X. 
 
 ^ 

 
 LI E) RARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 U N IVER5ITY 
 
 or ILLINOIS
 
 m
 
 ADDRESSES 
 
 ► THE RIGHT HON. 
 
 GEORGE J. GOSCHEN 
 
 M.P. 
 
 DELIVERED IN EDINBURGH ON JAN.^ AND FEB. 3, 
 AND IN LIVERPOOL ON FEB. II, 1 885 
 
 EDINBURGH 
 
 ANDREW ELLIOT, 17 PRINCES STREET 
 
 1885 
 
 PRICE THREEPENCE.
 
 edinburgh : 
 
 printkd by frank murray, 
 
 9 & 11 voun5 street.
 
 FJEST ADDEESS. 
 
 Delivered in the Music Hall^ on Saturday^ ^t^st January 1885, to 
 the Electors of the North-Eastern Division of the City of 
 Edinburgh. 
 
 Mr. GoscHEN said — Gentlemen, my first duty is to thank you 
 most heartily for this reception which you have given me ; in the 
 next place, let me say that I have come here invited to deliver a 
 political address. I have come here to take counsel with a certain 
 portion of my countrymen, thinking that the time is a fit one for 
 public men who have been some time in the public service to 
 confer with their fellow-citizens. (Cheers.) We have clearly 
 arrived at a momentous crisis in the history of this country. 
 ]N'ew forces are coming to the front, and by a curious coincidence 
 the new democracy (cheers) is enthroned in power at a moment 
 very full of difficulties and troubles. There are fresh issues, both 
 at home and abroad, coming up which demand solution ; and I 
 think that no one can look around him without seeing that the 
 country, in many respects, at home and abroad, will be put upon 
 its mettle. The temper of the new forces will be tried very soon ; 
 and the new recruits may come under fire, even before there has 
 been time to discipline and train them. (Cheers.) But the graver 
 the times, the more incumbent it seems to be on public men to 
 speak out, and to say, each man according to his humble judgment 
 and ability, that which he thinks ought to be said. And, gentle- 
 men, you shall not have to complain of any reticence on my part. 
 (Cheers.) 
 
 I have sometimes been called " dark," but I do not know why. 
 I think that I have spoken at least with as much freedom upon 
 most public questions as other men ; indeed, sometimes my very 
 frankness of expression has been laid to my charge, and a complaint 
 has been raised against me because I have spoken out. It has been 
 said, " Why does he publish any differences that he may have with 
 some of his friends ? " " What game is he up to 1 " is a question 
 that is sometimes put (laughter and cheers); "What can he be 
 driving at % " Then people say that I must be driving at office ; or 
 they think I must be wishing to weaken the Ministry, or to change
 
 my party, or to form a cave. (Laughter.) They say there must l)e 
 something more than meets the eye. Why, I ask, why ? I will tell 
 you who ask these questions. These questions are asked by those 
 who think it impossible that a politician can be independent, unless 
 he has some secret motive and some ulterior aim. (Cheers.) The)' 
 think that he must probably be driving at Executive power — he 
 must wish to sit upon the Treasury bench. Well, gentlemen, it is 
 a worthy and a high ambition to wish to be a Minister; but 
 there are other ambitions, too, which can stir a man to action, and 
 rouse him to the performance of his duty. There are other positions 
 outside the magic Ministerial circle where men may do work of 
 which they need not be ashamed (cheers); and therefore I say I 
 do not see why it is necessary always to suspect a secret motive. 
 (Hear, hear.) For my part, I have fought many a battle with, and 
 for, my party (loud cheers), and I hope to do so again (renewed 
 cheers); but I cannot consent to be blindfolded with a party ban- 
 dage, or to clap a party muzzle on my mouth. (Cheers.) Let me 
 say one further thing, and that is this, that my allegiance to the 
 principles, the Liberal principles, in which I have been brought up, 
 has never been shaken (cheers) ; but I have been too long in public 
 life always at once to acknowledge that a principle must be a prin- 
 ciple of the old Liberal party, simply because it is so labelled. Public 
 life would indeed be intolerable if every man, not. him self in com- 
 mand, were at once to be tried by court-martial, because he refused 
 to obey with absolute, and unquestioning, and blind obedience, 
 the Government Whip. (Cheers.) We live in times when even 
 Cabinet Ministers claim considerable independence of utterance 
 (hear, hear, and a laugh), and when they are, or think them- 
 selves, entitled to submit independent programmes to their fellow- 
 countrymen. (Cheers). If that be so, am I offending against 
 political propriety when, on my part, I claim some little latitude 
 both of action and of speech? (Cheers.) 
 
 Gentlemen, I am not going to waste your time to-night by dis- 
 cussing matters which have been settled once for all. (Cheers.) I 
 am not going to say anything on the Bill for the Enfranchisement 
 of Voters in Counties. I said my last word on that some time ago 
 (hear, hear), and the Redistribution Bill is as good as settled ; and 
 though I have not agreed with my party upon this group of subjects, 
 yet now I say this, that I will do as much as in one man's power 
 lies to falsify my own misgivings (cheers), and I shall look accom- 
 plished facts boldly and cheerfully in the face. (Cheers,) ^«»4U
 
 there is only one remark that I should wish to make upon 
 thlf mode in which the Kedistribution Bill has been carried, and 
 th)it is as to the extraordinary rapidity with which its details 
 are being worked out. Now, to what is this due^ It is due to 
 thb fact that the two great parties in the State seem to have 
 agreed on the principles of the Bill, and are both anxious that it 
 should come into force as soon as possible, and with as little 
 friction as possible, Hence the rapidity with which all the 
 details are being carried out. Not long ago, Europe thought 
 that Great Britain was about to pass through an ordeal, 
 under which her steady traditions, her love — her traditional 
 love — of order and compromise would break down. But 
 no. British common-sense has triumphed ; and now, instead 
 of having indignation meetings, culminating in riots, we have 
 Boundary Commissioners settling the areas of political con- 
 stituencies with as little difficulty, and with as little opposition, as 
 if they were poor-law officers settling the boundary of a parish. 
 (Cheers). What a contrast, gentlemen, to the way in which public 
 business generally progresses ! See — and I wish the country to 
 note this fact — see what a reserve of power we possess for speedy 
 action, and for effective action, when the nation is determined that 
 its will shall be done. (Cheers.) That is a reserve of power that 
 may stand us in good stead in some hour of emergency. (Hear, 
 hear.) It might help us in foreign troubles. Suspend the 
 action of party for a time, and foreign nations would note, 
 and marvel when they saw, with what rapidity, with what 
 decision, with what steadfastness, and with what unanimity, 
 the voice of Great Britain and Ireland could speak. (Cheers.) 
 
 Gentlemen, I am not here to-night, as I told you, to discuss 
 the Redistribution Bill. You all know that there are a 
 number of very interesting questions connected with it. 
 There is the campaign that is going on now with regard to pro- 
 portional representation ; there is the question as to the wisdom of 
 the subdivision of the great towns ; and there are other questions 
 of that kind. I do not propose to deal with them. With your 
 permission, to-night, I want to look forward — I want to see what 
 work is to be done. (Hear, hear.) 
 
 The question which is upon every man's lips at present, with 
 regard to the future elector and the power he will wield, is this, 
 What will he do with it 1 What will he do with his power 1 What 
 can he do with it 1 What ought he to do with it ? In what spirit
 
 will he act, and in what spirit ought he to be addressed 1 (Cheers.) 
 These are the questions which must occupy the mind, not only of 
 every statesman, but of every one who takes an interest in politics. 
 To hear some men speak, one would think that it was 
 necessary to introduce a set of brand-new principles for the 
 use of the new elector, and that we must discard all the old 
 methods and principles of the Liberal party, and toss them aside 
 almost like old clothes. Well, there is, I think, no one in tkis 
 room who is not agreed as to what the aim of every politician 
 — and I mean by politicians, not those in authority only, but all 
 who take an interest in politics — must be. We have a common 
 aim, and that is to secure the greatest happiness for the greatest 
 number. (Hear, hear, and cheers.) I should like to repeat it, 
 because it is the cardinal point — I say that the object of all politics 
 must be to secure the greatest happiness for the greatest number 
 (loud cheers) — to endeavour to spread the prosperity of this 
 country over an ever-widening area of the population (cheers). 
 Every one would think it a miserable failure, politically and 
 economically and socially, if this country were simply to be the 
 paradise of the rich. That would be a miserable failure (hear, 
 hear, and cheers); but I wish to ask, Has this ideal dawned 
 upon the Liberal party for the first time now*? I thought that 
 that had been our aim for some time past. I thought that 
 we had been at work upon it. I thought that it was for that 
 that we had been struggling throughout the history of the Liberal 
 party. (Cheers.) Before we entirely part company with the 
 traditions and the principles of the old Liberal party, let us, at all 
 events, look to what they have done. We fancied that they had 
 secured some prosperity, some pre-eminence to this country ; we 
 thought that they had struck off the fetters from industry; we 
 thought that they had promoted the union of classes, till classes were 
 less antagonistic in this country than in other nations abroad ; 
 we thought that they had redeemed this country from untold 
 calamities which have fallen upon other countries ; and so we 
 thought that we owed something to the Liberal party, and to 
 the Liberal principles and traditions in which we had been 
 brought up ; and that we could not be prepared to discard those 
 methods at a moment's notice. We recognise that work in the 
 future has to be done — and much work too ; but we, many 
 of us, wish to set about this new work in the old spirit, and 
 I trust the country will recognise that the statesmen, who for
 
 so piany years have been responsible to this country, have not 
 been idle or indifferent in the performance of their work. 
 (Cheers.) 
 
 put, gentlemen, we have lately had a different picture presented 
 tojus; and one would think, from some things that have been 
 said, that it would be necessary to have recourse to extremely 
 violent measures in order to remedy a system of glaring social and 
 financial wrong. It is said that we have built up a system of 
 taxation which is not only imperfect — all systems of taxation are 
 imperfect — but which is fundamentally unjust. But I should like 
 to ask, before we condemn this system of taxation — grievously as 
 it may bear upon many parts of the community — before we con- 
 demn it as absolutely unjust, whether it deserves the reproduction 
 of the story that there was only the difference of an adverb 
 between the taxation bearing upon one class and that bearing 
 upon another — that it bore hardly upon the poor and hardly at all 
 upon the rich ? If we think of this saying in regard to our present 
 system of taxation, let me ask, Who is responsible for the system 
 of taxation under which we live at present 1 Whose system is it 1 
 — a system elaborated with greater care, with greater industry, 
 with greater skill, than that prevailing in any other civilised 
 community. Whose system is it, I ask"? It is his who is the 
 greatest financial genius of this century. (Hear, hear, and loud 
 cheers.) It is his whose magic wand has touched our finances, 
 and who has brought them to a point which makes them the admira- 
 tion of every country in Europe. (Cheers.) It is the system of Mr. 
 Gladstone (loud cheers); and, for my part, I am not prepared to 
 stand by in silence without registering an emphatic protest against 
 language which would bid the new democracy signalise its advent 
 to power by the dethronement of Gladstonian finance. (Cheers.) 
 
 But I said something about the spirit in which the new electors 
 might be addressed. If it were right and proper, at this first 
 moment of their enfranchisement, to say to them, " Look what you 
 have suffered in the past ; look how unjust the system is under 
 which you are living ; shift your burden upon others ; strike at 
 other classes ; push your own class interests " — and that without a 
 word as to corresponding obligations, without a word to lift them 
 to a high and worthy conception of common national duty, without 
 a word to inspire them with zeal for the union of classes — then 
 many persons would be disposed to think that no prophecies could 
 have been too gloomy, and no prospects before us could be more dis-
 
 astrous; then it might be thought that the new electors had stormed 
 the constitution in the spirit of an enemy storming a town, who de- 
 mands a ransom for abstaining from plunder. (Cheers.) But it is 
 not in that spirit, I am firmly convinced, that our fellow-countrymen 
 have entered the pale of the Constitution, to share with us the high 
 duty and the privilege of governing the State. It is not in tliat 
 spirit that they will set themselves to the functions of their new 
 citizenship. They will push their class interests, as others have 
 done before them ; they will fight for their interests ; but they will 
 not think that they have done their whole duty by the country, 
 these new arbiters of the destinies of Britain — I say they will not 
 think that they have done their duty simply by a drastic 
 application of the principle of self-interest. I, who have 
 opposed the late measures of reform, am absolutely con- 
 vinced that this will not be their spirit ; and I trust that those 
 who would claim their ear as their special champions will prove 
 by their words and by their acts that they have an equal belief 
 in them. (Cheers.) 
 
