotion the English lad may make this boast hrs own, whether he be born in these little islands of the northern seas or m one of the lands of Greater Britain. ihat he may learn to prize his birthright more deeolv and know the Story of the Empire better^s the obleTof the writer of these pages. WARDrRS OF THE EMPIRE. TPIE STORY OF CANADA CHAPTEK I EXPLORATION-COLONISATION-CONQUEST |CA NADA— nothing here," said the Spaniards of the sixteenth century who came to the great north land for gold, and were disappointed. " mthing here," thought the Portuguese, who cared little for colonisation, and who were busy on the coasts of India with silks, spices, and jewels. In their belief gold was only to be found where the natives were black, and the few roving Indians of Northern America were red. The treasures of the gorgeous East were bound- less, why then should they trouble about the paltry furs and fish of the New World, where savages were fierce and the winters rigorous ? Besides, who needed furs in the sunny Peninsula? The English in their chilly islands might go north to the Imnnathas, or Indian villages, and stop there if they pleased ; as for them and the Spaniards, they preferred the warmer and more fertile lands of Central and Southern America. Thus it was that, when the first excitement of discovering the New World had died down in Lisbon and Madrid, the vast continent of the north and north-west was left to the enterprise of Britain and France. But although the Portuguese had no very great skill in colonisation, they gave the lead as explorers to all other 16 i6 The Making of the Empire \ r/v ;■ ° -f ' """=""* ""'• f°«'«™* centuries, ManJevill '". " f ""7"^ ^°'"' """ '^» °™ ^ir John fb^Mh T ™''."' "'" ]i«.st. to awaken men's curiosity abouUhe undiscovered regions of the earth. But it was to the Portugese and three Italians, Columbus, Cabot, nd ^2TkT- ^ 1"' "f " °' ""•'"« ■"■" exploring the coast of America is due. And yet the Italian States were Portuguese, had grown prosperous in their Indian trade, and ihoy cared nought for the dim and distant West event! T^ "Vr'f.^™"' '""'"^ ™^ '"»*^<» ^^ ^'''^"8 events. The belief that beyond the Atlantic there was a huge continent had become a certainty; men who had wtd rirf r T "'"""^'^"^ «trang'e'birds,a:d dr- t wood which had come from no known European trees. But lies m '"'r^''' "'"'^* "* ™^ '-^ --' °f th Azores. When it is remembered that their ships were ndiculously small to our modem notions, and that tie r Trtood! '"'"^' "' ™'^ """'^^ '"^^ pi™'' »<' Columbus, wearied by his repeated failure to persuade the courts of Portugal and Spain to give him ships fn which h nnght seek the New World, sent his brother to London to discuss the matter with King Henry TIL The monarch was gracious and invited Christopher to come to England and arrange the details of an expedition. As is well krfown, Bartholomew Columbus was detained by pirates on hi^ homeward journey, and when he eventually reached Spain Christopher had sailed. Thus it was that England wS "deprived by accident" of the glory of the great discover" A few months passed, and then "a little bark, leaky and roTtb?r C "f'" ''''"^' '" *^ ^"S"^- n had come from the far West-over that stormy sea where, from the creation until then, bad brt^oded in ;„-„„-,-. ' "™ "^"^ ^ ji'.i..ueu an impenetrable mystery. The Story of Canada y 7 It bore the richest freiglit that ever lay upon the bosom of the deep— the tidings of a New World." And yet tliere was another " accident." It is said that if, on October 7th, 1492, Cohimbus had not followed the advice of those who were with him, and had not changed his course and gone south-west, he would have been carried by the Gulf-Stream towards Florida and Virginia. In that case, Humboldt tells us, the United States might have had a Spanish and Koman Catholic population instead of bein^^ peopled by English Protestants. ° Henry VII. was naturally disappointed at being forestalled by the Spaniards, but, rightly judging that there must be room for others in the New World, he sent out John Cabot, a Venetian merchant who had settled at Bristol. On the 24th of June 1497, Cabot discovered a northern land. He was the first who had ever burst into that silent sea since the days when, five hundred years before, the Icelanders and Northmen had visited the coast for furs and fish. Cabot was followed, three years after, by Cortereal the Portuguese, who entered the great Gulf of the St. Lawrence. Then came Basque and Breton fishermen, who carried on a hazardous but profitable calling on the Newfoundland cod- banks, and gave their name to the island of Cape Breton Discoveries followed thick and fast. Verrazano coasted along two thousand miles of the sea-board, and gave the French King, his master, the benefit of the information he had gained. In the years 1512-1517 other seamen sailed into the great inland sea which now is called Hudson's Bay Exploration was followed by some feeble attempts at colonisation, and in this Englishmen were again anticipated by foreigners. While Henry VIII. was trying to find excuses for marrying Dame Anne Boleyn, his friend and ally Francis I. was planning an expedition to the New World. He had secured a splendid leader and captain in Jacques Cartier, who sailed on April, 20th 15.S4 xvitb tw- snips of 60 tons. The voyage was favourable ; he explored I i8 The Makiug of the Etiipire the coast of Newfoinnlland and Nova Scotia, and, entering the Gulf of St. Lawrence, took possession of the country in tlic name of his "Most Cliri.stian" master. Then he went home to tell of the beauty of the scenery, of the friendly natives, and of the splendid future which awaited the New World under the management and control of his countrymen. Cartier was enthusiastic about his visit, and, sincerely pious liimself, was also eager to convert the natives to the Catholic faith. He came again in the following year, and ascended the noble river which is one of the many glories of Canada. He visited the wigwam of the Indian chief, and climbed a mighty headland which overlooked the stream. Dense virgin forest clothed the hills around him, and covered the valleys with a carpet of gorgeous colouring, for the autumn had begun. Yellowing oaks and scarlet maples blended their tints in a way which the woods of the Old World could not imitate. Below him was the rushing river narroA\ed and hemmed in by the cliffs. On this headland was built in later years the fair city of Quebec; and here too in 1759, the prize of Canada was wrested from the gras[) of Cartier's countrymen by the valour and genius of James Wolfe. On the day that Cartier stood on the heights and surveyed the country, everything promised well for the French, but bitter days were in store. Winter set in with terrible severity, and the sufferings of the French were acute. They soon became tired of colonising, and longed to get back to Europe. Others, undeterred by their Avarnings, came out, and built fortified stations on the St. Lawrence; but they too were killed or weakened by scurvy and frost-bites, and during the latter half of the sixteenth century little progress was made. Cartier had gone never to return. His record was a fine one ; the natives trusted him, and he did not betray their confidence. He was one of the real pioneers of luu'()[)e in the New World, and England rightly remembered The Story of Canada 19 his work, when, in 1856, slie issued postage stamps wliich bore liis head. France was disappointed. There was no gold to reward hicky seekers, nor any special comi)ensation for the risks of a long sea journey, or for the winter cold. A few noblemen received patents to trade and colonise, but until the beginning of the seventeenth century little was done by either England or France in Canada. The fact was that neither of these countries was overpeopled ; and instead of there being a struggle for existence in their crowded cities, as is the case to-day, emigration of any extent would have been a source of danger and weakness. England especially needed all strong men to remain at home. AVliat the governments of England and France, Spain and Portugal, required, was not lands, but money. Hence their unwillingness to undertake the settlement of the unpeopled New World. In the early years of the seventeenth century a race began between p:ngland and France. The former favoured the east coast of America, which received the name of New England; the latter chose Quebec as the site for their capital, and called the country round about it New France. James I. signed a charter for the colonisation of Virginia, and thirteen years later the Pilgrim Fathers sailed in the Mayflower. A year after that, the King presented Sir William Alexander with Acadie, who— patriotic Scotchman us he was— changed its name for that of Nova Scotia. In this light and airy fashion millions of acres of land were disposed of to royal favourites both by the English and French monarchs. In some cases the gifts were considered of little value, and were speedily abandoned. In others, an honest effort was made to turn the presents to good account. ^ The French were fortunate in having Champlain as their pioneer. In the midst of many discouragements and diffi- culties, he never lost courage. Now exploring, now fighting with the Iroquois Indians, who had grown jealous of the 20 T/ic Making 0/ the Empire 1 1 «■!„ men from over tho sea, now building f„rt, an.l shelters, he may bo said to have kept New France frou. f.ul,ng a prey to the English or to the natives. Un,lor hi, caJersh.p a smcero effort was made by Jesuit missionaries to spread Christia, ;ity among tho friendly tribes of the St Lawreneo ; and when, about tho year 1C31, the new company founded by Cardmal liiohelieu for the government '^and settlement of the eountry met with grave disaster, it was Champ am who saved his countrymen from total ruin. The few h„ta_ erected by the IWh at Quebec had been sei.ed by the English, and the fur-stores burnt, and the same cry was raised by men in France aa is heard sometimes from t " " V '""''"' '^'^' "-^'■'^ '"^^^o ^"'^fes worth keeping!" It was not till the French had lost Canada for ever, that they found out what a magnificent inheri tanc had slipped from their grasp. The seventeentn century dragged on. The New England States, founded and colonised by men who had left home for conscience sake, were steadily growing. New France was so p^gressing, but at a far slower rate. Difficulties iu tiade, home-sickness, the interference of the French Govern- ment, constant troubles with the Indians, and the severe eompetition of the English traders, all helped to hinder the tnV ^"^^'.^"Sland settlers in 1690. News had come to these thriving merchants that the Frenchmen liad plundered their stations on the border, and preparations were instantly made to invade New F^nce. ' Th rt^" disastrous The fortifications were far too stron- and the vessels of the ii.vaders, crippled and riddled by tL fire o the French, drifted down the St. Lawrence ,»ilh the t de or were lost in the shoals. The attack by the land fo cTs was equally unsuccessful, guns and stores falhn. into the hands of the victorious Frenclimen For some years an irregular warfare vva» kept up, until, in i The Story of Canada 21 1702, bo-an tho first of the great stniggloa between England and France, for the possession of the New World. The War of tho Spanish Succession, as it was called, lasted eleven years. It was a tremendous contest— a battle indeed, of giants. Thanks mainly to tho victories of Murl- bonnigh and Prince Eugene in Europe, Nova Scotia, New- foundland, and the Hudson's Bay Territory ..-ere secured to England when peace was signed at Utrecht. Uut men thought at the time that England's share in the spoil was insuflicicnt to compensate her for her sacrifice of blood and treasnre. Men think now that if wiser heads had arranged the treaty, we should not have had so much bother with France over fishery rights. In the next war, the island of Cape Breton was captured but at the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle it was restored to France! The truce lasted barely seven years, and then tho Seven Years' War broke out, which resulted in the wrestincr of Canada from the French. ° It has been said that, towards the close of the rcicrn of George II., England had reached the lowest point of national degradation recorded in her history. The King was un- popular, and his ministers incapable. The rebellion of Prince Charlie had been crushed, but there were disasters abroad and discontent at home. Our army badly fed and badly equipped, was led by unskilled and ignorant generals, who owed their promotion to favouritism or bribery, rather than to nient. We have only to look at the coarse caricatures of the time for abundant evidence of what is here said. In Canada a terrible drama was being played. The English and French there were at war, and althou-h the New England colonists far outnumbered those of New France, the latter were better organised and generalled. ihe brave but wrong-headed Braddock was in command of the English and American battalions, and young George Washington, with his Virginian companies, loyally supported his leader. Braddock was disastrously beaten, and he, and I 22 The Making of the Empire \^ nearly a tlion.sana ufliccrs aiul men, wore slain by Frenoh l)uHot8 and tho snalping-knivcs of tho Indians. "Poor nmn, says Ciwlylo of tho ¥av^\Av loader, "very bravo, but without knowledge, except of lield-drill, a heart of iron hut brain mostly of pipeclay quality." ' Those who have read Tlwu^keray's delightful story of The Vuyjtmans, will renumibor how the news of tho disaster was brought to Madam E.mond, and how young Ilarrv V\ arringto.n wore crape for the gallant brother who was reported to have fallen. The great novelist lias given us a bn. ant picture of tlio time, and the book is a chapter out of the liistory of tho making of Greater Britain. The consequences of this defeat and of those which followed It were frightful. The Indian allies of the French on tho Canadian border made havoc of the scattered settle- ments of the English traders, and tlie autumn woods ran- with the screams of tortured victims. Tho power of tho in-ench was supreme, and their determination to drive the English rosbifs into tho sea was openly proclaimed. When the news of the desperate condition of her armies reached England, it caused widespread anger and alarm. biv Horace Walpole, writing to Sir Horace IMann at the tune said: "It is time for England to slip her own cables,^ and float away into some unknown ocean." Lord Chester- field also expressed the general feeling of shame when ho wrote : " The French are masters to do what they please in America. We are no longer a nation. I never yet saw so dreadful a prospect." "But there happens to be in England a Mr. V^ii with royal eyes more and more indignantly set on this biiyin' ss."! A loud clamour was raised against the Government, and King George w^as forced to send for this Mr. Pitt. In i few months after the statesman had seized the reins of power, a new and glorious era was begun. " I am sure that 1 can save the country," he said, "and that no one else can ! " 1 Cailjlu. The Story of Canada n Tf tliat boast had boon mado by a woak man, it would have boon vain and contemptiblo. But Pitt know bis own powerH, and that ho was capable of doing what ho said. Vast pro[)aralion8 were made for campaigns ])y soa and land, and the ablest soldiers and sailors wero selected for commands. A mighty fleet sailed from Portsmouth, with orders to attack the T''ronch in Capo Breton Island, xho defenders mado a stent resistance, but tho wisdom of Lord Andierst, tho P^nglish general, and tho daring of James Wolfo, his brigadier, triumphed. Tho noble liarbour of Louisburg, Prince Edward's Island, and a great crowd of prisoners, fell into tho hands of tho conquerors. It was tho first serious blow to French power in tlio New World, — tho first step towards the fulfdment of Pitt's proud boast. About tho same time that these stirring events were haiipcning, an attack was being mado by a largo army under Abercromby upon the French on the mainland. The latter, under tho heroic IVIontcalm, had taken up a strong pofjition at Ticonderoga, and as tho English advanced with deplorable rashness, they wero mown down like grass. Notwithstanding the liorce charge of tho 42nd Highlanders and tho English Grenadiers, the French were easily able to hold their own. Tho British troops wavered, broke, and fled in wild disorder. Nearly two thousand were slain or wounded, of whom four- liftbs wore regular troops. It was a disgraceful defeat, and a cruel blow to tho hopes of the gre^it English minister. A third army under General Forbes captured Fort du Quesne, and then winter stopped tho fighting. Every effort was mado during this jreathing space for the next campaign, which was to decide tho future of Canada. Pitt determined to attack Niagara, Montreal, and Quebec, simultaneously with three strong armies, and his projects were supported enthusiastically by the Britislx nation and their fellow-subjects in America. No time, too, was lost by the French in strengthening their defences, but 24 The Making of the Empire instead of beiiT^ TMotor? k„ miser, and famr.ot «' i'^^ar^"""' »'°"^ «>oy ^a.- In the summer of 1759 tlio lo^f r n i Quebec, where MonfrnJ,^ ^umson, but it was at that the laat LfdT LZ^Hf J°^ «'^ '^^' decided. combat of heroes was to be The command of the atfoptin^ * Wolfe. Ten ,ea. b:L? I Z^r^^" '" "'^'"^ over as being too yonn-. but V\»Y^ '" '^'^'^"^ questions of e'tiq.ett'o o "i-rocedenee H " TT '" ="'^' «onm8 and daring; a nnn on I, f ™"ted a man of .oader,W...oMFe;.3:oX"tZ:nno :r'' ''^'-'' - fobr.,ar„ nndef Ihl rofn^X^^J^^-f "^ i" t-y the end of T,,r.o +i i , ^i-annral feaunders, and Q^.ebec. VL t: I'ol r,^»^^ ^^^"''" ='»"!>' 0* found that the French werT!,!f 1 , "'"'"''' '■™'^- He position rtieli apneatdTiT '""''''' °" ""^ '>^'ghts in a by the aid of hiX 11 ''^,."»P«'gnable. He eould see, dark patches showld hi ntht °' */'' fortifications, and on the hills beyond "se w ''''' °^ '""^^ ^^'■'> """P^'' sary MontcalmTonId do ^Z'^v'^'T' '""' '"^ ="'™^- resist his attack • and I » T ^ "° *"' ™' P"'''''"^- to would fail al oa'nd 'h t ttrr °' f'' " ''^ '^'''"^ P«' tbe conquest of Ca.Jad "^.^^ ^ f T"'?™- '« perhaps, ho thought of ,vhlt C ive h d done , ' > 'n the far East against greater odds liZf^ T ^f^' country, and the fair c,M ,f i, ,' ^"^ '''"> ''"■^'' "f h s l>i".se>f for the ^2^,^17" "'""^ '"' '°™''' ''^ "^-^ then, never cne.'and tCsa rge ats^TthrV™^ '° J'"'" rokntless in their attacks. Su^.li rZr . .r".";: 77 ■"" '"""''-'' '-^ '» ^^ d-lt out to the so r ;, sit ' a The Story of Canada 25 of all, the Worst spare form of Wolfe himself was racked with fever. September came, and then it was that the English leader determined upon a course which, for sheer audacity has seldom been equalled in lailitary history^ or even indeed in the romances of his- torical novelists. About three miles from Quebec, a narrow path wound up from the water's edge to the Heights of Abra- ham on which the French garrison were posted. It was up this path, more fit for the hill-fox than for burly Grenadiers, that Wolfe proposed to lead his men. On the evening of the 12th, the flotilla of boats which carried the British glided down the stream with the tide. Not a shot was fired, not a voice was heard. SWORD BELONGING TO GENEKAL WOLFE. 26 The Making of the Empire except that of the young general or of one of his staff, who IS said to have repeated in low tones to those in his boat Gray's " Elegy in a Country Churchyard." It was a curious poem to choose, perhaps, as a prelude to scenes of slaughter but then, It must be remembered, Thomas Gray was Tn the height of his poetical success, and the Elegy was a new poem. The Highlanders were the first to land, and scrambled up the path like cats and when morning broke I\rontcalm found to his horror an army of nearly five thousand strong, drawn • p in battle array on the plains behind Quebec. Ho foolishly determined to attack in the open, and with splendid courage led a force of over seven thousand a^^ainst the Britishers. But this army was largely made up of raw levies, who were no match for the disciplined soldiers of Wolfe. As the French advanced they poured in a murderous volley upon the English, whose orders were to reserve their fire until the enemy were within close range. Then Wolfe's voice was heard, and a fearful hail of bullets sped from the British muskets. The French wavered. Eeloadin- and advancing, as if on parade, Wolfe's troops were magnifi- cent. He himself was wounded unto death, and was carried to the rear. Montcalm, too, was mortally hit, and the rout began. The Highlanders with their claymores, and the 47th and 48th with fixed bayonets, charged the flyinc. Frenchmen, and Canada was won. ° ^ Wolfe died happy in the thought that he had won for England a continent; Montcalm, his beaten rival, breathed out his life in the consciousness that his honour was unstained. On the 18th of September 1759, Quebec surrendered, and the English flag was hoisted on the Citadel. The news was received in England with wild joy; a day of public thanksgiving was appointed, the chief towns were illuminated, and, on the motion of Pitt, tlio House of Commons unanimously agreed to erect in Westminster THE CITADEL, QUEBEC. 27 The Story of Canada 29 Abbey a memorial to the man who had given Canada to the English. " The whole nation rose up," says Thackeray, " and felt itself the stronger for Wolfe's victory." On February 10, 1763, peace was signed at Paris. "His Most Christian Majesty cedes and guarantees to His Britannic Majesty, in full right, Canada, with all its dependencies, as well as the island of Cape Breton, and all the other islands and coasts in the Gulf and Kiver of St. liawrence." Well might the dying Earl Granville say : " This has been the most glorious war and the most triumphant peace that England ever knew." The French naval power was destroyed, her Indian prestige had been smitten to the ground by Clive, and she had lost an empire in the New World. Pitt had kept his word. i Mi \i : ^jJ*s*;-:-;>^rospcrou8 towns arose. The action of Washington and other founders of tho United States has been sufficiently extolled in history, but it was not more noble than tho behaviour of the bravo Canadians. In the struggle of 1812, moreover, the contrast is un- favourable to the Americans. England was engaged in her last desperate fight with Napoleon. Now is the time, thought the young " war-hawks " of the States, to strike at Canada and teach tho subjects of King George a lesson. It was indeed a favourable moment. Wellington was in the Spanish Peninsula, wrestling with Marmont and Massena, and the victory of the Borodino had laid Russia at the feet of Napoleon. All the resources of England were strained to the utmost, and only a second-rate army and a third-rate general or two could be spared for America. Tho Yankee eagle flapped its wings, and Congress called for 100,000 men for the invasion of Canada. Henry Clay, one of the vainest of the Young American party, thought a regiment of his Kentucky militia would be amply sufficient. Ilalf-a- dozen armies invaded the British American territory, and were easily beaten by far smaller forces of Canadians, aided by British regulars. On the sea the British were less successful, although the smashing defeat and capture of the Chesajiealce in Boston harbour by Captain Brooke of the Shannon was n some way a compensation for our reverses. At New Orleans the defeat of the English by General Jackson, who had posted his troops behind strong entrench- ments, brought the war to a close. No advantage was gtiined by cither party, but the Americans never invaded Canada again. If Canada is to join with the United States— and such a thing is far less likely now than it was half a century ago— she will do so of her own accord, not because she is forced. The attempts to drive Canada into the American Union failed, as has been seen. The less violent, but almost equally 36 The Making of the Empire s t ; i 111 ; \ « dishonourahlo, monns more rocently used of hrinf^'inj,' prcssiirfi 10 iR'iir upon Cuuiula, by trying' to cripple her trade, failed also. To-diiy tlio supporters of annexation, hoth among the Fr.'neh and Knglish Canadians, are i)rol)ahly fewer and less influential than they have been at any time durin«,' this century. " I have often })een asked," said the Afarquis of Lome, one of the Governors-CJeneral of Canada, "as to whether the feeling in Canada in regard to its connection M'itli the Empire remains as strong as before. I believe it to be stronger." In the first year of the Queen's reign there was a lamentable quarrel between the two races in Upi)er and Lower Canada. The French settlers rebelled against what they maintained wore unjust restrictions and unfair treatment. Force had to be employed before order could be restored. Ikit when peace had come again to the colony, the IJritish Government made inquiry as to Avhether or no there were any grounds for the discontent of their French subjects. Finding that they had a grievance, ministers gave to each of the two Provinces a certain measure of self- government. History has since shown us that the Home Government came very near to repeating the awful blunders of the last century. But they were stojjped in time. It iv-as i)ressure from without which caused them to pass the measure referred to. This seif-government did something' to draw Upper and Lower Canada more closely together, and to lessen the friction between French and English. It also showed to the French population that Great Britain liad not forgotten their past loyalty, and was eager to goveri all colonists with equal justice and impartiality. No wonder, then, that the French in Quebec and Montreal felt that they had been the real gainers by the defeat of their chivalrous leader Montcalm eighty years before. Swept away for ever was the oppression of the French Government, ii'o longer was the torture of the rack heard of ; gone were all the evils of the feudal system, which had lingered on in the iN'ew World. TlIK LATK .Sill JOIIX A. MACDONALl). 37 t ^ r ' The Story of Canada 39 Here was honest, governing ; and Parkman, who has written so brilliantly about things Canadian, probably does not exaggerate when he says, a happier calamity never befel the people than the conquest of Canada by the British arms. During the awful Civil War in the United States, between the North and South, in which a million men perished, and America became one vast shambles, the loyalty of all classes in Canada was strong. Wild talk was indulged in by the men of the North as to how they would force Canada to join them when they had beaten the Southerners, and without doubt there was in those dark days much unpleasantness, or what the newspapers calls " friction," between Great Britain and the Northerners. Perhaps Punch best summed up the trouble when he drew the famous picture of Naughty Jonathan and Mrs. Britannia, and wrote underneath it: — " You shan't interfere — and you ought to be on my side — and it's a great shame — and I don't care — and you shall interfere — and I won't have it." Troops were sent from the English ports to Canada, and the latter called out her militia and volunteers to repel any attack by the United States. But no invasion was attempted, although, a few years later, Irish-American Fenians had to be cleared out at the point of Canadian bayonets. The steady, though not rapid, growth of the great colony led to the passing, in 1867, of an Act of Parliament, called the British North American Act. By it Great Britain showed that she felt that the time had come when her fellow-subjects in Canada must be looked upon as a nation. They had reached manhood, as it were, and had outgrown the old forms of government. The whole of British North America was formed into one great Confederation, under the name of the Dominion of Canada. On Canada's illustrious statesman, Sir John Macdonald, fell the task of carrying out tlie details of the scheme, and it was he whose tact and wisdom over- caxue opposition in the Eastern Provinces, won Manitoba 40 The Making of the Empire and British Columbia to the cause, and added vast prairies to Canadian territory, ^w Ontario and Quebec, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, Manitoba and Prince Edward's Island, British Columbia and the North- West Territories have each their separate local parliament. Over them all IS tlie Governor-General, who is appointed by the Crown The Federal Parliament, which sits at Ottawa, consists of the feenate, whose members are nominated by the Governor in Council, and the House of Commons, whose body is like the British House of Commons, elected by the Canadian people. The union of the Canadian Provinces was the joint work of Canada and Great Britain, and its result, speaking generally, have been most satisfactory. As the country becomes more developed, as great lines of railroad, hke the Canadian Pacific, link ocean with ocean, ports with ports and the vast prairies with regions uf mines and tores^ . the feeling of nationality becomes strengthened If bir ooiin Macdonald may be said to have made Canada a nation, the Canadian Pacific Railroad has opened up its I rovinces to European settlers. And yet what a mixed medley of nations Canada is I French, English, Scotch, 'i ; S?'"''f ' Scandinavians, Dutch, Chinese, Indians, and half-breeds. To govern these, with all their dilferent interests and sentiments, has been, and is, a difficult task : but the freedom and impartial justice which all find under tbe folds of the Union Jack are the best mainstay of British power. The increasing influence of the French in the Irovince of Quebec is looked upon by some writers on both sides of the Atlantic with uneasiness, but, when all is said, there seems no real occasion for alarm. The French v^anadians have much to lose and nothing to gain by env change. J " j Such gatherings as the Intercolonial Conference, which met at Ottawa in June of last year, must convince all doubters that Canada is a united nation. It was a re- markable event in the history of the Dominion. Delegates i 11 t f I'AKT OF TJIE i;OUTK OF THK <'AXADIAX PACIFIC ];.vll.\VAV. 41 =«, ■ y i The Story of Canada \ 43 from Great Britain, Australia, Now Zealand, and Cape Colony met together in the Canadian capital to discuss the best means of promoting commercial intercourse. They talked of telegraphs and steamships, of trade "duties," and of submarine cables which should link together the remoleb't parts of the Empire without touching foreign soil. They met, as their late Premier, the lamented Sir J. Thomson, said, "not to discuss plans of separation, but to plight anew their faith in one another, never yet tarnished, and their affection for the mother-land." These gentlemen drew up an address to the Queen, in which they assured her of their resolve to do their part in upholding her throne, which was "the symbol of their union and strength." Before they separated they went to Quebec and banqueted together in the Chateau de Frontenac, which overlooks the national monument to Wolfe and Montcalm; and then might have been seen the spectacle of British subjects of Australasia and the Cape fraternising with French Canadians. Two-fifths of the country included in the words British Empire, lies in Canada, and yet the population of India is fifty times as great. There is room, therefore, for scores of millions ; but, as Lord Lome has said, she does not offer an El Dorado to those who go out to her expecting to make sudden fortunes. "Her offer is this-a comfortable home, on his own soil, to any man who has a good pair of hands and a decent knowledge how to use them ; if he have some- thing of his own to start with, so much the better will it be for him." The story of Canada is less romantic than the history of the conquest of India, but it contains less of \vhich English- men need to be heartily ashamed. I ! THE STORY OF NEWFOUNDLAND. IJ UR brothers and sisters in Ireland often talk ot tlieir "unliappy country." What would they say if they liad been born Newfound- landers? That island is our oldest colony, , , ^"' 0* a" I^ritain's children it has been the most unfortoate. Lord Salisbury once spoke of it s the i/:ore1ccX''"^^"*-''™^ "° ''- -"'O "^ Our West Indian colonists deplore the ruin of their su^ar ^d-ffi ,r r '^'^ ^'^ '"' '"™'= f"""-. ™d India" ndiffi„lt,es because of the fall in the value of silver bu tins ddest eluld of the Eanpire is most to be pitied. Before the Elizabethan sailors had be<.un to ",;„L t^ c, , King's beard" in the Caribber S^, o tie East It: Con,pany had sent out its first ship^ to the la, d of t 1 Great Mogul we had claimed possession of NewTund an^ Lut when Darbadoes and Madras were flourishin„ .s land fanned for its dogs and codfish, it " ^"1 Z catts," was struggling with adversity. Unjust kwslLi .^ growth, and made its few settlers poI £rat td often brutal governors wielded almost unlimited power Wars sapped ite strength in the eighteenth c^rry"^!:; storms destroyed its shipping; while during the pasfei„htv of Greater Bntam have brought misery and ruin tn 4 -landers. After more than three hundred years of trouble! 44 * ^J ). The Story of Netvfoundland 45 the Newfoundlanders were beginning to see the sunshine of prosperity, when the disasters of 181G, 1846, and 189-^ once more blighted their hopes. Again, the ashes of the hre at St. John's had scarcely been cleared away, when, in December of last year, there came terrible financial troubles. J^anks and business houses stopped payment, and it was found that the colony was on the verge of bankruptcy, iracle came to a standstill, and gloom settled down upon the islanders. The leading statesmen of ^Newfoundland are at their wits' end to know what to do. The recent attempt to join Canada and become part of the crreat Canadian Confederation has failed, and what will be the outcome of present difficulties no one can guess. But the ^Newfoundlanders— like Oliver Goldsmith— have a knack of hoping. " Not for the first time, or the dozenth time, says Mr. Edmund Gosse, "is Newfoundland in a forlorn condition. Frost and fire, the caprices of the cod and whale and seal, have reduced her in past years, no doubt, to a far lower ebb than we find her in her present embarrassments. She has suffered much. ... But her spirit, we love to think, is indomitable." Much of the recent money trouble is probably due to reckless expenditure and over- speculation, but we cannot but sympathise with our colonists in this season of gloom. We hear that, although the seal and cod fishery has of late been good, and farming and "lumbering" have been prospering, large numbers of settlers have left tne country since the present year began. And yet there is plenty of fertile soil in Newfoundland. There are vast forests of valuable timber and an abundance of mineral wealth waiting for the axe and spade. A hundred years ago it was said that the island had been looked upon as a great English ship, moored near the ' banks " during the fishing-season for the convenience of hsnermcii. Nowadays a great many people have much the same idea. They regard the big island-which, by the 46 The MaHng of the Empire way, IS a ^ood deal larger than Ireland-as a misty country near the cod-banks of the Atlantic Ocean, where nothin' IS to be seen but cod-liver oil and tinned lobsters. They know little of the existence of charming fogless country, of forest-clad hills, of lakes teeming with fish, and of handsome towns. It was in Newfoundland that the making of the Empire was begun. For a hundred years and more it was our only colony, and in the stern toil of the Atlantic fisheries lay the commencement of our naval greatness. If, as the Duke of Wellington once said, Waterloo was won on the Eton playing fields, then the victories of Drake and Howard Kodney and Is^elson, were made possible by the trading voyagers of the early sixteenth century. It will be remembered that, in the time of King Jlenry VII., great excitement was caused in Europe by the news that a New World had been discovered by the Genoese sailor Columbus. England did not like the idea of Spain establishing herself in this land across the ocean and many a merchant and sailor puzzled his brains and dreamed of fresh discoveries. But there was in Bristol city a hard-headed Italian, who knew as much about navi- gating a ship as Columbus did. He journeyed up to London and laid his plans before the King. Tlie monarch had had some dealings with Cabot, and knew him to be a shrewd man. At first Cabot was unsuccessful, but by degrees the King's vanity was tickled. "H 1 give this man leave to seek the new world," we can im^ine the King saying to himself, "I shall have great glory by his success; he shall pay me part of the profits he may make, and I will take care to lose nothing by his failure." Thus it was that, in the spring of the year 1497, John Cabot fitted out a little ship of fifty tons at his own expense, and sailed out from Bristol, bound for the unknown west. He took with him a charter, or patent, giving him and his 1 -i % ) The Story of Newfoundland 47 three sons, Lewis, Sebastian, and Sanctus, leave to set up the Kinrr's banner on any new-fun nd-ianrl. A clause was, how- ever, put in, binding the Cabots to pay a fifth share of the profits into the royal treasury. Mean and close-fisted, Henry's conduct stands out in sharp contrast with the behaviour of Queen Isabella of Spain. That royal lady furnished Columbus with the means of carrying out his plans of discovery, but the English soverei^m treated Cabot in the spirit of a pedlar. ° On June 24th land was sighted, or, as an old chronicle has It: "In the year 1497, the 24th of June, on St. John's Day, was America found by Bristowe men in a ship called The Mathew:' Such is the simple record of the finding of our senior colony, and of that unknown continent which was thourrht to be joined to Asia. It is not certain what particular point of the New World was thus seen, but the general opinion IS that It was Cape Bona Vista in Newfoundland. The memory of Columbus is ever green, but our knowledcre of John Cabot is of the slightest. And yet it was he who opened up the New World to the Old, and in his tiny vessel led the way for great steamers, to which the two thousand miles of stormy Atlantic are but a week's journey. Kmcr Henry IS said to have actually bestowed upon "hym tha't found the new isle " the sum of ten pouii.Is, and permission to go out again with six ships. The - hym " may have been the lookout man, but as John Cabot received a pension of twenty pounds a year, we may be sure that Henry was well satisfied with the results of the voyage. The twenty pounds however, di. doKB ha,l .soareoly hoen hoard hoyon.l their ow M....,-«.,„n„k" We wore, howev,., ,„aU„,, a 1 i„„ ™ an e. Virs-in.a had been ,.,|o„i.sed. W„ |,a,l b,,™ t„ 1.0 .01,1 Coa.st uf Africa and to (Jniana, and we wore trvi, ,! ..-. to ,10 husm,.s» in I„,Iia. The llom.nd,. were sm^ * .0 u.,,.t i. a,„l is not „.oro than nine thousand rL"L It was Ihoiiyht woll to hold thcni ti-bt. Tho colony was a suecossfnl experin.ont. To-,lay the la .,1s are qn.ot as a r.sidonce on ],artn.oor. but they , ! s, hoalthy, eont,.ntod, and sleepily prosperous. The v y ouses seen, to .shnuber an.ong lovely flowers. Of bel. y 1 ere ,s no lack, but Bermnda is i.otfc^ndly beaut fulTit H dsomeo til ■ r ™* '" the islands, we have linked some of tho principal ones together with brid-es and ".>.uo„.t:or;:: tf lUi:': r.s "' °"'"'^' ^"'^'°- 62 ifitli T/ie Making of the Empire Lifo in tho JJcnniulas, like the lii.>tury of tlio islands, is uneventful. Their story is very diflbrent from that of the West rndies, a three or four days' journey away. Stretching across the Gulf of IMexico and tho Caribbean •Sea, the nearest of these islands are only fourteen days' steaming from England. To-day, Avlien we are out of "the roaring fortic6»," the voyage is a holiday trip, but to > ■ '/ '.'- . IN A WEST INDIAN FOREST. Columbus, and, a century later, to Kaleigh and Drake, it was long and dangerous. The spirit of adventure took the first explorers thither, and when they brought home treasures of sugar and spices' they told the gaping landsmen strange stories of wealth and beauty. Then men in larger numbers were tempted to trust their fortunes in the little tub-like ships, with their The Story of Bermuda and the West Indies 6- lufty i,ooi,s ,u„l quocT-cut sails. Awny tl.cy went: some to ,lio l,y (Iruw,,,,,.-, Of in li^-l.t, or in Simui^h prisons, or by disease Oll.ers roacl.cd tl,o isl.n.ls, an.l teeamo tillers of the soil ; others bcnne robbers, (ilibusters, an.l buccaneers, lliis IS an ontline of our early ilealinf-s witb tlio West Iiulies but tlie picture, to be faithful, must be lilled in Tbo isluiKls may well bo elasse.l among the loveliest works of the Creator; but Siumianls, Portuguese, Frenchmen, and, alas 1 ].nglishmen, made them the scene of murder, cruelty anil almost imboard-of oppression. The 31st of July 1498 was Trinity Sun.lay, and as the pitiless scorching sun rose out of tlio east, Christophe. Columbus fel on his knees on tbo deck of bis ship, and vowed that If Go,l would show him tbc land that day ho would name it La Trinidad. His six vessels were leakv and h,s sailors m sorry plight from thirst and privation Midday came, and with it the joyful news from the mast- head that three mmmtains were visible in the west. Aa the ships drew nearer, C. '-imbus saw that the three peaks thought of his vow, ana saw before bim a rock picture of the mystery of the Holy Trinity. Cruising northwards he found more islands, beautiful as the sunsbnie, and wonderfully fertile. Ho called them h covery. Like a swarm of greedy locusts, the Spaniards swooped, upon the Lidies, torturing and allying thoZ j of the natives in their mad lust for gold. Nothing o"ld their poisoned arrows for their long-cherished privileges of eating their gentler brethren the Arrawaks. ^ Unable to find the stores of precious metal which thev ancied must be lying under the mountain for te the invaders sought to draw profits from the boundless Vege table wealth around them. But here the difficidtv of finding enough "bands" confronted them. Th y w rtto f r: i 64 llic Makino of t/ic F.nipi'rc |>nMi slavn tra.lo IS laid ,m tlio Porlu-urs.., tl,,.,, under Iho rulo of S|)Min. Ilowrvvr M.at may l.c, ll.o t.alli,-, .losn;ratcd tho islands for nrarl.y tl.roo l.nndivd .y.-ar... It was al.olishod in 1807; and ,.n August ls(, isiJl, Kn-laud .•Icansr,! l.orsolf of licr sharo of tho slain, hy (.mancipatiuK Mio sIav.«M i,, .ill her West Indian ])ossosHions, to tho nuniiu-r ..f 770,000. Hy (ho nii.ldio of tho sixloonth ocnturv, Mio Spaniards woro in possession of tho Wost Tndios, from tho JJuhamas '" ^''*' "'''"<'» <" Trinida,l in tho soulh ; hut, in tho roign nf Quo(Mi Kli/al.oth, slonth(«arlod Kn-IishnuMi hogan to (•hallon.jro lh.>ir supremacy. Th.5 romanoo of thoso advon- turc>rs has h.vn wrilh>n by Clmrlos Kingsloy in HW/m/v/ llo! which book ov(>ry boy anro rrolcslants, and delostcd Popery. Freemen themselves, they hated the Si^auiards for their cruelty to the enslaved blacks. JJut it cannot bo denied that tlie wish to share the wealth of tho West Indies was the prize which (hvw them a(>ross tho seas. They longed to plunder the Spanish King's plate ships ; and, kei^ping up a si>rt of guerilla warfare, they harried tho Spaniards, who had themselves robbed tho islanders. To tho Spaniards Drake was an object of terror ; and if they had caugh' him they would have burnt him as a robber and lieretic, as they burnt other Englishmen who fell into their hamis. "It was a Willi business," says iMr. Froudo in liis Knqlish teamen in the Sixteenth Century— i\iQ hist book we shall ever liave from this lover of Greater Ih-itain— "cntorjiriso anii buccaneering sanctilicd by religion and hatred of cruelty; The Story of ncnniida nud the West Indies 65 hut it „a.s ,. .ol,„.,l lil<„ „o „tlK,r for scan,a„sl,i,, a,„l „ .oho„l f„r ,„ :„„i.l,„K of v„,„ol, which c„„I,l „„Uul „|, "th,.r.s „u tl,„ «cu; a «„h„ol, too, f„r thu trahm.jf „„ „f lu.nly ,„.„, ,„ who.,, blo,„l ma l„.tr,,l of tl,o Inm,iMti„a »iMl tho T,„|,„»,ti,m'„ nmst.,-." Why, it may l.„ „«k,.i, "houl.l KhKhshmcn attack tho S|.m,b,,l., if they an,I wo »,.ro not at war J Th„ auswor is, that wo we>o at war iM.iixh It may not have hc,™ openly doclar,;,!. R|,a„iar,l>, l."rn«^ han^-cl, nn.l tortuml o„r men who vcnturcl into wl.-t. .Spain ticatcl a,s her preserves. .Sl,„ plowed to assas- sinate our (jueon, «n,l overran our island, with her spies r was a ouK war of raee.s and reli.-ions, in which Spain otl^u,pte,l to crush our hu,I,ling .streuf-th, and failcl miscrahlv To return. Italcif,-!, cau.o to Trinidad at tho end of tho sLKtecnth century, and foun.I it " most excellent good." Tfo showed te islan,lers Queen liess's portrait, and, visiting the wo.ulcrful lake of hitun.en, pitch d his ships; then e.xecutn,g sun.Iry Spaniards for their cruelties, ho sailed away to (ind KI Uorado. The "piteh lake" doos not seem to have been lessened in value by what Sir Walter's sailors took away on their si';" lmlls_ Its hundred acres bring a revenue of between thirty and forty tlumsand pounds a year. IJnriug tho first quarter of the sovonteonth century, tho Spaniards, whoso .nlluenco was founded, not on trade but . force, could no longer claim sole right to tho West Indies. Lnghsh, Lrench, and Dutchmen began to settle there, and to nuport negroes to cultivate tho teeming soil. A French u est Ind,a Company was formed in 1C25. T,v > years later, Barbados was colonised, and until the c mro of Jamaica, rn 1655, it was the chief depot of ojr tr.ado Sugai-.ca„o was largely grown ; and crowds of adventurers; att cted by tho wonderful prosperity of tho island, flocked .her Cromwell used to send his unruly subjects there, and the phra,se, •• To liavbados a man," became proverbial. Jn ]6_9, we established ourselves in the Bahamas, and 66 The Making of tlu Empire r I three years afterwards in Antigua. In the winter of 1G54 a "sea armament" of sixty ships and four thousand soldiers,' under the command of Admirals Penn and Venables, sailed from Portsmouth with sealed orders. Blake Avas lying in wait off Cadiz for Algerian pirates and Spanish plate ships, and men rightly suspected that the destmation of this new armament was the West Indies. It was, as Carlyle says, "the unsuccessfulest enterprise Oliver Cromwell ever had concern with." It attacked Hispaniola, and failed. It "realised almost nothing— a mere waste island of Jamaica, to all appearance little worth the keeping at such cost." The admirals came home, and were strai.dit° way lodged in the Tower. To C vawell, who "had hojDed to see the dark Empire of Spain a little shaken in the West, and some reparation got for its inhuman massacrincTg and long continued tyrannies," the failure was a keeli disappointment. The English left in Jamaica fared badly; some died of plague, others of exhaustion. But the soul of Cromwell W.IS a great one. He sent out fresh batches of settlers, and among them a curious cargo of "a thousand Irish girls" The "poor unpopulous island," which seemed hardly worth the taking, has now a populati'-i of 660,000, and is the headquarters of our West Indian ..■oops. Almost evcrythincr can be grown there. Coffee, sugar, ginger, and tobacco flourish. Its oranges arc the finest in the West Indies • while no less than 1,300,000 bunches of bananas havJ been exported b\ a single quarter of a year. ^ All this time the buccaneers and privateers of France and England had been carrying on a desultory robber warfare with Spain. In the year 1660, the French and English governments tried to come to some understanding as to^the partition of the islands, but no permanent arrannement could be made. When Europe quarrelled, there were pretty sure to be collisions in the Wo.^t Indies. The islands constantly changed hands, and so the weary struggle for a ^ /i The Story of Bermuda and the West Indies 67 lasting s„rremacy dragged on. Knglishmon fou<.l,t v,;„, U.itcl.n,o„, Spaniards, and Frenuh in t,™ • w L f latter Imlf of the eighteenth conturv TIL 1 , settled d„™ into a dnel between :^L Eritarid w'" My readers ,nay remember that in 1760, the conquerof Canada was completed, and that about the same tZ C iv„ - engage^, .^ his hnge task of wresting I^ol'tL war against „s, and tried t profibvonr Tl"; ^""l"'"'^ and abroad a„a win back tCllr f't^tf ''?/^: rgiisX!::;.^""'""-™--'-'"-'"— in'ate: ::ir:thrSsSt«t:c:f ------ A lull came the following year; but the eenturv was to eo yet one „,ore desperate struggle between EngLr nd her nvals. France now a republic, declared war Cinst us in 1793, and seized our West Indian settlemen-s Tb " years later, the united fleets of France Soain nm wT, ! made another atten.pt to cripple our p^kr'o:;, e L 'ihe Spaniards were routed by Jervis off Cape St. Vincent ^he F eneh and D.tch by Duncan at Camperdown, and at he Spam lias Cuba and Puerto Rinn tt it j , y^^, W has sevenf:;d\tlrf te Tf' h™ Tf iZr ,T\?''"^'" P°-sses twelve, and our got thitevoafT ""*","'*' ™"™ "'« '•''^''^ durin. all laise }ears ot bau e and timmlH tk^ .• .° ^lad long been e'dinof T ''^^'^' Population canict. The negro slaves had multiplied 6S The Making of the Empire F III i i 1 I 1 ■ ■, : \ i 1 \ ^ V ! Ml h ( enormously. Vast fortunes had been made in the sugar and tobacco plantations by the white proprietors. But while the clouds of war rolled away from the foresi-clad hills of Dominica and Montserrat, the orange groves of Jamaica, and the cane fields of Barbados and Antigua, the curse of slavery remained. In 1834, as we have seen, it was abolished. Since that time the prosperity of the islands has collapsed. Labour is difficult to obtain; and sugar, once sixty pounds a ton, has fallen to a price which scarcely pays. Beetroot sugar, and what are called the "bounty fed" industries of America and Europe, have been its fierce competitors. Great estates have been ruined, and costly machinery has rusted. Thousands of the white population have left the islands, leaving to the Imperial Government the difficult question of how to govern the idle, excitable, half-civ:- :ed blacks. In some of the islands, like Jamaica and Barbados, the members of the legislative councils are partly nominated by the Crown and partly elected. Others, like Trinidad are governed by men selected, not by the popular vote, but by the Crown. Now, in India we have done splendidly. We have kept the peace between Mussulmans and Hindoos, and have given to each the freedom and security which they n^vev enjoyed before. On the other hand, we have given to Australia and Canada full self-government. When, therefore, the black population of the West Indies ask to be allowed to control their own affairs, on the ground that they far out- number the whites, we have to ask what is the right and wise thing to do. If we take the case of Hayti, we find that the blacks, left to themselves, have established a republic, where everything that is abominable is practised • where, as Carlyle says, " black Peter is exterminating black Paul." Self-government there has produced a crop of murders, cruelties, and tyrannies, which are a disgrace to the modern world. The Story of Bermuda and the West Indies 69 To leave our West Indian Colonies, therefore to tl,„ negro population, as some writers have suggested, wo W til wf f ™'", '\ ^''""P"'^ °* H"^"' ^ -do the wo k that wo have already accomplished, and to throw back the dusky races into barbarism. The collision iL the whites and blacks in the Bahama: a J 'T.Z ii:"Go;=^^^^«™--°'--vr But there is greater cause for hopefulness than there was a few years ago. Englishmen are adapting themsZ niore thoroughly to the climate, and are discoverin" I? a hough "sugar .s down," cocoa, coffee, indigo, °sl ' pu.ts are an mexhaustiblc source of wealth. The luxuS forests produce timber of the finest kinds, while the new fibre industry is advancing by leaps and bounds Cd s cheap m most of the islands, and, except in Barb^ vh.eh ,s densely populated, little more than a fourth of the acreage is under cultivation. wortirnV^' ^''T'' '! ""'"'' "' '^^'y-^'-" "'°»^an«' <>' beaten off. and British nfnT settlement, but were right of eonqlrt « L h! ?.: ""' '"'"^- I' '^ ™" by it wa,s formal yprolld I ' '"*' ""'' "''^"' '^ l^e^: did not object!' ^ ^ '" '""'"' " ^ »''«^h colony, Spai,; Spanish word meaning "d"! " ffi^^ ''°"''""^' f™» " ie was .'groping for'a pas^" tf hi" E^ T ''^'"' ""l^" up and down these seas -md P„ . , , " ^"'^'*'' «''"«d way to the eonquelt of kelo B^ tb ^' ,'"' "^ °" '"^ simply meant that a iiag was hoi.f.d ."^ Possession It was in no sense colonContl if we '"f '"'''"'' '"^• the rough-and-ready law of iCltl Z^ f °™ ""<= ^^ centuries, it is perfectly good PoT,; ''^^'^teenth the law, says the proverb w!,?" " "ine-tenths of plaee, and we kept t TV ' '''"'=•'■ ^™ f°"ght for our according to nfnteth-X ^Lttt ^^L T^*'^' were as much invaders as werour ^ ^ ^P'"'"""^ piratical forefathers. BesiderTv T ■ '°«''"'°'l-'="'tiug and '=•=•: £ =„»t -• «■• ™ •" " There are more than 30 00n i \ " ^" ^-^"Sgcration. are coal-black neles nr K r T"^ inhabitants. Some are Hindoos from distant rd"''^^ •^'''"^'»^'=' "*- a different kind ZZ /!"' "^^''^ "'« In<"ans of descendants ofte famous / T ''""' °» <'™b'- a- ficent temples and cZ u/ hS.t .™'"' »?"<- -gni- forests. Ounces and pa- Iv , '" ''" ^^'^'"'^ °* ""= panthers make their home amon" o In Central America yc mouMcring palaces; snakes coil among the sculptured columns; and where in bygone days was heard the scream of human victims bound for sacrifice, innumerable monkeys chatter to their neighbours the bright-plumaged toucans. British Honduras needs good roads, railways, and more labour, to open up the interior. Only a small part of it is under cultivation, and, as the English Governor has said in a recent report, it might be made "the tropical garden of ^orth America." Its industries are in their infancy. Vast forests of palms and pines cover two-thirds of its area Ihere are other trees, like the rosewood, which find a readv market But it is to her fruits and sugar, her rubber and spices, tliat the colony will do well to look for her future prosperity. The low-lying ground of the coast is hot and damp, and where the mangrove grows Englishmen cannot live B„t in the high lands behind the climate is healthy, and, on the whole, better for Europeans than that of many of the West Indian islands. Hurricanes like those which visit far-away Mauritius are rare The good people of Belize, therefore, when they eo to chape or church on Sundays, or sit in their shops and counting-houses during the business hours of the week have no fears lest the buildings be blown about their ears' and they themselves be buried beneath falling bricks and c THE STOIiY OF THE EMPIRE IN SOUTH AMERICA BlilTISH GUIANA L r>ORADO 1ms been found at last. At least that IS what the gold miners of British Guiana say, and they do not seem to be far off the truth. sailoci „n tl,„ n ■^'""' '"""^/"'' ^'"'"'' "SO. Sir Walter Ealeigh n^l ^ nT""' '""'"'""S ^°' '"arvellous cities of gold and jewels. Of ecrse he did not find them, because the ™l h was underground and waiting for the s i ^e h mneteenth century. As he grew older he began to dfetrus the accounts which tlie Indians gave of golden w^b Ind rouir;":ft7^^'"^^^^^^^^^^^ 7°1 Tn , "^ P™°"' ^' ^^^'d search in the rocks of Gmana, and, if necessary, tunnel in the soil itself Chrilndl'.^ ''' °''''' "' "'"^ --' '--d foo> in But what Sir Walter could not do witli all his learning the last ten years. In 1884, only two hundred ind fif? if: c c O G ►-* r* c w H O o ts e H i'l 1 li 1 ^ \ L In South America 79 forward to the time when they will put Califcruia, Australia, and &outh Africa in the shade. No wonder that the Governor .v^ ur.t the promise of gold is splendid, or that the Lri; iMi puMic lo being invited by very liighly-coloured circular.^ ,o *c.Ve shares in mining companies. Our <,jcl f. fe.Usthe Spaniards must be sorry that they did not 8ucr..ed in keeping a firm hold upon this strip of bouth Arne, ',.,. Four centuries ago tliey missed their oppor^ tunity, and the labour of CoIuml)us was lost for ever The Dutch too, must feel very wroth. In the time of Queen Bess they formed a settlement in the neighbourhood of the Kiver Lssequibo, and Gradually increased their hold upon the country until the whole of what is now British, French, and Dutch Guiana was under tlieir control. Then came the turn of the English. In 1781, wo were at war with our American colonists. They gave us quite enough trouble • but we liadalso to contend with France, Spain, and Holland' It was a stirring time. We suffered many defeats both on sea and land, but sailors like Kodney saved our honour and future Lmpire. In the year after his great victory at St Vmcent he took part of Guiana. During the next twenty years, the settlements changed hand^ more than once In 1803, they came finally into our possession, and in Kin- William the Fourth's reign, Demerara, Essequibo, and Berbice were formed into one colony under the British Crown. So it is that the rivers which once flowed past the cot ages of Dutch planters, now bear on their bosoms the tools and machinery of English and Scotch miners. But it IS likely that the caimans, or South American crocodiles would prefer the Dutch, with their old-fashioned guns which did not often shoot straight, to the newcomers, whose rifles have a nasty way of making holes. Now, what is it that the Dutch gave up to us in the early years of the century ? It i« a magnificent conntrv with an area of about ] 09,000 square miles, lying betwi^n the ^«v<>#v- 8o The Making of the Empire been trvinf^ his hn^^f fn o ' ^"^^^la- liie Pope has ^V"'o i^ia DeSC to act as a ,,•« off . ^ mediator in the coIo„,_tl,ere is an astonish n. Z^' I'T f '"™?" the coasts, and at the mouths of Ihe ^ I™"^- ^^ Mvamp, lands and mangrove till ott T /" "" '"" wait for careless Europeans In tt! ' f ^'''"'■' "" "' by is the oal, cuItivat'edTJ ^^Z^Ttt "" ' small port on, indeed of fl^n „ \ i ^^^ony. It form.- a but it^ fertiiw rifaJ'; ^^bI" ,;!*''' ?■'""' m every trrocer's ^Iiot. , ? . -^-^merara sugar is known Kingdo,^ andX« Imcla 'Xm °"°"'",r' "'^ """^^ to two million nound«' w^ " '"'""'° "'"l » 'ialf that modorn since can dT """""^ ""' ''™^' ^^ ail it« manufacture has been don: ^'n ™ ''^ "'"'"""■^ ^» colonies of Esseqmbo and Zb e iT') ™V'^ ^''^'<'' we send linen and wool'^r ^ood, .. '"™ ^"^ '"S"--' all sorts. In the bad oH nf .^ ""*''''^' '"'* ■"""'"''"^^ of slave labour; now over one' ,"';'"' '^"^ "°*^'l ''y coolies have beerUTinTo d" ttT ' "^'f °" negroes will not do. It is v-ell tbrf^ , ^"'' '"'^ and industrious East IndL! , '"PP'^ °* *''"% progress made of "t "n ^.d "lini 'T 'f^™" "'^ ™'^'^ sugar-workers to exchaLll: ?° '""' '^"^ "''™y ^^ "'C tl- Wthemore^^Sllwthfdi™^^^^^^^ '•>» ^^■»- prospects. But Tow " f^'^^"' '^^""1'^" about their future of the Govtnor^I mv' ^"«r-^^«"'''">S to the report -custry wcT :: b s wS : :;:^^ \ - ^"^y ^' «- colony but it is not the on / th if hat cT .'""'" "'" Acresof fertile soi, suitable fo^r marlet" 1^ e triTe In South America 8i fanner; and, indeed, it is difficult to Icnow what tronieal fruit, tree, and vegetable eould not be made ZZu? } harvest of wealth. The country is in tt /Itl^w eyes on that glorious water-lily the Victoria T?Pr,;o i, Deb.nd the plantations are the forests n,tl,l„. gloomy as those of Darkest Afric '°f '^ . P"*'''''^ ^n^ been touched by the wolan' .«. Th ^'^ r'^- ""^ haustiblo supply of valuable timber, a, d a ,lnd d 1 , 7"" ground for the sportsman or naturalist W lat saiUhS «.e country as a va.t Kew Gardens ; it is also a g^ , loo For days together the white traveller may r,ot see! soul' but the place seems given up to the tapir and tH t ' .guanas and wild hogs, and mammoth ant-eate^ wL gnp . as deadly as that of a h..!.y Mounta " ^'^Lt » At dusk the woods are full of weird noise, H„ i- monkeys till the hot air with their wdhngs and the P '"f or Arrawak shivers, because he thinks tafevU sprits !:« abroad The marshes are alive with bellowing wfaM even the flsh in the river-bed make strange sounds n is at dusk, too, that the vampire bat ™p= t„t , " . ' ■" "^ "' white man in his hamS ^ irtuek^,"",''"^' ^^ *'' securely round him when he s^^'ththad wy fot ofT flying bloodsucker among the trees. What Mr. Brown wrote of the interior of British Guiana five and twenty years ago, is probably no less true now ^.:^\t.T' "^f '^'"^ ^^>^ -y^that,tthl exception of a few settlements, it remains todav in fu same state as in the time of Raleigh. ^ ^ ^ ^^' Beyond the forests are the mountains and rolling nlain« 01. savannahs The scenery becomes grand in tt ext^t? Lut .he chief glory of the hill country is Mounf- Jinr perpendicular wall of p,nk and red 11^1^71: 11 * 5 1:1 ; 11 i r: t 82 The Makuig of the Empire miles long, and rising to the height of 7500 feet. So steep arc the sides of this great rock fortress, that it Lanied the skill of veteran Alpine climbers, until Mr. im Thurn climbed R.naima and dispelled the m^dtery which enveloped its summit. If we have done little to open up the forests and savannahs, we have shown energy and enterprise on the coast. Georgetown is as flourishing as it is handsome. Broad streets, good shops, well-built houses, churches, schools, banks, public gardens, a cricket-ground, and busy wharves and docks— all tell of the newcomers' activity. Nor is the beautiful neglected. The houses seem to be nestling in trees and flowers, and in the trenches or canals, which tell of the old Dutch settlers, the Victoria Kegia is care- fully tended. A railway has recently been constructed, but it is only twenty miles long. It is proposed to extend this further, but for many years to come the rivers will probably be the chief highways of the colony. "British Guiana is unique among British possessions," said the Governor, two or three years ago. "It is a great tropical region, inhabited, not like India, by the countless millions of an ancient population, but, with the exception of a narrow alluvial fringe along its seaboard, only by the remnants of a few scattered tribes. It is not like Australia or Canada. ... It is simply, at present, a great lone land, whose soil teems with gold and natural riches, but where the climate is treacherous to the stranger, and where the seeker after wealth is as likely to find a grave as a fortune. Whether these forests will ever be cleared away, and whether towns and cities will ever spring up on the mag- nificent rivers, is a problem of the future." *^ Opinions seem to differ as to the climate of this Crown colony of ours. But there can hardly be two opinions as to its value. .1 In South America 83 Little did John ^lilton think, when he penned that p- "^'''"g ">» '"■'«- Tf .1 n ^^ '""" <=»"'<'" *<"• Jiiii'opean nations to et he,r in, 1 ions of armed men lay down their welon" or the ieinple of Hercules, wo may haul down our fla.'. But at a time wlien the powers of Kuropo are armed to th"; tect It IS pleasant to turn from talk of war to think of the value Gibraltar to our eoinmeree. It is a coaling.place of he W Lo2rb ""; ^''" ' "'" "' '"'''^^ "'"ndred ide coal. Thousands of vessels entei and leave the port everv year, and four-fifths of them are British. One of our foremost statesmen was quite right when he ..aid, '. Wh rever I V ! I J B I «1 T/ie Story of Gibraltar 91 there is a sliip carrying? Ihitish niorchaiKHso, tliere is the frontier of the British Empire." Viewed from the sea, the Kook rises stern, l)are, and forbidding' Few who liave landed at its quay and gone up Waterport Street, would suppose tliat Gibraltar gave a home to twenty-six thousand people, to jolly little Barbary apes, to fifty-iivo diirerent species of butterflies, and nearly five hundred varieties of plants. Few would suppose that pretty villas nestled among almond and orange trees, and in gardens bright with geraniums and scarlet pomegranates. Nor would they imagine that the town has a cathedral church, live-and-twenty schools with over two thousand scholars, or that it boasts a splendid library, and delightful puljlic gardens which give shelter from the hot summer sun. Mars has not all his own way in Gib. Minerva, Pomona, and other gods and goddesses might come there, and find some of the comforts of their detached family residence on Mount Olympus. Tommy Atkins is not the sole occupier; and although Gibraltar is a strong place of arms, it is also the pleasant abode of scores of English families, who have become used to the shattering of windows and cracking of ceilings when the big guns are fired, and the shutting of the gates at sun- set which military discipline requires. In ancient days, Gibraltar— or Calpe, as it was called— and Abyla, on the opposite coast of Africa, were the Pillars of Hercules of which Latin writers so often speak. For centuries Mediterranean mariners, fearing what dangers might lurk in the great ocean beyond, seldom ventured out- side the Pillars. For hundreds of years, also, after the Moors crossed over into Spain, the Rock was the scene of desperate 3onflict. Twelve times had it been besieged before the year 1704, when, in the War of the Spanish Succession, the English and Dutch fleets under Sir George Rooke wrested it from Spain. It was thought by the proud Dons to be impregnable, but the English sailors climbed the rock, and its into IKHUH- |»io.s. pain [lily. the He tlio lien, liled in lip's I Itlio )Ufc w] Idi irs of le. rs, ed ^Kii IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) ^ r/u 1.0 I.! 1.25 I ^ IS S I4£ lii M 1.4 1.8 1.6 V 96 ■ nl The Story of Malta 97 July and August with suffoci , , ,. ^ , o *lust, British residents and soldiers find life in Malta very tolerable. Long years ago the Roman poet Ovid spoke of its fertility Its roses and honey too were famous throughout the East But now it would be a barren spot were it not for the untiring industry of man, who has eked out its scanty soil with earth shipped from its big neighbour Sicily, fifty or sixty miles away. Many of the early potatoes, which doctors say are so indigestible, are grown in Maltese gardens, while of the delightful oranges shipped from its bustling port no healthy schoolboy needs to be reminded. Corn, cotton, olive- oil, grain, grapes, and melons also, are the prizes which the islanders have won in their ceaseless struggle with nature. Within the narrow boundaries of Malta and Gozo, more than 170,000 people are packed, in addition to the troops which form the garrison. Who, then, are the Maltese? Some think that they are the descendants of the Phoenicians who began to colonise the place when Gideon was a leader in Israel, more than three thousand years ago. The dis- covery of ruined Phoenician temples, at any rate, proves that these hardy ancients were no strangers to the islands Others say that their ancestors were the Carthaginians whom the Romans dislodged two hundred years b.c. ; while a third opinion is that the Arabs who mastered the island a thousand years ago are the real grandparents. Whatever the answer to the question may be, every race which, in olden days, strove for mastery in the East, left its traces upon Malta, for each felt that it was one of the keys of the Great Sea. Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Normans, bpaniards, French, one after the other, fought for the tight little island. But except for its associations with the ship- wreck of the Apostle Paul, whom its "barbarous people'' treated "with no little kindness," the most interesting part ol Its history is connected with the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem. Dating from the time of the Crusades, this famous order I '.I 98 The Making of the Empire of kniViits foiiiuled a hospital and church at Jerusalem, and devoted itself to works of religion and charity. Then, as its numbers grew greater, its warlike spirit increased, till the red cloaks of the knights, with their eight-pointed white crosses, were seen in the forefront of many a fierce onslaught upon the Saracen hosts. Their services in protecting Christendom against the Moslems, whoso mighty forces were rolling like a great wave over Eastern Europe, and in warring against Medi- terranean pirates, were continued long after the Crusades were over. Malta was part of their reward for religious and military work, and here they remained until the close of the last century. They made a splendid defence of their new possession when the Saracens attacked it, three hundred and thirty years ago. They did much for it when they made roads and aqueducts, and built the chief town of Valetta. But their tyranny and dissolute lives sapped their power. Their subjects tried to shake off the heavy yoke of their government, and rendered them an easy prey to Napoleon Bonaparte. The great Corsican, full of plans for con- quering the East, was on his way to Egypt, and sought to take Malta. The island surrendered ; but no sooner had the rule of the knights been exchanged for that of the French, than it was in turn attacked by England. The crushing defeat of the French fleet at Aboukir Bay led the Maltese to rise in revolt. For two years the garrison held out against the Mistress of the Seas, until famine forced them to capitulate. At the peace of Amiens in 1802, our states- men agreed that within a certain time they would leave the island. We never fulfilled this part of the treaty, because, as Professor Seeley points out, England had good reason to believe that Napoleon would soon re-occupy Egypt, and that the struggle for India would begin again. Our last war with Napoleon, which was only brought to a close by the valour of Lord Wellington and his Prussian allies at \7atcrloo, was at the outset a war for Malta, ; / The Story of Cyprus as 99 At the peace of Paris in l«u Afoi^ «/ r:::rr:a r a^:^, "V '-> recently constructed. Sou les of ™- ^ 7''\''"' ^•'" obtained, and the power 7choIenth: .T ''!'"' -ou^e of hot c.iItos-hl t ' VeS LleMt new constitution which was granted 30™:!