 Gentlemen, the situation, then, that to my mind presents itself 
 is this : — We have a common aim. Our aim is, as I said before, 
 to secure the greatest happiness for the greatest number, and we 
 shall not be content unless this prosperity widens over a larger area 
 of the population. We shall all be agreed — the extreme faction, 
 the centre, and the moderates — that we ought to utilise the 
 momentum given by the new Eeform Bills to fetch up our 
 arrears of legislation. We shall all be agreed that there are 
 many new needs which require to be faced. New needs 
 spring up in every society. It would be folly not to recognise 
 these new wants ; in this we can all act together. But there are 
 many Liberals who are thoroughly sound in heart, thoroughly 
 sound in Liberal principles, who do not believe that it is necessary 
 to have a policy of root-and-branch changes in everything — in our 
 treatment of taxation, in our treatment of contracts, of the inter- 
 ference of the State, of the independence of individuals, accom- 
 panied with large changes in the relations of classes to each other 
 — that it is necessary to have recourse to such methods in order to 
 secure our common aim. They will go forward with equal resolu- 
 tion, but with more prudence, and with less passion — they will 
 believe less in the omnipotence of legislation ; they will face new 
 problems, but in the old spirit — they will go forward, I say, with 
 equal resolution, though disbelieving in crude panaceas, which
 
 Mve been proved, over and over again, to be useless for the accom- 
 plishment of the|aims they have in view. (Cheers.) 
 I Now, gentlemen, I used the words " crude panaceas," and I will 
 tfeU you what I mean. I call the Nationalisation of Land a crude 
 panacea. (Cheers and some hisses.) I call the establishment of 
 a vast bureaucratic system for the distribution of land a crude 
 panacea. (Cheers.) I should call the establishment of a Land Court 
 to fix rents in every part of the United Kingdom a crude panacea. 
 I should say this, Let us try freedom first (hear, hear), before we 
 try the interference of the State. Let me say one word more, 
 not very complimentary to the panaceas, before I part with them. 
 These panaceas are like strong drink, which spoil the appetite 
 for wholesome food. (Laughter). Public attention is diverted from 
 many useful, practical, and practicable reforms because these 
 visionary schemes have been put forward. (Cheers.) In all the 
 points on which I propose to touch, I want to plead the cause 
 of freedom against State interference, and that is one of the old 
 Radical doctrines. (Hear, hear.) Don't let me be told that I am 
 not a Liberal if I am in favour of freedom in all the respects to 
 which I am going to call your attention. It is the old Radical 
 doctrine that you should try freedom first, before you attempt to 
 interfere by the State. (Cheers.) 
 
 Let me take the question of Land. I am for absolute freedom 
 in land. (Cheers.) I am anxious — I trust that, though I am 
 addressing a town audience, they will not be bored (if I may use 
 the expression) by some reference to land (cheers) — I am anxious 
 to strike off any fetters still remaining on the owners of land, 
 which prevent them dealing in the freest possible way with 
 their land. (Cheers.) I wish to see land made as saleable as 
 Consols. (Cheers.) The Liberal party have been working in two 
 directions already in this respect. They have been trying to free 
 the owner, so that he could dispose of his land with greater ease 
 than heretofore ; and they have been trying to assist the tenant by 
 giving him more freedom in the cultivation of his land, and more 
 freedom for investing capital by giving him greater security for his 
 improvements. (Cheers.) I have been in perfect sympathy with 
 both those movements. I was in sympathy with the Bill which was 
 passed by the Government to deal with the latter question ; but I 
 entertain very strong opinions indeed with regard to this freedom of 
 land, this saleability of land, because I hold — and I go there as 
 far almost as any of my political friends — that it is greatly for
 
 10 
 
 the interest of this country to increase the number of land- 
 holders (cheers), and to promote as far as possible what I may- 
 call the dispersion of land amongst a much larger number of people. 
 (Loud cheers.) A good deal has been done in regard to freeing the 
 owner ; I do not forget that Lord Cairns passed a Settled Estates 
 Act; but I still think the fact is clear, land is not as saleable as 
 Consols. In fact, as was pointed out by Mr. Bright yesterday or 
 the day before (cheers), there are still a vast number of legal com- 
 plications, and I know that if a landlord wished to sell 1000 acres 
 of his land to ten, or twenty, or fifty people the legal difficulties 
 would be enormous (hear, hear), and that you cannot dispose 
 of your land in such a manner as to encourage men to sell it. 
 The most willing owner finds himself surrounded with a great 
 many difficulties. So I say this — Let Liberals work forward 
 on that line, and let them not rest till land is infinitely more 
 saleable than at present. (Hear, hear.) I will suggest what 
 may be considered a very advanced doctrine in this respect. I 
 am not sure that we shall ever have reached the goal of our en- 
 deavours, and have attained a thoroughly satisfactory position, 
 unless we have every title to land registered — unless we have 
 a perfect register of titles throughout the United Kingdom. 
 (Cheers.) I should like to see what I would call a Land 
 Register in every great local centre ; and I should wish it to be a 
 kind of agricultural ledger, in which transfers of land might take 
 place, with not very much greater difficulty than transfers of 
 Consols take place in the Bank of England. (Cheers.) Now, that 
 is something which I think it is worth while to work forward to. 
 The lawyers will say, I am afraid, that it is absolutely impossible ; 
 but it has been done in other countries, where the complications 
 of tenure are not less than they are in this country. And so, I 
 say, let us see at least whether we cannot work forward on these 
 lines. I think you will agree that that is sound Liberal doctrine. 
 (Cheers.) 
 
 But I am sure that in some senses it is Conservative 
 as well. The old system of tying up land was intended 
 to assist the territorial aristocracy. At that time the owning 
 of land was a kind of pivot on which Conservatism turned, 
 but that is all changed; and now the danger is the other 
 way. The danger is, that land should be in the hands of too 
 few people, and the great safeguard for the owners, and 
 for the public interest generally, is that land should be held
 
 I li 
 
 by a largely increased number of people. (Cheers.) My ex- 
 perience at the Poor-Law Board quite confirmed me in that 
 -view. The fact that our agricultural classes are without any 
 possessions at all, that nearly the whole of them live on weekly 
 wages, immensely increases the difficulties in dealing with that 
 which is one of the most serious troubles of this country — I mean 
 the Poor Law. Prom a social point of view, I do not think you 
 can exaggerate the advantage of having a large number of small 
 proprietors ; and I am not convinced by any argument that tells me 
 that if you proceed on these lines the aggregate produce of the 
 country will be less. I can conceive that it would be better that 
 less produce should be raised in the country at large, while having 
 a larger number of landed proprietors, than to see the whole land of 
 the country remaining in the hands of a few, with a larger aggre- 
 gate produce from the soil. (Cheers.) You must look to the poli- 
 tical and to the social advantages as well as to the economic 
 effect j but I am not at all convinced that even from the economic 
 point of view in these days, it would not be more profitable, even 
 as regards the raising of produce from the soil, to have the land held 
 amongst a vastly increased number of owners. (Cheers.) 
 
 Well, gentlemen, these are my views upon making land 
 saleable. But it is said that there is no desire to buy land in this 
 country — that do what you will, you will not be able to find a 
 large number of small agriculturists who will care to buy. 
 I say, at all events, give them the chance. (Cheers.) One thing 
 is certain, I think, and that is, that there are plenty of owners who 
 are anxious to sell. (Laughter.) Land is not such a very encourag- 
 ing possession at this moment that there are not a large number 
 of owners prepared to sell; but why do not people buy? I 
 still believe that it is in consequence of great difiiculties, 
 as regards transfer, settlement, entail, and aJl the legal 
 difficulties of the case; and therefore I say, give them 
 the chance. The owners also, I should think, would thank you 
 for legislation in this respect, because in this you are not striking 
 at the rights of property; you are increasing the rights of the 
 existing owner. It is bad for the country that the existing 
 owner should be hampered by the dead hand of his ancestors. 
 (Hear, and cheers.) I say, let the living hand grasp the living 
 soil. (Cheers.) But there is one thing I do not see my way 
 to, and that is any artificial planting of the agricultural labourer 
 upon plots of land, to be bought by local communities and 
 
 B
 
 12 
 
 distributed amongst them. I do not see that we can be very hopeful 
 that many men will avail themselves of the opportunity of pur- 
 chasing because we know that it is to a great extent a question of 
 wages, and that the high wages paid in our towns are a counter- 
 attraction — and that our colonies are a counter-attraction. But 
 never mind ; I say, give them the chance — let us have freedom 
 in dealing with land as we have freedom in dealing with every- 
 thing else. (Cheers.) 
 
 There is a counter-j^lan which is sometimes run — viz., the 
 " three F's " — Fair rents. Free sale, and Fixity of tenure. Well, I 
 would ask you to be rather careful when you have these trilogies, 
 because I want to point out to you, that it frequently happens 
 that two out of the three terms are destructive of one another, 
 and antagonistic to one another. Take, for instance, "Liberty, 
 Equality, and Fraternity." Liberty and equality almost 
 destroy each other. (Oh.) Liberty is the power to possess as 
 much as you please or as little as you please, to work, to get forward, 
 to rise in the scale of life, if you can. Equality is against all that, 
 and says every man must be exactly the same as his neighbour. 
 (Cries of No, no; laughter, cheers, and some hissing.) I should 
 like to argue that out, because I have a very strong opinion about 
 it. Equality in France killed liberty. (Hear, hear; hisses and 
 cheers.) I am astonished that that is not accepted. (A voice, 
 "That's right.") I am not speaking against equality in the slightest 
 degree. I am only showing that these catch-phrases of three words 
 often involve fallacies. I want to show to you that fair rents 
 and free sale are incompatible. 
 
 Consider the following argument : the idea of fair rent is 
 a fixed rent — a rent fixed by a Court. Well, the Court 
 fixes the rent, and says that is a fair rent, and the tenant 
 cannot be asked to pay any more. But he has also got 
 " free sale," and he sells his tenancy to another man, who pays 
 him a large price for it. The new tenant has got to pay the old 
 fair rent, but he has got to pay, besides, the interest of the capital 
 which he has paid to the tenant who sold to him. Therefore the 
 new rent is the old rent 2Jius the interest upon the capital which 
 he has had to pay (cheers) ; and so he is paying a new rent which 
 is unfair, because the Court has said that it is the lower rent 
 which is fair. So "free sale " has killed "fair rent." (Laughter 
 and cheers.) You may either have free sale or you may have 
 fair rent, but I confess I do not see how you can have both.
 
 13 
 
 I go for free sale on the part of the owners, and I believe most 
 liiberals will do the same. (Cheers.) I say that the "three 
 Fs" are not applicable to the United Kingdom. I won't 
 say anything of any special circumstances that may require 
 special legislation ; but, taking the United Kingdom as a 
 whole, you cannot apply that system to the United Kingdom 
 without disturbing the whole agricultural industry, and running 
 counter, I believe, to all the habits of farmers and labourers, and 
 to the whole mode in which agriculture is carried on. (Cheers.) 
 But I have given you what I consider to be a clear line for Liberals 
 to follow in this respect — absolute saleability of land, and no rest 
 till we have accomplished that. (Cheers.) Here, again, you will 
 remark how these crude panaceas may divert men's attention away 
 from that which I believe to be the true line of Reform. 
 
 I turn, with your permission, to a subject in which I have 
 always taken the deepest possible interest, and that is, a genuine 
 and sweeping reform in local government in all those parts of 
 the country where no local government worthy of the name 
 exists ; which reform should be followed by something else 
 equally imj^ortant, namely, a thorough review of all the duties of 
 the central authority and the local authority respectively, with a 
 view to as much decentralisation as possible. (Cheers.) I have 
 been at work upon this question for the last fifteen years. I 
 introduced a Bill on the subject as a member of Mr. Gladstone's 
 Government as far back as 1871, and for my part I have been 
 deeply disappointed that time has not permitted this, which I con- 
 sider to be a most important question, to have been carried out. 
 (Cheers.) I have spoken on this subject in season and out of season. 
 I have introduced it into speeches to audiences who much preferred 
 party hits to any discussion upon local government, and who probably 
 found what I said to be intolerably dull. (Laughter.) I have bored 
 audiences with this topic of local government, but I have been 
 very persistent, and now I confess that I see with considerable satis- 
 faction that many of my arguments and much of my plan are being 
 presented to the new democracy" with every chance of their being 
 accepted. (Cheers.) And let me tell you here, as citizens of Edinburgh, 
 Do not think, because you have such excellent municipal institutions 
 yourselves, that this is not a question which concerns you. I am 
 not anxious only for the direct and immediate advantages to be 
 derived from better local government in the counties. They will 
 secure, no doubt, better roads, cheaper administration, better sani-
 
 14 
 
 tary arrangements, better government in many ways ; but that, to 
 my mind, is only half the battle. What I want to see, and what 
 I have pleaded for, is this, that in all local commnnities there 
 should be more civic life, such as you have in your large towns. I 
 am not content that the dwellers in the country, the agricultural 
 labourers, should have no other idea of civic authority than the 
 tramp of a policeman or an official of a workhouse. (Laughter and 
 cheers.) That is not what the civic views of the agricultural labourer 
 should be. I know in other countries that there is scarcely a vil- 
 lage where every one does not know who is the head of his com- 
 munity, and who are the responsible people ; but here in this 
 country there are Boards of Guardians, there are Sanitary Boards, 
 Boards of Health, but there is no real civic life such as you have 
 in the big towns ; and it is that which I wish to see secured for all 
 the agricultural communities throughout the United Kingdom. 
 (Cheers.) 
 
 Some of you may remember that it was the absence of training 
 for civic life which excited some misgivings in my mind with 
 regard to the political enfranchisement of these classes. I knew 
 that in towns, all citizens had been trained, through municipal 
 institutions, to the performance of political duties. At all events, 
 let those who have admitted the agricultural labourer with satis- 
 faction to the political franchise, now do their best to assist him 
 also to civic enfranchisement, to assist him in every way to have a 
 government worthy of the name throughout the local communities 
 in the length and breadth of the land, and to train him in the per- 
 formance of public duties. (Cheers.) 
 
 Gentlemen, there are other arguments in favour of this increase 
 in civic life, and especially in the new distribution of functions 
 between the central government and the local authority. There 
 are many new needs arising, to which I have alluded already — partly 
 sanitary, partly civic; and I think that the danger of many of 
 these movements — for there is danger in some of them — will 
 be decreased if those new duties, involving great questions as 
 they do, are put upon the local authority, instead of being put upon 
 the State. (Cheers.) If you put them upon the State, you dis- 
 guise the expense. You may have some vast system which will cost 
 the country a deal of money, and you won't see, or you will not 
 know, that you are paying for it. But all such taxation adds to the 
 aggregate ; it increases the burdens upon industry, it helps to check 
 production, and handicaps you in your relations to the foreigner. The
 
 15 
 
 Uxation is there, even if you do not see it. But if it is put upon 
 the local authority, you may be certain of one thing, and that is, 
 that the local authority will be pulled up before it is too late. 
 (Laughter and cheers.) The greatest master in modern finance 
 once told me that many nations had broken down under the burden 
 of their imperial taxation, but none had broken down under their 
 local burdens. (Cheers.) Depend upon it, gentlemen, it is wiser 
 now, in these days of what is called State Socialism — it is wiser 
 to strengthen your local authorities ; and then, through these 
 local authorities, to deal with some of those questions which, in 
 the hands of the State, are so much more dangerous. (Cheers.) 
 