™". aL has, on the whole, succeeded wpII t>, . ^ ^ ' Her Kajeatys Ma/tese e„£s it^I'; ^ctj^r' J lojerance, allows everyone to worshio in hi« «. t, way. No wonder that'FioM.Mar.::^|ir"L,'rstnr a former Governor, was recently able to sneak i„ fl™"".""' terms of Maltese loyalty. ' flattering The cathedral is supposed to stand on the site of the hou,e ajosie^ndlif;:^'''^"''"''^' "'" "^^'"'^ "'^ ^'"P^-^ed unive^ity, and school, peLe has wZt^ v t" es. S rt r rrer.:rt- a^:nV;rLe::-\r^ '^^ friendly salutes. ° "^ ' ^*^ '"^ *^^ ^^^^^ ^^ CYPRUS the Saltan of Turkey, who had agreed to allow the IsTand of Cyprus to be occupied by British troops. ThI ^ronlT"'""'"' "" """' •'^ '»■- --"ncement. exirsrd in r F '''"'°"' "'"" ''^"«l"«'«f Cypr„swere expressed in the European newspapers, but it was generally ■ \ f M lOO T/ic Makini^ of the Empire felt tli.'it KtiKliUul \m\ ''.scoro.l." Tlio llusso-Tiirkish War was over, and tlio Congress of Lorlin, wliich had met to consider tlio fato f»f Tiirkoy, had woll-nipfh finished its work. It was no secret that Turkey would loso some of thoao fair provinces Avhich she had shown herself unablo to govern, and that certain advantages would fall to Russia, who had pushed her troops to the gates of Constantinople. But it was also known that Groat ]h'itain would oHoav no inter- ference with her power in the INIcditerrancan, or with her free route to India. Party feeling ran very high. Sonic took the part of Turkey, because they thought that Russia had made the subject of the Bulgarian atrocities a pretext for attacking the Sultan and establishing herself in his capital. Others said that holy Russia was a better pe\son than the un- speakable Turk, and that England ought not to interfere in the quarrel. AVhat, then, was Lord Beaconsficld's Government going to do? All doubts as to its action were cleared np by the announcement. Men turned to their maps, and found that Cyprus Avas the largest island in the Mediterranean, rather more than eleven hundred miles from Malta, and about two hundred and fifty miles from the Suez Canal. Its value was then keenly discussed, and the subject again came up in the House of Commons in IMavch 1895. One view was, that if the neglected and sand-choked harbours were cleared out, British ships would find safe anchorage ; and that, if fortified, the island could be made a second Malta, which would contrc' the starting-point of a future railway to India across the valley of the Euphrates — if such a railway were ever made. On the other hand, many still persisted in their opinion that the climate of Cyprus was terrible, and that the island would be a burden to us. Never, probably, was tho word Cyprus so often mentioned by Englishmen, since the days when they first heard that their king, Richard the Lion icr r. c 101 The Story of Cyprus 103 Heart and the lovoly Dorcngariu had beou married at Liiuiisol. Thoy took it for granted tliot Cyprus was now a part of the Enipiro, whereas it ^till belonged to Turkey and was only to be occupied and controlled by (iroat Britain so long as Russia retained certain fortresses in Asia J.'inor. Russia will never give up tluj prizes of war until she is forced, and Oy[)rus ia to all intents and purposes ours. Wo govern it as if it were a Crown cohjny, anil it lightly forms part of the story of the Making of the Empire. On 22nd July 187^, Sir Garnet — now Lord— Wolseley landed in the island as the High (^Commissioner of Great Britain, with a largo body of British and Indian troop?. H. issued a proclamation thatsucn measures as were likely to incieaso the prosperity of tl. j Cypriotes would be ordored, and that equal justice would be done to all, without favour- ing any race or creed. Then the British flag was run up, and, amid fresh cheering and singing of "God save the Queen," a now chapter was begun in the history of Cyprus. And what a history it is 1 Like Malta, it has had many masters — Egyptians, Phoenicians, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Saracens, Crusaders, Genoese, Venetians, and Turks. For centuries before the coming of our Lord, pagan worshippers bowed down to Ashtoreth and Venus in the great temple of Paphos, the ruins of which have rece:.itly been discovered. Five hundred years B.C., the Cypriotes were rich enough to contribute one hundred and fifty ships to aid Xerxes the Persian in his wars against Greece. In our era, Cyprus was the first v'ountry in the world to have a Christian ruler Sergius Paulus, the Roman proconsul, "called for Barnabas and Saul, and desired to hear the word of God." It was the home, too, of the former apostle, and the estates which he sold to assist in the spread of the gospel were Cypiiote lands. Lord Beaconsfield was not the first Englishman who obtained control over the island. In the twelfth century. King Richard I. conquered the island, and eventually pre- r04 The AfakhiO' of the Empire sontcd it, with princely Koncrosity, toaji old cnisiKliii^' frioiKl, (Jny Do Liisi«,'iiiiii, tin; ox-Kin<,' of JcnisuhMn. Uiidor tho Vonotian. it attained its lii.i^diost wealth and iinportMnce. Its population, which is now something more than two hundred thousand, rose to nearly a iiiilIi(MK In tho sixteenth century it passed under tlic sway of the Turks. Since that time its decay has heen steady. No wonder that its inliahitants, hoth Greeks and Turks, received the English .joyfully. Thoy exi)ected that the wealth and energy of the iiowconu'.rs would restore to the h(\uitiful island something of its old prosperity. Venus gave it tlio pomegranate, the old legend says. Tho Cypriotes now expected another gift, that of orderly government and a lightening of taxation. For a little wliilo they were not disappointed. "British rule," said tlio Times newspaper, "spread almost as swiftly as oil spreads on tho surface of water." Justice was dealt out fearlessly. The old Turkish forms of hrihery and corruption »vere swept away. Piers liave been built at two of tho most important i)orts, and good roads liave been made. The Cyprus Society in England has established li.ospitals and schools. Acti'^e measures have been taken to destroy the locusts, which are the curso of the country, and wliich destroy crops anil desolate the iiclds of the peasants. Irrigation works liave been started, so that the second plague — tho want of rain — has been in some measure lessened. Ikit the harbours are still choked and useless. Ships can only anchor in tho open roadsteads. Fever - breedin^^ marshes are still nndrained, more bridges are needed, and taxation is terribly severe. Recently, meetings have been held in the island, at which the Cypriotes actually clamoured to be taken under the protection of the Greek Governmant, because they said that the burdens of taxes laid upon them by the British were even greater tlian those of the Turks. The re^l fact is that the sum paid to Turkey or.t of tho revenues of the island is too much. W k: 11 I i The Story of Cyprus 105 Great Britain has not fulHUcd ull lier promises, and a recent speech made by Sir William ITarcourt, tlie late Chancellor of the Exchequer, shows that there is a feeling among some of our statesnKMi that Cyprus is not worth keeping. As a naval outpost, it may not be all that we hoped and expected. But it must be rememberad tliat in 1878 wo were not occuj-ying Egypt, of which Cyprus, like Malta, is said to be one of the keys. Jiut, above all, wo have a duty to the islanders which we are bound^ to discharge. We could not, in honour, hand over the island to another power, nor would the Greek population consent to our surrendering them to their late masters the Turks. Recent reports show that some progress has been made, and we must hope that better times are in store. Even if the ancient glory of the island has departed for ever, and it is of little strategical value, yet, for the sake of our word as a nation and the welfare of the islanders, we must do what Lord Wolseley promised. As Mr. Balfour, speaking of possible troubles in the East, said, " He would be a rash proplict, and he would be a reckless politician, who would say that Cyprus would not prove to be of great importance." I THE STORY OF THE EMPIRE IN ASIA THE SENTINELS OF INDIA PERIM, ADEN, AND SOCOTRA E can hardly wonder that foreigners are jealous of our Empire. In the great struggles for colonies in the eighteenth century, we won, and we have since shown ourselves more successful in managing, more settlements than any of our rivals. France, with all her military genius, does not seem to understand how to colonise. The foreign pos- sessions of Spain are either turbulent or sleepy ; Portu°gal can barely hold what she claims ; and Holland made the mistake of treating her colonies as estates which were '• to be worked for the benefit of the mother-country." At one time we were in danger of committing the same blunder, but happily we stopped before it was too late. Napoleon was pretty right when he called us a nation of shopkeepers. We are not ashamed of the title ; and as long as we can keep a clear highway for our ships, and make our trade routes safe on sea and land, people may call us what they please. The road to the East needs more watching than the Atlantic, and while we hold Gibraltar and Malta, and can support them with a strong fleet, we know that "all's well" in the Mediterranean. Let us see if the rest of our journey to India is equally secure, remembering mean- 106 ° «'i Hi{r E ill fc...:,........;. 3i« 107 I I I' i The Sentinels of India 109 while, that the times care peaceful, and that if war were to break out we should probably find the canal blocked, and we should have to go East via the Cape of Good Hope, as wo did before M. de Lesseps was born. We steam slowly through the canal into the Gulf of Suez. On the loft, in the distance, is the sacred hill of Sinai, and in a few hours our screw is churning up the heated waters of the Red Sea. Six or seven hundred miles further on we pass Suakim and Trinkitat. They are now historic names. Our troops landed there in the recent war with the Mahdi and the graves of many brave fellows lie under the burning sun. ^ Soon we reach the little island of Kamaran, occupied by us m 1858, lest some hungry rival should seize and fortify It. Then on the left shore of the Red Sea is Mocha, once a prosperous seaport, but now a mere village, renowned for coffee, which it does not produce. The sea begins to narrow, but Great Britain has two sentinels to watch the straits. The one is Perim ; the other about ninety miles to the east, is ADEN-the Gibraltar of the . Red Sea. They are— to change the figure— our first stepping-stones in xlsiatic waters to our Indian Empire, two thousand miles away. The former is but a tiny speck on the map, an island but five or six square miles in area. It lies in the narrowest part of the Bab-el-Mandeb Straits. Held by an enemy, it could make the passage of our ships most difficult And yet we abandoned it soon after it first came into our possession, ninety-six years ago. That was the time when J^apoleon was trying to see what he could do to make trouble for us in India, and when he promised his friend lippu Sahib that he would come and drive us out from the peninsula. Kapoleon never came, and Perim was left to itself. About the year 185? we changed our mind., and sent a ship s crew m hot haste to reoccupy the bare brown rock. I lo The Making of the E^npire • Sir Charles Dilke tells the story in a very amusing way in his book on Greater Britain. He says : " The French had determined 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 un- exceptionable 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." After we had thus stolen a march upon our rivals, we retained possession of the island. We have never fortified it, but we use it as a signal and coaling station. Aden has been a strong place of arms for many years. The peninsula on which it lies is a mass of barren, sun-scorched rock, connected with the mainland by a narrow neck of sand. It is ugly, and produces nothing, yet this little strip of Arabia was for many centuries one of the world's markets. Its history can be traced back more than six hundred years u.c. Twenty years before the Christian era, the Romans, seeing its importance, captured it. The Venetians and Portuguese quarrelled over it ; the Turks held it in the sixteenth century, and the many Mohammedan mosques give proofs of its former dignity. Some fifty-six years ago, the shipwrecked passengers and crew of a British vessel were shamefully treated by one of its Sultans. Satisfaction for the outrage was refused, and on 16th January 1839, Aden was taken and made a depend- ency of our Indian Empire. It was found to be in a state of ruin. The population had fallen to less than a thousand, and its trade had well- nigh gone. Thanks, however, to good government and the opening of tlie Suez Canal, something of its old prosperity i. \ The Sentinels of India II I has come back. A brisk trade is done in coffee, gum, feathers, hides, and ivory, wliich are brought down from' the interior to the coast ; and as a coaling-station and harbour It IS of great importance. Its population is largely composed of Somalia from our protectorate on the African coast, and with some of these we liave recently made acquaintance during their visit to the Crystal Palace. The town boasts of a church, a school, a post-office, a lighthouse, and Government buildings, and it is also con- nected by telegraphic cable with Bombay and Suez. It is curiously situated in the crater of an extinct volcano, and, like Gibraltar, it is fortified, both by nature and the hand of man. We have also a protected border of land round it, and the Arabs are bound not to accept the protection of any other power but ourselves. The reason of this is clear. The fortifications might be rendered useless if a hostile power were to establisli itself— f(jr example— in our rear. Like the Rock, Aden would be a hard nut to crack,' but It is not a pleasant place to live in. It is not unhealthy, but the heat is blazing. Rain falls about once every three years. One thing, however, makes the place worth seeing. It^ water tanks, or artificial lakes, like those of Ceylon, are among the wonders of the world. There are about fifty of them. Constructed in the mountain gorges, many centuries ago, to catch and stoi-3 up the precious rain water, they are marvels of ancient engineering skill. Time and neglect had made many of them leaky and useless, but, in 1856 we began the work of repairing and clearing tliem out, at a' cost of hundreds of thousands of pounds. If England has made a fortress of Aden, she has also done much to promote the welfare of her subjects there, and that IS a great deal more than Persians, Romans, and fearaccns ever did. Aden is strong, but our possession of it depends on our supremacy at sea. Without a big navy this rock could not be held. Many distinguished military men are of opinion ■ 112 The Making of the Empire tliat in time of war wo owj^xi to be able to seal up, as it were, tliis end of the Red Sea. To do this it would bo necessary to make Pcrini a fortification garrisoned by Indian troops, and to add to the strength of Aden. As we turn out of the Gulf of Aden, an island as largo as the county of Cornwall looms in sight. This is Socotra, one of the youngest of our possessions. Portugal claimed it nearly four hundred years ago, but soon grew tired of keep- ing it. We hear little about it, and yet so beautiful and fertile is it, and so cool its climate compared with that of sun-baked Aden, that the old Sanscrit writers called it " the Island of the Abode of Bliss." Some twenty years ago our Government suspected that Italy was casting longing eyes at Socotra, and was thinking of making it a convict settlement. They therefore arranged with its Sultan that he should not allow any foreign power to settle in the island without their consent. In return for this undertaking, they agreed to pay him a sum of money every year. In 1886, Socotra was annexed to the British Crown. The change of government seems to have made but little differ- ence to the population, which is as idle and contented as the West Indian blacks. The island produces the best aloes and " dragon's blood " in the world, and while these fetch high prices, the Arabs, Somalis, and mixed races have no cares or anxiety. A glance at the map will show how important it is that Socotra should be under our control. It lies right in the track of P. and 0. steamers bound for Bombay. f ! THE STORY OF INDIA CHAPTER I TRADING HEN Lord Macaulay wrote his famous Essay on Lord Clive, more tlian fifty years ago, he .aid that the story of the conquest of India was to most readers, not only insipid but positively distasteful. Such a statement sounds strancre to us, but there can be little doubt that, at the beginning, of Queen Victoria's reign, the great peninsula was looked u;on by many Englishmen as the property of a few lucky persons lIToI;^^^^ '-''' '-'''- '' '- --^- ^^ t^^ ^^-t We regard India very differently now, and we are realising r ralh rT"l '\"i ''f °"^ fellow-subjects in India! Austiaha, Canada, and elsewhere are citizens of an Empire wice as populous as that of Rome in her proudest days and that we have a duty towards our distant brothers which we cannot properly discharge without knowing something of the growth and progress of our rule. _ The story of the Making of the British Empire in India Ks a chapter out of the romance of history. Even the w^i^ lnd^a is meaningless. There is no such country as Indh and here is no Indian people ; and we are repeatedlvtl J ^nj unul we grasp this fact we shall never understand" how '^«« 114 The Makino^ of the Empire was Hint our doiiiiiuon was foiindod by a liand of traders wlio liad no idea that, when thoy wore Ijiiilding their first few wareli()ns((s and factories on tlio Indian coast, and t-aflickiii;; in ihdij,'o and s[»ices, tlicy were beginning tlio conquest of a niiglity emjjiro. India, then, is not a placa, but a colloetion of places ; not one luition, but many nations, speaking a multitude of tongues, and diHining from one another as much as Spaniards dill'er from Scotsmen or Norwegians from Turks. ]Mr. John P.riglit once spoke of India's "twenty natious and Mieir twenty languages," and yet the great orator's description falls far below the actual facts. There aro within the huge peninsula tribes and clans, great stales like Hyderabad and (Iwalior, and scores of castes and religious orders. The languages spoken by the men of tho south aro gibberish to tho IJengalis of the East; wliilo these in turn would have as great a dilliculty in making themselves understood by the Sikhs in the north-west us they would by London cockneys. The country, too, is as varied as tho men who inhabit it. \\\ r.engal, for example, the traveller finds luxuriant tropical vegetation, deep swamps, and rice-fields stretching away as far as the eye can reach. Hero the rainfall in a day is sometimes greater than that of England in a year. Ho may go up tho Ganges and away towards tho north-west, and lie will see arid plains scorched by fiery winds and sw^ept liy blinding dust-storms. Or, if his visit be made in winter, he is refreshed by cool and bracing breezes. He goes towards the far north, and fiu'ls liimself in the midst of pathless jungle, which clothes the slopes of gigantic mountains, whose summits aro twice as lofty as JNIont Blanc. India, then, is a country of dillerenccs. Had it been a country of one race and one religion, swarms of invaders would not have come down from the mountains in the north west, five times in eight hundred years, to pillage and The Story of India \ \ ^ dovastato. Hud Dcngalis ami Mahrattas, Sikhs and Rajputs l)cen unitod in later ycarH a-ainst thoir conquerors from tlio sea, or liad tlusy been ruled hy one native prince instead of by a nunil)er of foreign cliicfs, tl„.n tl.c Portuguese and Dutch, tlio French and Kn-lish, coul.l have done nothinr. with their puny strength against the two hundred millions of the peninsula. 'In the fifteenth century, the Antonios of Veni(;o and Genoa were the only Europeans whoso "arcrosies with portly sail" did any considerable trade witli India, but the dis- covery by Vasco da Gama of a sea road to the East round the Cape of Good Hope, and the determination of Ids fellow-l'ortuguese to push business at the point of the sword, deprived tlio Italian cities of their monopoly Ihcnceforward, for a])out a liundred years, the rich sea- borne trade with tlie East Indies was in the hands of Portugal and Spain. Fortified settlements were built larrre fleets carried merchandise to and from Libson, and' other Europeans who tried to get a sliaro of the trade were tlireatened with the severest penalties. The Europeans thus menaced were the Dutch. In the latter years of the sixteenth century they tried hard to build up for themselves a navy which should be able to cope with that of Spain, and their merchants had been spendincr large sums of money in fitting out ships for tlie Eastern trade. At the beginning of the seventeenth century the Hollanders were the Spaniards' most formidable rivals on the Indian coast, but, unfortunately for them, they raised the riUCE OF PEPPER. " By wliat strange cliances do wo live in history," said Carlyle. It was to this rise in pepper that England owes the beginning of her Indian Empire. On the 22nd September 1599, an indignation meeting. a.s we should now call it, was held in the City of London I he Lord Mayor took the chair ; and a resolution protesting against the action of the Dutch merchants in increasin° r 1 6 The Making of the Empire tlic price of pepper from three to six aliillings per pound, wan passed witli due solemnity. Unlike many modern indif,'na. tion meetings, this gathering did something more than pass a resolution. It was agreed that there was no reason wliy the foreigners should have their own way in the Indies, and that an association should be started in England for trading with the East. A Company was formed of one hundred and twenty-five persons, and £70,000- a largo sum in those days — was subscribed. The Queen favoured the enterprise; and, indeed, so interested was the royal lady in the schen'-, that she despatched a special messenger to the Great Mogul, then the ruler of the chief portion of the Indian peninsula, with the request that ho would grant privileges to her subjects. In tJio year 1600, a charter was given by Elizabeth to the East India Company. It is as memorable a date as any in the history of the Making of the Empire, but it must not be imagined that England had never previously tried to extend lier Eastern trade. INIore than a hundred years before, John Cabot had tried to iind a new way to the Indies. He sailed north- west, and discovered Newfoundland instead, which was neither what he nor his master wanted. Frobisher, Hudson, and Baffin, in later years, met with no greater success; but in 1577, Francis Drake touched at the Moluccas or Spice Islands, and, having persuaded the king to supply England with all the cloves which the islands grew, brought back glowin<^ tccounLs of the wonders of the Orient. Sir Walter Paloigii still furth^i excited the imaginations of Englishmen, by capturing and bringing home a Portuguese vessel, laden with a cargo of Indian silks, ivories, and spices. Then came letters from a gentleman named Stevens, who is said to have been the first Englishman who ever reached India. He spoke of the marvellous wealth of the country, and of the way in which the Portuguese were enriching The Story of India \ \ 7 thcnisclvcs, and sai.l tlmt tliore M-as no just cause or impcdiinchf, why liis countrymen sliould not liave their share of the Indian trade. His opinions were supported by tlireo other mendiants named Fit(di, Newberry, and Lcedes, wlio went out likewise to try their fortune in the U)d■ „ ? ^l:'^'''''^-^' '*» h»-l hitherto held aloof, bc-an o a.d the ]..ngl,.h, and with their irregular cavalry i >fltte too, from the forces under Duploix and Chunda Sahib tecan,e frequent; and when, among the mango groves of Cavenpak, Chv., with an arn.y nu,ch inferior In numbers tation of the British was established. By destroying, too the column and trophies which Dupleix had erected to commemorate his former triumphs, lie showed" , thoroughly understood the character of the Asiatics who nicknamed him Sabat Jung-Daring in War ' In January 1753, his health was so shattered that he was compiled to return to England. He had gone out five years before without friends or influence. He eame back It «>e age o twenty-seven to find himself fame ,s. Th stl es schoolboy was now the hero of Arcot and T.iehinopolv and his name was coupled with those of the foremost men of the age. England was at peace with France itTs tn,e but the fact that Clive had checked Duplehx t't m wlen 1..3 power was causing profound anxiety to the EnlhA merchants, touched the nation's pride. n1 wond r that t^^e serriceof liTr^'"' "S^'",""'""^ ^^ employment in the service of the Company and the ofovernment. The former was glad to secure his services and promised him the .over norshipof Fort St. David; the latL, foreseeing that war ;::ia™:iri:ra:::^^^'^ -' '^^' ■-'- ^ H 127 f V he salary of India 129 Tilings ill Iiulia Imd ii,,t born j^'oing on sntisfactorily during,' his absence. It i.s tiitc that uii agi-ceinont lia.l been arrivcv^ at with tho Frcndi, by whicli ahnost ail the advan- tages gained by J)ui.leix Imd been given np, and that tho great Frenclnnan liad been recalled and treated shanicfu.Iy by the profligate Louis XV. Uut the innuonco of the I'Jiglish in tho Deccan provinces was as small as over, and tho prestige which liad been won in the Carnatic by Clivo and Lawrence had cost enornions sums to the Company. ^ On his arrival Clivo found abundant work to occupy him. The destruction of a pirate stronghold was his first achieve- ment ; but the satisfaction of tho English traders was speedily damped by the news that Suraj-ud-Dowlah, the viceroy of JJengal, had marched to Calcutta and had captured Fort- William. The worst was even then not told. With true Oriental cruelty, his guards had shut up one hundred and forty-six of their prisoners in a dungeon less than twenty feet square, and known as the Llack Hole. No one who is unacquainted with the fearful licat of a liengal June can picture the agonies sudered by the unhappy victims; it was a night of actual and hideous nightmare. " The day broke. Tho Nabob had slept off his debauch, and permitted tho door to be opened. But it was some time be- fore the soldiers could make a lane for the survivors, by piling up on each side the lieaps of corpses, on which' the burning climate had already begun to do its loathsome work. AVhen at length a passage was made, twenty-three ghastly figures, such as their own mothers would not have known, staggered one by one out of the charnel-house. A pit was dug; the dead bodies, a hundred and twenty-three in number, were flung into it promiscuously, and covered up." 1 The murderers Avere unpunished, and Suraj-ud-Dowlah issued an order that henceforth no Englishman should live in Calcutta. Almost at the same moment that the news of the outrage ^ Maciiulay's Essay on Clive. I30 The Making of the Empire in JJcn^'al reached Mam TiiE liOOF OF NAWAU'y IIL'XTIXU LODGE. 131 TilE ill The Story of India 133 pc'iiinsnla. Clivc wiis riglitly ma.I(3 its first Governor, and ii(i iuul l.avvrenco took over tho comnian.l of the English forces. From the l)attle of Tlassey dates tlie coinnionccnicnt of a new era in India. So far, tho Kngli.sh had heen traders; competing at first with tlio Dutch and afterwards witli the French. So far, tlieir mihtary strength had heen diiccted to the protection of factories and dei.ots on the sea-coast. Now that the power of Franco was Inimhled, tlie East India Conii)any hegan its career of conquest, wliicli did not end nntil tho whole of tho Indian peninsula owjicd its supremacy. With its pockets filled with the spoils of Suraj-iid-Dowlah's treasury, and witli the support which it was receiving from the Government of Pitt in England, the position of the Company was indeed satisfactory. That all its doings can be defended is impossible. Ikit much exaggeralJon has marked many of tho criticisms which liave been passed upon it. It was a rough age ; and if there be no excuse for occasional treachery and high-handedness in the past, at least there has heen an honest attempt in later years to govern fairly that which was not always honestly acquired. While tho stirring events, of which a brie, outhne has been given, were happening in Lengal, the French were preparing for a descent upon the Madras coast. Their courage and perseverance were almost pathetic. Of them it may bo said, as it was said of us in later years by mpoleon, they never knew when they M-ere beaten. Tho command of the expedition was given to Count Lally a brave but hot-headed soldier of Irish descent. "Out- rngoous Lally," Carlyle calls him, with stran-e misuse of words. Ills success at first was alarming. But in the trenches before Madras his career was checked. With mutiny among his soldiers, an empty militarv chest, and his ammunition exhausted, he was compelled to retire to Pondicherry, where he was forced to surrender. He was :f= u III <, ; t 1 1 I II LI I ^34 T/ie Making of the Empire sent as a prisoner to lOngland, and thence to France. He lay captive in the Bastile for a year and a half, and then, after a trial which lasted for even longer, he was sent to the scaffold. Truly France had an amiable way of dealing with those who tried to serve her, and were unfortunate. " INIy policy is these five words : ' No Enfjlishman in this Peninsula,^ wrote he, on landing in India ; and now it is to be no Frenchmen, and there is one word in the five to be altered ! " i Beaten in Bengal, beaten and disgraced in the Carnatic, obliged to surrender at Masulipatam, where the English general, Forde, gained one of the most brilliant victories in tlie history of the British in India, their last hopes of dominion in the East were gone. What Dupleix could not do, no Frencliman leff^ at Chandernagore or Pondicherry could hope to accomplish, against such men as Robert Clive, Stringer Lawrence, and Eyre Coote. Their navy had failed to drive the English fleets out of the Indian seas. Their armies had been divided between European conquest and Asiatic enterprise, and in the double attempt they had been beaten. Louis XV. was obstinate and dissolute ; while England Avas governed by William Pitt, whose Indian policy was enthusiastically supported by the rich trading classes. No mere military strength could have obtained for the English in India what its naval ascendancy had secured. And the fact is as true to-day as it was one hundred and thirty years ago. One more European rival remained. The Dutch, whose military influence in the peninsula had long been insig- nificant, and whose power had moved towards Java, began, in 1758, to plot with Meer JafTir, the Nawab of Bengal, and successor to Suraj-ud-Dowlah. Seven ships, of two hundred and twelve guns, and with seven hundred Europeans and eight hundred Malays on ^ Carlyle, Friedrich II. vol. viii. ch. 6. The Story of India. 135 boan], appeared at tlie mouth of the River Hooghly. Tear- ing down the Britisli colours, the Hollanders burned the East India Company's houses and seized the shipping. Clive acted with his usual energy, and although a large part of his fortune was invested with the Dutch Company, he resolved to crush the Hollanders both on land and sea. A brilliant naval victory was obtained by Captain Wilson, on the same day that the Dutch soldiers were routed at Chinsurah. The Dutch then acknowledged themselves to have been the aggressors, and peace was granted, on the condition that they should not keep in Bengal more than a hundred and twenty-five European soldiers for the protection of theii trade. Clive returned to England after these brilliant achieve- ments. Another chapter in the history of the Britisli Empire in India was closed, and from the time that the Seven Years' War had ended in 1763, the sea-going powers of Europe began to withdraw from all serious rivalry with us in India. For the future the story of India is the story of the struggle between the East India Company and the Native States ; and, lest it should be supposed that the object of the writer is to glorify every act of his countrymen in the great peninsula, it may be at once stated that, amidst all the splendour of their military achievements in the eighteenth century, there are circumstances of almost revolting treachery. But, while readily admitting this, let us not adopt that form of nineteenth-century patriotism which consists in a delight to exhibit to foreigners the worst characteristics of one's native land and its history. It is easy to belittle the Makers of our Empire: it is harder to say precisely where they erred. The same difficulty was felt by Clive's enemies in London. During the four or five years of his absence, the conduct of the East India Company's agents in Bengal was ■ I 136 T/ie Making of the Empire \ i ; u ; marked Tiy flagrant acts of injustice. Their whole aim seemed to be to get money as quickly as possible, in order that they mi^ht return to England and spend it in vulgar display. Their ideas never seemed to soar above the counter. The just government of a province like Bengal was utterly beyond their powers, and, as it has been well said, they looked on India as a buccaneer would look on a galleon. The natives were taxed beyond endurance, and, in consequence, they hated the English as much as they had hated Suraj-ud- Dowlah. These exactions were followed by outbreaks and petty wars, and it is hardly an exaggeration to say that every ship which arrived in the port of London from Bombay or Calcutta brought news of a revolution, a mutiny, or a massacre. At home the merchants began to lake alarm. The question had long before been asked by the timid, " Was the Indian trade worth keeping ? " In the British Museum Library there is a pamphlet, dated 1754, and entitled, " Some Thoughts on the Present State of our Trade to India, by a Merchant of London." In it the writer complained that juoney was being drained from England to pay for the produce of the East. "Tea," he says, "that mean dirty Drug, established by luxury, is become a Necessary of Life. Our hardy seamen brave all climates, Difficulties and hazards, to bring them gold and silver to take in return a few dried herbs and baked Earthenwares. Infatuation ! " This outburst reads funnily enough, but it probably represents a large body of eighteenth-century opinion. Clive — now Lord Clive — was prevailed upon to return to India, and was nominated Governor and Commander-in-Chief in Bengal. He found the condition of affairs at Calcutta even more desperate than he had imagined. " Alas ! " he wrote soon after his arrival, " how is the English name sunk ! " In a few months his marvelloua energy had worked wonders. Under a grant from the Emperor at Delhi, he ^ The Story of India 137 took over the control of the revenue of three great provinces, Bengal, Eehar, and Orissa. He reformed the Company's army, he discouraged the evil custom of receiving presents from the natives, which were in reality bribes, and by making peace with the Nawab of Oudh he began that policy of forming " buffer " friendly States which, in later years, has been followed in various parts of Asia and Africa. LORD OLIVE. In 17G7, Lord Clive left India for ever, and when his master-hand ceased to direct the policy of the Company, the old abuses were repeated. The feeling became strong in England that it was not right that the affairs of great Indian provinces should be controlled by a mere Company, and in 1773, an Act was passed creating a Governor-General of the presidency of Fort 138 The Making of the Etnpire William in Bengal, and a Council of Four to assist him, having autliority over ^^ad^as and Bombay. A Supreme Court of Justice was also set up at Calcutta. This was the first step towards getting rid of the Company, or rather it was the first recognition by the English Parliament of its duties towards the Indian peoples. Tlie first Governor-General thus appointed was Warren Hastings, a ^^'^-tleman of good family but scanty means, who, like Clivf.. had gone out at the age of seventeen as a clerk in the Company's service. For some years lie liad worked at his desk, until the attack by Suraj-ud-Dowlah upon Calcutta and the victory of Clive, decided his future plans. lie joined the army of the great English leader as a common soldier, and speedily drew upon himself the notice of Clive. His rise was rapid; he became :Member of Council at Madras, and was soon after appointed to the high office at Calcutta, with a yearly salary of £25,000. It Avas a fortunate thing for the Englishmen then in the peninsula, that the new Governor-General was a strong man. Three rivals, Hyder Ali the Mysore adventurer, the Nizam of Hyderabad, and the wild Mahratta freebooters, were fighting for supremacy, and each in turn threatened the British settlements. The Company was deep in debt, and had been justly blamed for many of the acts of its agents. Vulgar squabbles were of almost daily occurrence, while a series of inglorious fights with Hyder Ali had almost ruined its prestige in the south. Hastings began badly. His attack upon the Afghan Rohillas brought down upon him a storm of indignation, and although many of the accusations made against him by his enemies, and by writers like Macaulay, have been disproved, it is impossible to regard his action otherwise than as a stain upon his name. In 1778, war broke out once more with France. We were already engaged in a contest with the IVIahrattaSj and with Hyder Ali, and when the French made their last The Story of India 1 39 descent upon tlie coast of tlio peninsula, thoir chances of success were far greater tlian they had been years before. England was without an ally. Hor North American colonies were in revolt, and in Europe she was confronted by Spain, France, and Holland. Her worst enemies in India, however] were those of her own household. Thanks to Rodney's splendid naval exploits, and to Warren Hastings' strength in India, England emerged from the fearful crdeal, battered, indeed, but safe. She lost her American colonies in the West, but was left Avithout a rival to build up an Empire in the East. Her navy was supreme, and she had kept her line of communication with Asia unbroken. When Warren Hastings returned home in 1785, he left India in peace. He had pilr'ed his ship through a terrible storm, and with a mutinous crew. The story of his eight years' trial, of the floods of abuse which were let loose upon him, and of his final acquittal, are too well known to be repeated, and, moreover, they do not concern this book. It is sufficient to say that the gravest accusations which were made against him by the great orators, Lurke, Fox, and Sheridan, and which Lord Macaulay, to a certain extent, repeats in his famous essay, have been exploded. The late Sir James Stephen and Sir Alfred Lyall have shown their falsity ; and as to the minor charges, it may be said that none of the acts complained of were done with any other motive than the preservation (^^ the interests of his country. He was harassed by his enemies, and thwarted at every step by the timidity of his friends, and yet he saved India for the British. When the peace of Versailles was signed, India was the only quarter of the world in which we had not lost ground. H ,1 THE STOKY OF INDIA I ' I nun •ff CHAPTER III CONQUERING HE English Parliament now made up its mind that it would no longer allow the abuses which had crept into the management and working of the East India Company. We had by our folly lost the American colonies, and, like parents who have mourned over the loss of one child, and so cling more closely to the others, we deter- mined to strengthen our hold upon India. A bill was therefore passed, which placed the full control of the civil, military, and monetary matters of our Indian territories in the hands of six Commissioners, appointed by the Crown. It was a severe blow to the Company, which was now nearly two hundred years old; but the aged corporation deserved all that it received. Under Lord Cornwallis, a thoroughly honest attempt was made to govern justly, and yet he had scarcely landed when he found himself obliged to prepare for fresh wars. Tippu Sahib of Mysore, egged on by the French, attacked a State which we had pledged ourselves to protect. We fought with him, and stripped him of a largo ^^ice of his territory on the western coast. Thus, often reluctantly, the The Story of India 141 most peace-loving Governors were forced to take pait in the quarrels of the native races in India who were scrambling to get the upper hand of one another. Jiefore the century closed, England and France were locked in a death-struggle. Napoleon announced his de- termination to drive the English out of India, and, as a first step towards the fulfilment of his aimable intention, he marched into Syria, whence he wrote to his good friend Ti[)pu, saying he was coming. What a strange thing history is! Here we find the French, who, in their great revolution, had got rid of their king, calling this Asiatic despot— Ciife^ew Tippu ! Something of the same sort occurred but recently in I^gypt, when the French Republic refused to help the ]]ritish Government in abolishing the evil system of Corme, or forced labour. And yet that same Gorvfe was one of the abuses which led to the outbreak of the French Revolution a century ago! Napoleon did not come, and Tippu was left in the lurch. He was driven into his stronghold at Seringapatam, and in its capture was slain. Readers of Baron Munchausen will recollect how funnily he describes the siege, and his single combat with this "dreadful warrior." His kingdom of Mysore was then handed over to a Hindoo rajah; in 1830, it was placed under the control of British officers; and in 1881 it was restored to the rajah's successor, on the condition that he should not repeat the oppressions of those who had misgoverned it half a century before. It was in this campaign against Tippu that Arthur Wellesley, by the aid of native and English troops, gained some of the most brilliant of his earlier victories. The period was rich in conquest. Ceylon was taken from the Dutch. The Carnatic district on the south-eastern coast was next brought under our control ; and, at the begin- nmg of the nineteenth century, a large slice of the famous province of Oudh, with which the memory of Warren ■iiMiMlg" "'~»° t'-il-"! "'ler- ov r ;i,„ r, 1'^°"' "'^ •"'"'"'y- ^'""1 "''»""«« took over the eontrol of the foreign relations of all the Native States, mth the e.xcei,tion of the Punjab and Siude. In other words, while these native prince., were not own laws ,f they showed themselves (it to govern, thev root: "".Trf """" """' "eigl,b;,rs w'ltS our consent. And it ,3 upon these terms that so many of the native rulers of I„,lia at the present day hold thJ thrones, under the supreme eontrcl of Queen vfctoria! n 814, because m almost every campaign in which our years, the httlo Ghoorkhas have shown splendid pluck Tommy Atkins has a great respect for tbe.,e wiry littirh lb men, and indeed he has cause for admiration. When ttiey vent tf tt ''°*'*'' '' "" '"'■^'"'^ ""y- ^"'1 i" the event of the invasion or attempted invasion of India by a turopean power from the north, his help would be of immense value to us. Under the leadersMp of BrLh officers, he is fit to go anywhere and do anything irthe recent fighting in Chitral he did great thn"fand h lowing telegram is only one of the m ny newspaper W 1""/: ■;," f * ''"' ''»^''^-" The Guidel went ZZ stardy IH leVr \T' "" '"'"'* "'s'^''™''-^ ^^ 'he sturdy little Ghoorkhas went for the foe direct a Maxim playmg bnskly on the enemy's position." added Tif r VT r "■'' " """^ ^"P °' --'^-^ ™» aaaea to the British territories, and our north-eastern frontier^along the line of the Himalayas was made seci^e The Making of the Empire The next trouble Avas with the ]jurmese. Tliey had been menacing our protectorate of Assam, and causing great uneasiness in the north-east. The first war with Burmah, under Lord Amherst's Governor-Generalship, resulted in the annexation of Aracan and Tenasserim ; the second war, in 1852, ended in the cession to us of Pegu; while the recent contest with King Theebaw finished up, as every schoolboy knows, with the march to Mandalay and the conquest of Upper Burmah. Mr. Kipling's profane soldier would have liked to stop there : — For the temple-bells are callin', an' it's tlieie that I would be — By the old Moiilmein Pagoda, looking lazy at the sea; On the road to Mandalay, Where the old Flotilla lay, With our sick beneath the awnings when we went to Mandalay ! the road to Mandalay, Where the flyin'-flshes play. An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer China 'crost the Bay I" Thus the eastern frontier of India was secured. To make the north-western safe cost us and is still costing us enor- mous sums of money and the sacrifice of hundreds of our British and native troops. After the first "''^ar with Burmah there was a period of peace. Lord William Bentinck, one of the wisest Governors that India has had, devoted himself to the cause of reform rather than to conquest. The abolition of Suttee, that horrible system under which widows were burnt on their husbands' funeral pyres, was abolished, in spite of bitter opposition from the Hindoos, who resented any interference with their " religious " practices. Another act of Lord William's, of a difierent kind, was the encouragement he gave to the cultivation of tea. Gardens were laid out in the Himalayan districts and ir^ Eastern Bengal, and Chinamen were brought over to super- intend the new venturf vhich has added millions of pounds The Story of India H7 to the revcni.cs of India. Doctors, however, tell us that Indian tea has aided largely in the increase of indigestion among English people; but then English cooks wfll not earn how to make tea. The fault may therefore lie with them rather than with Lord William Bentinck. Peace did not last long. In the early years of Queen Victoria's reign, the steady advance of Eussia towards Central Asia led English states- men to turn their thoughts once again to Afghanistan and the north-western frontier. It is a subject which even now causes our Governments anxiety, and has given rise to the widest differences of opinion among military men. The fact is bat, while our navy is supreme, the north-west is our one vulnerable point. Hence the jealous care of the Indian Government to strengthen and fortify our strong places of arms. ° ^ At the present moment our relations with the fierce Afghans are most cordial, and much is hoped for from the recent visit of the Ameer's son to England. Afghanistan will probably be never conquered by us, but we cannot allow her to be conquered by anyone else. We have blundered often m our dealings with our neighbour, and we have paid a heavy penalty for our mistakes. Dnlf M f ' ' f '^i'^ "'""^ '''''''^'^ *" ^^""'^^^^^ to expel Dost^ Mahomed, who was supposed to be too friendly with Rus^a and to restore Shah Soojah to the throne. The expedition succeeded, but the proud Afghans did not approve of our remaining to support him. They rose in insurrection, and murdered the British Agent at Cabul, as they murdered poor bavagnari, sixteen years ago; while a British army was c.u pieces in the mountain passes, one man only reaching Jela abaa alive The victories of Generals Pollock, Sale, and ^^ott brought the war to a close in 1 842 No mention of Afghanistan is complete without a mfp.r- ence ro tiie war of 1878-1880, and to the splendid march of General Roberts from Cabul to Candahar, at which all the m I. 148 Th Making of the Empire world wondered. It was one of the most splendid feats of British arms in India, although Colonel Kelly's recent march to the relief of the Chitral garrison is said by many military men to have been a no less brilliant achievement. A friendly Afghanistan is necessary to the safety of the north-western frontier of our Indian Empire, but until lately we hardly seem to have adopted the wisest plan of securing her confidence and respect, although it is treason to hint at this to many of our Indian statesmen. Now, Afghanistan, like Eeluchistan, is a "buffer" State, independent indeed, but protected by us against foreign interference. In our quarrels with the Afghans it was necessary to have a base, as it is termed, in the State of Sinde, for our armies which were fighting in the north -v/est, and, after the conclusion of the war, Lord Ellenborough desired to retain possession of these stations. He therefore entered into a sort of treaty with the native ruler, who signed the compact, and then attacked us. He was badly beaten by Sir Charles Napier at Meeanee, and a district of 50,000 square miles, including the great seaport of Kurachee, was added to our long list of conquests. It was in respect of this achievement, made against the wishes of the Govern- ment, that the well-knoAvn joke was perpetrated. It was said that Sir Charles announced his conquest in the one word, " Peccavi—1 have Sinde." The whole of the seaboard in India, with the exception of some half a dozen Portuguese and French trading settle- ments like Goa and Mahe, was thus put under British control. There was now but one kingdom left outside the pale of the British Empire in India. The Punjab, or Country of the Five Rivers, had lost its great ruler, Runjeet Singh. No successor had arisen to curb the stalwart fighting Sikh peasants, who are as much unlike the eflbminate Hindoos of Bengal as these are unlike men of Yorksliire or Aberdeen. Jealous of the English power, they crossed the Sutlej. A rniNClPAL GATK OF THE FORT, GWALIOR. 14D ■^1 MI $v-"Mr- *ii i VI' I I The Story of India 151 liardly-won victory by our troops at Moodkee was followed by that of Ferozeshah, where, after the bloodiest contest ever fought by English and native s( ! lers in India, we were able to secure a slight advantage. The victories of Aliwal and Sobraon completed the defeat of the Sikhs. For two years the Punjab was superintended by British officers. The assassination of two of these was followed by the outbreak of the second Sikh War. Wo lost two thousand men at Chilliauwallah, and although the honours of that terrible contest lay with the British, the hearts of Indian statesmen were anxious. At Goojerat everything was changed. General Gough inflicted a crushing defeat upon a Sikh army enormously superior to his in numbers, and the Punjab was formally annexed. Now the Sikhs, like the Ghoorkhas, are among the best of our native Indian soldiers. By a similar proclamation, seven years afterwards, Lord Dalhousie, "the Great Proconsul," took over the land of Oudh, which, under a native ruler, whose crimes rivalled those of Nero, had become the lurking-place of murder and pillage. The act was loudly condemned by certain people at home, who little thought that in a few years' time tumults and brigandage would give place to quiet contentment, and the cultivation by the peasantry of the arts of peace. One awful storm was yet to break over the Indian peninsula. A year after the annexation of Oudh, the mutterings of the storm were heard. The Indian Mutiny had begun. It was hatched at Benares, the home of the worst superstitions of Hindooism, and in a few weeks the insurrection became civil war. Under the pretext that the British Government was endeavouring to destroy the Caste^ on which their happiness now and hereafter depended, the sepoys of the Bengal army murdered their officers, and committed acts of hideous cruelty upon women and children. They were joined by a part of the Bombay and Northern Indian forces in their Avork of outrage and death. ilJl 1 5 2 The Making of the Emp ire It IS easy to see how the ill feeling against the British was strengtliened. Absurd slanders are even now circulated by Bengal newspapers, and forty years ago these falsehoods were not so easy to demolish. Thanks to the splendid generalship of Outram, Colin Campbell, and Havelock, to the valour of the British soldiers, and the chivalrous loyalty of their Ghoorkha Sikh and Pathan allies, the massacre of Cawnpore was sternly avenged, and the Mutiny suppressed. " Praiso to our Indian brothers, and let the dark face have his due Thanks to the kindly dark faces who fought with us faithful and few, Fought with the bravest among us, and drove them and smote them, and slew. That ever upon the topmost roof our banner in Ihdia blew." We kept India, as we had won it, with native troops trained and disciplined by Englishmen. ' The year after the Mutiny, the East India Company winch for two centuries and a half had governed India, was forced by Parliament to hand over its possessions to the English Crown, and on Mayday 1876 the Queen was publicly proclaimed Empress of India. The story of the English in India, from the days when they were timid competitors of the Portuguese and Dutch has been outlined in the foregoing pages. It has been noted that we went there without thoughts of conquest, and that for a very lengthened period we barely held our own. Then as our naval strength increased, we secured a firmer footing upon the shores of the vast peninsula, and began to train the friendly natives to defend our factories and warehouses From the unsettled condition of the neighbouring tribes and States we secured advantages, and, eventually worsting all European rivals, we obtained complete supremacy. India was not colonised, like Australia or Canada, nor was It acquired by settlement. It was obtained by a series of wars, which endod in the giving up of territory, not by smote all of o R S) ^ ? 1^ ' a cs KJ O 5 "^ H a S- "-I n tt H !* 153 :..... L H 4 ill The Story of India 155 savages, hut by peoples whose civilisation dated from an earlier period than our own. The great continent was, to use the words of Sir Alfred Lyall, " the prize of continuous success in naval war and trading adventure." Occasionally we hear the cry raised that India should be restored to the natives. The suggestion is ridiculous. The great native princes of the peninsula are no more natives than the British. They are foreigners, just as King Eomba was a foreigner to the Neapolitans, or the ill-fated King Maximilian to the Mexicans ; and in some cases, like those of the ruler of Oudh and the Gaekwar of Baroda, whom we deposed, they imitated the cruelty of that despicable sovereign. Again, if our power were withdrawn to-morrow, Hindoos and Mohammedans would be flying at one another's throats. Even as it is the British Government cannot entirely prevent "religious" outbreaks. The indolent but cunning Bengali, who can talk loudly but cannot fight, would be crushed by the Sikh or Mahratta, who despises his elFeminacy, and in a short space of time all the horrors that followed the downfall of the Mogul Empire would doubtless be repeated. li all the past acts of the British in India cannot be defended, it will not be denied, even by those who are most skilled in abusing that which is British, that we have succeeded in governing the 287,000,000 of India justly and impartially. "The hardest thing," says Sir Charles Dilke in Greater Britain, " that can be said about our Government in India is, that it is too good." Our ablest lawyers have laboured to frame laws for India. Education has made vast strides ; railways and good roads connect the principal cities, and great rivers have been bridged. In a word, we have done our level best "To show men how a wiser West a wider East can rule." In a recent memorable debate in the House of Commons, Englishmen of both parties showed that they were willing Iff ll J . '56 The Making of the Empire to give uptho intcresb of their home tra.lo for the sake of th« welfare of tl,cir Kastern f«llow.,u),iech and 7„T , ■ e..eri„g that followed the deelaratC'oftet^tro Sta . that every meml»r of that Hou™ was a memhef for Ind,a « a m«„ that the responsibilities of Great LMtai, towards her d>.sta„t dependency are fnlly realised The words of Mr. Goschen, too, deserve to be published m largo letters throughout India: "What I wL is tW Indu should thoroughly understand that in thfa House on both sides, there is a determination that Indlm feeli^^ ofltLziJ:f:lT.ranYrir^^ THE STOKY OF CEYJ.ON EYL(-)N'« Isk;'' ie between six and seven thoiLsiind miles fr..ni London Ih'ul^o, and the ordinary traveller finds the three - weeks' journey from the Thames to Colombo quite long enough. But, however experienced a globe-trotter ho may be, ho rarely fails to break out into exclamations of delight when lie first sees the island Ho may soon begin to grumble at the heat, but unless he cares nothing i. lovely trees and flowers, for grand mountains and pic^ Tesque lakes, he will not wonder that the Hindoos call it "the Pearl on the Brow of India," or that the old geographers speak of it as Paradise-the home of Adam and Eve. For those Englishmen who love beauty, to whom the history of ancient peoples is full of interest, and who take a pride in the exploits of their own countrymen, Ceylon is probably without an equal. It is the very opposite of ^Newfoundland. As that western island has been unfortunate, so the "Gem of the East" has been fortunate. We are fond of talking of "the Old Country," but, at the time when our land was covered with dense forests, through which wild men hunted for their food, and when London was not even a fishing village, the Cinghalese were a powerful race. Ancient manuscripts have been recently found, which tell long-forgotten stories 167 'i 158 T/ie Making of the R tup ire aliout tlicir .skill in liioratiirn and art, in tlio days whon our furofrtthers wcro i)aintin<,' thoir bodies bhio. Two tliouHand livo hundred yoars a-,'.), (lautanm, tho founder of tho Ihnhlhist roli<,'ion, in .said to liavo been b(.rn in Ceylon. Thi.s tradition ro.«t8 on a very .'-■lender ba.si.s. Anotlicr story is tliat ho \i.siLod tho i.sland throo times or more, and mado many converts. In a tcunplo at tho sacred city of Kandy, ono of hi.s teeth is sliown to awestruck pil-.'rims, and on Adam's Teak men climb to see his foot- print. But, again, as tho ono is a tusk two inches long, and tho otlicr is a mark live feet long, wo aro forced to believe THE IIAUBOUR OP COLOMno, CEYLON. %\ !H that tradition is a very unsafe guide, or else tliat Gautama was a more extraordinary person than even Sir Edwin Arnold's poem, " The Light of Asia," would lead us to suppose. A century after Gautama lost his tooth, fierce tribesmen from India crossed the narrow channel, and found the gems and cinnamon mucli to their liking. They attacked and conquered the Veddahs who dAvelt there, and who, the Mohammedans say, are the children of Cain. Sir William Gregory, a recent Governor of Ceylon, only saw one descend- ant of the island kings, and this solitary Veddah was both harmless and dirty. It is calculated that there are, however, T/ic Sloyy of Ccyion \ 5^ al.o..t two t; ..„.a,ul still left in the rcnote puiLs of the l.sliiiul. It 18 c.mou.s l.ovv often wo fln.l ,vferen.-cs to our firnt parents ,f<, i„ Cyi,,,,. Adam is said to Imvo cros.se.l over from Iml.a viA Adam's Bridge, or the rocks wliidi make tl.e channel between the island and the n.ainland dangerons. On Adan, 8 Teak he is supposed to have mourned the loss of Ahel for a hundre.l years, and eventually to have die.l there Others say that, when ho fell from Para.lise, he anded m Ceylon, an.l that the pearls for whieh the island has been famous for many centuries are really liis tears. By the Greeks and Romans the island was cdled Taprohano; and John Milton, with liis usual love for calling places by a classical rather than a modern name, 80 refers to it m rarculise Regained — " From tliG Asian king, and Parthian, among these, Fron: India and tlio golden Chersonese, Aiid utmost I71U MU isle Taprohane, Dusk faces with wliito silken turbans wreath 'd." As the years passed by, Tamils from Malabar, Arabs Ma ays, Chinamen, and Africans, came to Ceylon, and to-day a population of three millions lives contentedly under the rule of the descendants of the woad-stained Uritons. Strife and bloodshed marked the island's history for many centuries. Revolutions were as frequent as they now are in oouth America. When Milton penned the above-quoted lines, the burghers of Holland were drawing la _,e .-enues from Ceylon and were making themselves disag: able to the nnfortunate coloured peoples. They had fought for its possession with the Portuguese, who had been first of the European nations to discover and trade with the island. Eut the title of the i ortuguese to the possession of Ceylon was more impu.lent tlian good. They had come to Ceylon about the year 1518 J t i , < : i 1 r i ; .. \ i^ ■ 1 60 T//e Making of the Empire and, having built a fort and frightcncl the Cinghalese with their guns, they liad claimed the island as their own Frenchmen came too, eager for a share of its far-famed treasures The Tutch suffered defeat, but spon.lily re- captured Trincomalee, and for a hundred years and more grew rich at the islanders' expense. In 1782, England was at war with Holland, and sent a fleet to the Last Indies. Trincomalee again changed hands, bi . the end of the struggle was not far off. In 1795 we retook the place, after a three weeks' siege, and th. island aune under the rule of the Indian Government. It was made a Crown colony in 1801, but for a few years longer ho native leaders at Eandy did their best to dislodge us. In 1803, a bod.- .T British troops was cut to pieces among he mountains, ana it was not until some seventy years ago that there was real peace in the island. Under a succession of wise Governors, much has been done o restore prosperity to the Cinghalese, but their ancient grandeur has gone for ever. Life and property are secure. Justice is dealt out in the law courts, to all suitors, whatever their race or colour may be. As in India and many other of our dependencies, a handful of Encrlish- men control the country, without fear or favour ^The customs of the islanders are safe from interference, and they are free to wor...ip as they please. Buddhists, Brahmins, Fire-Worshippers, Mohammedans, may erect their temples and Christians their churches and chapels. A truer freedom is enjoyed by the coloured races under English rule than m the days when chieftain rose up against chieftain, and revolutions were of yearly occurrence! In return for these benefits, we in England find a valuable market for our goods. The traveller sees the first proof of the white man's energy when he enters Colombo harbour. Here a magnifi- cent breakwater has been built, within which the ships of all nations are protected from the ocean rollers. Within ox THE llOAI) FROM UALMO TO COLO.V li, f li II l! -^ The Story of Ceylon 1 5 ^ the island 3000 miles of roads have been made, and thns both natives and European planters and merchants have been benefited. In 1832, the first mail-coach ever driven m Asia began to carry passengers and luggage from Colombo np to Kandy, a distance of seventy-four miles. Now there .a a railway between those places; and in other parts of the tea-plantations, through woods which are the home of the elephant, and across river-beds where buffaloes and tinv humped cattle lie in the mid-day heats. Some of these railways are marvels of engineering skill. As the train ascends, the traveller sees around him scenery of entrancing beauty, and from the cars he can look down "to immens^ depths, with only a foot or two between the rails and the precipice." Probably the greatest boon conferred by Englishmen on Ceylon ,s the gift of good water. It is a pity that we have also encouragea, m past days, the consumption of more harm ul drinks. We in our northern island, who are accustomed to turn on a tap and obtain a constant supply, often fail to understand the preciousness of pure wat^J to a dweller in tropical heat. There has always been plenty m Ceylon, but its storage and distribution were neglected The consequence was that there were frequent failures of the nee crops, and whole districts were smitten with fanime and disease. The English Governors, Sir Henry Ward, and, m later years. Sir William Gregory and Sir Arthur Gordon, took the question in hand Irrigation works and the restoration of the great tanks were begun, and Sir William Gregory speaks with pardonable pride of his share in this good work. He claims that ample food has been given to all, and tha disease has been driven out of some of the most unhealthy portions of the island. The great water-tanks, like those at Aden, are remarkable. oTthTR' • J \ ° '""'^ " ''"''" '^ '°''"«»'^J' i» think of the Brighton Aquarium, or at least of the New River i ;.; 164 The Making of the Empire Company's ponds at Clerkenwell. But they are puddles compared with the reservoirs of Ceylon. One of these is thirty miles round; another in the northern province is fifty-four miles round; while a third, which was made fourteen hundred years ago, covers an area of seven square miles, and has an average depth of twenty feet. It was no child's play to repair these giant reservoirs. There are scores of smaller ones, many of which, until lately, were choked up or leaky. The Government, however, is steadily doing its best to make them as water-tight as they were in the bygone days of Cinghalese history. The alligators which lurk among the lotuses and lilies would probably prefer to be left in undisturbed possession. It is difficult to describe the glorious beauty and fertility of the island. " Every prospect pleases " ; and whether we look up at the mountains or at the marvellous variety of trees and flowers, we feel that the writer who described Ceylon as "the brightest jewel in the Crown of Great Britain," in no way exaggerated its loveliness. Year by year the ground is being cleared and made to bring forth abundantly. So much so, that Englishmen have to pay very high prices for it, and the best finds eager purchasers. Hundreds of thousands of acres are given up to rice, or paddy, which is to the natives what bread is to us. Cocoa- nuts, cocoa, quinine, cinnamon, are also largely exported; but it is to her tea-plantations that much of Ceylon's present prosperity is due. The story of the fall of coffee, and the rise of tea, io a curious one. A quarter of a century ago an enormous acre- age was planted with cofiee trees, and as much as a million cwts. was sent abroad in one year. Suddenly the trees were blighted. Fungus and caterpillars made their appearance. Men who had put their savings into cofiee saw ruin staring them in the face. What was Ceylon to do? Then, in their perplexity, the planters thought of trying tea. A few people had already grown a little, and they had found that IN A CEYLON FOREST, 165 The Story of Ceylon 167 tho climate and soil were well suited to the pretty white- flowering shrub. Water was plentiful, and the wages of Hindoo coolies were low. And so men set to work to root up cofifee and plant tea as quickly as they could. Their success has been so wonderful, that in 1893, eighty-two ruilliun pounds were shipped from Ceylon, to cheer and not. inebriate the hearts of men. It is pleasant to know that the last reports show that the export of coffee is again in- creasing, and, like tea, it is giving employment to numbers of emigrants from India. Almost every kind of tropical trees, fruits, and flowers flourishes in the island. The cocoanat and bamboo provide the Cinghalese with most of his daily needs. Satin and tulip trees, banyans, tamarinds, and palms, grow everywhere. Formerly vast forests used to be destroyed by the improvi- dent peasants ; now the English Government regulates the cutting of the trees, just as it regulates the shooting of the elephants. (What a pity it is that some of our own woods are not as carefully preserved !) Pine-apples can be bought for a few pence. Bananas, mangoes, mangosteens, limes, guavas, and dozens of other fruits, are as plentiful as blackberries in an English hedgerow. And who can describe the flowers ? Lotuses lift their lovely pink cups out of the ditches, orchids hang in clusters from the tree trunks, and arum lilies grow as freely in the moist heat as buttercups do in the Old Country. Geraniums line the sides of the roads ; and as pilgrims ascend Adam's Peak to see the far-famed mark of Buddha's foot, they may pluck roses, sweet-peas, and scores of northern favourites. Ceylon is not less rich in animal life. Wild boars, deer, leopards, sloth-bears, porcupines, and jackals roam the forests and clearings. Flying foxes prey on the fruits at night-time, when the big moths and fire -flies flit among the trees. Peacocks and birds of paradise sun themselves on the tree- tops, and look down condescendingly upon busy tailor-birds and chattering paroquets. On the marshes and seashore 1 68 The Making of the Emp ire \ ^ I '- * I \ vast numbers of scarlet flamingoes and clumsy pelicans may be con as well as many birds that are famili/r to us Hut the snakes and insects are pests. Cobras lurk amo„. traveller, crocodiles or alligators lio in the river mud mosquito lurk , lies, flies, but never hides-every where. The nun 1 ^.