 But let me say one word more, if you will allow me 
 (cheers), upon this question of local government and these new 
 wants. I am anxious that there should be as much put upon 
 them as the State can give them, because the State is over- 
 worked. The State breaks down under the many functions 
 it has to fulfil. (Cheers.) And, therefore, see the immense 
 advantage you have. You will relieve the State ; you will 
 enable it to perform its functions better than it has been 
 performing them hitherto, and, at the same time, you will be 
 raising your civic life by making it more responsible and 
 more independent. (Cheers.) Therefore, I say move forward — 
 and this is worthy of the Liberal party — move forward on those 
 lines. 
 
 Let me say one word upon this question — how far, when 
 you have burdened the local community with new functions 
 which come from the State, and with some new functions 
 which must be placed upon it to meet the increasing needs of 
 the country — how far is it wise to endeavour to seek ivork, 
 and, if I am not using too strong an expression, to attempt 
 to take the working-man in hand, to interfere with him at 
 every step, and to manage his affairs for him 1 This is not only 
 a question for the ratepayers. I think there is a great danger 
 that there should be too much patronage of the working-classes, 
 which the working-classes themselves will resent, and which they 
 will not welcome. (Cheers.) I should think it infinitely wiser 
 to run — if I may say so — voluntary association, voluntary co- 
 operation upon the part of working-men, against the constant 
 tendency to increase official inspection and offi(;ial interference 
 with them, be it imperial or be it local. (Cheers.) We cannot 
 too much recognise or pay too great a compliment to what
 
 16 
 
 the British -working-classes have done in this respect. As our 
 Parliamentary institutions have been examples and patterns to 
 Parliaments everywhere, so have these societies, the voluntary 
 societies of the English working-classes,|been models for those else- 
 where. Is there any one who cannot sympathise with those great 
 friendly societies, which have shown tliat there is no incom- 
 patibility whatever between capital and labour 1 I had myself the 
 pleasure of addressing 500 delegates from a friendly society which 
 owned five millions sterling in the Funds. ^ (Cheers.) I rejoiced to sec 
 the extreme skill with which they administered their affairs. There 
 is plenty of room still, I hope and believe, for co-operation and for 
 association, and I believe that they will do far better to follow in 
 those lines, especially when they look abroad and see what is 
 being done with regard to what I have called State Socialism, 
 where there is a combination for the patronage of the working- 
 classes, composed of the bureaucracy, the priests, and the Socialists. 
 Those three classes in Germany are combining together against 
 voluntary co-operation, and in favour of constant State inter- 
 ference (cheers) ; but I trust the English working-classes will 
 never be led away by a nightmare of that kind, but that they 
 will still continue to be as they have been hitherto, the best re- 
 presentatives of the power of joint working together for joint 
 common action. (Hear, hear, and cheers.) 
 
 Gentlemen, I must, I am afraid, take you to one more social 
 topic. (Cheers). I would say one word upon that whole 
 class of questions involved in the housing of the poor, and on 
 sanitary questions generally. (Cheers.) I must speak with 
 reserve upon the housing of the poor, because I am a member 
 of the Commission, which has not yet made its report ; but this 
 I can say without reserve, that both in this and in all sanitary 
 questions, I am for enforcing liability — individual liability — and for 
 bringing home the fact to those who are responsible that they must 
 do their duty first before the community is asked to do their duty 
 for them. (Cheers.) I am afraid that here, too, wild schemes 
 may damage the more hum-drum reforms ; but I say that there 
 is not nearly enough execution of the laws which enact liabilities. 
 Sometimes it may be due to defects in the law itself, to weak clauses, 
 or to the failure of the authorities to whom the execution of these 
 laws is committed, and sometimes, also, to public opinion, which goes 
 to sleep ; but, at all events, we ought to continue upon the lines of 
 making house-owners, and the owners of any other kind of property,
 
 17 
 
 do their duty according to the legislation in force and according to 
 their contracts. Much can be done in this respect even before you 
 liave recourse to other remedies. An immense deal is done now- 
 a-days by inspectors, but much slips through the fingers of inspectors. 
 (Hear, hear, and laughter.) I know it is rather a craze of mine, 
 but I dislike the idea of a tremendous army of inspectors spread- 
 ing over the whole length and breadth of the land ; and I am 
 much more in favour of seizing a recalcitrant and culpable man, 
 and punishing him if he does not do his duty. (Cheers.) I am 
 against relieving him too much and instituting any action of the 
 State to do his duty for him. 
 
 Now, I hope that the topics I have put before you, though 
 serious, have not been entirely without interest. (Cheers.) 
 They are those which we come across, most of them, in our 
 daily life. But I now approach a subject which I know has 
 very considerable interest for a great portion of the citizens 
 of this city, and of many other cities, and that is the Licen- 
 sing question. (Cheers.) I am in favour of the i^lan of trans- 
 ferring the duty of licensing to the local authorities. (Hear, 
 hear.) I am in favour of giving popular control over the 
 licences (cheers) ; but as for a Bill, which I have seen, which pro- 
 hibits altogether the sale of drink, I am not in its favour, and I 
 will tell you why. (Loud cheers and some hisses.) It is far 
 better to be quite candid. I am in favour of giving the popular 
 voice the power of closing public-houses on Sundays ; but when 
 you come to say this, that you are to stop the sale of drink 
 altogether, I will say that it would require an overwhelming 
 demonstration of the wish of the working-classes upon that 
 subject before legislation ought to take place (hear, hear, and 
 cheers) ; and I would not listen very seriously upon such an 
 immensely important topic as that to anybody except the people 
 absolutely certain to be affected by it, because — I wish to put this 
 argument most briefly before you — I conceive that the upper and 
 middle classes would exempt themselves from all the inconveni- 
 ences involved in this legislation, while the working-classes would 
 feel its full effect. Therefore I say it is entirely a question 
 for the working-classes themselves. (Cheers.) Look at this — I 
 have studied a bill upon the subject, and it proliibits the 
 sale of drink, but it does not prohibit the purchase of drink, 
 nor does it prevent drinking (laughter and cheers). Therefore, 
 supposing by an overwhelming majority the inhabitants of a
 
 18 
 
 certain city, or a district of the city, had passed a self-denying 
 ordinance and said, " We will make it criminal to sell drink in 
 this district," why, what would the upper and middle classes do ? 
 (Cheers.) Members of the upper classes would order six dozen of 
 wine from a merchant in the next district (laughter), or they would 
 lay in each, according to his ability, a certain stock; they would 
 send for half-a-dozen of whisky, or three bottles of whisky, from the 
 neighbouring place. (Laughter.) I could see the force of your 
 saying, " We will make it criminal for a man to drink ;" but I do 
 not see how you can carry your object by simply making it 
 criminal to sell, if your neighbours are going to sell ; and a splen- 
 did business they would do at the expense of the self-denying 
 community. (Laughter.) Therefore, if any one comes to me and 
 says, "It is our bounden duty to put down drunkenness," I 
 say, yes ; and I will assent to all practical methods by which it 
 can be done (cheers) ; but you must first show me that the 
 law cannot be evaded ; and you must first show me that those 
 who will most be affected by it, who cannot lay in a stock, whose 
 wages do not admit of their doing more than buying a small por- 
 tion at a time, and therefore who will not have the facilities 
 for going to neighbouring places to buy their drink ; you must 
 show me that there is such an overwhelming majority on their 
 part that no great injustice or inconvenience will take place. 
 (Cheers). These are my views, which I have told you frankly 
 (cheers); and I may add that in accordance with these principles, 
 which I am afraid I have enforced at almost too great a length upon 
 you, I am against the majority coercing the minority. (Cheers, 
 some hisses, and counter cheers.) Well, I do not in the slightest 
 degree resent the expression of dissent. I quite feel that it 
 is an open question. To me it is not open, nor to the 
 gentlemen who have expressed their disapproval; but it is a 
 question upon which an argument may be made. But 
 do not let us, who do not go so far as others, be taxed 
 with any want of interest in the subject. All we say is this: 
 We think that that very drastic legislation which is proposed 
 would defeat its own object (cheers) ; but short of that we 
 will go with you. We will do all that we can in order to 
 diminish the number of public-houses. (Cheers.) We are pre- 
 pared to put the licensing in the hands of the authorities, and to 
 give effect to any practical legislation that is put before us. 
 
 Now, gentlemen, I really do not know at what length it is
 
 19 
 
 right for me to detain you. (Cries of "Go on.") There are 
 two subjects more upon which I should like to say a word 
 (cheers), and one is the question of Taxation — a subject that 
 will come home to a great many of you. I have already alluded 
 to the fact that the system under which we are living 
 at present is a system which has been elaborated with the 
 greatest possible care, and which has been constructed practi- 
 cally by the greatest living statesman of the century (cheers), 
 and I think that we shall not approach with light hearts 
 the destruction of that system. Every system of that kind is of 
 course imperfect, and there is work which I know Mr. Gladstone 
 would wish to have done. There is the improvement in the Death- 
 duties — a subject which has long commanded the attention of the 
 Ministry, and with which, I believe, they are prepared to deal as soon 
 as time permits. But when we hear of questions like the graduated 
 Income-tax, then I say to myself, must not Mr. Gladstone's hair 
 stand on end when he hears of doctrines being propounded which he 
 has combated with so much eloquence and with so much success. 
 These are views which are now put forward, and are put forward, 
 I think, with some crudity, and without having really been thought 
 out. I should be doing the subject an injustice if I were to-night 
 to argue against a graduated Income-tax. The matter is one of 
 such extreme importance that it cannot be dealt with satisfactorily 
 towards the conclusion of a speech. But let me point out this, 
 that there are a number of questions which have to be considered. 
 You have to consider, not only how far your system of taxation 
 touches the individual, but how it will affect the community 
 generally. It is not enough to say, " How will it bear upon this 
 manor thaf?" But taxes have frequently been proposed w^hich 
 would drive capital out of the country ; and while you were attempt- 
 ing to shift a burden, you might be striking at the whole springs 
 of industry. (Hear, hear.) Taxation is a matter that cannot be 
 dealt with in this light spirit. And may I venture to put 
 one suggestion before you, when it is said that burdens should 
 be entirely shifted, and it is this : Have we not heard that 
 taxation and representation ought always to go together? We 
 have heard this argument very often, that because the work- 
 ing-classes bore their share in the burdens of the State, 
 therefore they ought to be represented. I don't think the 
 working-classes themselves would deny the converse of the 
 proposition, that if they are represented they will also bear, and 
 
 G
 
 20 
 
 willingly bear, their share in the burdens of the State. (Cheers.) 
 We have to think how these matters will affect the whole course 
 of legislation ; and I do not think that there are many statesmen 
 who would venture to suggest that, when the whole power has 
 been put in the hands of a class, because the great multitudes are 
 now the arbiters of the destinies of this country, that moment 
 should be taken to point out to them that they should shift their 
 burdens upon others. 
 
 Then there are others who bring forward the idea of Protective 
 Duties. Protective Duties in these days! I wonder how many 
 Scotsmen are in favour of a return to Protection! (Laughter.) 
 Would not Adam Smith turn in his grave if he heard some of 
 the nonsense which is talked about Fair Trade in these days? 
 But, again, it is too large a subject upon which to embark at this 
 moment. Protection ought not to be dealt with as I saw it dealt with 
 in a speech not long ago, when it was said, " I can show you a better 
 method. I won't give Protection to the land ; but I will give the land 
 itself. That will be an easy solution of the doctrine of Protection." 
 (Laughter.) Protection must be fought with other weapons than 
 that. Nothing has struck me with greater admiration than to see how 
 the working-classes have stood the depression of trade, and how 
 little effect has been made ujDon them, even by the advocates of 
 Pair Trade. (Cheers.) The working-classes may ask this, and 
 they may ask it fairly — I have never yet seen this argument 
 answered — " You tell us that we are suffering because we have 
 Pree Trade? Is there not Protection in Germany ? Is there not 
 Protection in Prance? and is their commercial or industrial 
 position one whit better than it is in this country? (Cheers.) 
 Are they not suffering, though they are steeped to the very lips 
 in Protection, even in a greater ratio than the British workman, 
 from the badness of the times?" (Cheers.) JS'o, gentlemen, I trust 
 that the British workman will stand by his colours as he has done 
 hitherto in this matter (cheers), that again he will reject crude pana- 
 ceas, and that he will know that it is by his industry and his free- 
 dom that he will best meet the difficulties of the time. (Cheers.) 
 