^j^^ „j ^ .^ ^^^ remarkable Lar™ quantities of plumbago are sent abroad, to be mado il crucibles, but after all "black lead" is not so interes n! tamed. Some think it was the ancient Tarshish. rmrrmrs."^^'™^''-^ ^-^ ^■•^ngmgup;:! Sir Charles Dilke speaks of a curious fact about the th eTIntr °'. "' """■'• ^^ ^»^- "0- th— td us thatC 7 ^7''°ty. years ago, the Chinese record tells us that Ceylon, then tributary to the Celestial Empire sent presents to the Brother of the Moon, one of theJe gifts bemg a ' lapis-lazuli spittoon.' " of ^'t"" Milt *;°r™°'"'l' ''''"p"^' "•"'■' "°' --' P™-"- ot that kind, but tries honertly to do its duty bv the coloured races. When it is remembered that out of a totd population something over three millions there are no mor tl^e bin ^ .1 8°™""»™t of Ceylon has been largely for the beneht o. the Cmghalese. Under the rule of white men Ceylon is continuing to prosper. That rule means oX justice, and security. It means also, as we have seen good water, more abundant food, increased healthin s fa ' There is a group of coral islands four hundred .,;ies -.. of Ceyion, which are called the Maldive ArehipeFag; Tie, The Story of Ceylon 69 are several hundreds in number, and are a dependency of the " Pearl of the East." Many of them are mere uninhabited islets, others are extremely beautiful and populous. Like the Laccadive Islands, which lie to the north, they are, of course, not colonies or even fortified outposts of our Empire. But they are too near to India and Ceylon for us to allow them to pass under the control of another power. THE STORY OF THE STRAITS SETTLEMENTS ANY people seem to imagine that tlie ISfalay Peninsula is remarkable for rattan canes, for the durian fruit with its indescribable smell, and for people whose only athletic exercise is running amuck. It is quite true that handy walking-sticks are grown in Malacca and its neighbourhood. It is also true that among the thousand and one fruits of Malaysia the durian grows, and that its scent is almost as strong as its compatriot the one-horned rhinoceros. But running amuck is not the daily amusement of our dark- skinned subjects in Singapore, or anywlicre else, although a well-bred IMalay would be inclined to snatch u}) his Iris and dash tlirough the streets of the Lion City, if he knew that his glorious country was so little known, or the habits of his friends so shamefully misrepresented. We are a curious people. We seem, as the late Sir John Seeley said, to have conquered and peopled half the world in a fit of absence of mind. And how ignorant many of us are about the value of the greater part of our colonies and possessions. We are not, perhaps, so ignorant as our grand- fathers were, but then their means of obtaining information were much smaller. Take, for example, the subject of this chapter — the Golden Chersonese, as John Milton more than once called the long strip of land which hangs down from 170 The Story of the Straits Settlements 1 7 1 Siam to the equator. The ancient geographers knew some- thing of it, and called it Aurea Chersonesus ; others said it was the land of Ophir. The Portuguese settled on its coast early in the sixteenth century, and Francis Xavier, " the apostle of the Indies," preached in the jungle villages of Malacca in the time of our King Henry VliL Francis Drake a..d James Lancaster made the acquaintance of Malaysian wonders in the closing years of the reign of Queen Elizabeth ; but by this time the Dutchmen were beginning their career as a great colonising power, and were preparing to supplant the Portuguese. When the East India Company obtained its charter, England learned still more about the spices and pepper of the Golden Peninsula. In the well-known historical atlas called the Thmre du Monde, which was published at Amsterdam in 1640, Malacca is spoken of as the "renowned city," "the first place in all India for trade," " the great resort of ships which come from China, the ]\Ioluccas, Ijanda, Java, Borneo, and Sumatra, to load and unload," and from which " every year a ship goes away loaded with costly merchandise for Portugal." In the following year the Dutchmen turned the " Portingals*-' out of Malacca with small ceremony, and, a hundred and°fifty years later, the monkeys in the palm-trees chattered to see the Hollanders driven out in turn by the British. So little was thought of this acquisition, that we gave it back to the Dutchmen in 1801 ; and finally, in 1825, they exchanged it for Bencoolen in Sumatra. Since that time, Malacca, now a sleepy agricultural district, "hot, still, and dreamy," has remained under the British flag It is but a small part of our Straits Settlements, and is altogether overshadowed by Singapore, that "link of the greatest value in the armed chain of Empire." The East India Company obtained Singapore, or SingaPura, as it used to be called, from the native princes by a treaty, about the year 1820, It is but a little island at the southern end of the peninsula, yet, as will presently be seen, its political and com- mercial importance is enormous. I il'i ' 72 The Making of the Empire If thi,s inlet were our only c.l.my in the f.r East, our i«noranco woul.l not bo oxcusublo, but it is really only a «.nall part of ..ur Kn.piro. Higber up tbo Straits of Malacca, an.l we,lgo,l in between Malaysia and Sun.atra, is anotber island 1 enanc^s wbicb was ban.led over to us by tbe Ilaiab of Jvedab one bundred an.l ten years ago. Little by little we estal,lisbec our position. Opposite tc it is a tiny sugar 8cUlenie,>t, called Wellesley, wbicb was bougbt a few years later. Tben tbere is the island of Pangkor, and anotber strip on tbo mainland wbicb we call tbe Dindings. Out- side tbe Straits, in tbe Indian Ocean, are the Cocos Islands and Cbristnias Islan.^ lying to tbe south-west of tbo great iJutch colony at Java. All this is very dry reading, but for the sake of those who do not know tbe meaning of the words Straits Settlements, the explanation has to bo given. A glance at the map will make it clear. ^ These Settlements are a Crown colony; that is to say, they are ruled by a Governor appointed by the British Orown, who is assisted in his work by a number of gentle, men, who are not elected by the votes of tbe colonists and foreign settlers, but are chosen by the Crown, or named by the members of the Cliamber of Commerce of Singapore and 1 enang. Within the last twenty years there has been a great revolution in Malaysia. Five splendid tropical States, of which the most important are Perak, Pahang, and Selangor have been taken under our protection. A British Resident has been sent as a sort of adviser to tbe Malay ruler of each State, and under the wise direction of these gentlemen marvellous changes have been wrought. As Mr Henry Norman tells us, these protectorates "possess hospitals (both paying and for paupers), leper hospitals, lunatic asylums, and dispensaries; there is a State store, a State factorV, and even State brickfields; there are sanitary boards and savings banks, fire-brigades and printing-offices; water- works, roads "i 1 Kiijah The Story of the Straits Settlements i ^i and railways; post-offices, telephones, and telegraphs ; schools and police; and vaccination— which is compulsory, although there is no necessity foi- C(jnipiil.sion— is performed with 'biMalo lymph,' obtained from the PastcMir Institute in Saigon. Order is preserved by forces of Siklis, linked with an equal strength of Malays, and all the duties of administra- tion are carried out under the Resident by a mere handful of Europeans .... As Sir Andrew Clarko has said, 'The result of our policy of adventure is one of which England may well be proud. A country of which in 1873 there was no map whatever, has been thrown open to the enterprise of the world. Ages of perpetual fighting and bloodshed have ended in complete tranquillity and contentment.'" The Malays and Chinamen owe great things to these bravo men. Though they are merely Residents in name, they are really Governors of the districts into which they are sent. They have in the past carried their lives in their hands. ^ At first the Malays were jealous of the intrusion of the white man, and now and again there has been a terrible . crime committed, like that of the murder of Mr. Birch in 1875. Vc-y often the British Resident was—and occasion- ally is even now- -a hundred miles from any other European. Alone in the jungle, perhaps, with only a native servant, whose religion and customs are far apart from his own; there he lives, the sole representative of the British nation,' but at the same time the representative of impartial laws and fearless justice. He keeps the Rajah of the State in order; he superintends the making of roads, bridges, and railways, of canals and other public works. He looks after the clearing of the rivers and of forest belts; he encourages the cultivation of the ground, the working of the mines, and the exporting of their produce. He works for long hours in a climate which we should think terrifically hot, and for wages which a merchant of London or Liverpool would laugh at. Within walking distance of his house is dense forest, the home of the elephant, rhinocci'ol, and :cr. 174 The Maki np- of the Empire n The result is wel] expressed in the broken Endish of « ^^ohe, of when. Miss Isabella Bird speaks n hef btk TA Mdena^rsonese : «^ Empress good-coolie get mone;t k!^^p «o^T ' . ^ -'-"^'^ ^^ P^o"d reading and tho coohes sense of protection is shared also by the Inv Chinese who liavc come to Great Britain in M i • ^ have settled down as citizens of „r Cre lit"' with the Sons of Heaven in Singap:rrHon„ Ko^ Tnd Int Vh' t' T r'"°"^ "^ °" felwX cts in India When the Englishman ceases k. be inst an .mpartral ,n his treatment of coloured races, thn and only then may we be afraid. Our countrymen abroad^re "ol r..:ri:sti::""''^'^ ""'''"' ^he'.. niggers;!.: :,::: r:imwhrd:t;Totr;ar '''' '''''' '"- '-" '- It ,s not easy to govern the mixed races of the Straits Settlements and protected Malay States, but althouT mo.o than SIX or seven years, he has done wonders In only one State, Pahang, is the progress slow. This penh.sula is truly golden, but not in the sense that the old geographers meant. It is one vast evergreen forest and in the searings anything can be mad. to g ow Zt ts tin mines twenty to twenty-five million dol ars' wort^ o are flourishing; and its soil needs but little coaxing to brin^ camphor, spices mdigo, canes, and indiarubber. As for H fruits, they arc Minumerable. Compared with the gorgeous beauty of the mainland where the trees and flowers defy description sTn^po"e' moretarhl'ifTb- '^ "°" '"T^' ^"' «>™""'^ " ^ -' more than half as big again as the Isle of Wight there is room ,n it for jungle, " where the cobra and ha,nad,,"d llv" The Story of the Straits Settlements 175 and a stray tiger is occasionally seen," room for the fire-flies to dance at night-time to the trumpets of the cicadas, and for orchids to blossom on every tree stump. When the Sultan of Johore handed it over to us less than eighty years ago dense forest covered it. A few piratical fishermen made It their lurking-place, just as their brothers on the Canton River prowled about Hong Kong before the British cleared them out. And now Singapore lias a population of nearly two hundred thousand, and is one of the great ports of the ^^'orld, an imj-'-ial outpost, a coaling-stat.on, and a place ot arms on the .i\..:hway of our trade. Though by no means unhealthy, its climate is extremely hot and moist ; at Christmastide, when we are decking our houses with holly, the orchids and stephanotis are bloomin« freely. Hence the smallness of the white population, which does not number more than six thousand Europeans and Americans. Lut what a marvellous mixture the Orientals compose! "There Malay jostles Chinaman, Kling rubs shoulders with Javanese, Arab elbows Seedie-boys, and Dyak stares at Bugis, all their dirty bodies swathed either in nothing to speak of, or else in scarlet and yellow and blue and gold." There are Chinese, Eurasians, Indians, Bengalis Burmese, Persians, all living in their different quarters in the island, trading in their own fashion, worshipping in joss- house, temple, or mosque, while above them all on Govern- ment House floats the Union Jack, the sign of government and order. And what a constant whirl of trade there is in these far- away Straits. Over fifty different steamship lines call at the port of Singapore, to say nothing of the endless variety of native craft. It is no exaggeration to say that a big slice of the world's commerce comes to Singapore, and is thence sent out again to Australia, China, and Japan. In fact, the Lion City is a Pickford's receiving-ofHce on a gigantic s^ale. VV itliin man's memory the peninsula was Malay, ilow the Chinese have come in overwhelming numbers to the \ \ mmm f 76 The Making of the Empire Straits Settlements and the protected States to settle and trade under British rula, Some writers think that tlie whole of the Chersonese will become British, and that our influence will extend fror. Bombay to Singapore. After what has been done during the last twenty years, even this would not be surprising. Amidst so much that tellg of prosperity and progress, it is not pleasant to read that ,;f late tliere existed a very bitter feelmg between the Briti: h Government at home and our fellow-subjects at Singapei.,. The trouble arose over the question of the amount oi money which the colony should pay towards the cost of foitifications and the military gar- rison. Our brothers in tl)o far East said that the Imperial Government was making too great a claim upon them especiaUy at a time when their trade had been so much disturbed by the fall in tno value of silver. It is beyond he scope of this book to deal at all with such questions as these, but we are glad that both our Government and the good people at Singapore were able to sp."]] that most useful word — Compromise. I ! 11 If Iff!* I 1 ■ THE STOEY OF BORNEO K RINCE BISMARCK once spoke of Great I^ritain as un pouvoir fmi, a finislied-up power, and there was enough truth in the remark to give it a sting, Tliirty years ago, the "Little England" partv, which treated our colonies as useless and even dangerous encumbrances, and which cared nothing for the strength of the Empire' was numerous and powerful. To-day it ""scarcely exists, and every year the feeling increases that the tiny islands which we call the United Kingdom are only a small part of Greater Britain. The fact is, tiie Anglo-Saxon race is increasing so fast, that our statesmen are forced to find new markets for trade,' and new ways of securing our command of the seas. Then' too, the eagerness of other European powers to seize upon bits of territory in every part of the globe, has made us watchful and enterprising. We have made a fresh start as a colonising power. In Africa wo hav >^ duviTig the past ten years, acquired vast slices of lan^'.. We have extended our Indian Empire, and link by ^'^ we have made our "chain of communication" wi^ft the far East more secure. As time goes on, the chain will need to be made yet stronger, and the early years of the twenti-fh century will probably see the word exten.iosi given up, and the still longer word consolidation taking its place. The behaviour of the Britisli Governments in past years 73 f ^ i yS The Mafiing of the Empire towards the great island of Borneo was curious. Tlierc the island was, lying midway between Singapore and Hong Kong, and possessing splendid harbours, in which the whole British fleet might ride in safety. In the hands of a hostile power these harbours might have been turned to terrible use against us, and our sliips plying between the Straits and China or Australia might have been captured by armed cruisers sallying out from them. But for many years the English Government turned a deaf ear to those Avho desired to see our " line of communications " made secure. It thought, no doubt, that Great Britain was big enough already, and that it had sufficient trouble and expense in providing for its growing family of troublesome children, without having to look after any fresh tribes and races. England was a weary giant. We did, it is true, take possession of the tiny island of Labuan, half a century ago. But it is little else than a coaling-station, and with North Borneo occupied by an enemy the place could not have been held. Everything, then, was left to private enterprise, and it was not until a few years ago, that the British Government made it known to the world that it had taken the north and west of the island under its protection. With the exception of Xew Guinea, it is the largest island in the world, and by this step Great Britain has secured the control of its coast for a distance of nearly two thousand miles. The three provinces thus protected are Sarawak, Brunei, and Sabah or British North Borneo. The rest of the huge island is governed by native chiefs, or is under the control of our good friends the Dutch. In the vast tropical forests this little England of ours could easily be hidden, without causing the elephants and orang-outangs any special inconvenience. The reports of its mineral wealth belong partly to fact and partly to fable. That it contains some store of diamonds and precious metals is certain, and very "tall stories " have been told by travellers The Story of Borneo lyg of gifiiit diamonds and nuggets. But it is to coal, timber, and the usual vegetable products of a tropical country, that settlers and merchants look for their future profits. European enterprise has done something, especially in Sarawak, to develop this island, which Eajah Jkooke said was the fairest and richest of the world ; but in a land of hot sunshine, where it is " always afternoon," the energies of the most persevering slacken. It is dilRcult, too, to turn natives, who for generations have hunted the heads of their fellows, into quiet tillers of the soil. The Dyaks of Sarawak and North Borneo have cease' treasure up skulls and otfer human sacrifices ; but if • luence were withdrawn, head-hunting would at once bee 3 the fashionable pastime! As the years go on, the natives and the more business-like Chinese may take a more active share in increasing the prosperity of the country ; but at present, with all the money and labour that has been expended, Eonico is a land of promise rather than of performance. Four hundred years ago, the island was in the heyday of its importance. Its native princes fared sumptu- ously, even if they were not clothed in purple and fine linen, or anything else to speak of. China came in her countless junks to trade. Large towns occupied the place of petty villages, and the far West sent its explorers and adventurers to share in Bornean wealth. Portuguese of course came first, and Dutchmen next, and shortly after- wards the English made their appearance, but no permanent settlements were made. In the opening days of the eigh- teenth century, Englishmen made a more practical start in Borneo, and, having built Avarehouses, began to traffic with the natives. But, like their Portuguese and Dutch pre- decessors, they failed. Seventy years later, pirates attacked our luckless trading settlements on the coast, and although at intervals fresh attempts were made by the East India Company, no real footing was gained in Borneo until after Queen Victoria's reign had begun. m t > 1 80 T/ie Making of the Empire Then it was that a young Englishman, James Brooke, who had been in the service of the Company, determined that, even if others had failed in Borneo, he would succeed. He bought " a rakish slaver-brig, two hundred and ninety tons burden, one that would fight or fly as occasion re- quired," and set sail for the distant East. It was a rasli adventure, but Brooke was only thirty-one years of age, and was weary of his aimless life. His object was partly to trade and partly to discover, but no real plan seems to have been thought out. But the brig never reached Borneo. Four years after, he tried again, and, in a yacht of one hundred and forty-two tons, reached Sarawak in August 1839. The Kajah received him graciously, and granted him permission to travel in the interior of the country. When he returned to Borneo a few months later, '.he Kajah sought his help in quelling a serious rebellion, and in return foi his services offered him the government of Sarawak. The country was in a terrible condition — murder and pillage were of daily occurrence. Out of such a chaos as this Rajah Brooke made a settled State. Men who had lived by piracy became decent citizens, head-hunting was checked, the op- pressed were shielded against the strong, wise laws were made, and, in a word, Brooke became the Great Protector of Sarawak. Will it be believed that, with the exception of aiding him to destroy the pirates who swarmed in the Eastern seas, the British Governments, one after another, refused to give him the slightest help, or even to recognise Sarawak as an independent State? Again and again he pointed out the benefits which England would gain from making the country a protectorate. "A political position, an increasing trade, the development of one of the fairest countries on the globe, and an ample supply of coal," said Brooke in 1858, "are the advantages which Sarawak offers for permanency and slight support." But no ; " the colonies are already too numerous," said Lord Derby. Weary with repeated disappointments, ffiti LADY BUOOKE, RANl5l.: OF SAUAWAK. [From a photograph, h,j permission of l\ Kingsbuuv, v.''.!vdm':orth Common, S. W.) 181 i ik sil 1 H ! 1 1 f II f; ! 11 ' i m f:' i The Story of Borneo >83 and iniaLlo to govern his country luiaMod, Urooko even went po far as to offer it to Holland and France. We deserved to liave lost thin part of Borneo for ever. When he had visited I*]ngland in 1847, lionours had been sliowcred upon him. He liad been made a Knight Com- mander of the Bath, and many flattering things liad been said. But it was not till twenty years after he had been laid to rest in the little Devonshire cluuchyard that the much-desired protectorate of Sarawak was proclaimed. He was one of the real IMakers of Empire, and the good work that he did lias been carried on with splendid results by his nephew, the present Kajali. Sir Charles and Lady Brooke are greatly beloved by their people, and the secret of their influence is that they rule by kindness rather than by fear. As Lady Brooke has said, both the Kajali and she are always accessible to those who desire an interview. Their palace stands close to the water's edge, and " in the early morning the path leading from the landing-place to the doors of the palace is thronged with natives of either sex and various denominations, awaiting the Rajah's return from his daily ride, with some grievance or petition. A few moments are devoted to these people, who are almost always requested to attend the court on the opposite side of the river, where the Rajah, aided by the three principal Malay chiefs, and two of his English officers, dispenses justice three times a week." To this charming lady the Malay women owe much. She has made herself their friend, she has encouraged them to learn to read and write, and she even claims to have persuaded the chiefs to give up the practice of keeping several wives. Sarawak is about 50,000 miles in area, and contains a population of 300,000. Those who love milk puddings may be interested to learn that Rajah Brooke's country produces half of the world's sago supply, in addition to quicksilver, antimony, indiarubber, coal, and other things which are not generally considered good eating. 1 84 The Makifi^ of the Empire Just as the East India Company, nearly three hundred years ago, laid the foundation of our Empire in Ilindcstan, and as laryo provinces iu Africa are now being developed by English companies, so part of Eorneo is controlled by the British Noith IJornco Company. It obtained its charter from Quoon Victoria in 1881, two hundred and ei-],ty years after Queen Elizabeth signed the patent of the East India Company. And what changes in our Empire time has brought about I Little England has become a fifth part of the whole world. The tiny ships of the Elizabethan sailors liave been replaced by giant ironclads and swift liners Our distant possessions are linked together by electric cables, and at the same time our responsibilities have increased enormously. I5ut an even better change has come over public opinion. We are more sensitive as to the manner in which our adventurers behave towards the native races, and althou-h at times we hear of a lack of straightforwardness in the dealings of our pioneers, there can be no question that mirrht IS no longer considered right, as it was in the Elizabethan or even Georgian age. Moreover, what a man does in our most distant colonies and dependencies is quickly known • to evildoers the words of that talebearer — the electric telegraph — are as wounds. The object of the r.ritish North Borneo Company is declared to be, to open up the country to trade, to govern and control a territory of pirates and savages, and to found a commercial colony. The Company has twenty million acres of land within its borders, but its progre, , has been slow. Slackness of trade has caused the directors great anxiety, just as it has made business men in England look grave. But prospects now are more encouraging^. The country is very lovely, and its climate, though hot°, is not unhealthy. Its great forests contain "millions of tons of timber, hundreds of thousands of tons of cane, and tens of thousands of tons of guttapercha and indiarubber." The dilHculty, of course, is to make use of this wealth. Rajah The Story of Borneo 185 prooko has proved that whifco men can live in r.ornco, but It IS hardly to ho expected that the number of Kuropean f^ettlers will greatly increase. We have, however, given settled government to a groat part of the i«lan.l. Wc have put down piracy and made liead-huntnig of rare occurrence. We have opened new markets for our trade, and have prevented those who may some day be our enemies from establishing themselves up.^n the coast and threatening our shippinrr. It is, however, to bo feared that" the most interestincr thing about British New ]]orneo, in the eyes of an En-Ii.h schoolboy, is the beauty of its postage stamps. It is a pity though, that these are made in Knglan.l. Unlike the ar-iis pheasant and PambAr deer, therefore, whose portraits th(>y give, these beautiful labels are "not home produce." lt-t:f*-0^.0-i>-^ \.v STATK OP ___ XOKTH BORNEO m m'mi^\ .^ \ 4^ 4^y w % "^"^ 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N. . 14580 (716) 872-4503 '«^ #? ^ A ^ \ €^ ^> THE STORY OF PIONG KONG HONG KONG, "the place of sweet streams,'- is one of the most remarkable spots on the earth's surface. It is one of a cluster of tiny islands on the Canton River, a bit broken off, as it were, from Horrible China. And yet of no place have we greater reason to be proud. Even in vast Australia the British race has done no better work. Fifty-five years ago it was a desolate spot, peopled by a few sickly Chinese fisherfolk ; now it is the fourth port of the Empire. Once it had an evil name for being the haunt of pirates, and that is why the Portuguese called the islands the Ladrones, or Robber islands. Now it is the Gibraltar of the China seas, a naval station, and a place of enormous trading importance. We obtained possession of it in the great "Opium War" with China which broke out in 1839. News travelled slowly in those days, and it was not until March 12, 1840, that the announcement appeared in the Times: "Intelligence has just reached town that the Governor-General of India has, in the name of the British Government, declared war against China. This important news is contained in despatches from Bombay, dated January 31." Great as China was, she was no more able to fight England than she has lately been a1)le to stand up against Japan. Cantoii surrendered, and, in November 1842, it was 18(i The Story of Hong Koug 187 announced ii London that a treaty of peace had been entered into; by wiiich China agreed to pay twenty-one milhon dollars, and to cede the island of Hong Kon- to Her Britannic Majesty. ° Before the w r, however, was over, it was known that Hong Kong was to be one of the prizes of victory, and, as a matter of course, people wrote to the newspapers about the worthlessness of the place. Some of the letters are very amusing. One writer complains that the island is formed of granite rock, with scarcely a "vestage" of vegetation, except a few spots used as gardens by the poor fishermen who inhabit it. Then he goes on to say, "If our trade in tuture IS to be confined to this miseraUe island, the loss by accidents to laden boats, during a voyage from Canton, will be very great. A loorse situation could not have been selected for trade, and that is the reason why the Chinese have so readily ceded it." In the following year an even worse account is given by another wise-head, who said that "the site selected for a town IS totally unfit for such a purpose. In a place where hill towers over hill, hoio is it possible for man to subsist?^' But, while the croakers were busy in England, Captain Llhott was equally busy in China. He mapped out the spot for a new colony in the island, and sold plots of land for houses. It was a fortunate thing that no attention was paid to the writers of letters. Whatever may : our opinions as to the justice of making war upon China, Hong Kon- has been proved to be the best possible place for trade. °And although the moist heat of summer is simply terrible the stately villas and bungalows on the "Peak" show that life in the island can be made very pleasant. ^ Now it must not be supposed that this Chinese island IS beautiful like Ceylon, for exami)Ie. It has nothing of the glory of an island in the tropics. Its soil is poor and Its lofty hills barren. It is, in fact, a fortified rock' 'iJ '. 1 88 The Making of the Empire with a splendid harbour. But if nature has failed to give it beauty, the hand of the white man has done much in the way of planting trees and laying out public gardens. Miss Bird, the well-known lady traveller, speaks of the deep shade of the palms and bananas; and Mr. Henry Norman, in his recent book, The Far East, says that, as soon as you begin to ascend, the streets of Ilong Kong might be alleys in the tropical conservatories at Kew. Victoria, the capital, is a fine city ; and when it is compared with filthy Canton, ninety miles off, the difference between the manners and customs of Europeans and Chinese is plainly seen. In the Chinese quarter, the yellow man tries hard to keep his home as dirty as his brother on the main- land ; and although John Chinaman has secured a big slice of Hong Kong trade, the progress of the island is due to the "foreign devils," as he is pleased to call the British and Americans. Upon this one J barren rock there are now cathedrals, colleges, hospitals, banks, barracks for our soldiers, schools, factories, and, in a word, everything which makes a city great. Splendid docks have been constructed round the base of the island, and across the tiny strait which separates it from British Kow-loon. Here ships of all sizes, from the biggest iron-clad to the daintiest yacht, can be repaired. Viewed from the heights, 1800 feet above the sea, the harbour is a wonderful sight, both by night and day. " It is the focus of the traffic of the East, though what this means one cannot realise until one has looked down many times into its secure blue depths, and noted all that is there : the great mail-liners— the P. and 0., the Messageries Maritimes, the North German Lloyd, the Austrian Lloyd, the Occidental and Oriental, the Pacific Mail, and the Canadian Pacific; the smaller mail -packets to Tongking, to Formosa, to Borneo, to Manila, and to Siam; the ocean 'tramps,' ready to get up steam at a moment's notice, and carry anything anywhere ; the white-winged sailing-vessels resting after their i k. (iHi, #f' ■'--'«».^ STliEKT OF STEPS IN UOKG KONG. 180 The Slory of Hong Kong 191 'ong fligl.U; the innumerable Ingl.-sterned junks plying to every port on the Chinese eoast; and all the mailed hoste rival, t« the yellow crown of the tiny Portuguese gunboat or the dragon pennant of China." 1 . ^ S"""""" Of course Hong Kong is strongly fortified by batteries and mines; but as, in the event of war with China J p or any Wpe^n power, our colony would surely be attacked rhrporecte.'"^"' ^^ -- ""- '»"■ -^ — - ->' The population for so small a place-it is only thirty m les m area-rs also very great. The Chinese far "ul at n ooVvir ""' ''""f""" "^ "><' '^' — . «°- 238 000 t/ 7- "T '"'' '™'"^" »"» of " total of 238,000 The fact is that the Chinamen find that their lives and property are far safer under the rule of Enc,th men than under their precious Mandarins. And yet, when- ver anything goes wrong in Hong Kong, they always put th trouble down to the "foreign devils/' When we bull a tramway up to the Peak, they cried out that we Ze making the evil spirits angry; and in the time of the relen plague they laid all the blame on the English, and not on their own dirty habits. The Chinese are 0. e of those sdveTh?' ''"'"" ^^'" "■'"* "- more difflcuU :elbefor:':Ser ""* '"^ ^'^""-' <=-■"'- -or The Hong Kong people recently asked for power to manage heir own affairs, instead of being ruled as a brown colony W an Enghsh Governor. They sent a petition to the BrLh Government, m which they pointed out that Hong Kon. CvDruT IT ^r ""V" "™ ""■'"^ f'^" oven Malta! Cyprus, Mauritius, or British Honduras. Now, if there ' Norman's The Fur East. 192 The Making of the Empire \\\\\\ I was anything like a majority of British or European residents, their request would at once be granted. But it is felt thjit it would not be safe to entrust the Chinese with the right of elect- ing representatives ; while to give a vote to Europeans and to refuse it to highly-educated and wealthy Chinese merchants would be unfair. Thus it is that the presence in the colony of so many " Sons of Heaven " is a hard nut for the British Government to crack. But there is another difficulty. The island has long been the resort of the Chinese of the baser sort. Forty years ago, the European inhabitants of Hong Kong used to sleep with loaded pistols under their pillows, and even now the most vigilant watch has to be kept over the criminal population. Hong Kong suffered terribly during the plague which broke out in the Chinese quarter in the May of 1894. By the end of July between two and three thousand deaths had occurred. The loss to the colony amounted to a million dollars; and it will take some time before it recovers its good name. Steamers naturally avoided the port, and had it not been for the heroic behaviour of the British garrison, the colony might have been utterly ruined. The Chinese, whose filthy ways had caused the pestilence, either left the island in thousands, or refused to lielp in checking the spread of disease. Then it was that three hundred, volunteers were called for, from the ranks of our little army, to bring out and bury the corpses, and cleanse and disinfect the reeking hovels. Three hundred answered the appeal, and for weeks " the whitewash brigade " laboured at their dangerous task. In the teeth of strong opposition from the Chinamen, they soaked the houses with disinfectants, and burned tons of filth in the streets. Captain Vesey and five of the gallant Shropshire Light Infantry were struck down by the plague while thus engaged, and it was not until September that the colony was declared to be free from the disease. Reference was made in the House of Commons to "this fresh instance of the gallantry and devotion of our residents, lit that it t of elcct- ns and to lerchants 10 colony le British The Story of Ifon^ Ko7tg 193 of the ...,.Ue.wa.h ^^ ^^^^T^^^ -'- ^\ e have turned a pirates' nest into a great colony W„ Lave made of it a frontier fortress, a naval de ,6t and „ 7 port open to the traders of the wo Id ' ' " ^™ ong been 'ears ago, ieep with the most alation. le which ^94. By 50,ths had I million sovers its and had garrison, Chinese, r left the he spread olunteers , to bring ifect the peal, and at their from the ants, and T and five ick down not until from the nmons to >n of our t3 THE STORY OF NEW GUINEA 1: n |R. PUNCH is an admirable historian, and those who are fortunate enough to possess a copy of liis Victorian Era slioiild not part witli it. He does not teach ns as our schoolmasters did, but he manages to make us remember. It is not an exaggeration to say that in these three volumes we can find a better record of the events of our Queen's reign than in many a dull manual. For an example we may turn to the year 1883, and, under the date August 25, we find a cartoon by Sir John Tenniel, entitled "jMossoo's Little Game." It represents a French sportsman firing at a guinea-pig which his poodle dog — the French press — has put up. From the sportsman's belt hang a cockatoo which is labelled Madagascar, and a barn-door cock called Cochin- China. Underneath are written the words — "Aha! I 'ave ze Oocliin China, and ze Madagascar, I will pot now ze little— a New-Guinea Pig ! " Later on, in 1885, there is another cartoon, in which a fat little John Bull is sitting staring open-mouthed at Prince Bismarck. A large plum-pudding is on the table between them, and the German Chancellor, with a big slice in one hand, is carving out another huge portion with the other. This second supply is called New Guinea, and Bismarck is "The Greedy Boy." 194 The Story of New Gmnca Limes we Let us take them in order Tv^ni^o tcKe possession of the south-eastern part of N-^w Pn,- Jhoy .e.e afraid ,.t France, .ho .X^LTJ^^^ ou for islands whore hor convicts might be sent sT ^? s:e;;„crthat*f \'°^^ "' ''- ^--^ q— woufAave 1 1 '™^' ''"^ *""'^ ^ "''^»''. ">eir colony were then urging her to sot n'w G'uLea"'"" ""^^"^^'^ hnt If the uneasiness of the Australians was orMi- if , of the mother-country to the welfare of her colonies tI 1884, proclamation was ,nade, and a Z'h Pn "' auDointed fc, ♦„!.» 1, T , Sh Commissioner Eh nei!ih 71 '^ '^' ""' protectorate. Our i'rench neighbours and their convicts, therefore did not capture the Guinea-pig after all. ' ""' at fll in^^^w'? "f °°* '''''«^''- ^l"^ ™°''' passage e was a the year was the rived at of seven IS ! were ire were )f them, i^ere the tnent of sh felons r to seek •odk had B Home Luminals, y sort of ren who STATUE OF CAPTAIN tOOK AT SYDXKY, X.S.W. 213 \Hl'< II' II : i i t < f- :i,lii mm The Story of Australasia 215 had been found guilty of stealing apples or picking pockets, seems to us now almost inconceivable cruelty. This abominable practice lasted until thirty years ago Many of us have shuddered over the story told by Charles Reade m his Never too Late to Mend, and the even more harrowmg novel, For the Term of His Natural Life, from the pen of Uv. Marcus Clarke, and we have wondered that a civilised nation should have continued such a system However, it is all past and done with, but for years escaped convicts and ticket-of-leave men made the lives and property of squatters or farmers in lonely districts insecure. Escap- ing to the woods, they were called bushrangers, and until quite recently their descendants were a terror to the colonists. The country close around Botany Bay was found unsuit- able for settlement, and the whole party of willing and imAvilling visitors was shifted a little further north to Port Jackson. The side of the cove upon which the commander's house was erected was called Sydney, and the little band of settlers thus became the founders of the great and beautiful capital of New South Wales. Around them was dense virgin forest, haunted by wild ammals, and by black men armed with boomerangs, spears and stone hatchets. To-day, the English tourist finds a stately city, in a high stage of progress and civilisation. ^ew South Wales is half as large again as France, and its population IS about a million and a quarter. Its exports and imports amount to between forty and fifty million pounds every year, and it is calculated that the number of sheep in the colony is fifty-eight millions-that is to say, just double the flocks of Great Britain and Ireland. For a colony which was started a hundred years ago, and which scarcely made any progress until the present century was several years old tiiesG figures are startling. ^ The visitor to i\ew SouLh Walos who talks with the old inhabitants, and hears thoir stories of the hardships they irfrBii li'ii If h 2 1 6 The Making of the Empire endured, and then looks at the wealth and prosperity around him, begins to feel that life in the Old World is very slow. About the time that Queen Victoria came to the throne, sheep-farming had become a profitable industry, and men were taking up land and becoming squatters. They would set out from the coast with their tin pannikin or billy, their guns and blankets, tea, flour, and sugar. Having chosen a suitable spot where there was good herbage and water, they would apply to the Governor for permission to start farming. Many of these squatters were convicts who had served their time, or were Englishmen to whom the crowded cities of the Old Country had become intolerable. The life on these sheep-farms and cattl(!-runs was healthy, and not without that spice of danger which an al)le-bodied Briton loves. '"Tvvas merry in the glowing morn, among the gleaming grass, To wander as we've wandered many a mile, And blow the cool tobacco cloud, and watch the white wreaths pass, Sitting loosely in the saddle all the while. 'Twas merry 'mid the blackwoods, when we spied the station roofs, To wheel the wild scrub cattle at the yard. With a running fu-e of stock-whips and a fiery run of hoofs ; Oh I the hardest day was never then too hard ! " But it was not always sunshine and prosperity. The ravages of sheep disease, of dingoes and kangaroos, caused bitter disappointments. Then there were attacks by black men and bushrangers— ruffians over whom Morgan and Ned Kelly have thrown a sort of romance, just as Dick Turpin has thrown a halo over the lives of the cowardly desperadoes of Hounslow Heath. Cattle and sheep would be driven off; others would perish by drought: sometimes the squatter's hut would be fired ; sometimes he could not get his flocks to market for want of sufficient hands. All these troubles J around is very ) throne, md men !y would or billy, Having lage and ission to cts who lom the olerable. healthy, e-bodied grass, ) wreatlis 3 station loofs ; . The , caused ly black .nd Ned Turpin )eradoes ven off; [uatter's s flocks iroubles 217 I 'I { j !-. I The Story of Australasia 2 1 9 would come npou the settler. Sometimes he failed, and sometimes he made a huge fortune. In 1851, the sheep-farmers found their difficulty in obtain- ing labour increased by the great gold discoveries, which turned the heads of Australians. In the year following, nearly a million ounces were found. No wonder, therefore, that men gave up wool and sought for gold ! At the present time, Avool, gold, silver, and coal are the cliief wealth of the A squatter's station in tiik old days. colony. Of the former, ten million pounds' toorth is often exported in one single year. When the Si/dney .lazette was first published, that is, in 1803, an English naval lieutenant sailed from New South Wales, for the purpose, it was said, of establishing another convict settlement in Tasmania. The more probable reason for his journey was the fact that France was o.astina lonrrin^ eyes upon the island, and England had no wish to see\er old enemy in Australian waters. 1 I I \m- IfiUi ^^'' In; 2 20 T/ie Making of the Empire The lieutenant arrived in time with his human cargo, and thus the second settlement of Australia was made? ' The spot chosen was found, after a year or two, to be unsuitable, and it was changed to the opposite side of the river, whore now stands the flourishing town of Iloljart. The island was lovely and fertile, but the progress of the plantation was not even so rapid as that of Sydney on the mainland. For nearly thirty years wars raged between the settlers and the blacks, who numbered six or seven thousand. Food, too, rose to famine prices, and occasionally the state of the white visitors was desperate. Bushrangers as well as the woolly- headed, spear-throwing natives harassed them, and armed guards had to be appointed to protect the scanty wheat crops. In 1818, the settlement did not number four thousand persons, but better times came with the throwing open of the island to "free colonists," and, in 1825, Tasmania was made an independent colony. It is interesting to note that, three years before that date, the first Tasmanian Sunday school was established. To-day an English settler finds in Tasmania the comforts of the Old Country. He finds, too, far greater freedom, a superb climate, and a land of exquisite beauty. Fine ron.ds, railways, and stage-coaches make travelling easy. The savages, who made the lives of the early colonists almost intolerable, have disappeared. Tliis is not altogether a subject for satisfaction, because, although the blacks were often atrociously cruel, they were fighting for their lands and hunting-grounds, which they rightly judged were in danger. Moreover, the introduction of spirits into their midst was a crime, and we have in olden lays been guilty of similar offences in widely distant parts of the world. The mineral resources of Tasmania have been developed. Gold, coal, and tin have added to its wealth. Fruit-growin» is an important industry; in fao.t, the island is a huge Covent Garden Market, only the prices charged for its The Story of Australasia 221 irgo, and le. The [Suitable, T, wliore land was was not d. For and the )od, too, 16 white s woolly- i armed y wheat housand open of nia was strawberries and grapes are not so exorbitant. In the year ending March 1893, no less than a quarter of a million cases of apples were exported to England, and nearly a million pounds weight of jams were also sent abroad. Evc-yone knows, or ought to know, how delicious is the flavour of these apples, and therefore it is to be regretted that, although such large quantities have boon shipped for our enjoyment, the profits made by the growers have been occasionally very small. The island has recently passed through a time of severe trade depression, but as the area is more than 15,000,000 acres, and only 540,000 acres are at present under cultivation, it is clear that the twentieth century will see a vast increase in Tasmanian importance. It is fortunate for us that there are such glorious islands as these, where we may take refuge when there is no standing-room left in England. lat date, :omforts edom, a e ron.ds, . The almost ether a cs were T lands vere in their 1 guilty d. eloped, growing I huge for its (iiniiititili%IMiiMilli>ll THE STORY OF AUSTRALASIA 1 1 CHAPTER II N the year 1825, a clioice collection of some of the worst convicts of Sydney, under a strong military guard, was landed in that part of Queensland where now stands the city of Brisbane. What an extraordinary way our grandfathers had of using God's earth ! They allowed criminals to associate together, and expected that they would turn out industrious colonists. Now, instead of having to enlarge our home prisons, or scour the globe for places upon which we can " plant " our convicts, Ave are able to pull down Millbank and build a picture gallery, and turn Coldbath Fields Gaol into a depart- ment of the Post-Office. It is not that we are so very much more virtuous; it is that our system of punishing law- breakers has been changed. Yet our grandfathers saw nothing foolish in this treatment of evil-doers, and they seemed to have cared little if penal settlements did not make successful colonies. Truly the French poet was right when he said, "Many things which do not shock us will be regarded as unimagin- able crimes by those who come after us." Tlie rack was thought to be a very proper form of punishment in the seventeenth century, but it was looked upon with horror in 222 some of a strong part of city of of using together, jolonists. or scour nt " our build a a depart- iiy much ing law- lers saw nd they did not , "Many nimagin- ?ack was t in the tiorror in The Story vf Aiistralasia 223 the niiiotcontli. So wo regard traiisportiition as being barbarous, wherea.s forty years ago it was a mutter of every- day occurrence. No real progress was made in the (Queens- land colony until it was thrown open to all comers, and the convicts were withdrawn. The first emigrant ships arrived in 1848, and, eleven years afterwards, the colony was made self-governing, instead of being a mere dependency of New South Wales. It is a giant land, twelve times as largo as Englaml and Wales. ^ Part of it lies within the tropics. The eastern district is mai'ked by luxuriant vegetation, vast forests with rich stores of timber, and a climate in which anything, from tobacco to alligators, from oranges and sugar-cane to turtles and sea-slugs, flourishes. Abundant pasturage exists for sheep and oxen. Vast fortunes have been made in its gold mines, from which more than ten million ounces have been obtained since its first discovery. Its stores of coal and tin are no less rich. But there is another side to the picture. If Queensland contains some of the most fertile country in the world, it also contains some of the most desolate ; dry, cracked, and gaping plains, which stretch for hundreds of miles, and which are lit for neither man nor beast. " Dull, dark scrub all around, a sandy barren soil underfoot, a cloudless sky and a hot relentless sun overhead. Even more desolate than he usual dreary-looking scrub of the interior of Australia is this lonely thicket. The trunks of the stunted trees are gnarled and crooked, the foliage is scant and almost shadcless, the ground absolutely free from all undergrowth, and a deep, lifeless quiet reigns throughout." ^ This is the sort of country— waterless and horrible— which baffles the skill and energy of the settler, and in which many more travellers than poor Dr. Leichhardt have perished miserably. Apart from these plains of salt bush and porcupine grass, there is plenty of good land yet unoccunied in Oueensland. ^ raveuc's Talcs of the Austral Tropics. 1 224 The Afakin(^ of the Empire IP ,r i , TIhto Ir cvon more in Wostcrn Aiistuilia, or Swan River Settk'iiiont, na it used to be calkMl. It is the largest as well as the most l)ackwar(l of all the divisions of the Australian continent. It is no less than ei^ht times as ])ig as England, Scotland, and Ireland put together. Its climate is perhaps the healthiest in the world, and yet its po[)ulation at the last census was only 123,000. It is calculated that there arc only "05 persons to the s(piare mile, while in the United Kingdom there are 311. In the south-west of the colony towns have sprung up rapidly, but in the micUUo and north there is waterless and unexplored aesert, and untrodden forest land, where giant Eucalyptus trees du arf the Sequoias of California. Western Australia was settled in the year 182G ; that is to say, a party of convicts and soldiers was sent to King George's Sound by the Governor of Now South Wales, wlio was afraid tliat the French were likely to take possession. He was willing to deprive himself of the pleasure of the convicts' society rather than have France for a neighbour. It was rare unselfishness ! Three years afterwards, the Swan River Settlement was formed. A large number of emigrants arrived from the Old Country. They came because the Government promised them grants of land, and no doubt their hopes ran high. They got their land, but found the natives so troublesome, and food so scanty, that for a number of years these unfortunate settlers were in "doleful dumps." They felt themselves lost in this enormous wilderness, so they actually drew up a petition to the English Government, asking that convicts as well as more emigrants might be sent out. This strange request was at once granted, and whole shipfuls of criminals were despatched. The number of free emigrants was not so large, but on the whole the colony benefited by the introduction of convicts. They were employed in road- making and building, and some of the best parts of Perth — the capital city — were constructed by convict labour. Now the " Country of Parrats " and of beautiful black swans has Ill River -J as well lalriilian ''ngliiiul, perhaps 1 at tliu at there I United J colony id north itrodden luoias of irl82G; sent to 1 Wales, to take of the ance for ent was the Old )romised m high, blesome, cs these hey felt actually ing that t. This ipfuls of ;nigrants jfited by in road- Perth— r. Now vans has IS The Story of Atistraiasia 227 was not even a printing-press to be found in the colony. continent and ascertain if the interior were fit to be the home of Europeans. Lieutenant (afterwards Sir George) Grey started, in the year before our Queen's accession to the throne, but did no get far from tlie coast. Eyre, who subsequently became Governor of Jamaica, tried what he could do, foifr orXe years later, and very nearly lost his life. Twenty years aso Mr Giles, Colonel Warburton, and Mr. Forrest' sCcTed m getting across at different points, but their sufferings and hardships were terrible. They each found that the country contained barren rocks and stretches of desert, riverlcss ftirb '.;^'"%."''»^ "the air is so aglow with heat hai a grim black expanse of scrub," and salt-water pools tha sparkle in the sunlight and mock the traveller's thL The resulfa of the recent Elder Expedition force us to believe with Dr. Wallace, that about one-third of the e^ti e rSei^"^"'^ "" "^ "^ " **«• -^-^^^^ -^ rl^^^^T^^r^J "'" *'™'^ "f "'^ <=™" P"te Of the colony, "the Cinderella of the Australias " has during the past year or two, been doing great things. Her fine pasture- ands are being stocked with sheep and cattle, her Lnlr forests are beginning to resound with the blows of the wood- man s axe, her seas are yielding up their pearls, her vineyards Westralia is looking most eagerly. &.r Wilham Robinson, the first Governor of the colony m rfC'r:,^!-'"-^. -".'^ ^"'^^ -'^'^" ^^^ -n^ryZ ■•<:■-■ -l^-sovurument was granted to it four and a half years ago, he said that "the wealth which Ues hidden in •■WMWSMMHhMnniiMii, m i t ip II 22 8 ne Making of the Evipire the area of country from Kimberley to Diindas, no man can rightly predict." He told his hearers, too, that the size of the Murchison and Coolgardie gold-fields was more than three times the area of Ireland \ and he finished his speech by saying: "Cinderella went up a short time ago to Coolgardie in rags, and exchanged them for the golden robes of the princess whose fame has reached you even here." What Dampier prophesied, two hundred years ago, has come true. Of all the stories told about Australia, that of the colony of Victoria, and the rise of its capital, Melbourne, is the strangest. The country which in 1803, and again in 1826, was reported to be fit neither for settlers nor convicts, has during the past forty-four years produced two hundred and for, ij million pounds' worth of goM, and given a home to multitudes of white men. Where, half a century ago, kangaroos bounded among the trees, and little kangaroos looked out suspiciously from their mothers' pouches at black savages, or caught occasional glimpses of white men, the proud city of Melbourne now stands. The river which runs past docks and wharves was then reedy and rushgrown, a haunt of wild-fowl and black swans. Sixty years ago, John Batman sailed from Tasmania in the Rebecca^ a little schooner of thirty tons. He went up the Yarra, and moored his boat to a gum tree. He was deter- mined to find out if the reports about the unfitness of the country were true. He found a silent wilderness, but his quick eye saw that it was a land of promise. In a few months, other settlers arrived, and by the end of the year there were fifty men, women, and children encamped on the site of modern Melbourne — now one of the chief cities of the Empire. Their homes were of the rudest and most primit- ive kind. Sometimes they were mere huts of bark or liiiixufaF, liaiicvi ivuacij tuj^CKiiei, Or Klliipiy tJllUU.S VI CUnVaS, under which the thievish blacks could crawl, and which the wind would overturn. man can le size of )re than s speecli ago to 3 golden m here." las come B colony J, is the in 1826, icts, has 'red and home to long the om their 3ca.sional me now rves was ad black la in the I up the IS deter- 3 of the but his 1 a few the year aped on cities of t primit- bark or canvas, lich the The Story of A tistralasia 229 Life, though free, was full of hardships and privations. Men had to carve out of forest and wilderness their places of settlement; working with axe and spado, and with loaded firearms be.ide them, in case of an attack by bush- rangers or blackinen. They were making the K.npire, while their brothers in the Old Country wore, as ^^r. Molesworth says, "going mad with misery." In 1837, the ground was surveyed by the Sydney Govern- ment, and divided into lots, which were sold by auction One man bought three plots for one hundred and thirty .even pounds, and sold them some time afterwards for ten thou- sand pounds; while another lot, which was knocked down for less than a hundred pounds, fetched at a recent sale forty thousand pounds. This marking out of the country showed that John Batman's opinion was being shared by the authoriQes. The population was beginning to increase, and in the month of September in the same year, the name of Melbourne was given to the little settlement, out of respect for our young Queen's first Prime Minister. But it was a grand name for this poor village. Even in 1840, according to an early pioneer who has recently l)ublished his reminiscences, it was but a group of hastily run-up wooden shanties, with only two or three brick buildings. There was really nothing to tempt settlers to make any stay on the Yarra, it was better to go up country and become squatters. Land could be got for a mere trifle, and the climate and pasturage were found favourable for sheep The history of the colony until 1851 is an uneventful one' Settlers were com nig in large numbers. The population had increased to 77,000; everyone talked about wool, or about having a government of their own and beincr inde- pendent of JS^ew South Wales. ° This wish was realised, and Port Philip became the province of Victoria. The other event of 1851 was of a more sensational kind, and stopped for a time all talk about 2;o The Making of the Empire wool. Gold was discoverod in extraordinary quantities. Tlie entire population became " drunk with gold." Squatters left tlieir farms, shepherds their sheep, merchants their desks, sailors their ships, and engaged in the toilsome search for the precious metal. Tens of thousands of emigrants arrived. Ships lay in the bay waiting for cargoes which could not be despatched for want of sailors, and townships sprang up almost like mushrooms in a damp summer's night. Food and house accommodation rose to fabulous prices. The hard- ships of a digger's life and the utter want of any security for person or property, dismayed no one. Hundreds fell victims to exposure and violence. Great fortunes were made by lucky diggers, only to be squandered in dissipation. Unlucky searchers often became dosperate, and, at the risk of being " shot at sight," turned thieves. Dr. Wallace has thus summed up some of the results of the great gold fever : " The influx of men of all classes from the mother-country, and of almost all the races of the world, together with numbers of released or escaped convicts from the neighbouring colonies, led to a struggle for existence, in which only the most hardy, the most energetic, the most patient, the most far-seeing, could succeed. Thus, amid much trouble, much degradation, and much crime, the seething mass of humanity, drawn together by the love of gold, has worked itself into something like order ; and the result is a population of almost unexampled energy, which is now steadily engaged in developing all the resources of a fertile and beautiful country." Such is, in brief, the strange story of the making of Melbourne and Victoria. To-day the London of the Anti- podes has, with her suburbs, a population of half a million. Some of her public buildings are princely, and worthy of any Old World metropolis. And yet, when our grandfathers were boys, Melbourne was unexplored forest and scrub. Victoria, like all her sisters, has recently had her dark days of money troubles, when bank failures plunged many [uantities. Squatters nts their ine search emigrants lich could ps sprang it. Food rhe hard- curity for 11 victims made by Unlucky of being results of sses from he world, icts from stence, in the most aid much seething gold, has result is 1 is now a fertile aking of ihe Anti- , million. ly of any lers were ler dark ed many RAILWAY THliOrGII THE GIl'l'SLAXD FOREST (VICTOIUA). M ' -Tf •231 F-asmoi^mmimxifiimm u i I r I; The Story of Australasia 233 with Lf T'i",*' P°T'^- ^'' '^''^ '''' ^^ «°°^Pa"«on with her splendid growth and prosperity, mere trifles, which these. The crew of the Greater Britain are her sons and will weather them also. ^un.,ana The last of the five great divisions of Austrah'a to be ZTa' 7V\" ^T '""'^ '^ ^^^^ ^ ^^^^«h tlie name of Soutli Austraha lias been given. The name now is inaccu- rate because it stretches for 2000 miles from the south right across the continent to the north. It is more con- iroper, (2) the great desert of the centre, an: (3) the iNorthern or tropical territory. ^ The southern shores were first traced by a Dutch mariner m 1^27 but It was to Lieutenant Flinders that the honour of Its real discovery is due. He came at the beginning of the present century, and made a careful examination of the coasts. No knowledge, howeve,, was obtained of the interior till Sturt and Eyre, and, in later .ears, Warburton Forrest, and the Scotchman Stuart, made their perilous and remarkable journeys. Some sixty years ago, a body of emigrants from the Mother Country arrived in South Australia, and fixed upon the place where Adelaide now stands as the site for their firs attempts at settlement. They cam-' out under the protection of an Act of Parliament, which not only pro- hibited the planting of convicts, but made the future settle- ment a Crown colony. The colony was thus formed before there were any colonists; but, nevertheless, it was saved trom the evils of the convict system. For some few years the settlers made but little progress but when copper was discovered in the early Forties^ the tide of progress began to flow. In fourteen years the " population increased from a few hundreds to 64 000 ihen came news of the great gold-find in Victoria ' and : in 234 The Making of the Empire {lit men left their copper-mines and grazing-groimds for the diggings. The streets of Adelaide are said to have been deserted, and grass began to grow in the chief thoroughfares. Houses were abandoned, business come almost to a stand- still, and ii was some time before South Australia rccovnrcd from this gold fever. To-day the colony's prospects arc fairly bright, but the population shows a very small incroase during the past ten years. The cultivation of the land is said to be almost stationary ; the vineyards, however, are growing in numbers and importance. Ostrich farming is fairly profitable. The introduction of camels, too, has been found helpful in reach- ing the sun-baked country, which stretches for 1500 miles between South Australia proper and the tropical north. Great Britain also watched with much interest the jiros- pects of the Irrigation Colonies at Mildura and Eenmark, in the neighbourhood of the Murray River, one being in Victoria and the other in South Australia. The idea of the originators, two Canadian gentlemen, was to try what science and engineering skill could do to make the rainless waste lands of this corner of the continent bring forth abundantly ; as a result thousands of acres of once bare desert were planted and watered. Vines and figs, oranges and lemons, apricots, apples, and pomegranates, were reared side by side ; while outside the rabbit-proof fences were "wild mallee scrub, drought, and desolation." Schemes like the above are interesting ; but it is in her mineral wealth of silver, copper, and tin that the chief commercial importance of South Australia lies at present. South Australia was allowed to manage her own affairs in 1856, and, seven years after, the Northern portion, a mere trifle of half a million square miles, was added to the older colony. Port Darwin was chosen to be the chief town of this tropical land, and as it has a fine harbour it r lay develop into an important place. But it needs the intro- duction of labourers from Asia. The heat is too great for I for the ave been nghfares. a stand- rccovnrcd but tho past ten »e ahiiost numbers )le. The in reach- •00 miles rth. the ])ros- iienmark, being in ea of the it science ess waste mdantly ; lert were [ lemons, by side ; i mallee is in her the chief esent. affairs in 1, a mere blie older town of it nay he intro- great for TAe Story of Australasia 235 white settlers. xVorthern Australia is doubtless rich in minerals and can grow all kinds of tropical fruits and vege- tables, but at present the country is undeveloped. The population IS very small for so gigantic a land ; and though he construction of the telegraph right across the continent from beautiful Adelaide brought workers to the north for a while, there is now no substantial increase. This tele-raph Imo was a magnificent feat of engineering. It is nea.