 Now, I think I may fairly claim that in almost all that I have said 
 upon the question of Land, upon the question of Local Government, 
 upon the question of individual Independence, and against State 
 Interference, I am in sympathy with the great bulk of the Liberal 
 party. (Cheers.) I believe that I am in sympathy with three-fourths 
 of the Cabinet upon these questions. I believe that I am a truer
 
 21 
 
 disciple of the Prime Minister on these questions (cheers) than 
 some of those recent speakers who, perhaps, officially at least, may- 
 be said to be nearer and dearer to him. (Laughter.) I do not 
 believe that our great Liberal leaders have sympathy with raising 
 at this moment the question of the natural rights of man 
 to the property of his neighbour (hear, and a laugh) ; nor do I 
 believe that they hold the theory of ransom or insurance. And 
 I would plead very earnestly with my fellow-countrymen, 
 both in this room and out of it, to ask themselves this : Whether 
 it is a fair picture to give of this country and its society, to repre- 
 sent it as consisting of two camps — the camp of the rich and the 
 camp of the poor (cheers) — standing as it were in antagonism to 
 each other 1 That is not my view of the state of society in this 
 country. It appears to me that there are an immense number and 
 variety of classes all shading off the one into the other ; so that it 
 would be difficult to say where the rich end, where the middle classes 
 begin, where the middle classes end, and where the industrial classes 
 begin. Thank God, in this country men rise from one class into 
 another. (Cheers. ) Thank God, these class distinctions are more and 
 more being broken down. (Cheers.) The interest of one class is the 
 interest of another class; and the teaching is dangerous, Vv^hich would 
 incense one class against the other. (Cheers.) And when it is argued 
 that ransom is to be paid, may I ask to whom is it to be paid ? What 
 happens in this question is this, that the destitute and the helpless 
 are confounded in one sentence with the independent, well-to- 
 do working-class artisans; and then remedies that might be 
 necessary for the destitute, and a kind of patronising sympathy 
 that might be suitable for paupers, are raised into a kind of 
 plea for a war by the working-classes generally against capital. Surely 
 that is not the view of society which the working-classes of this 
 country will accept. They will not believe in this antagonism be- 
 tween classes. It may be said that these views are but vague 
 generalities, and that when the measures are stated by which these 
 subversive generalities are to be carried out, those measures do not 
 look so very big after all. Eut the seed cannot be sown without 
 its taking root, and a man who has sown seed in a field might as 
 well try to go and pick back the seed he has sown, and gather it 
 into his sack again, as men who have pronounced dangerous doc- 
 trines can attempt to take them back. (Cheers.) And so, gentlemen, 
 I trust you will pardon me if I have thought it necessary to make 
 some protest against doctrines of that kind. The protests will come
 
 22 
 
 — I am sure tliey will come — from those who are responsible for the 
 party and to the party ; but time must not be allowed to elapse be- 
 tween the enunciation of such doctrines and some protest. 
 Those protests ought to come not only from one class, but 
 from all ; for this is not a question for the upper or 
 for the middle classes only, it is a question for the working- 
 classes quite as much, in which not only their interests, but their 
 honour and their duty are concerned. There are two policies 
 that can be put before the country. The one is a policy 
 of union, freedom, justice, and common sense ; the other 
 is a policy of class conflicts and wild dreams. I know 
 which the country will choose in the end; and I know 
 too which I believe the democracy will choose. If I had 
 the right, which I have not, to appeal to the democracy, I know 
 the language I should use. I should say, You have succeeded 
 to the government of this old and great country, not like the 
 French democrats after a violent revolution, and through a reign of 
 blood ; you have not succeeded to government like your Australian 
 fellow-citizens, who have grown up with the growth of the country, 
 and have to deal with comparatively simple issues ; but you have suc- 
 ceeded to the government of a vast and an old empire, with classes 
 whose interests have become complicated through centuries ; ^''ou 
 have been invited to take part in that government with the full 
 approval of all classes of the community. You have high and 
 important duties ; you will look to it that that common-sense and 
 fair play which have characterised the history of the United King- 
 dom in the past shall continue so to characterize it in the future ; 
 and if you have reproaches against the classes that have ruled 
 before, because they have followed too much their own interests 
 — you, the democracy, will show that you take a higher view of the 
 duties to which you have been called. You will remember how 
 Great Britain is the mother of Parliaments. You will remember 
 how, throughout the world, upon the destinies of this country depends 
 also the well-being of countless millions. And remembering all 
 this, I believe that the new democracy will do its duty, if those 
 -who aspire to lead it will only tell the truth. (Loud cheers.)
 
 SEOOlsTD ADDEESS. 
 
 Delivered in the Literary histitute^ on Tuesday^ 2)<^ February 1885, 
 to the Rosebery Club. 
 
 Mr. GoscHEN said — My Lords and Gentlemen, I have to thank 
 this Scottish audience for its cordial reception of me this evening, 
 and I shall endeavour to reciprocate the kindness of that reception. 
 An hour or two ago I received a letter — not a threatening letter 
 (laughter) — and not an anonymous letter, but one from a gentleman 
 who is present this evening, and who warned me of a danger into 
 which I might fall. He said that I might use the terms England 
 and English, where I ought to use the terms Britain and British. 
 (Laughter.) I am all for a united Empire, and it is upon that sub- 
 ject that I wish to address you this evening. I am for the union of 
 England, Scotland, and Ireland (cheers) ; and I only wish that I 
 knew an adjective to suit my purpose. I must not say English, 
 because it does not include Scottish; but if I say British, does 
 it include Ireland? (Laughter.) Therefore, pardon me should I 
 fall into mistakes, and trust me that, whatever adjective or substan- 
 tive I use, I am one of those who believe we are a united Empire, 
 and am determined that, so far as one man can contribute to that 
 object, this Empire shall remain one at home and abroad. (Cheers.) 
 
 Lord Eeay in his most striking address last night, spoke of a 
 possible repugnance that might be felt by audiences at this 
 moment to have their attention turned from domestic affairs to 
 foreign and colonial subjects. I do not know how that may be, 
 but I am here to contend that it is difficult to draw a line ; and 
 I am not sure that I could tell you, if I wished it, where a home 
 question ends and where a colonial question begins. (Cheers.) Is the 
 question of our trade not a home question % Is the question of the 
 outlet of our surplus population not a home question? Is the 
 question of markets for our manufacturers not a home question, and 
 a very vital home question too % And if, through our union with 
 the colonies, our home prosperity is affected for better or for worse, 
 I am here to contend that you cannot say that anyone who speaks
 
 24 
 
 upon a colonial question is departing from the circle of subjects 
 which vitally interest all classes of the community. (Cheers.) 
 
 Let it not be said that this is a question of sentiment which 
 only concerns the cultured classes. I am not one of those who 
 would depreciate sentiment in politics, for so long as men are what 
 they are, and nations are what they are, sentiment, whether we 
 wish it or not, will play a very decided part in politics, (Cheers.) 
 We cannot ignore it. But it is not in the spirit of sentiment that I 
 shall approach this question this evening. I wish to press home that 
 which was urged by Lord Reay last night, which has been urged 
 by my friend Mr. Forster, and which is being urged now, I am 
 glad to say, in many quarters. I wish to see interest taken 
 in these colonial subjects. The question of the united Em- 
 pire, the question of our Colonies, is to a great extent a working- 
 man's question. It is they who supply the chief number of the 
 emigrants who go forth to seek their fortunes beyond the 
 seas. It is they who work at the manufactures that are sold 
 to our Australian fellow-subjects ; it is they who would feel the 
 effects if, in the course of the destinies of this country, any calamity 
 should break up the colonial empire. And so I say this is a 
 question that cannot be ignored, and that the working-classes must 
 take up; they must hold their statesmen and their public men 
 responsible for attention being paid to our colonial empire. 
 (Cheers.) 
 
 I do not think that this is a subject which I need elaborate much 
 before an audience of Scotsmen, because, as was pointed out by Lord 
 Reay last night, Scotland, of all the various parts of this Empire, 
 is the one, perhaps, which furnishes the most successful colonists. 
 I was at one time Governor of the Hudson's Bay Company. Eew 
 names came before me except Scottish names. (Cheers.) There 
 were Grahams, there were Donalds. Then look at the Premiers 
 of Canada. They are either Macdonalds or they are Mackenzies. 
 Go to India ; look to banking in China ; and wherever you look you 
 find Jardines and Mathesons, Wallaces and Crawfords. Wher- 
 ever you go you find the most successful men to be Scotsmen — in 
 fact, if you were to make a list of the most successful bankers, 
 merchants, and traders in the colonies, it would look uncommonly 
 like a Scottish directory. (Cheers.) Therefore I do not think I 
 need elaborate this question of the interest which you must feel 
 in your colonies. But mark this. The colonists are now more 
 and more being brought into contact with the subjects of foreign
 
 25 
 
 Powers. Europe, more than at perhaps any period, is becoming a 
 colonising and a maritime Europe ; and our colonial fellow-subjects 
 are beginning to have neighbours. And, therefore, if you go 
 with me so far that you are vitally interested in colonial matters, 
 you cannot put away foreign questions. You may think that you 
 have little interest in them. It is not so. You are interested in 
 the colonies, and the colonies are gravely affected by many foreign 
 questions. 
 
 On Saturday I spoke to another audience of the duties of the 
 democracy at home. I hope to be allowed this evening to say 
 something with regard to its duties abroad; and the state of 
 Europe is such — the attitude of foreign Powers is such, the 
 events which are passing around us, or which are passing 
 beyond the seas — in Africa, in Australia, in India — I fear 
 almost wherever we turn our eyes, are such, that the demo- 
 cracy must prepare itself for these duties; and it must 
 remember that its affections and duties towards the colonies 
 may perchance cost it trouble and sacrifices ; and for those 
 sacrifices, and for that trouble, the democracy must be prepared. 
 (Cheers.) Now, I will tell you what I think would be a great mis- 
 fortune, and that is, that the new electorate should be easily bored 
 by questions of this kind. I trust that will not be the case ; but you 
 know it is rather a British failing to be easily bored. We have 
 sometimes drifted into wars formerly because statesmen were bored, 
 and did not like facing in time the difficulties which occurred in 
 these foreign questions. (Cheers.) It will not be easy, I admit, 
 for the new electorate thoroughly to understand and to master 
 foreign politics ; and I am told that everybody must beware of 
 addressing his constituents on these subjects. No ; he must not 
 beware. (Cheers. ) It is his duty to speak to his constituents upon 
 subjects so vitally affecting the fortunes of the Empire. (Cheers.) 
 If they do not care, he must persuade them to care. (Cheers.) 
 And so I say, Let the new electorate face these questions, and 
 take a constant interest in them, because they will really vitally 
 affect the future fortunes of this country. (Cheers.) 
 
 I have spoken to you of your interest in what concerns the 
 colonies. It may be said, perhaps, " We acknowledge all this ; 
 but should we not do the same business with our colonies, even 
 if they were not under our own flag?" Experience is not entirely 
 in that direction. I should like to know whether this country 
 would do the same business with India if India were under a
 
 26 
 
 ^Russian protectorate — which Heaven forbid ! (Cheers.) You will 
 remember that goods follow the flag to an extraordinary degree 
 (hear, hear) ; and, what is more, men follow the flag. They prefer 
 to go to the colonies which belong to the mother country ; and the 
 colonies, notwithstanding their protective tariff's, take an infinitely 
 larger proportion from the mother country than from others. I 
 will not try your patience by being statistical this evening. I will 
 reserve my statistics for another audience. I will only tell you 
 this — that our trade with the colonies has stood the depression 
 which has existed with far greater strength than our trade with 
 foreign countries not under our own flag. 
 
 But I should be doing an injustice to this subject of our 
 connection with the colonies if I were to speak only of the 
 material advantages which our working-classes will gain and 
 retain by the maintenance of our colonial empire. We have 
 duties to the colonies as well as duties to expect from them. We 
 have duties to the subject races in many parts of the world where 
 our flag has been planted, and we cannot and will not say, in an 
 hour of danger, that we must surrender our position towards those 
 races, or towards those colonists, because we see troubles rising on 
 the horizon. (Cheers.) I hope that you have gone with me to this 
 point — that our colonies are to us a matter of imperial urgency and of 
 imperial duty, and that we cannot shrink from or shirk those duties. 
 
 I now come to a part of the subject on which it is my bounden 
 duty to speak, but which may not be so agreeable to you — and that 
 is to explain how the accomplishment of those duties may not be 
 so easy as it has been in times past. But perhaps the very fact 
 that there are some dangers threatening, that the colonies turn 
 with confident hope to the mother country; that there are times 
 when they see that union with the United Kingdom is a matter 
 of the greatest importance to themselves — may draw closer the 
 ties which are already binding the Empire together (cheers) ; and 
 our colonies, seeing themselves threatened in some vital points, 
 may say^ "We are glad of the old country; we see that all the 
 talk of separation, and that we had separate interests, has been 
 false; we see that there are interests which are binding us to- 
 gether." We, from a sense of duty and interest, and the colonies, 
 from a sense of interest and affection, may, at a time like this, 
 perhaps even be drawn closer together. (Cheers.) 
 
 I have spoken of some dangers that may threaten the colonies ; 
 and I wish to call your attention specially to this — that their
 
 27 
 
 situation as regards Continental Powers has undergone a very 
 serious change during the last five or six years. There was a 
 time when the colonies were considered to be entirely beyond the 
 range of European politics. We had neighbours — we have 
 always had neighbours : but those neighbours showed no rest- 
 lessness, and the colonies practically said, or were more or less 
 entitled to say, looking at the circumstances of the moment, 
 " What is Europe to us 1 " That is not the case any longer. I 
 should like to know what our Cape Colony has got to say to 
 that now. I think they would say, that certain European Powers 
 were standing in a very peculiar position to the Cape Colony indeed. 
 I should like to know what the Australian colonies would say. 
 There are colonies which have had before them the question of 
 exportation of criminals by their neighbours ; there are colonies 
 which have objected to the establishment of Germans in New 
 Guinea (cheers). And what do the colonies do? Who has 
 to look after the colonies at such a time? It is the mother 
 country (cheers) — it is the United Kingdom. The colonies 
 may feel that, but for their union with us, they might have some 
 very disagreeable passages indeed with the Iron Chancellor, who 
 is not to be trifled with (laughter) ; or they might find that it was 
 not so easy to produce much effect on the authorities in France. 
 But now we are all acting together ; we are acting for the colonies 
 and with the colonies, and I do hope that we shall not turn aside 
 and say, " What troublesome questions these are, and how dis- 
 agreeable that we have these foreign complications owing to our 
 colonists ! After all are they so important to us ? " That would be 
 shabby (cheers); that would be unpatriotic. (Cheers.) But it would 
 be worse ; it would be foolish ; it would be absolutely suicidal ; 
 and I shall be much surprised if the working-men, and, in fact, all 
 classes of this Empire, do not see that it is just a moment when 
 it is right to assert that the United Kingdom has to do its duty. 
 
 You must allow me now to follow up the argument that I sub- 
 mit to you — namely, that union with the colonies is essential 
 to our Empire, and that our union with the colonies now, in 
 the present state of Europe, makes it impossible for us to overlook 
 the great importance of foreign politics. (Cheers.) I have spoken 
 briefly upon the changed attitude of Europe towards colonial 
 questions. But I wish to put before you more than that. The 
 whole situation of Europe is changed, and vitally changed. 
 This country is placed in a different position from that in which it
 
 28 
 
 has ever been before. You remember how Europe was sub-divided 
 — possibly some of you are too young to remember the immense 
 number of principalities into which Germany was divided ; but, 
 at all events, the map of Europe was not what it is like now, when 
 the whole German-speaking population has been brought together, 
 and is subject to the controlling will of one gigantic Power, and 
 that gigantic Power swayed and moved by the will, I had almost 
 said, of one gigantic man. (Cheers.) It is a very different thing to 
 face a Europe divided and sub-divided, and to see Europe massed, I 
 may say, as it is at the present moment — a certain number of Powers 
 uniting for common action, and, above all, Germany and France 
 pulling together — unless it were a more correct expression to say 
 that France is pulled by Germany (hear, hear, and laughter). 
 And we see Germany and Austria not, as before, arrayed in a 
 kind of friendly rivalry, sometimes assuming the form of very 
 considerable diplomatic rivalry, or Germany and Austria at 
 loggerheads ; but we see a combination of European Powers, 
 and that combination swayed by the will of a single and 
 most powerful man. I do not think that since the days 
 of the great Napoleon there was more power massed together 
 in the hands of one man (cheers), and united for common 
 action. Their aggregate power is immense ; their naval power is 
 not inconsiderable. Four Powers that used to spend eleven 
 millions on their navy are now spending fifteen millions. Of their 
 gigantic military strength I will not say a word ; but I wish to 
 point out to you that Europe is combined, and that Europe is 
 now more powerful even at sea than at any other period. 
 
 And what will Europe do 1 What will the attitude of Europe 
 be towards this country 1 There have been times when we could 
 have looked with absolute indifference upon the combination of 
 Europe for all purposes (cheers) ; but we cannot be blind to what is 
 passing; for this Europe, which I have thus described — I hope 
 in no exaggerated terms — this Europe has suddenly been seized 
 with a colonising mania, and France and Germany and other powers 
 seem to feel that they must adopt a forward colonial policy, and they 
 push it more or less together ; and we, who hitherto have 
 thought that we could do what we liked, when we liked, find our- 
 selves now in face of a very powerful European combination. I 
 am not going to be alarmist in the least, but I wish to put the 
 truth in regard to this matter before you, and the importance of 
 that truth for us. (Cheers.) I do not for one moment believe
 
 29 
 
 tiiat Europe is animated by any particular aggressive, combative, 
 or warlike desires. I have no idea of that kind. They simply 
 wish to have their way as much as they possibly can, and to utilise 
 to the utmost the aggregate power they possess ; and, in these 
 circumstances, I think it behoves this country to look very 
 seriously to its position, and to say what, from our point of view, 
 we ought to do ; what we can admit, and what we cannot admit. 
 Every country like ours is entitled to maintain its acquired position. 
 (Cheers.) It would be shirking its duty if it did not look facts 
 like these in the face. 
 
 I have shoAvn you that Europe is united ; I have shown you 
 that although Europe is not aggressive, it is more bent on colonial 
 enterprise than at any other period. There was a period, 
 I might suggest by way of parenthesis, when we had restless 
 neighbours, not in this century but in a previous century, 
 and when we had those restless neighbours we had a very 
 troublesome time. No statesman could then present himself to his 
 constituency without acknowledging that he had paid considerable 
 regard to colonial questions. We have passed through a period 
 when this restlessness had calmed down, but now we find ourselves 
 face to face again with a period of restless colonial movement. 
 I do not say for a moment that we ought to take up any selfish or 
 isolated position in these circumstances, but I wish to say, and I 
 shall endeavour to convey to you and the public, that we ought to 
 make up our minds what we consider essential and what we do not, 
 and then stand by what we consider to be the rights and duty of 
 this country. (Cheers.) 
 
 Let me suggest to you one or two illustrations of this common 
 action of Europe. We have seen it in several places ; we are 
 seeing it at this moment in Egypt. A combination of powers is 
 attempting, or appears to have been attempting, to dictate to this 
 country the terms which ought to be made, while Gordon is 
 holding Khartoum (cheers), and while our soldiers are pouring out 
 their blood in the deserts of the Soudan. (Cheers.) I have no 
 desire that we should be unreasonable, but I do think that it will 
 be the duty of Her Majesty's Government carefully to weigh to 
 what point concessions can be made. 
 
 You see the present action of Europe ; you see pressure applied 
 to us which I do not remember in this generation to have seen 
 applied to this country before. 
 
 Take the case of the Congo, where a Conference was arranged
 
 30 
 
 on colonial and maritime questions by a Power — Germany — which, 
 till lately, had no colonial interest worth speaking of. And to 
 whom did she address herself to arrange this Congress, which was 
 to determine maritime questions of deep interest to this country ? 
 Bid Germany come to Great Britain and say, " What shall the 
 basis of this Conference be?" No. Germany went to France, and 
 France and Germany together arranged the preliminaries of a Con- 
 ference which was to discuss the rights and privileges of Great 
 Britain in her colonial possessions. The despatches relating to 
 that subject are not pleasant reading to the public generally. I 
 am speaking of this not in the way of criticism of any particular 
 action that has been taken ; I am wanting to bring home to you 
 that you cannot say we have no concern with foreign matters. 
 Foreign nations are closing in upon many points where we never 
 dreamed of contact with great Powers before. 
 
 And now I should like to know what will be the vieAV of the 
 country generally of the attitude which, under these critical circum- 
 stances, we ought to take. There is one thing of which I am 
 absolutely certain, and that is that we ought not to hide from 
 ourselves the gravity of the situation. As I said before, we 
 ought to look the facts in the face. (Cheers.) We ought 
 to see what they mean; we ought to examine them; we 
 ought not to put them aside; and if they are worthy 
 of being brought before the attention of the constituencies, 
 we ought to deal with them as men. (Cheers.) I have 
 spoken of the attitude of Prince Bismarck. I do not for one 
 moment believe — and I am very happy to be able to say it — 
 that Prince Bismarck has any particular hostile or unfriendly 
 designs against this country. I do not think that that is his atti- 
 tude of mind. I do not say that there are not many steps that 
 have been taken that are unfriendly, but w^hen it is said Prince 
 Bismarck has sinister designs against this kingdom or Government, 
 I think it is misreading the position. He is simply — and he is a 
 strong man — decided to have his way if he can possibly have it. 
 (Cheers.) He wishes to remove all obstructions that come in his 
 way, and to remove them very unceremoniously, if he finds that the 
 obstructions do not object particularly to be removed. (Cheers.) 
 He is a very business-like man ; he is a cynical man, and he knows 
 his own mind thoroughly. (Laughter.) What I hope is that this 
 country also may make up its mind and know what it wants (cheers) ; 
 and when Prince Bismarck finds himself face to face with a country
 
 31 
 
 which knows what it wants, I do not believe he will be found any- 
 thing but a business-like, practical, and sharp statesman to deal 
 with. Supposing that you are playing a rubber of whist with a 
 very clever player, and you fumble with your cards before you play, 
 the clever player knows at once what you have in your hand, and 
 knows why you fumble perfectly well. He is able to know the 
 suit you have got. It is exactly the same with Prince Bismarck. 
 If he finds any fumbling on the part of his adversary, he takes ad- 
 vantage of it. He likes winning points very much ; and, besides 
 that, there is a certain satisfaction to a diplomatist and states- 
 man in knowing he has played a very successful game. (Cheers.) 
 I hope this country will not fumble with its cards too much, 
 but that it will know what card to play at the proper moment. 
 (Cheers.) We must make up our minds. 
 
 I wish now to be permitted to say a few words upon a subject 
 that does not touch either one Government or another Government ; 
 it touches public opinion quite as much as any particular set of 
 statesmen. For many years past the position of the United King- 
 dom has been such, that we have been able to do what we pleased 
 when we pleased. The consequence has been that this has induced 
 the belief in the minds of many of us that we need not hurry about 
 anything, that we can take our time, that we can shilly-shally, if 
 we like, and that things will come right in the end because this 
 country must have its way. If I read aright the situation of 
 Europe, this is not an attitude of mind that can long continue. 
 And here I will say that I have frequently noticed a phrase that I 
 detest, and against which I once before took the opportunity of 
 making a public protest. The little phrase is this — " After all." 
 I will show you how it is used. People say, " Sir ! Egypt 
 is indispensable to the supremacy of England. Egypt is the 
 high road to India ; we must defend it at all costs. British 
 supremacy must be maintained in Egypt." Difficulties arise — 
 very great difficulties — and you find the same man going 
 about saying, " After all, is Egypt so very important to 
 US'? (Laughter.) After all, have we not been too hasty in 
 our views with regard to Egypt '? On the whole, we think we 
 might give it up." Or again, " We have duties to the 800,000 dark 
 men in the Transvaal. These duties we must perform. England 
 is always on the side of the subject races." Then there come 
 immense difficulties, and you hear men going about again — "After 
 all, it is a very long way, and what have we got to do out there ?
 
 32 
 
 After all, it would be best that we should mind our own business 
 and not look to those distant countries." (A hiss, and loud cheers.) 
 I do not know whether anybody is in favour of that word " after 
 all," or will back it. I do not know whether the gentleman I 
 heard was against my view of "after all "or against the word itself 
 (laughter) ; but this I say, if you make up your mind in time you 
 do not need to use the word " after all." I object to the change of 
 front under difficulty and under disaster. (Loud cheers.) It is 
 perfectly arguable whether we should do such or such a thing. It 
 is not arguable, after having maintained any view, that when 
 troubles occur, we should at once turn from it. It is perfectly 
 arguable that we should never annex the Transvaal; but is it 
 arguable, after having undertaken to back up the subject races, to 
 say " After all" 1 (A voice. — Who are the men to say "After all" 1) 
 (Hisses.) Well, I wish I did not know them. (Laughter.) I believe 
 they exist in nearly every society (No, no) ; they exist in private 
 life, they exist in public life. Surely we might be quite agreed upon 
 this — that, whatever our politics are, that which we have said, we had 
 better stick to. (Cheers.) I have no particular set of men in 
 view. If the gentleman who asked that question thinks I am 
 insinuating anything against any particular body of men, I am not 
 doing so at all. (Hear, hear.) I have known men who began 
 this " after all" business in the year 1865, when Lord Palmerston 
 had come down to the House of Commons and had stated that if 
 Denmark should go to war with Germany she would not find her- 
 self standing alone. It made a great impression upon my youthful 
 enthusiasm at that time. A great many members of Parliament 
 then went about saying, " Well, after all, what have we got to do 
 with Denmark V I do not wish to tread upon the toes of anybody, 
 and I am quite sure that the gentleman who interrupted me would 
 never use the word " after all " himself (hear, hear, and cheers), 
 but it is a word that may lead to much mischief in our political 
 life. It has led to much mischief. 
 
 What does it mean, the word "After all"?" If it were defined 
 in a dictionary it would be said to be, "A word used occasionally 
 by timid people when they wish to back out from a position which 
 they have taken up." (Laughter.) But I trust that in future 
 political dictionaries we shall find when we open them at that 
 phrase, "An expression once current, but which has become 
 obsolete (loud cheers), and is no longer considered good British 
 style." (Renewed cheers.)
 
 33 
 
 I have often seen aims which, have been put forward, 
 philanthropic aims, noble aims, aims of which any nation 
 might be proud; I have regretted when I have seen that in 
 times of difficulty those noble aims have been afterwards 
 more or less repudiated. I say it is not the fault of any political 
 party, but it is the traditional view of the people of this 
 country, a view perfectly justified when the situation was different, 
 that they could enunciate and carry out all those aims, that they 
 could demand reforms in the subject races of other countries, that 
 they could address other Governments in such tones as they pleased. 
 It is essential to remember that now such language can no longer 
 be used with impunity, and it would be wise to discard it, and the 
 one point which I think ought to be impressed upon public opinion 
 in this country is, that we should concentrate our efforts, both in 
 moral and in material respects, that we should not say that we will 
 do more or attempt to do more than we are prepared to carry out, but 
 that upon those points which we think essential either to our duty 
 or to our interests we should be absolutely clear. (Cheers.) Let 
 us give up the idea, that we have got a kind of prerogative to be the 
 rulers in all the unappropriated portions of the globe. (Hear, 
 hear.) 
 
 I should be sorry if anything I have said to-night should 
 be misinterpreted, or if it should be for one moment thought 
 that I was speaking in favour of an aggressive policy. 
 (A voice — "Jingo.") Let me dismiss at once that view 
 by saying, if the country thinks it absolutely necessary, let 
 us limit the objects of our ambition and our duties, let us have 
 a strict delimitation of what are our interests and our British 
 duties. What I am contending for is this — that we should have 
 fewer vague and general aspirations and aims, and that we should 
 have more distinct performance in those duties which we have 
 asserted to be ours, and in vindicating those interests which we 
 have said must be ours. (Cheers.) Know your own minds, and 
 then concentrate your efforts upon what you decide. 
 