-ly 2000 miles long, and is one of the most gratifying results of PKAKE's OVEliLAND TELEGRAPH STATION. the explorers' labours. Through forest, over waterless plains, past salt lakes, across marshes, the wires have been carried. Iruly the Austrahans are an enterprising race. ]3ut with all their eagerness and haste to develop the great continent hey do not forget that England is the mother of Greate^ Lritain. Their loyalty is probably deeper than ever it was and my readers will remember how, at the time of the Soudan War, the hearts of Englishmen were stirred by the rr.f l/^f^'^^'" ™ '^"^^"^^ " ^^^^ body of troops to help the Mother Country. We were all eye-witnesses, too, fn 236 The Making of the E))ipire of what these soldiers vere like, in the summer of 1801. At the wedding of Prince George of Wahsa, Ilur ^rajesty's Indian escort attracted no greater attention than did the stalwart Australians. Some may think that the appearance of these men in the procession was a small matt(!r, and that sooner or later Australia will cut herself free from the Old Country. The signs of the times are against the croakers. It is to the interest of hotli Great Ih-itain and Australia that separation should be postponed. It is likely to be postponed until — the Greek Kalends. Ml I NEW ZEALAND AND THE ISLANDS OF THE PACIFIC IT is hardly too inucli to say that if, in the early • part of this century, Ijritish Governments had had their own way, ,ve should have lost many if not all of our colonies. Nor is it an exaggeration to declare that the great bulk of those colonies were gained not by ministries, but by indivi- dual enterprise. India was won by traders who went out with no protection from the Government of the day Australia wa3 hindered and stunted by the vile system of transportation. The early history of Canada is a record of good work done by scattered settlers and of constant blunder- ing by the authorities at home. More than once the loyalty of Canada was strained to the uttermost; and had it not been for the influence of men outside the Government, she micdit hke New England, have thrown off the yoke of the Motlier Country. But instances need not be multiplied. In New Zealand we see a striking example of governmental foolish- ness. To-day that colony is flourishing, but it is not the l>ritisii Government which has made it so. A century and a quarter ago the islands which we call New Zealand were practically unknown to Englishmen. A long time elan.ed, moreover, before we learned that New Zealand was not part of Australia, but that it was as far '*'*'^^^'"'^'^'»*^'^^ffiiftii»mi i I i k i i i' i i I ill 238 T/w Making of the Empire uway fi'om tliat coiitiiiciit as the Kiij^'Iisli Channel is from the J5()splionia, or London from Rfadcirii. It i.s truo tliat tlu; morcliants of Holland knew of New Zealand's existence, ])ecauso their compatriot Tasman anchonsd r ^-^ few are occu^td ^ white^eTt ! ' t ."^ ,".«""' P'^"'^'- ^ to scientific men, they cal for S, ' ."*°"S'' "'«'^^«"« a, this. ^ ' *°' '""" ^t"^' in a book such whtifirbeteerctrrdi t r"'^" ^'^^'^-^ °^ «- the coasts of ^.J^^t^^^^^ ^ j^iiow that tiiere nro f>ir.i,c.„^ i , "" ""^ ^tiicr, wzii 244 The Making of the Ejupire in size. Some are mere rocks and coral islets, others are large and densely populated. In some the visitor sees nothing but sun-scorched rock or barren sandhills, in others he is charmed with scenery of the most exquisite kind. Some are tenanted by ferocious cannibals, others by peace and order loving native Christions. An English admiral said the other day that there were no more of these islands left for Great Britain to annex, and certainly the little red line and the letters " Jir " in our maps indicate that a large number have been either annexed or placed under our protection. In the splendid records of missionary enterprise their progress is fully told. Our colony in Fur deserves more particular mention. Like New Zealand, the group was discovered by Tasman, and visited by Captain Cook, and its history during the early part of the present century is also one of outrage and disorder. The British Ministry, moreover, showed the same unwillingness to give settled government to Fiji, as it had in the case of the great islands of the south. The points of resemblance do not end here. Both are gloriously fertile, and enjoy a fine climate. Both have in the past been cursed with cannibal natives and disreputable white visitors, and both owe a debt of gratitude to missionary workers. In July of the year 1859, the most powerful of the Fijian chiefs offered the islands to Great Britain for nine thousand pounds. The Imperial Government declined Thakombau's offer, and for fifteen years beautiful Fiji was a prey to anarchy and disorder. Its white population, however, increased. The success of the cotton plantation attracted a large number of settlers. The life of the poorer planters was often extremely hard ; hurricanes sometimes swept away their cotton, or insect pests attacked the younger plants. Inability to obtain sufficient labour was another source of difificulty, and, in addition to all this, the r.-^tives were savage. Novertlioless, for several years cotton was the only thing talked of in Fiji, m New Zealand and the Pacific Is tabids 247 until the fall in prices turned the cettlers' attention to sugar and cocoanuts. In 1870, there was a rush of emigrants from Australia, but they were hardly the class which Fiji wanted. Many were mere loafers, and it soon became evident to the more orderly section of the white settlers that a government of some kind must be formed if Fiji were to be saved from ruin. There had been civil war in the islands ; and there was little or no security for life and property. The British Government turned a deaf ear to the representations of the colonists. In June 1871, there was a revolution. The ex-cannibal chief Thakombau — now an old man— proclaimed himself King. He was aided by a number of white planters of the baser sort, and a constitution was drawn up. Money was collected to pay ^he first salaries of the ministers. A number of half-naked Fijian chiefs formed a House of Lords, and, in the words of an eyewitness of these ludicrous scenes, " the English Constitution, which had taken eight hundred years to develop, had been transferred bodily to a country whose inhabitants had not yet learned to wear clothes." Rioting soon followed this impudent attempt to govern the colony. The country was going from bad to worse, and, in 1 873, the new constitution collapsed like a child's house of cards. Again the Imperial Government was besought to interfere and save Fiji. Thanks to the efforts of Mr. (now Sir John) Thurston, the islands were formed into a Crown colony, with the full consent of the principal chiefs in 1874. Sir John Thurston is now the Governor, and although his policy has met with much Opposition from the white settlers, he claims to have done much to promote the prosperity of the natives. The old bad Jays of cannibalism and of the turbulence of cx-convicts have given place to years of peaceful trading. Wesleyan and Roman Catholic missionaries have worked a vast change in the habits of the natives, and there can be little doubt that there is a bright future in store for this land of jasmine and orange blossoms. THE STORY OF AFRICA CHAPTER I UK story of tlio Making of tlie Empire in Africa i.s a strange one. Unlike Canada, it was not the prize of a single battle, nor was it, like the West Indies, won by groat naval victories. Our possessions in the Dark Continent were gained in half a dozen different ways. Explorers, settlers missionaries, soldiers, and traders have each had their share m the work. To the Bible, the staff, the spade, the sword and the pen, therefore. Great Britain owes her African colonies and dependencies. An American once said of the English climate, that it was made up of samples. The same thing may be said of almost e^verythmg connected with Africa. As far as English Governments have been concerned in its history, they have at various times shown themselves at their worst, and samples of timidity and courage have marked their policy. Our wars have led to some of the painfullest defeats that the British armies have ever suffered, and also to some of the most brilliant triumphs of a few against overwhelmincr numbers. .Alajuba Hill and Isandhlwana are samples of the one, while the Abyssinian and Ashantee campaigns are fair specimens of the other. In the missionary field, in tlie records of explorers, and in the efforts of settlers and colonists, we find the same varied fortune. 248 c. W O H H o r! e tJ 249 ■1 H i 1 t^l 11 m 111 m ij I ll ■ 11 1 m 1 W 1 The Story of Africa 251 The history of tho country is, then, like the country itself. Tliere are vast deserts of glowing suinl, wlioro no Europeans can live, where there is "sky without clouds and sands without shadow," glorious meadow-lands stretching for leagues, where sheep and oxen thrive ; endless swamps reeking with fevers, and the homes of crocodiles and noisome heasts; and gloomy forests, where dwarfs as spiteful as pixies and gnomes lurk behind the trees. There are rivers whose falls almost rival those of Niagara, and yet on which ships of any size cannot float for want of sufficient depth of water. Then there are bracing hill countries, and mountains whose summits are covered with perpetual snow. There are wheat-fields and gold-fields, diamond-fields and rice-fields, countries which produce every tree, fruit, and vegetable which we can think of, from laburnums to bread-fruit trees, and solitary plains wliere nothing but scrub and stunted plants are seen for scores of miles. And the animal life of Africa tells tlie same story of samples. The Daf Continent gave to Europe the donkey and tne cat, and • ome say the ox and the goat. It is also the home of the elephant, the hippopotamus, the lion, the gnu, and the giraffe. Lastly, there are among the tribes and nations samples of every complexion, from red to black; samples of homes, from mud huts to pile dwellings ; samples of money, from gold to cowrie shells. When the old writer spoke of there being always some- thing new coming out of Africa, he did not exaggerate. It is a continent of wonders. And yet the romance is fast disappearing. The unexplored countries are becoming fewer every month, and the same delightful stories of such men as Paul du Chaillu in the gorilla country, of Captain Mayne Reid, and scores of others, whose names are so well known to EngHsh boys, will have to satisfy their grandchildren. For it is clear that before the twentieth century is very far advanced Africa will be as well known as the United States of America. The big game is going fast before tho rifles of 252 The Making of the Empire white inon, an,)eing the most English of all id — were 3y talked irse, was me. to Great nder our ortcrs of stitution. owardly. ry IJoer 3 sort of Avill be 2n taken 15 lately :ch with ited. ers is a h ended hanks. Africa 1 ent, and [and has ■d made tile, and indance, that we ist land 16 earth ; horrid " smell- le worst vill im- lony of h of all Z//'^ S/ory of Africa 261 the African colonies. It was discovered on Christmas Day, 1497, by Vasco da Gama, who gave it the name of Terra Natalis, and went on his way :o India. It is about one- third the size f England and Wales, and, like Cape Colony, is well fitted to be the home of Englishmen. It has had its troubles with the Boers, who treliked thither from the south, and fifty years ago battles were fought between them and the English. The Dutchmen surrendered, and Natal was formed into a British colony. It is now quite distinct from the Cape to which it was once joined, and has its own Government all to itself. To the north of Katal is the famous country of the Zulus. Every schoolboy knows the story of Cetywayo, and how his twenty thousand dusky w^arriors swooped down upon a hand- ful of British troops at Isandhlwana, and cut them to pieces. Everyone remembers, too, how the young English officers Chard and Bromhead, with eighty men of the 24th Eogiment, held the camp at Rorke's Drift, behind the mealie bags and biscuit tins; how Melville and Coghill tried to save the colours, and were slain ; and how Natal was saved from Zulu invasion by Lord Chelmsford's great victory over Cetywayo at Ulundi, in July 1879. His country was thereupon parcelled out among thirteen chiefs, who set to work to quarrel and fight. Prince Bismarck desired the land for Germany, but, after further troubles, we hoisted our flag and sent out a Commissioner to govern the remains of Cetywayo's kingdom. Between Natal and the Orange Free State lies the beauti- ful country of the Basutos, whom French and English missionaries have saved from heathenism. The Boers loved to enslave them, but we have stopped these little tricks by making Basutoland a Crown colony. We did the same with part of the Bechuana country, which was the scene of t?rae of the grandest of the missionary labours of Moffat and Livinf(stone. The northern part, which the Boers, Germans, would have liked to snap up, we have and Portuguese i I 262 T/ie Making of the Empire placed under onr protection; the remainder lius recently been taken over by Cape Colony. Both are splendid tracts of country, and as there are many Christian churches and schools, which our missionaries have built, it is right that they should be under British control. With all our faults as a nation, we have done great things to bring the light of Christianity into this part of the Dark Continent, and if right is not always might, it can hardly bo said that Boer rule is better than British rule. If Little Englanders say it is better, the blacks are ready to contradict them. Still further north is the rich land of the Mashonas, and Matabele, with a climate well suited for the Englishman who keeps clear of whisky. Here an English Company has control, and is treated by the British Government almost as if it were a separate and distinct colony. Like the old East India Company, it possesses powers in dealing with the country, and, as we know, it recently carried on a successful war against the Matabele king, Lobengula. Many people think that these chartered companies are allowed to have too much authority. On the other hand, it is clear that Portugal and Germany were eager to secure the lands of the Zambesi River while the British Govern- ment Avas hesitating; and if the compajiy represented by the Duke of Fife, the Duke of Abercorn, and Mr. Cecil Rhodes (Prime Minister of Cape Colony), had not stepped in, these Powers would surely have seized the opportunity to do so. It was known, too, l1 at the Boers were getting ready to trek to the lands of the Mashonas, and so extend their Transvaal State. If they had, our trade would have been cut off. Forty or fifty years ago, the country was the scene of Livingstone's wonderful discoveries. How he crossed the great Kalahari desert and found Lake Ngami, how later on he explored the Zambesi and saw the glorious falls, and ho,v he christcnLiI tliem after Queen Victoria, is an old story. Other Englishmen to-day are trying to put his The Story of Africa 263 recently iid tracts dies and gilt that ne great part of night, it . British acks are inas, and jlishman Company eminent J. Like L dealing carried bengula. lies are er hand, secure Govern- i by the Ehodes n, these ) do so. y to treli ransvaal )ff. !cene of ised the >w later Ls falls, ; an old put his discoveries to actual use, and it is the aim of Mr. Rhodes to connect Cape Colony with the Zambesi valley, and thence to open up a road — perhaps a railway — with the Great Lakes which feed the Nile. " From the Cape to Cairo " is the watchword of the company, and the project seems possible. There is therefore a glorious future before the British in South and Central Africa. In Zarabesia and Nyassaland the company is in charge of a slice of Africa more than eight times larger than Great Britain. The country is a fine one, and is enormously rich in gold. The reports of the trade of 1894 are most promising. Steamers and barges are plying on the Shir6 and Zambesi, and on Lakes Nyassa and Tanganyika. Coal has been found near the Shire ; calicoes and handkerchiefs have been taken by the natives in large quantities, and coffee-growing is making great progress. But beyond all these trade benefits which may be looked for, there is the welfare of the Africans. Even while these pages are being written, news has come that the slave-tradeis in Nyassaland have been smashed up by a force of native soldiers and Sikhs from India, under Commissioner Sharpe. The action was a brilliant one, and as our mission stations had been attacked without provocation, there is nothing to lessen our rejoicing. If, too, the traffic in vile spirits, which has been carried on by unprincipled traders, can be stopped, or at least decreased, then a great hindrance to the spread of Christi- anity will be taken away. It has been said that the followers of Mahomet conquered Northern Africa with the Koran in one hand and a sword in the other, and that England came to the west, the east, and the south, with a Bible and a bottle of gin. The sneer has enough truth in it to be unpleasant. Some little time ago, the Bechuana chief Khama was strongly pressed by the brandy merchants of the Cape to let their travellers sell liquor within his territories. He appealed to Queen Victoria, and she cabled back to him a message of sympathy and 264 The Making of the Empire encouragement. This was splendid, and did much to strengtlien the crusade. But public opinion is being arou.ed. Ihe Kedskms of North America have been destroyed in larger nmnb.-s by "fire-water" than by the bullets of the Uni.ed .St^^tcs troops, and the same destruction has been caused in Africa. When, therefore, the liquor traffic and the slave trade are rooted out of the Dark Continent, then and on^Iy then will Europeans be able to say of their work,' "Behold ! it is very <^ooU." much to '; aroused, fcroyed in ts of the lias been afRc and iut, tlien, 3ir work, THE STOEY OF AFRICA CHAPTER II GLANCE at any np-to-date map will show us that Great Britain has a large slice of South Africa, extending for 1600 miles from the Cape of Good Hope to the southern end of Lake Tanganyika. Some of it is colony, and some is only under our protection and within what is called our " sphere of influence." This latter phrase is quite new, and is a result of that mad scramble for land which has already been spoken of. It is a polite way of saying, " warning to trespassers." ^ But we have by no means a right to all the coast on either side of it, any more than we have full rights over the Boer republics, which lie in the very heart of our territory. If wc take ship a few miles north of Durban, the capital of Natal, and steam along the eastern coast, we shall find that we have not a colony or dependency for hundreds of miles. The Portuguese are in possession of the seaboard from Delagoa Bay, along past the mouth of the Limpopo, famed for crocodiles, away beyond the mouths of the great Zambesi and the Mozambique coast, up to Cape Delgado. There has been a great deal of trouble about their claims. Everybody is ready to own that, centuries ago, the little State did much to explore the unknown countries of the world ; she has, too, in later years made great efforts to compete 266 ^ 266 The Making of the Empire fill!! 1 !l i ■ Hi witli Tiritain and Germany, and is ovon said to have almost emptied two of hor provinces to send emi[,'rants ont to Africa. But, on the otlicr hand, she has spent with great recklessness money borrowed from other Europeans. She has on many occasions shown herself quite unable to deal honestly with the natives, and she is extremely jealous of other traders. One of the IJoer newspapers has recently published a cartoon, representing Portugal as a dog in the mangor, while the horse of Progress is not allowed to come in and feed on the oats of Commerce, which the dog cannot eat himself. Even more severe was the remark of the dusky chief of Gazaland. lie said the Portuguese are " not white people, but a coloured folk, whose chief delight is to sit on the sea sands, and paddle in the water." However, there they are, in the land which Mollat and Livingstone, Young and Grant, hoped would be under English rule, and where these and scores of other travellers and missionaries worked hard in the cause of progress. Portugal, a few years ago, claimed a great deal more than she has got, and her present position was marked out under an agreement brought about by Lord Salisbury in 1890. North of her East African possessions, Germany has a large strip of land, stretching along the coast from Cape Delgado as far as our little town of Mombasa. Inland she has pushed her way to the eastern shores of Lake Tanganyika, and to the southern side of the splendid Victoria Nyanza, which is as large as Scotland, and which was proved by Speke and Grant in 1862 to be the chief reservoir of the Nile. Dozens of Ijooks have been written by English and German travellers, like Sir Samuel Baker, Stanley, Burton, Schweinfurth, and Junker, about the Great Lake region, but it was only some half-dozen years ago, when the scramble for Africa was at its height, that the boundaries of Germany were, like those of Portugal, finally settled. The rights of Great Britain and Germany as to the coast were the most difficult question to adjust. Prince The Story of Africa 267 r>ismaick was known to be dcterminod to secure, at any prico. the control of the Zanzibar coast. Now, we and our Ind-an subjects had traded there for fivo-and-twenty years. V e were on excellent terms with the Sultan, and wu had i> \\^. cliurches and schools. There is no wonder, therefore, t when, in 1885, the news came to England that Germany h-d seized upon the mainland opposite the island of Zdnzi])ar, there was a loud outcry raised. It would be tedious to describe the attcimpts made by the British Government to bring about a fair settlement with Prince Bismarck. The newspapers were full of angry talk about ".pheres of influence," and about '' hinterland ;' or the right of a power wliicli holds the coast to be able to reach the ^^ hack-land ;' or land behind the coast, without interference. It was not until 1890 that Lord Salisbury was able to come to an agreement with Germany. In the meanwhile the latter had been making a terrible mess of her new possessions, and even Prince Bi«marck had grown angry with the behaviour of his fellow-countrymen. He said that their actions had been marked by" a want of prudence, judgment, anc^ humanity. By that agreement we gave up Heligoland to Germany but in return the latter withdrew from certain parts which she had claimed, and agreed to our protectorate over the islands of Zanzibar and Pemba. Zanzibar has been called the Liverpool of East Africa, and a capital trade is done in the cloves and other spices for which it is famous. But a black cloud has long been hanging over the island and the neighbouring coasts. Slavery and the slave traffic are the curse of Zanzibar, and the caravan routes wliich lead from the sea to the far interior are the slave routes of the Arab dealers. For hundreds of miles the paths by wliich the ivory is brought from the home of the elephants are marked bv the bones of the wretched blacks. And yet the European" Governments seem powerless to root out this wickedness. Our efforts to 'm I'll \ 1 1 1 fl- Hi 268 T/ie Making of the Empire stop the trade cost us .£150,000 every year, and we send gunboats to watcli tlie shore and catch the Arab " dhows." \^et they sometimes escape our wi.tchfulness. The fact is, as Lord Khnberley said in 1894, "slavery is part of the social life of Zanzibar." It is very horrible; and yet not more than thirty years ago the same thing might have been said of the Southern States of North America. The next strip of country which a steamer coming up from the Cape would pass is in our charge. From the little stream called the Pemba to the River Juba, and right away inland to Uganda, and up as far as the western valley of the Nile, all is under Ilritish protection. The size of the territory thus open to IJritish trade is about six-and-a-half times the size of the United Kingdom. There was great rejoicing in England esi)ecially when Uganda was thus secured. Our exi>lorer.s have spent enormous pains over ii, and our missionaries have done some of their noblest work there. It is called a modern battlefield, because Paganism, Mohammedanism, and Christianity have striven there for victory. Everyone knows how King Mtesa invited Christian missionaries to come and live in his country, and how his cruel son Mwanga burnt hundreds of his subjects because they had given up their heathen practices. Uganda, too, was the scene of the keenest rivalry of the English and Germans. No wonder. It is in the very centre of the Great Lakes district, and the power that holds it holds also the vvay to the upper waters of the river Nile. It is mainly to Captain Lugard that the honour of securing Uganda for Great Britain is due. The British East Africa C(jmpany did grand work in putting down slavery and the liquor traffic within its borders, but it found itself unable to hold Uganda without the help of the Jiiitish Government. In fact, the company has been ruined by its patriotism. While the Government stood aloof, it stepped in and saved an enormous extent of country from falling into the hands of foreign traders who wanted to get the business The Sto7j of Africa 269 into their own hands. But tlie cost of doing the nation's work was enormous, and has been too much for tlie company An arrangement was recently made by whi(;li the Briti'^li Government purchased some of its rights and the Sultan of Zanzibar the rest. The Sultan will also get back a strip of the coast, but in any ca-^e the land will be under our pro- tection, and will be administered by British officers, under the control of the Consul-General at Zanzibar. In May 1891, Lord Salisbury made a great s -eech at Glasgow, in which he m I that "the enterprise and phil- anthropic determination ' of Sir William Mackinnon the founder of the Ih-itish East Africa Company, "deserve to be mentioned with honour in any audience." And then he declared that there was one way of destroying the slave trade which was being carried on across the country from Lake V^ictoria .%anza to the coast, and that was by makin- a railway to the lake from our settlement at Mombasa. ° Mr. Stanley, too, has told us that, while it takes' three months to get down to the sea-coast from the great lake in waggons or on foot, a railway train could get there in five days. Happily, Lord Rosebery's Government, before it resi"ned was able to declare that the railway should be begun at once. The French and Germans have beeD straining every effort to get at the trade, and we cannot afford to lose any markets, for we must remember that every English pockct- JiandKerchief and every yard of calico sold in Africa, means so much more bread and butter for the Lancashire mill- hands. The scramble for Africa, moreover, is not quite over, for the French have been pushing their way fast in the Soudan, and towards the Nile. If they were to get the control of the Upper Nile, they could threaten Egypt's water supply, if they were so disposed, But, thanks to the late Sir Wilham Mackinnon, to Mr. Stanley, Captain Lugard, and others, we have got our feet firmly fixed in this part of *i.iriCci« 'I [■Jjg^lgg^'gy^ ^jSfe t ,;^ ^. ii!|i>l 1 i i 270 The Making of the Empire Our next floor ncigli])()ur on tlio north-eastern side of the great continent is Italy, who lias taken up a splendid position among the healthy highlands of Ahyssinia, and has also taken part of the Soraalis under her protection. But not all. Great Britain has a "sphere of influence " in Somali- land, opposite to her stronghold of Aden, on the other side of the Gulf. We wanted to make the passage for our ships quite safe, Init we were not quite quick enough, because the French seized upon Obock, a little place near the narrowest part of the straits. However, we have done the next best thing, and the Somalis do not seem to mind our intrusion. Somaliland has been well described as an outpost of India in Africa. We have nothing more of Africa now until we get right round to the west. We sail up the Red Sea, past Suakim, where our soldiers sweltered in the recent war, and we remember, with sad thoughts of Gordon, that Khartonm and a large slice of the Nile Valley is still in the hands of the Mahdi. We pass through the Suez Canal into the Mediter- ranean, and out through the Straits of Gibraltar into the Atlantic. Sleepy old-world Morocco, Spanish West Africa, and the French colony of Senegal, are left behind before the British flag is seen flying on the Gambia River. This is the oldest of our West African trading colonies, and our settlement dates from the time of King Charles II. j\Ir. Samuel Pepys, in his famous Diary, writes that on January 16, 1651, a "Mr. Stoakes told us that, notwith- standing the country of Gambo is so unhealthy, yet the people of the place live very long, so as the present king there is 150 years old, which they count by rains; because every year it rains continually four months together. He also told us that the kings there have above a hundred wives a-pioce." The Portuguese had been along the coast round the Gulf ..f Guinea long before, in search of gold and ivory ; and, in the first quarter of the sixteenth century, they were obtaining The Story of Africa le of tlie position has also Ijiit not . Soniali- !!' side of lur ships ause the ari'owcst lext best itnision. of India ^et right Snalvini, and we 3nm and s of the Meditcr- into the ; Africa, ;fore the colonies, arlcs 11. that on notwith- yet the mt king because He also 3d wives the Gulf and, in btaining 271 large numbers of negroes, wl,„m tln-v sliinne.I „fr t„ 1 «f bo„cI,^n ,-„ tl,o West mdies. In H ,-, f K^! Mward VI we beg.n to iit out ships to tra.lo ni.l, We If Africa; and oven in the time of Tfenry VIU "vi M IIawI<,ns of Pljmoutli took a cargo of slavcsf,-™,, i and sold them at great profit. More n ota\ k " n"'""' he trading adventures of his more fame': fjo. ' vW J.ngi,sn and Uuteh companies were formed, and Franco rfo-l,f f. , , ' °' ^^'^ ^'^^"^^^ squabbling for the right to take ivorv and sI'ivpq no fi i , ''hinterland." n,./" '^^^^^^' /^« t^'^re has been about j;.ere arc not more t,;: ol ll^ J:;,?,,-'^:^^:- the whole of tlie British territory Europeans m bounding the bend before turning into the Gulf of ^■Mciia Leone. Ihe place-hkc all the West African coas -has a bad reputation as far as healthiness c^oes and has been called "the White Man's Grave " Jifrl mahi- in.! fi • ^^'^"'^ ^lave. Its chmate is very moist, ana tJiero is no dnnhf fimf ;; • -^ I^nropcans. Ih., on the ^^ / , :,r mrfo'lT llie west coast of Africa, and oat and drink 7*1 ^ that the, do at home, 'the, l::t^:^ ^ ^^^tZ untry demands of its visitors that they shdl -by cc^r n ndcs. If negroes want to live in En.lan l '^ey must wca overcoats 111 winter; and if we want to n r w "' or at tlie Vnrf), P 1 ''''^ '" l""' climates or a the ^ortll Pole, we must alter our habits aeeordin^y There IS a belief amongst the natives -.f -^V'-estem Af?!,', that m ./,a„.«^ Europeans a.e proof against fever Wh! comfort iig thou'dit f.ii' «el„ „ii, 1 ""' " hoingcalkd-canots!" '' ''"' "" '"™™'^'' '^^ There are .lot n.any more Kuropean» in Sierra I.eone than 272 The Makmg of the Empire . i there arc in Gambia, but it is a much more important place, In the olden days it was a slave mart, but when the groat judge. Lord Mansfield, one hundred and twenty years ago, declared that as soon as a slave set foot in England he was a free man, and must not be enslaved again, a number of poor blacks were left destitute in the streets of London and other towns. Then it was that Clarkson, Granville Sharp, and William Wilbcrforce made up their minds to send these unfortunates back again to Africa. A company was formed ; Sierra Leone was bought from a native chief, and the first batch of dusky settlers was sent off. In 1807, the settlement was made a Crown colony. Like the Gambia, the Gold Coast, and Lagos, it exports palm kernels and palm-oil, some of which is made up into candles, and some, alas ! into butterine. In return for her wealth of oil, gums, resin, and rubber. West Africa takes a very respectable quantity of our calico and other cotton goods. Next to Sierra Leone is the black Republic of Li, eria, next again is a French colony, and then comes our Gold Coast colony. The place has had a very changeful history. In the days before we became an ocean-going power, Portugal and Holland came there for gold, and built forts. Sir Richard Burton thinks that, since 1471, six or seve7i hundred million pounds' worth of the precious metal has been found in this El Dorado. At the present time the yield is nothing compared with that of Australia or the Transvaal. In 1664, we attacked the Dutch forts with such success, that Mr. Pepys thinks "the beating will make them (the Dutch) quite mad here at home sure." Four years later he seems equally pleased, and writes : '* This day came out first the new five-pieces in gold, coined by the Guiny (Guinea) Com- pany ; and I did get two pieces of Mr. Holder." The place has had many masters. After giving up our settlements in the reign of George IV., we took control of them again fifteen years afterwards ; and then, in 1871, we made an agreement with Holland, by which we took over her it place, he groat ars ago, he was iiiber of don and 3 Sharp, id these formed ; the first '. Like I kernels lies, and h of oil, pectable Li: eria, Id Coast )ry. In Portngal ts. Sir hundred in found nothing [n 1664, hat Mr. Dutch) le seems first the sa) Coni- up our control 1871, we over her The Story of Africa 273 rights, and thus increased our possessions there. During the American Civil V.^ar, when our Lancashire mills were unable get cotton from the States, large quantities were shipped from this side of Africa. It was a prosperous time for the Guinea folk. It is, however, by u.e Ashantee War and the famous march of Sir Garnet Wolseley to Coomassie in 1873, that the Gold Coast is best known to us. Our next-doo^ neighbours are the Germans in Togoland and the French in DalK)mey-the country of the famous Amazons or women- soldiers. Next to them are our colony of La. .. , ^ the ?T:ger Coast or Oil Kiver protectorate, while at . ack, the Koyal Niger Company has secured an enormous province, which is watered by the great river of that name. The climate of this part of Africa is nothing like so good as that of the district which «ie other great companies are opening up in South and Central Africa, but with better drainage a considerable improvement may be looked for. This, however must be done by native labour. Europeans dare not turn up «ie virgin soil. The company, like the British East African Company, has done much to prevent the sale of spirits to its black subjects, and has also forbidden the introduction of rifles and gunpowder into any part of its lands. It was hrough the Niger valleys and forests that Mungo Park made US first journey a hundred years ago; it is to him, to the brothers Lander and Macgregor Laird, and to many German travellers, that we owe the making of the Empire in this bic. corner of Africa. ° We have practically speaking, nothing more on the western .sliores of the Dark Continent. The Germans are at the Cameroons; the French have a Congo colony; the immense Coiigo Free .State, which stretches far up into the very centre of Africa, IS under Belgian influence; the Portuguese come next wun Angola ; and lastly, between them and the frontiers liiel^of.IU '"''/' r'^ ^"^''-"^'^^ ^'''''^' The border lines of all these have been settled during the past ten years. 