 Might I point to the further tendency, that we often wish to put 
 off liabilities? The great danger of putting off our obligations 
 is that they are returned upon us in greater force afterwards. 
 We fancy there is a liability which we think we may escape 
 from, and we find a little later that it would have been better 
 had we discharged that liability at once. There is such a thing 
 as compound interest in politics as well as in trade. (Hear, hear.)
 
 34 
 
 Take for instance the case of the Soudan. It was thought at 
 one time by a great many people that we could draw a kind of 
 marked line and say we had nothing to do with the Soudan. It 
 reminded me at the time of an old story of two men who were 
 going to fight a duel, and the one said to the other, who was ex- 
 tremely stout, " I will draw a line with chalk upon your stomach, 
 and any thrust I give outside that line shall not count." (Laughter 
 and cheers.) Well, without intending it, he made a thrust outside 
 the line, and it was as deadly as a wound would have been 
 within it. (Laughter and cheers.) So it was, unfortunately, 
 with the Soudan. It was impossible to draw the line. We 
 did not succeed in our limitations, and now we have that gallant 
 expedition, the exploits of which we must read with pride, although 
 we may regret that the expedition ever was necessary. (Cheers.) 
 
 I will not pursue the topic of the various occasions on which, if 
 we had acted sooner, greater liabilities might have been avoided. 
 What I want to insist on is that our situation is different now from 
 what it was in times past, and that it is necessary that not only 
 should we make up our minds to concentrate our efforts, but that we 
 should limit our influence to those cases where we intend to make a 
 stand. 
 
 Above all, we must have the material force by which we can 
 assert our rights, and by which we can support the words to which 
 we are pledged. (Cheers.) One word about the Army. I do not 
 like to stand on this platform at a time like this and speak of the 
 army without saying one word as to the splendid manner 
 in which our soldiers have performed their duty. (Loud cheers. ) 
 The days of military sentimentalism are past, but not the less on 
 that account will every inhabitant of these islands follow with the 
 deepest sympathy those gallant men who have won the admiration 
 of Europe. (Cheers.) They will remember the gallant Gordon, 
 who has shown what an Englishman can do ; whose name is now 
 a household word over all Europe, and who shows an Englishman 
 at bay, but using the resources of his genius and courage. (Cheers.) 
 And let me say one word of Lord Wolseley — a reforming soldier, 
 an intellectual soldier — who has known the same energy in carrying 
 out reforms as he shows in his campaigns in the face of the enemy ; 
 and of those gallant troops who held in their hands the honour of 
 the British Army, and who showed continental neighbours that 
 if it is not large it is composed of stuff which has never been beaten 
 in the annals of our country. (Cheers.) You must allow me also
 
 35 
 
 to say one word of the ^'avy, the service over which it was once 
 my high privilege to preside. (Cheers.) Never among any other 
 class of my countrymen did I find a greater sense of duty or a 
 greater desire to assume the proper responsibility in the hour of 
 danger (cheers) than among our naval officers and among the 
 men. (Cheers.) He would scarcely be doing a service to 
 his country who did not boldly face the question as to what 
 the force and the standard of the Navy ought to be. (Cheers.) 
 The Government have wisely increased the strength of the 
 Navy. (Cheers.) I trust that they will not go before their 
 countrymen with any apology for having done so (cheers), 
 but will tell their constituencies that it was necessary for 
 the safety of the public service. As statesmen, they were bound to 
 take this step ; as patriots, you are bound to accept it. (Cheers.) 
 You cannot put aside these questions of the strength of the Navy ; 
 and why should any apology be necessary, if it is thought to be 
 essential for the public service 1 I will tell you why it is. The 
 efficiency of a Government is tested by their aggregate expenditure 
 over a certain amount of years. It may very probably happen 
 that, while the Conservatives are loudest in their demands that the 
 Navy should be increased, at the next election the increased esti- 
 mates due to that very augmentation of the Navy will be made an 
 item of charge against the Government to prove their extravagance. 
 The view is taken, "Let us test the Government by its aggregate 
 expenditure." That is a false test. (Cheers.) The test of a proper 
 economy is, " What do you do with the money which is placed in 
 your hands 1 Do you avoid waste in the expenditure 1 Do you 
 make the most of it ?" I can fancy a postponement of expenditure 
 infinitely more prejudicial to the public service than the incurring 
 of expenditure. (Hear, hear.) Supposing you postpone your ex- 
 penditure, and in consequence your repairs or your building in an- 
 other year cost more than they would have cost, if they had been 
 done in time, the department which has nominally saved on its 
 estimates has been at fault, and has done wrong to the public ser- 
 vice. It has not avoided the expenditure ; that money does not 
 flow into the pocket of the taxpayer, but it is spent in the next 
 year in the augmentation due to the iDostponement of the work. 
 (Hear, hear, and cheers.) I think they are sometimes unjust 
 stewards of the public purse, who, when they ought to put down 
 100, put down 50. 
 
 What is to be said with regard to the augmentation of the Navy 1
 
 36 
 
 It is not M^e alone in this country who have thought it necessary 
 to increase the naval forces. (Hear, hear.) You cannot apply a 
 fancy standard and say that the Navy ought to be so-and-so large 
 in comparison with previous years ; you must look to the time, 
 the duties to be performed, and to the proceedings of neighbouring 
 countries. (Hear, hear.) Let me for one moment turn to neigh- 
 bouring countries, not to the great military empires, but to demo- 
 cratic and Liberal countries. Look at Italy. Italy is being 
 governed by Ministers who, if they were in the House of 
 Commons, would probably sit below the gangway. That is a fair 
 description of the general attitude of Italian Ministers. They are 
 the Ministers of a democratic country. Italy is burdened with 
 heavy debts. Its finances are improving, but are not in the best 
 condition. Nevertheless, Italy takes it to be, not a matter of 
 ambition or aggressive inclination, but a matter of security to it- 
 self to expend large sums upon its Navy, not in the old aristo- 
 cratic spirit, not in that spirit which is sometimes denounced, 
 but as a matter of essential importance even to a democratic 
 country. Look at France. France is no longer an aristocratic 
 or military country. France is not even a bourgeois democracy. 
 It is a utilitarian democracy headed by men of letters and by 
 journalists and lawyers. And democratic France has made greater 
 efforts in the direction of strengthening its navy almost than any 
 of the preceding Governments, not, I believe, from any aggressive 
 views, and certainly not from any aggressive views against this 
 country ; but because France knew what it was to have lain at 
 the foot of the conqueror (cheers) ; she knew how important it 
 was to make sacrifices in time to avoid national danger (cheers) ; 
 and I do not believe that this country will be behind in making 
 such provision for its naval forces as occasion may demand. Surely 
 the constituencies will gladly respond to such appeals as may be 
 made by Her Majesty's Government, and no statesman need be 
 frightened to propose an increased expenditure if he can show that 
 the changed circumstances of Europe, the grave times in which we 
 live, render that essential. 
 
 Once more let me say that foreign and colonial questions are so 
 bound up with home industry and with the prosperity of this 
 country that they cannot be separated. (Cheers.) We cannot 
 speak' any longer about having no concern with the affairs of the 
 Continent. That has gone by, because we see the Continent closing 
 around us in some of our colonial possessions. We must, therefore,
 
 37 
 
 face these difficulties, and I venture to say that those men are 
 not exceeding their duty who think that it is necessary and 
 right to bring these matters home to the public audiences they 
 have the privilege to address. (Cheers.) I do not believe 
 that these questions will be put aside by the public as uninterest- 
 ing, or as of less vital importance than others to which they 
 attribute the greatest possible importance. We Liberals, at least, do 
 not wish to approach this matter in the spirit of that word which 
 has been imported into the language ; we do not wish to approach 
 it in the spirit of "Jingo" boastfulness. We are not aggressive, 
 nor do we wish to measure the Empire by this kind of sentiment, 
 " That our Sovereign may rule over an Empire on which the sun 
 never sets." But we must remember the duties imposed upon a 
 great empire such as this. It would be a woeful day for justice, 
 for liberty, for the equal treatment of subject populations if the 
 flag of this country should be lowered, and if we should lose our 
 influence on the whole body of public opinion in Europe. (Cheers.) 
 Our flag is not a flag under which only military glory is to be won. 
 We must remember when the flag of this empire is planted in 
 different countries it means constitutional liberty ; we know that, 
 among all the great nations of Europe, our flag means disinterested 
 and moral international conduct (cheers) ; we know that it is the 
 only flag to which subject races can look with confident expecta- 
 tion and hope (cheers) ; it is the only flag on which are emblazoned 
 in letters clear and bright, "Justice and mercy to black and white." 
 (Hear, hear.) We know how our warriors abroad fight round that 
 flag, and we shall not shrink at home from such sacrifices as will be 
 needful to maintain its honour. Why, even stripling heroes will 
 hold that flag in distant countries to the death, and we have read 
 how, when shot down, they have clasped the colours of their 
 country to their hearts. (Cheers.) Let an equal sentiment per- 
 vade our breasts. This flag is now to be placed in the hands of the 
 new democracy. The old flag will be in its grasp. Let it honour 
 it as it has been honoured hitherto ; let it be true to its magnificent 
 trust. (Loud cheers.)
 
 THIED ADDRESS. 
 
 Delivered in Liverpool^ on Wednesday, ii t/i February 1885. 
 
 Mr. GoscHEN said — Gentlemen, this welcome which you have 
 given to me to-night is indeed gratifying. I was grateful for the 
 invitation which was extended to me, but I am still more grateful 
 for the kind manner in which you have received me this evening. 
 Yes, gentlemen ; Mr. Oulton was right. I come here as a Liberal, 
 or I should not be here. (Cheers.) I come here as a Liberal to 
 speak to Liberals. (Kenewed cheers.) I am aware that some 
 Conservatives have paid me the compliment to say that they agreed 
 with every word of some speeches which I have lately made. 
 (Laughter.) Well, I think it is always important to see what is 
 agreed to when agreement is expressed, so I would venture to 
 remind those gentlemen that, in agreeing with every word that I 
 said, they agree to the proposition that no questions of settlement 
 or entail, or any other consideration, should stand in the way of 
 making the land as saleable as consols (laughter and cheers), and 
 that we ought not to rest until we can see a compulsory registra- 
 tion of titles. (Cheers.) They will further agree that there should 
 be a sweeping measure of local government reform, in which more 
 attention must be paid to vivifying civic life throughout the country 
 than to any of the remnants of magisterial authority. (Hear, 
 hear.) They will further agree, as I .understand them, to the 
 transfer of the granting of licences to a local body, instead of keep- 
 ing it in the hands of the magistrates ; they will resist 
 all attacks upon the public funds for the purpose of being agree- 
 able to any particular class ; and, above all, they will agree, as I 
 understand them now — I did not understand them before, but I 
 understand them now, to a full, unqualified allegiance to the doc- 
 trine of Free Trade. (Laughter and applause.) Well, now, I am 
 uncommonly glad to see that there are many men outside of the 
 Liberal camp who agree to the whole of that programme. (Hear, 
 hear.) But I think, on the whole, looking at the speeches which 
 have been made, that it would be fairer to say, as they do say,
 
 39 
 
 that those gentlemen agree with me than that I agree with them ; 
 because, when I recollect their speeches, I confess I have never 
 been able to say that I agreed with every word they said. I 
 have thought that there has been considerable coquetry with Fair 
 Trade. And, gentlemen, let me just suggest one other thought in 
 connection with this. I remember the year 1867, and I have seen 
 something of Tory secrets by reading the interesting and edifying- 
 book which Lord Malmesbury has published. (Hear, hear, and 
 laughter.) I have also seen something of Tory policy in the 
 course which they have taken with regard to the present redistri- 
 bution of seats, in which they seem to me to have out-Heroded 
 Herod, and to have been perfectly prepared to put pressure on her 
 Majesty's Government to make the Bill far wider than the 
 Government originally intended. And I have also studied the 
 speeches of Lord Randolph Churchill. (Laughter.) I have learnt 
 from them what are the proclivities of Tory democracy, and I know 
 that those are views which are received with enthusiasm in largo 
 towns. Gentlemen, on the whole I am not attracted, and 1 
 confess that I am not prepared to agree, to a policy which seems 
 to me simply one of negative and temporary resistance, tempered 
 by a system of frequent over-trumping of the measures which your 
 adversaries propose. (Laughter and applause.) 
 
 But, gentlemen, I can assure you very sincerely, that I have 
 not come here to talk about myself, nor even of party politics ; 
 nor will I be tempted by either your kind reception or the 
 opportunity given me, to break a lance with my friend Mr. 
 Morley, who has thrown down a challenge to me. Though I am 
 a moderate man, I can assure you I am also a fighting man, always 
 willing to take up a challenge which has been thrown down. But 
 this is not the arena in which I should wish to answer points 
 which I think I might be able to answer. N'o, gentlemen, my 
 view in coming here was that I should address you, as I 
 understood I should be permitted to do, mainly on colonial and 
 foreign topics. (Applause.) But events have occurred since I 
 received your kind invitation which induce me to think that on 
 the whole your mind will mainly be fixed on occurrences which 
 have been passing in Africa. But even with regard to those 
 very events, I should wish to make two observations bearing on 
 the colonies. The more we take account of colonial feeling, 
 the more we take account of the colonists, the more I 
 think shall we find that they will be prepared to show con-
 
 40 
 
 sideration to the necessities of our imperial policy. (Hear, 
 hear.) And the stronger we show ourselves, whenever it is neces- 
 sary to show ourselves strong, the more will the colonies be 
 attracted to the mother country. (Hear, hear.) If they find us, 
 when troubles arise, to be strong, cool, calm and self-confident, I 
 believe it will not fail to exercise a great power over them (hear, 
 hear); and I believe that it is by such an attitude we shall do 
 most to increase the strength of the Empire, and to knit closer 
 and closer the ties which bind and hold all parts of it together. 
 (Applause.) 
 
 But you will wish me to pass, I think, without further delay, 
 to those events in the Soudan, and the work which is before us 
 there, which are now absorbing almost every one's mind. Let 
 me refrain from rhetoric on the subject. The most vivid pens in 
 England, and many of the most eloquent lips, have been busy in 
 setting before the public the latest story of British heroism and 
 its tragic end. Word-painting is not necessary to heighten the 
 dramatic effect ; and I think that little rhetoric is needed to stir 
 the hearts of every countryman of Gordon to answer any appeal 
 that may be made to him for sacrifice or eff'ort. (Hear, hear.) 
 Even party spirit is hushed, or almost hushed, for the moment. 
 I ventured to say at Edinburgh the other day that if foreign 
 troubles should arise, and if party warfare should be suspended 
 for a moment, foreign nations would be surprised at the 
 decision with which the voice of this country would speak, 
 and at the swiftness with which effect would be given 
 to its will. I did not think that the moment would arise 
 so soon when these foreign troubles would come. But 
 now we have seen the country almost speaking as one man. 
 It feels that a blow has been struck which has touched the 
 national honour (hear, hear); and we see a unanimity, a striking 
 unanimity of feeling, throughout. (Hear, hear.) The Govern- 
 ment and the people, the platform and the press, have all been 
 speaking the same language. Energetic orders have been given to 
 General Wolseley, with carte Uanclie to carry them out; and the 
 country is showing that high spirit which it always shows when 
 troubles and difficulties really and actually become serious. 
 (Cheers.) 
 
 I think I shall have most of you with me when I say that it is 
 not enough to show that spirit in meeting, as we are meeting, the 
 Egyptian difficulty with vigorous patriotism. That spirit ought to
 
 41 
 
 be equally shown in refusing to be so absorbed and exhausted by 
 that one subject as to be unable to look at other matters. (Hear, 
 hear.) There were, before the fall of Khartoum, events happening 
 abroad which were serious, and no one can watch the course of occur- 
 rences on the Continent at this moment without feeling that there 
 is considerable need for watchfulness elsewhere than in Egypt. 
 The situation in which we find ourselves now is not so different 
 that we can afford to dispense with that watchfulness elsewhere. 
 On the contrary, I feel that there is even greater necessity now for 
 the country having its eyes open all round. 
 
 It would be wrong indeed for any one to minimise the fact 
 of the fall of Khartoum, or its effect upon British credit, upon the 
 safety of our troops, or upon the safety of Egypt Proper. But I 
 also venture to think that it would be wrong to exaggerate the 
 disaster, or to treat in any exaggerated manner the occurrence of 
 a contingency which has been in the minds of many of us as a con- 
 tingency which might possibly occur, and as not so very remote. 
 We ought not to be thrown off our heads by the fall of Khartoum. 
 (Hear, hear.) I have seen language made use of as if it were a 
 military disaster ; and I am not quite sure whether Mr. Gibson did 
 not say so the other day in Dublin. (Hear, hear.) But no dis- 
 aster has happened to British arms. (Cheers.) Their honour is 
 untarnished. Our soldiers have almost done the impossible, and 
 the fall of Khartoum has followed, not on a defeat, but on the 
 victory even of our troops. No doubt there has been a blow to 
 British credit, but it would be wrong for any one to hold up 
 the sad and tragic occurrences which have taken place as if they 
 were a defeat to the British arms. And as it is not due to any 
 military failure that Khartoum has fallen, so surely it is not only 
 to the sword that we must look to retrieve the blow which we have 
 suffered. The blow is one to British credit. The Cabinet have 
 recognised the necessity of retrieving it, and the countr}!^ will stand 
 by the Cabinet in the resolution they have taken. I cannot add to 
 the eloquent words in which Mr. Trevelyan spoke upon the sub- 
 ject last night. It is not our soldiers who have suffered defeat ; 
 but no doubt it will be to them we must look — and we shall look 
 with confidence — to beat back that wave of Eastern fanaticism 
 which possibly may roll down upon Egypt Proper, (Hear, hear.) 
 
 Let us remember — and it is important that we should 
 remember — what we have to do. We shall not go forward in a 
 simply revengeful spirit. (Applause.) We shall not go forward
 
 42 
 
 simply with a haughty wish that we must conquer and win, but 
 we shall be inspired by feeling that no great nation with subject 
 races under it can, in the interests of those subject races themselves, 
 retire beaten and foiled. (Applause.) We shall remember that, 
 in the interests of Western civilisation, we have our duties to a 
 country which we have engaged to protect. We shall remember 
 that that is the spirit in which we must go forward. We have to 
 think, too, of saving Egypt ; and clearly it is most important that 
 foreigners should remember that that is part of our difficulty — that 
 we are not simply vindicating British prestige, but that we are 
 doing work in the interest of Europe itself. (Hear, hear.) 
 
 I rejoice to see that the Germans are beginning to show sympathy 
 with England in the situation in which we find ourselves. It was 
 only what we should expect of them, for the Germans admire a display 
 of strength ; and they see now that the country is determined to put 
 forward its strength, and they respect that spirit. They have been 
 educated to it in a very hard school themselves (hear, hear), and they 
 have little sympathy with moral or material weakness. (Hear, 
 hear.) And it is pleasant to see the gallant Italians, who seem to 
 wish to prove that ingratitude is not a charge that can be laid 
 against all nations, and that they harbour in their memory recollec- 
 tions of the services that have been rendered to them by this 
 country and its Government. They have not forgotten how 
 England has stood by Italy on many an occasion, and I rejoice to 
 see that there is so much fellow-feeling between the two countries. 
 (Applause.) 
 
 And if there is a rising tide of sympathy for us abroad, we must 
 not forget to whom, in a great measure, we owe that sympathy. 
 We owe an incalculable debt of gratitude to that gallant army and 
 its skilful chiefs who, at the very moment when Khartoum was 
 falling, struck dismay into the wild hordes of the desert, and who 
 redeemed the reputation of this country in the eyes of Europe as 
 regards military ability. (Applause.) May we hope that the 
 admiration that we all feel for our soldiers, and for the skill with 
 which they are led, may hold out during some dreary months 
 which may possibly lie before us, when the patience of this country 
 may be tried very severely 1 We cannot expect, looking to the 
 climate and to all the great difficulties of the situation, that our 
 soldiers will be able to advance very fast. And it would be, I 
 think, very hard upon the generals if there were to be any premature 
 and rash criticism of the operations which they may think it neces-
 
 43 
 
 sary to undertake, while their mouths will be closed, and they will 
 not be able to say a word in their own defence. 
 
 Look at the case of the march on Metammeh, that famous 
 race against time. Lord Wolseley knew that there was danger of 
 treachery in Khartoum itself, but, of course, it was neither his 
 business nor the business of the Government to reveal that fear. 
 He knew it, he acted upon it, and he ran risks that might not 
 otherwise be advisable, and so risked his military reputation, 
 because it was right, and ordered that splendid march across the 
 desert in the face of military criticism, (Cheers.) I know Lord 
 Wolseley well. He has all the courage to undertake responsibili- 
 ties as well as to face the bullets of the enemy. (Cheers.) He is 
 no hot-headed soldier; he is a calm-judging, cool-headed, man of 
 the world. (Hear, hear.) He has certainly a burning sense with 
 regard to the honour of his country, and a desire to serve it faith- 
 fully, but he is as steady as a rock, and as cheer}^ as a breezy 
 summer's day. (Cheers.) That is Lord Wolseley^ and he is the 
 man for the situation. (Eenewed cheers.) He will stand by the 
 honour of his country, and I trust the country will stand by him, 
 and that he may not be condemned for any operations which may 
 not fall in with the criticisms of the day, but that the country will 
 remember that Lord Wolseley has so far never failed when he has 
 undertaken an expedition in its cause. (Loud cheers.) I think it 
 is terribly hard sometimes upon officers in the field, when the news 
 from home arrives to which they look forward with intense longing, 
 and they find it full of strictures upon their conduct — strictures 
 made in ignorance of the plans they are carrying out. (Hear, 
 hear.) 
 
 Take the case of my friend Sir Charles Wilson. No one 
 can have read without feelings of pride and emotion the accounts 
 of the imperturbable coolness with which Sir Charles Wilson 
 took command when Sir Herbert Stewart had been wounded, 
 and how he ordered and executed that march to the river for 
 water, which tried the nerves of the strongest, and where 
 failure would have meant annihilation. (Cheers.) I can say 
 nothing — I know nothing — of the strategical capacities of Sir 
 Charles Wilson ; but I do know him to be a man of singularly 
 strong character — extremely quiet, extremely reserved, but with a 
 reserve of strength which has always made the deepest impres- 
 sion upon every one with whom he has come in contact ; and — it 
 is sad now to remember it — he was an intimate friend of Gordon
 
 44 
 
 himself, and had been cheered through months of toil by the 
 thought that, perchance, he might be tlie man who would first 
 grasp Gordon by the hand. (Applause.) And is he the man on 
 whom the reproach should fall — as I see that it has been hinted 
 in some quarters — that he had unnecessarily delayed his ascent 
 of the river to Khartoum, which, it is alleged, with his 50 or 100 
 men, he possibly might have saved had he not been too late 1 I 
 confess that it almost cuts me to the heart to think how such sug- 
 gestions must wound a brave and a sensitive man. (Hear, hear, 
 and applause.) Our officers are accustomed to face bullets with 
 the greatest coolness ; but there are other missiles with which they 
 are sometimes pelted which perhaps inflict even more painful 
 wounds. (Hear, hear.) Gentlemen, you will forgive me, I hope, 
 the warm words which I have spoken upon this subject. 
 (Applause.) 
 
 But it is not only that I hold Sir Charles Wilson in high honour 
 and esteem as a strong, conscientious man ; I frankly say, that I 
 have said what I have said with reference also to the future. Let 
 us remember the situation — that risks may have to be run which, 
 according to all the ordinary rules of war, ought not to be run, 
 but which, in the circumstances, may almost be absolutely 
 necessary, and, by the indomitable valour of our soldiers, may 
 succeed. An immense responsibility is now placed upon our 
 generals. They will not falter under it. It is a high honour to 
 have carte hlanche at such a moment from your country. But we 
 cannot conceal from ourselves that there may possibly be failures 
 here and there, and I dei^recate visiting forthwith any isolated 
 failures upon the heads of the officers commanding the expedition. 
 (Applause.) Her Majesty's Government have in my judgment, 
 and I believe in the judgment of the country, done their duty in 
 placing the trust they have placed, as regards the execution of the 
 objects which they have prescribed — in placing it with absolute 
 freedom — in the hands of Lord Wolseley. (Hear, hear.) But 
 the Government, of course, must share with the General a certain 
 responsibility for failure and success. It is they who must define 
 the objects which he is to carry out. (Hear, hear.) It is they 
 who must say to what extent, for instance, the power of the 
 Mahdi ought to be broken up. They must say to what extent, 
 looking to the empire at large, looking to the Mussulmans in India, 
 it is necessary to restore British prestige, and it is they who must 
 say what far-reaching measures are necessary for the safety of
 
 45 
 
 Egypt. I see it is questioned in some quarters whether the safety 
 of Egypt is concerned in this question at all. Those on the 
 spot, as I understand, declare that the safety of Egypt is involved 
 in the operations that are to be undertaken, and that any 
 premature withdrawal of our forces would imperil the safety of 
 Egypt Proper — (hear, hear). And it is very essential to bear that 
 in mind — very essential, for reasons that I will indicate in a 
 moment. Eor we are not only, as I have said, acting for ourselves 
 in this matter, but Europe — the Continental Powers — are con- 
 cerned in our operations for the safety of Egypt. 
 
 And now let me ask — What Egypt is it for which we are called 
 upon to act, and for the safety of which we are to sacrifice our 
 troops in the desert of Bayuda lest the Mahdi's troops should 
 swoop down on the rich and cultivated provinces 1 Is it even at 
 this moment an international Egypt 1 Lord Wolseley is to have a 
 free hand at Korti. Are we to have a free hand at Cairo 1 Lord 
 Wolseley has received cai^te blanche in the Soudan ; and I wish to 
 know, would it be right that the heavy pen of Germany and 
 Kussia should write orders across the carte blanche which Great 
 Britain ought to retain in Egypt? (Applause.) 
 
 I should like to know what is the meaning of the claim which 
 Germany and Russia have lately put forward for representation 
 on the Commission of the Public Debt in Egypt. What does it 
 mean 1 It can only mean one thing — that they wish to increase 
 their locus standi for interference, and to swell the majority of the 
 Powers on that Commission when they desire to put pressure on 
 Great Britain. (Hear, hear.) Now, mark this ! This Com- 
 mission of the Public Debt was established in 1876. It existed in 
 the time of Ismail Pasha ; it existed in the time of Arabi : and in all 
 those times of peril to foreign international interests Germany and 
 Kussia never thought those interests so near to themselves as to 
 insist on a representation upon that body, and it is not until Great 
 Britain has taken the matter in hand that they think it right to 
 insist in this manner. But why should they wish to control Great 
 Britain if they did not think it necessary to control Ismail Pasha? 
 (Hear, hear.) And if it be argued that when we evacuate Egypt, 
 then in the common interest it would be best that two such Powers 
 as Germany, and Russia should be represented on that Commission, 
 well and good ; let the claim be considered when that moment 
 arises. But at a moment like this — at a moment when we alone 
 are bearing the burden in Egypt — to put forward a claim such as
 
 46 
 
 that, I confess, seems to me to be unreasonable ; and, grave as the 
 situation is, I do not think it a claim which ought to be admitted. 
 (Hear, hear.) 
 