274 The Making of the Empire II , ! Il 111: The story of the Congo State, of the travels of Mr. Stanley an.l others, and the work of the King of the Belgians, cannot be told here. It hardly forms part of the history of the Making of the Empire. It is rather a page out of the Avorld's history. ]^y thus sailing in imagination round Africa, we get some idea of its vast extent, and of the way in which it has been parcelled out. There is no question but that the word Dark Continent must soon be given up. Kailways and trading ex[)lorations, and above all Christian missions, are turning its past darkness into the light of progress. Englishmen have much cause for rejoicing in their share of the work, and they should have great hopes for the future, Africa is the coming continent, and though there are enormous districts in which Europeans cannot live, there are others of equal size which are as well fitted to be the home of "crowded-out" Englishmen as the United States of America. By going to British Africa, we do not cease to be citizens of the British Empire. It is not, however, a place for loafers. Those Avho go must work, or they will starve more easily than they will do in the Old Country. They must be temperate and live cleanly, or they will fail miserably ; and, above all, they should give an example of just dealing towards the natives, so that the name of Britain may be held in honour. A '•*««l^.,. •. Stanley Belgians, listory of it of the get some has been ord Dark i trading JH'iiing its lien have and they ihere are there are the home States of 3ase to be place for irve more J must be bly; and, 'j dealing I may be MAURITIUS, TflE SEYCHELLES ST. HELENA, AND ASCENSION Y the side of the huge pear-shaped block, which the ancients called Iphricium, and which we call Africa, these islands are mere specks on the map. Even compared with Madagascar fi TT .u ^^^'^ ^^'' ^'"''"^ ^'^ ^S^""g ^"^ good friends the Hovas, they are insignificant. Yet they are too full of interest to be left without some notice. If an English schoolboy were to be* asked what he knew about Mauritius, he would probably say that it is the place where the most valuable postage-stamps in the world came from. He would be quite right, for the old "twopenny blue " have fetched enormous prices. But if he were well up in his French he might remember that the island was the home ot ir'aul and Virginia, of whose sorrows Bernardin St Pierre has told so pitiful a tale. If, in addition to being a stemp- collector and a French scholar, the imaginary boy were also a naturalist, he would say that Mauritius was the place where that wonderful bird the dodo lived and died. These tlixee bits of knowledge, though interesting enough, are, however, hardl y sufficient to enable us to pass an examination in the history of this Crown colony of ours in the far-away Indian seas. K X ,^'"''/*^t^^«*'^«^J^^ people of Mauritius call their beautiful island, is between nine and ten thousand miles from London It is about the size of the county of Surrey, and has a large and curiously mixed population. French, Lnghsh, Half-castes, Hindoos, Negroes, Malagasies, Parsees Chmamen, Arabs, and Malays find a homo there; and, indeed' so great has been the immigration in Infp, v^a- of Hind- ' tuu- r J ll if 1 hi 11 Ul U n ! i 276 T/ie Makino; of the Empire coolies and yclluw-faccd Chinese, that thoy now oiitmimber the white and brown men. In the cool season, which lasts from April to November, the climate is pleasant even to Europeans, but while wo are wearing furs and winter over- coats the Mauritians are being baked. Then is the time for luiglish and French residents to lly to the hills. They do well to avoid the hot, low-lying ground of Port Louis, for it is the lurking place of fever. There are terrible memories associated with the low- lands of this lovely island. Less than thirty years ago, an epidemic broke out which lasted from 1866 to 1868, and in these three years it is said that 72,000 people perished. The inhabitants died like flies. The Great Plague in the time of King Charles XL was scarcely more awful. I]ad 'Irainage, the carelessness of the city authorities in allowing the streets to remain uncleansed of the festering heaps of lilth, and the dirty habits of the coloured population, all aided the "destroying angel." Things are better than they were, but the scourge of fever from time to time returns. Mauritius is also subject to cyclones or hurricanes, which sweep across it with a violence which we Northerners can scarcely realise. In 1868, when the pestilence was carrying ofi' thousands of victims, one of these appalling storms burst over the island, bringing fresh ruin to the hapless Mauritians. Three years ago there was another awful cyclone. The 29th of April 1892 will never be forgotten by Mauritians. The telegram to England containing the news had in it the following words :— '* Mortality, casualties, distress appalling. Assistance of Home Government and public subscriptions implored." The Lord Mayor of London at once opened a relief fund at the Mansion House, and within three weeks from the arrival of the news, £6000 was subscribed .nd sent to Mauritius. A like amount followed ; but the terrible fire at St. John's, Newfoundland, and a colliery disaster in Wales, made other claims upon the British public. The disaster must have been frightful. Ill The Story of Africa itniimber ich lasts even to iter over- time for They do Liouis, for the low- 3 ago, an ;o 1868, ) people :it Plague :e awful, orities in festering •pulation, tter than e returns, ich sweep 1 scarcely rying off ms burst auritians. Qtten by the news jasualties, nent and f London )use, and s, £6000 ! amount )undland, upon the frightful. 277 One-third of the capital-Port Louis-was destroyed, and 20,000 people were rendered homeless. The Koyal Colkurc 62 churches and chapels, and 18,000 houses and building.' were either wrecked or damaged. Ships were driven ashore, the sea rose nine feet above its usual level, and a splendid sugar crop, which promised to yield 250 000 tons, was reduced to half. Worse than all, 1200 people perished, and three or four thousand more were injured Every traveller is struck by the brilliant green appearance of Mauritius, as his steamer draws near to it, and he can hardly imagine he is visiting a tropical island. An I-ln-lish county m springtime does not look more refreshingly g°een than do these sugar plantations. Forests have been cut down to make way for them. But sugar-growing is a very different business now to what it was in the days before chemists found that they could extract sweetness from beet- root, and of course it is far less profitable than it was when slave labour was cheap. Even after the abolition of slavery enormous fortunes were made. Then the crash came. Many of the planters were ruined, but the others keep on pegginrr away. In addition to sugar, the Mauritians export rum, the fibre of the aloe, vanilla, cocoanut, oil, and coffee. But these are not the only products. This island, which was thrust up from the sea in the days when the world was a-making, and whose hillsides even now show the marks made by the liery lava streams as they tore their way to the sea, is rich in all tropical trees and fruits. Travellers tell us such stories of the mangosteens and bananas, the citrons, guavas, and pine-apples, and the innumer- able kinds of vegetables, that we do nut wonder at the Portuguese mariners loading their ships with Mauritian fruit before they set sail for the far-away Indian coast. It was in the early years of the sixteenth century, and some eight or ten years after Vasco da Gama rounded the Cape, that Don Pedro de Mascarenhas found the island. But, like so many other Portuguese mariners, he was far 1 ' m li f^f = i I ir 27S The Making of the Empire too eager for " the wealth of Onniiz and of Ind " to trouble about making a settlement. So he left the birds and the Hying foxes to occupy the woods undisturbed, and those who came after him called only for fruit and fresh water. Ninety years after his visit, some Dutchmen, on their way to the P:ast, were driven out of their course by a hurricane, and, landing on the island, they called it IVTauritius, after Maurice, the then " Stadtholder " of Holland. It is the old story. First the ocean-going Portuguese, then the Dutchmen, then the French, and then the British. So far as Europeans are concerned, the history of Mauritius is like the history of India. Settlers came, and the Dutch built forts. They busied themselves with growing tobacco, but, finding that they could not make very much of their possession, they finally withdrew about the year 1712. Then the French, seeing that so desirable a property on the road to India was to be let for nothing, determined to try their hands at colonising it. They changed its name to that of the He de France, and fixed upon Port Louis as the site for a future town. Little, however, was done in the way of settlement for twenty years, until a Governor named Mahe de Labourdonnais set to work in earnest to develop the island. To him more than to any other man Mauritius owes its present position. He introduced the sugar-cane and the cotton plant. He built docks, cut roads and canals, erected fortifications and hospitals, barracks and warehouses! But, like the great Frenchman Dupleix, he received noLhing but abuse from his enemies in Europe, until he demanded a full inquiry into his conduct. It may be said that all this has nothing to do with the making of the British Empire. The answer is that Labourdonnais did the work, and we profited by his labours. When we wrested the island from its French masters, we found a flourishing colony there, all ready made. Moreover, if it had not been for the fact that an excellent harbour had been built at Port Louis, from which The Story of Africa 279 French cruisers were ablo, in tlio latter part of the eighteentli century, to sally forth and attack British East Tndianion, wo should probably have never troubled to seize the island. Thus it was that the good work begun by Labourdonnais brought about the loss of the island to France. During the long war with that country for the supremacy of the sea, terrible damage was inflicted upon our shipping. We had practically driven the French out of India long before they had ceased to harry our ships in the Indian Ocean, and it is difficult to understand why the Kast India Company did not make an earlier attempt to put a stop to the nuisance by attacking the Mauritian forts. In 1810, the long deferred assault was made. At first the Jiritish were completely successful. Fort after fort was taken. Then came severe naval reverses; and it was not until a splendid fleet had blockaded Port Louis, and General Abercrombie had landed an overwhelming force, that the island was surrendered. The French colonists were in a panic lest their stores should be pillaged by the English invaders, but they might have spared their fears. As an American writer has well said, "It is not easy to express their surprise, when they beheld 20,000 men, flushed with victory, enter without molesting a single individual. The next day the shops were all open, displaying their finest wares." At the peace of 1814, Mauritius was ceded to the English Crown, and a succession of wise Governors went on with the work of developing the island which the good Labourdonnais had begun eighty years before. After various measures had been passed for improving the condition of the coloured population, slavery was abolished in 1834, notwithstanding great opposition from the white sugar planters. During the next thirty years great progress was made. Education was advanced, commerce steadily increased, rail- ways and bridges were constructed, and in every way the prospects of the colony were bright. But in the terrible J Ji Ai V^ V ^^ IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) fe ^ X. 1.0 I.I |||M 20 11 1.8 1.25 L4 1.6 .4 6" — ► Photographic Sdences Corporation ?3 WEST MAIN STREET vVEBSTER.N.Y. 14580 (716) 872-4503 2So The Making of the Empire . \\ t I '' i\ ■ ii years of 1867, 1868, and 1869, when, as we have seen pestilence ana tempest^, ravaged the island, much of the prosperity waB swept away. However, there is a fine trade done by the Mauritians even now, although the palmy days of big fortunes are over. ^ ^ '^:i^ The long-talked-of cable, connecting Mauritius with Zanzibar and thence with England, was completed in November 1893. A message was flashed along the wires to ^ueen Victoria, who sent a reply, much to the delight of her Mauritian subjects. This, as Lord Rosebery would say, is another link m the golden chain of Empire " Mauritius has a number of dependencies scattered about the Indian Ocean. Some of these are mere coral rocklets • some are only sandbanks; others are extremely beautiful and textile, and serve as coaling-places for ships. The most important of these dependencies are The Seychelles. They were discovered by the Portuguese occupied by the French, and in 1792, were takenV I British man-of-war. Twenty-two years afterwards, they, like Mauritius, were formally given over to us Before America began to grow cotton, the trade of the Seychelles in the white fluffy pods was very important, but during the last sixty or seventy years it has dwindled away A good business is now done in cocoa-nut oil and vanilla Next to the Seychelles, the lovely island of Rodrigues, 344 miles away from Mauritius, is most worthy of note It IS a tiny paradise, healthy, and abounding in delicious truits, bu as It is surrounded by dangerous coral reefs, manners like to give it a wide berth. In this respect it IS less favoured than Diego Garcia, the chief group of the Oi Islands which has a capital roadstead for steamers which call lor coal. We have also snapped up a large number of other island tnfles m the southern ocean, such as the Amirantes, the Solomon Group, and a host of detached islands and islets. 11 we had nol appropriated them, some other Europeans would The Story of Africa 281 ST. HELENA AND ASCP:NST0N We must now sail away out of the Indian Ocean, and round tb3 Cape into the South Atlantic. Here are two tiny dots on the map. One of them— the more northerly of the two -IS Ascension. A barren, rocky peak, noted for turtles, beloved by aldermen. Once it was an active volcano; now Its fires are put out, and a thin soil covers its treeless valleys. It was first occupied by us in Waterloo year, and is in charge of an English captain, who manages the island for Its owners, the Lords of the Admiralty at Whitehall. When the great naturalist Darwin visited it sixty years ago, he said It was like a huge ship, kept in first-rate order. It is far less interesting in every way than its next-door neighbour, St. Helena, 800 miles to the south-east. But can two more solitary places be imagined? There they are, 1200 miles from the nearest point of Africa, "Remote, unfriended, solitary, slow.'* St. Helena will always be interesting, from the fact that it was the cage of the French lion. Napoleon, and here it was that the fallen monarch spent the last days of his life, looking out upon the waste of waters— a prisoner stripped cf all his glory When it was first discovered by the Portuguese-soon after our King Henry VIII. came to the throne-it was quite unpeopled. We took it from the Dutch in 1673 ; and, two or three years before he accession of Queen Victoria' it was transferred from the East India Company s hands to the British Crown. Once it was a busy place. Before our trade to the East was by way of the Suez Canal, a thousand ships called at St. Helena every year, and when Darwin came he found a population of 5000 persons. Now, but few vessels touch there, and the annual reports of the Governor are very dis- couraging. Young men leaving the country for the Cape or for the United States, the impossibility of making both ends IIJB I 282 f I ' The Making of the Empire meet in the islcncVs budget, the growing number of deserted cottages — all this makes sad reading. Now and again wo hear of experiments in some new industry, like that of rearing silk- worms for their silk, or of fish-curing. But though the island is healthy and exquisitely fertile, and though the sea swarms with cod and tunny, nothing seems to check the steady decline. A curious item appears in one of the recently 'published returns. The sum of £139 was received by the Government for the sale of St. Helena postage-stamps to foreign dealers. The money, therefore, that English and Americans spend on their collections, helps the St. Helena folk to pay their w:<,y. But this contribution is a poor thing in comparison with the sums paid by steamers in the good old days before the ditch was dug in the sands of far-away Suez. Some day we may wake up to find the canal barred, and then we may think more of this " huge black castle," and all other places which are milestones on the road to India round the Cape. ! Year by year uhe Empire is growing. " The more I see of this planet," says IMr. Rudyard Kipling, "the more I know the greatness of England. Why, you don't know how great you are. You don't discover that in Fleet Street and Piccadilly. But go abroad, get outside Britain, and then you begin to realise its size." But mere vastness will not keep the Empire together. Let us, then, on whom the future of Britain depends, read the lessons of history wisely. Let us remember that the strong hand, the trained judgment, the steady will, clear notions of duty and honour, have gone to the Making of the Empire, and that these will be needed to maintain it. m deserted I wo hear ring silk- he island I swarms r decline, mblished ^ernment dealers, spend on leir w:<,y. with the ;he ditch we may ay think es which ore I see more I now how breet and nd then her. depends, her that all, clear tg of the b. ADDITIONAL CHAPTER BRINGING DOWN THE RECORD TO DECEMBER 1897 T is difficult to keep pace with the growth of this wonderful British i.inpire of ours. No sooner is a book written about it than events happen, and changes occur which seem to make our volumes out of date, or at least to call for the addition of fresh chapters to make their records complete. All this is troublesome to those who make books but It is an excellent proof of the energy of the Anglo- Saxon race, which continues to extend its boundaries and develop unknown countries with all the eagerness of a young nation. The object of this chapter is to briefly record some of the latest events in the history of Greater Jsritam. The first copies of The MaUng of the Empire had scarcely appeared at the booksellers in the winter of 1895 when big black war-clouds rolled up from America, Germany, and Africa, and there seemed every prospect that Great Britain might be goaded into fighting. Not one of us wanted war but with almost every state in Europe trying to check and annoy us we were in no mood to bear affronts. First of all there came from the Government of the United States a message as to our relations with the little republic^ of Venezuela, which was justly regarded as threatening and offensive. Our negotiations about the 2oo 1.1 •.•!'■ ?11 in ; Tli ! i S; 284 The Making of the Einpire Venezuelan boundaries had been progressing peaceably though slowly, and President Cleveland's hostile language — however much or little it may have meant — came therefore as a bolt from the blue. It was followed by an extraordinary telegram from the German Emperor to President Kruger, congratulating him upon his victory over Dr. Jameson's raiders, and this in turn was followed by suggestions of German aid to the Boer Republic. Whatever his Imperial Majesty may have intended by the telegram — and he is probably heartily sorry that he ever sent it — its effect on the British people was electrical, and it is no exaggeration to say that the whole civilised world was astonished at the magnificent outburst of loyalty which its ill-judged words evoked. The scattered colonies, dominions, and continents which we call the British Empire, and which our enemies thought would break away from the mother country at the first hint of European troubles, proclaimed their common sonship. Greater Britain had never been so real a federation of states before. The Empire had been long a-making : men saw now that it was made. But though President Cleveland's message was regarded with sorrow, and the Kaiser's telegram was resented as an impertinence, there was no unreasoning passion or the vain boasting which springs from secret fear. There was national dignity and self-controL We knew that we were "splendidly isolated amf' i^ the nations," but we were conscious of our unity. It was, as Lord Bacon phrases it, "a just occasion of arming." With scarcely an effort we equipped a magnificent flying squadron and sent it to sea. Another and yet another could have been made ready with equal ease. We fastened on our armour, and behold ! in a few weeks the war-clouds dispersed, and the mutterings of the thunder died away. It was a grave and yet a glorious time — one in which it was a proud thing to bear the name of Briton, one which none of us dares to forget. It was glorious because cleai Record dozvn to December 1897 285 and unanswerable proof was gi^ on that the old British spirit was not dead, but that it was of a higher and nobler order. It taught us that we and CarQ,da and Australia and all our brothers beyond the seas held hands in real unity, that men could and would sink all differences of creed and party in the face of national danger, and that though Europe might scowl and America bluster we were prepared to stand "four square to all the winds that blow." Above all, the dark times of the winter of 1895-96 taught us and our enemies that though we were prepared to resist any interference with our own just rights, we were not wishful to invade the rights of others, and that we were willing to settle our differer.ces by arbitration rather than by the barbarous method of the ijword. The splendid display of Imperial greatness which was then shown to the world, and which was again exhibited during the Jubilee celebrations, was in no sense inconsistent with a genuine hatred of war. " I guess this makes for peace," said an American officer, as he gazed at the marvellous fleet of warships at Spithead, and his opinion was echoed—perhaps a little unwillingly— by many Continental newspapers and military authorities. Then, too, the patriotic enthusiasm of the nation and of the nations beyond the seas made for peace, because Europe saw that the resources of the Empire in men and treasure were inexhaustible. But though the barometer of the Empire is—speaking generally— at "set fair," there have been a lamentable num- ber of local storms. Scarcely a month has passed without bloodshed and trouble in some part of our vast dominions. In India, for example, the progress and well-being of three hundred millions have been hindered to a deplorable extent. Famine has stalked across Bengal and the sun-baked plains of the Punjaub and l\^orth-West Provinces, and pestilence has followed in its train. Earthquakes have brought ruin to the Assam planters, and have destroyed thousands of peace- ful peasants. Mussulmans and Hindoos have flown at one i The Making of the Empire aii()tli(»r'B throats, and wild and seditious words have been spoken, until men asked themselves if another Mutiny were coining. On the frontier of Afghanistan, too, iliere has been fierce and tedious warfare, and the splendid army under Sir William Lookhnrt's leadership— an army twice as large, by the way, as that which broke the power of Napoleon at Waterloo — lias found in the Pathan hillman a wily and dangerous foe. Precious lives have been lost in the wild gorges and mountain fastnesses, and an enormous expcniditure has been incurred. But while wo have deplored tlie blood- shed, our pulses have been quickened by the recital of deeds of heroism which have probably never been excelled. Highlanders, Northamptonshire and West Surrey men, and certain Sikh and Goorkha battalions have, in particular, behaved magnificently, and the story of the storming of the Malakund Pass, and of the Gordons and the wounded piper at Dargai, are among those which will live as long as British history is written. To turn from the dark to the brighter side, much has happened to Asia to cheer and encourage. In Burmah, for example, with the exception of occasional outbursts of the Chin tribes, progress has made rapid strides. Eevenue has increased, railways have been greatly extended, and, thanks to the energy of British Commissioners, the once turbulent country has become one of the most peaceful and flourishing provinces of the Indian Empire. In Malaya, again. Sir Frank Swetenham, the Resident General, has been Empire-making with extraordinary success. Formed into a Confederation in July 1896, the Malay states have been going ahead with a speed which even the Far West might envy, and Sir Frank records with a just pride that " the Malays are freer, wealthier, more independent, more enlightened, and happier by far than when Englishmen went to their country." Going farther south and east, we find that the prosperity ave been iny were sen fierce idor Sir large, by joleon at vily and the wild )enditure 10 blood- of deeds excelled, nen, and articular, ig of the [ed piper IS British luch has mah, for ;s of the 3nue has I, thanks lUrbulent )urishing Resident I success, ay states ^'ar West ?ide that Qt, more len went rosperity Record down to December j 897 287 of British Borneo and New Guinea has been somewhat marred by disturbances and bloodshed, and in the latter island Sir William MacGregor was obliged in the summer of 1896 to take the field with a small force of police against the Tugeri skull hunters, who had raid.^l the villages of the coast tribes under our protection. Warnings were found to be useless, and the rifle had to be employed to teach the dusky rascals that to ornament their huts with the heads of their fellow-islanders was not allowable on liritish t(!rrilory. Papua is a long way from London and Western civilisation but while the Union Jack flics at Port Moresl)y and a man of Sir William's strong character is at the Government House law and order do not slumher. We cannot easily afford to lose such men, and the death, therefore, of Sir John Bates Thurston, the governor of beautiful Fiji and II.M. High Commissioner m the Pacific, is greatly to be deplored. Far more to us, however, than all the coral islets which dot the Southern Seas is the great island continent of Australia. Never has the bond between it and the mother country been so strong, and never has a more inteUigent interest been taken by Greai Britain in its prosperity. We have been welcoming the tall Australian troopers to England, we have watched their gallant bearing as they have passed in procession or review before us, and we have learned beyond the possibility of doubt that the messages of loyalty which they brought with them were no mere lip service, and that their presence at the Queen's Jubilee Ceremonial was a proof that Australia desired to continue in deed as well as in name a part of the British Empire. We of the Old World, therefore, rejoice that Australia continues to advance. She does so, not by the startling leaps and bounds which marked her progress half a century ago, but with something of the stately dignity of an Old World country. But Western Aust.alia, once the most backward of the five sisters, is engaging much attention. 288 The Making of the Empire ; vn to ngula " — •nstriKited now that rher, and to I^iikc onnocting more of a to fail to has been ite a first- proof. )se of the xhaiisting .. Whih^. iisies and Australia, T Britain irly it is and those /^ctrorf^ down to Pcccmhcr \ .S97 .9 r ck,«CM. relation. .,. fosl.,,.! by its stat-sn...., nnd the majority "f Its e,t,.ens of li.ht and le,,'29. lieformation in England begun. ir).^)0. English on the Gold Coast of Africa. 157(5. Frobisher's voyage. 1.577-80. Drake sailed round the world, and touched at Moluccas. 1.579. Thomas Stevens in India. 1.580. Tobago (West Indies) seized by England. 1.583. Newfoundland annexed by Sir Humphrey Gilbert. 1.584-88. Colonisation of Virginia attempted. Drake's voyages. 1588. The Armada defeated. English Company formed to trade with West Africa. 1589. English trading expedition to India. 15!*2. Falkland Islands discovered by Davis. 1.597. English in Jamaica. 1.599. Meeting of London merchants to discuss trade with India. 1000. East India Company formed. Seventeenth Centuhy 1G04. English attempted to colonise Guiana. 1(!0.5. Barbados and Jamaica seized by Eiigl.'md. ]m07. Virginia colonised by England. Iti09. Sir Geo. Somors wrecked at the Bermudas. The islands annexed. IGIO. Hudson's Bay explored by Hudson. Charter granted to Lord Bacon (Newfoundland). 1611. Trading posts established in Canada and India. 1612. The Bermudas settled by English emigrants. 1613. St. John's (Newfoundland) founded. 2ya I ■'III II 294 T//e Makiuir of the Ivinpire ? t \\\ 11 I ' ims. 1G20. lO'Jl. KVJ:!. 1027. 1(128. ]t;2!l. 1G32. lo;!!. 1G31), 1G12. 1()13. Ki;')!. Itii);). IGOl. 1663. 1661. 1606. 1667. 1670. 1672. 16S2. 168;-). 16S6. 1687-8 1696. 1699. (lUiaiia visited by Sir W. l\aliM\'li. I'lui^'lish nil llic. f;;iiiil)i;i iiiid (loid Coisf;. <'aii(' ofdood iloiKi sci/.L'd by Miif^'lMiul, Itiit wA colonised. I|iij,nim l'';itlicr.s in New Kiigliind. Knj^lisli tnidt'is in liongal. Nova Si'oMii colonised by JMi^lisli. Knj^dish driven IViiim Molucciis. Massaore of Aniboyna. Barbados colonised. Nova Scotia sold to Krcncli. Colonisation of Guiana attempted. Dutch imvig;d,or.s on West Coast of Aiistralia. J'rogrcss of colonisation in New England (United States). The IJahainas colonised. French ))ossession.s in Canada taken. Cainida restored to I'Yance. Antigua and Montserrat (West Indies) colonised. Trade facilities given to Knglish bv Great Mogul. English attempt to colonise St. Lncia. Fort St. George (Madras) built. Montreal foumled. Van Dieinen's Land and New Zealand discovered by Tasmaii. Fiji Islands discovered. Nova Scotia seized by English. Jamaica seized by Admirals Penn and Vcuablea. Victories of Blake. English obtained Bombay. St. Helena occn])ied. St. Lucia occui)icd by England. Surinam occujiied by England. English took New York Vroni Dutch. English ibrt built at the Gambia. The Virgin Islands taken. French seized Antigua. Surinam ceded to Dutch in exchange for New York, and Nova Scotia and St. Lucia to French. Antigua and Montserrat returned to English. Hudson's Bay Company founded. Honduras ceded by Si)ain. Royal AlVican Company founded. Pennsylvania colonised. English e.vpelled from Hudson's Bay. Calcutta founded. S. Dampier's explorations in Australia. Fort-Wiiliani built by East India Company. St. John's (Newfoundland) captured by French. Hanipier ou West Coast of Australia. Ejohteentii Ckntury 1702. 1701. 1707. 1713. War of the Spanish Succession beL;un. St. Kitts (West Indies) retaken from French. Gibraltar seized by England. Union of England and Scotland, Death of the Great Mogul. Treaty of Utrecht. Newlbuudlaiid, Hudson's Bay, Nova Scotia, Gibraltar, and ]\Iiuorca ceded to England. Time Table 295 ?maii. and JNova iva Scotia, 1711. 1744. 174(;. 174.S. i7r)i- 1755. 1750. 1757. 1759. 17G0. 1701. 1763. 17C9- 1774 1775, 1776. 1778. 1779- 1779- 1780- 1782. 1783. 1784. 1786. 1787- 1790. 1793. 1794. 1795. 1796. 44. Anson's voyages. Iloiuliiraa admin i.stflred by Eugliali. (Capture of Louisburg (Cape Breton) by Eugliah. Ht. Lucia captured by h'reucli. Madras seized by t'leiich. I'oace of Aix-la-CliapclIe. ( 'ape Breton restoriMl to Franne. Madras restored to Knglisli. 52. Victories of Clive. Knglish reverses in Canada followed by conquest of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. Bi'l^dnning of Seven Years' War. .Siuaj-ud-DowIali captured Calcutta. Black Hole atrocity. Kn},disli took Dominica. Ki!cai)tnre of Calcutta. Victory at Plassey. Pitt's first administration. War in Canada. Conquest of Canada. Death of Wolfe. French and Dutch reverses in India. Fall of Montreal. Fall of French power in India, Martinique captured. Peace of Paris. English to retain Canada, Nova Scotia, Cape Breton, Prince Edward's Island, Florida, Senegal, Tobago, Dominica, St. Vincent, Grenada. Explorations in Australia. ■70, Captain Cook visited New Zealand, Fiji, and Australia. Warren Hastings Governor of India. Troubles with America. War witn America. French invasion of Canada failed. American Declaration of Independence. English reverses in West Indies. 83. Siege of Gibraltar by France and Spain. ■81. War in India with Malirattas. ■83. War with France, S]iain, and Holland. Kodney'a victory at Cajjc St. Vincent, 1780. Invasion of Ceylon by English. Victory of Rodney at Castries (West Indies). Treaty of Versailles. Pitt Prime Minister. Various exchanges in West Indies,' Alrica, and India. Boundaries of United States and Canada marked out. Pitt's India Bill. Penang (Straits Settlements) ceded to East India Company. ■88. Convicts sent to New South Wales. Freed slaves sent to Sierra Leone. Sydney founded. War with Tippoo Sahib in India. War broke out with France. Tobago and St. Vincent taken by England. Pondich^.iy (India) taken also. England took the Seychelles, St. Lucia, and other West Indian islands. Lord Howe's victory olF Ushant. Tile Ciipe of Good Hope and Malacca taken from Dutch. Exi)loration.s of Mungo Park. Ceylon and Guiana taken from Dutch. V I V ' ■: a 296 T/ie Makiuir of the Empire 1797. 1798. 1799. 1800. 1S02. Trinidacl captured. Victory of JerMs at Cane St. Viuceut N.lson's victory at the Nilc^ ^ "' Ciiptiiro of Seriiigapatam ( [lulia). Caj.tiire of Malta. Uuion of Great Britain and Ireland. NiXKTERN'TH CeNTUHY Peninsular War. Peace of Amiens. Cape and Guiana restored to Dutch. t|Oylon and Trinidad ceded to Mritish. mn9-4 Q ^^ °^'^';"f'' Australia explore.l by Kindere. JoAo"f-. Second Mall ratta war. 1803-14. War with France. Extension of British power in India Convicts sent to Tasmania Tobago and St. Lucia taken. Ceylon and Guiana occupied. Wellesley's victory at Assaye. Nelson's victory and death at Trafalgar. Capture of tlic Cape of Good Hope. Heligoland taken. T^^^^l I^Hbrador added to Newfoundland. 1 he Mauritius taken. View nf''^V''™''' ^l'^*''^ ^y G^^^^^\^^^^ an