 Look again at the international guarantee. Was there ever such 
 an extraordinary anxiety to assume financial liability as we have 
 seen on the part of the Powers upon this occasion 1 (Hear, hear.) 
 What does it mean 1 Why is there this rush to assume pecuniary 
 responsibility? There has never been anything like it before. 
 Yes, there has ; it is when money-lenders press their services on 
 young men of fortune in order to get them body and soul into their 
 hands. This claim for an international guarantee, we cannot disguise 
 it from ourselves, means the internationalisation of Egypt ; and it 
 means, I will not say immediate multiple control, but that the 
 Powers intend to make immediate arrangements so as to have the 
 automatic means of getting multiple control the moment they think 
 it necessary. If this international guarantee means more — if it means 
 that even now it is to give any administrative or financial control 
 whatever, now while our soldiers are in Egypt, and if the Govern- 
 ment should not avoid every chance or risk or shadow of a risk of 
 any interference, administrative or financial, to hamper us in Egypt, 
 while our soldiers alone are fighting battles in Egypt and British 
 taxpayers alone are bearing the cost — I say that it is a guarantee 
 which I don't think Parliament ought to vote. 
 
 I admit that the difficulties are extremely great, but again I say, 
 let us be reasonable all round, and if reasonable claims are put for- 
 ward by the Powers, let us meet them in a calm, temperate, and 
 conciliatory manner. But if unreasonable demands are put forward, 
 I believe the country will back the Government in resisting them. 
 (Cheers.) 
 
 Now, there is one point on which I should like to make a 
 very urgent appeal. It is not in a moment of difficulty — I do not 
 like to say a moment of disaster — it is not in a moment of serious 
 difficulty that we ought to show ourselves in any degree squeezable. 
 (Cheers.) If we show ourselves squeezable, all the Continental 
 Powers who think that they may gain some advantage may say, 
 *^ Now is our opportunity, let us put pressure upon England." I hold 
 that this empire is too large, our interests are too vast, and I trust 
 our resources are too great, for us to allow an isolated failure or suc- 
 cess at one point to influence our whole diplomacy. (Cheers.) There 
 are few dangers greater than this — that the ebb and flow of our 
 public opinion should be too much at the mercy of the storms of the
 
 47 
 
 moment. What we have to do is to look these matters very 
 quietly in the face. I know it was said, if Sir Herbert Stewart 
 had succeeded in rescuing Khartoum, that then our diplomatic 
 course would have been considerably easier. That may or may not 
 be so, but I don't want the converse to be true. (Cheers.) I want 
 this event not to so influence the mind of the public, or of our 
 statesmen, that we should now yield on any point where we 
 should not have yielded before. That seems to me to be the 
 attitude that we should take up. 
 
 And in using this language, I am not speaking in the air. I say, 
 that if ever there was need that this country should show itself 
 firmer than before, it is now. I will not hide from you that I am 
 considerably disquieted by rumours which I hear with regard to 
 the attitude of Russia. " What," you will say, " have we not 
 enough trouble in the Soudan, that you are going to bother us to- 
 night by reminding us of Russia 1 " Well, I am afraid I must ; 
 and again, I say, I hope that the occurrence of a contin- 
 gency, for which it was necessary we should be prepared, will not 
 induce this country to bolt from positions which we vowed we 
 would maintain as essential. (Hear, hear.) I said I was not 
 speaking in the air. I would not speak as I am doing now, 
 if there was nothing going on ; but if what I hear is true, 
 there is something going on. We are very much absorbed now by 
 events in the Soudan, and we have forgotten, possibly, that we 
 have got Afghan Boundary Commissioners who have been kicking 
 their heels for a long time on the frontiers of Afghanistan, while 
 the Russian Commissioners are either suffering from colds, or 
 enjoying domestic festivities at Tiflis. The Russians are not keep- 
 ing the engagement they made to join us in the delimitation of the 
 Afghan frontier. Her Majesty's Government apparently thought 
 it essential that frontier investigations should be made on the spot, 
 and that the two Powers together, in a friendly manner, through 
 commissioners, should examine those frontiers ; but for some reason 
 or other — I cannot undertake to say what reason — Russia is not 
 keeping to that engagement ; and I understand that she now desires 
 here, in London, to conclude a treaty, thinking that she may get 
 more favourable terms, without waiting for the results of any 
 investigation on the spot. If that were so, our commissioners 
 would have to be recalled. Now, if it were possible and right to 
 come to a conclusion here, in London, without any knowledge 
 gathered on the spot, why, in the name of common-sense, was
 
 48 
 
 an expedition sent — a costly expedition, and a very delicate one 
 as bearing on Afghan feeling 1 Why was it sent 1 If, on the 
 other hand, it was necessary to get this information, why, in the 
 name of our national credit, should we at this moment abandon 
 that ground? I hope we shall not abandon that ground. (Ap- 
 plause.) Why should it be necessary to abandon that ground in 
 order to treat on a perfectly different basis ? I want to know, Is 
 Russia again playing a game of which she is extremely fond, which 
 is to put pressure on at inconvenient moments, thinking at 
 such times she will gain advantages which otherwise would not be 
 accorded 1 What I maintain is this — if these matters bear on the 
 future of India, if they are of vital importance to our Indian 
 empire, then let us wait and negotiate and settle them when we 
 are free, when the Government and the country can give their full 
 attention to these matters, when we shall not be at a disadvantage, 
 and when we shall not be thought to be at a disadvantage. But 
 till then, we ought to stand by our position, and maintain the 
 ground which we have taken up. (Applause.) 
 
 It may be said, " What ! how can we act with this Egyptian 
 mill-stone round our neck V I am not prepared to admit that at any 
 time this Empire should have a mill-stone round its neck ; I am not 
 prepared to admit that matters on which we have set our hearts, 
 such as the frontier of India, should be determined according to a 
 temporary difficulty in the Soudan. (Applause.) 
 
 I am convinced that the honourable solution of the diffi- 
 culties in which we find ourselves will mainly depend upon 
 the view taken by Europe as to the determination of this 
 country, and all will depend on the removal of any impression 
 of weakness or ''squeezability" on our part. (Cheers.) Don't 
 let me be misunderstood. Doubtless there is hostility to 
 this country in many parts of Europe ; but, as I have said before, 
 and should like to say emphatically again, I do not believe 
 that the feeling of Europe generally is one pointedly directed 
 against the interests of Great Britain. (Hear, hear.) They know 
 on the Continent what they want, and the best thing that can 
 happen is that they should know what we want and by what we 
 are prepared to stand. (Loud cheers.) I am not one of those 
 who think that we can be indifferent to the opinion of the Con- 
 tinent as regards ourselves. I venture to say that public opinion 
 abroad at this moment may mean pressure at an inconvenient time, 
 or it may mean friendly support. Public opinion may determine
 
 f 
 
 49 
 
 intrigues against iis if there is distrust of us, or it may determine 
 alliances for us if there is trust. And so I say we cannot be in- 
 different to it. I wonder how far you go with me in that view, 
 because I know there were times when we felt a very considerable 
 indifference to public opinion upon the Continent. Those were days 
 before the concert of Europe had been invented. In those times when 
 Europe was still entirely sub-divided, in what I may call the ante- 
 Bismarckian days, when no groups of Powers were combined to- 
 gether, and in those times when we fondly thought our navy a 
 match for every possible combination that could be brought against 
 us within any reasonable political probability — in those days it 
 might fairly be argued that we could be indifferent to foreign public 
 opinion. (Hear, hear.) But now, when we have constant confer- 
 ences — some summoned by us, some, I am sorry to say, summoned 
 against us — we feel how much the view that the various Powers of 
 Europe may take of us may affect our interests and our power in 
 the centre of those conferences. So I say again that we cannot be 
 indifferent to public opinion abroad. 
 
 I trust, gentlemen, that, in making these remarks, you will acquit 
 me of any wish to raise any difficulties or to create any alarmist 
 spirit ; but, feeling these matters strongly, pray forgive me if I 
 have taken an opportunity of putting them before some of my 
 countrymen. (Applause.) We are very much misunderstood on 
 the Continent, and the question is. Is it worth while, and is it pos- 
 sible, if it is worth while, to remove any of these misunderstand- 
 ings 1 I say it is, if it can be done ; because misunderstandings 
 alienate friends ; they create enemies, and they turn from us sup- 
 port which we otherwise might have. Well now, all countries, 
 probably, would say that they were misunderstood. I venture to 
 think that w^e are doubly misunderstood. And I will tell you 
 why. It is partly because we are — excuse the expression — a 
 speechifying nation (laughter), and have a great dose of senti- 
 ment and philanthropy in our composition; and, what with 
 our platforms and what with our philanthropy, we jar on 
 the cynical and military spirit which exists on the Continent. 
 We are conscious, and at no moment have we been more 
 conscious of our sincerity than at present, that the whole 
 spirit of our international policy has been raised. (Hear, hear.) 
 We believe that we are more disinterested at this moment than 
 we have been at other times of our national history. (Hear, hear.) 
 But we have intense difficulty in bringing this home to the minds
 
 50 
 
 of foreigners, and it is partly because there are sometimes rapid 
 transitions of public opinion here. We make quick changes of 
 front which they do not understand ; and sometimes they seem to 
 think that we begin in a passionately moral manner, but that after 
 a certain time we keep a very good lookout upon our material and our 
 pecuniary interests (laughter), and at another time that we begin 
 with a perfectly natural clamour for our material and commercial 
 interests, but that, under stress of circumstances, we invent, ex post 
 facto, splendid moral maxims to cover our retracting. (Laughter.) 
 
 I can illustrate what I mean by a very familiar illustration. If 
 we had got a friend who went out hunting, and he were to find 
 the fences extremely stiff, and he were to trot home again and 
 declare that fox-hunting was an immoral sport (a laugh) we 
 should smile. And so sometimes when we have thought it right to 
 execute a retreat. Continental Powers have smiled, and their smile 
 has not always been extremely good-natured or complimentary. 
 And what I do feel strongly is this — that it would be wiser on our 
 part to make up our minds as to what our duties and our interests 
 are, than to widen them by language, as we constantly do. I 
 would wish there were more consecutiveness — I am not thinking of 
 the Foreign Office only, but I am thinking of our public opinion. 
 It would be better that we were more consecutive in the views 
 we take, and also that we should concentrate our efforts more. 
 
 I hope you have agreed with a good deal of what I have said, 
 and I know you are going to agree with what I am about to 
 say now, and that is that our interests and our duties are so vast 
 that it would be folly to go out of our way, as we have sometimes 
 done, to increase them (loud cheers), and going out of our way to 
 alienate our friends. 
 
 I had an interesting conversation once with some German Liberal 
 leaders with regard to their support of the foreign policy of Prince 
 Eismarck ; and I rather rallied them upon the fact that the German 
 Liberals never seemed to come forward to take any part with the 
 rest of the Liberals of Europe in fostering and assisting a Liberal 
 foreign policy. They were always upon the side of the militaryism 
 of Prince Bismarck, They candidly confessed why that was 
 so ; they said, " The unity of the German empire is too recent 
 for us to be able to afford any policy of that kind. What we 
 have got to do is simply to look to the immediate interests of 
 the German Empire." Well, now, we are an old Empire, and 
 not a new one, and we have our traditional ways ; but I doubt
 
 \ 
 
 51 
 
 whether we can much longer atibrd ourselves the luxury of indulg- 
 ing too much in what I may call platonic aspirations. We must 
 remember with whom we have to deal, and with what we have to 
 deal. You may remember Prince Bismarck's famous phrase lately 
 used, "i)o ut des," which the Pall Mall Gazette freely translated 
 into our vulgar idiom as " Scratch my back, and I will scratch 
 yours " (laughter), but which I would wish to put into more re- 
 hned but less vigorous language, as "A policy of exchange of 
 friendly offices based upon an avowed self-interest of the parties." 
 (Laughter.) That is what we have got to face on the Con- 
 tinent. We shall not follow that tack, but we shall remember in 
 all our dealings, I trust, with European Powers, that that is the 
 maxim which now has been set up — an exchange of friendly 
 offices on the avowed basis of self-interest. We must see how 
 to deal with this situation ; we shall deal with it, I trust, as this 
 country has dealt with difficulties before — without any excitement, 
 and without any alarm, and without any agitation ; but I call 
 attention to it on this occasion because I am so anxious that the 
 attention of this country should not be preoccupied so entirely with 
 one isolated expedition in the Soudan, as not to face boldly the 
 whole of the European situation. (Cheers.) We are being 
 squeezed in Egypt by France, with the connivance of Europe. 
 We are being squeezed in South Africa by Germany. We 
 are being squeezed on our Afghan frontiers by Eussia. Gentle- 
 men, this cannot go on much longer. This will not do. 
 We are not going to hold, I trust, the mill-stone doctrine to which 
 I have alluded before. We are not going to allow ourselves to be 
 weighed down by one difficulty ; and if it is said, " Why, there is 
 such an absorption of our forces in Egypt that we cannot help our- 
 selves V — well then, I ask, Are our forces of a stereotyped standard 1 
 Sooner than admit this doctrine that we cannot help ourselves, we 
 must add, if it be necessary, 20,000 men to the army, and set every 
 dockyard in the country to work. I say, if it be necessary. But 
 one thing is certain, that we must bear the weight upon our 
 shoulders with a straight back and an unwavering spirit. (Cheers.) 
 Do not let us localise our heroics in Egypt. Let us keep our heads 
 there. Calmness in the Soudan and firmness elsewhere, that is tlie 
 essential point at the present moment. Let us keep cool then, and, 
 if it be necessary, let us raise our forces to the strength which our 
 needs demand, and let us make up our minds, and make others feel 
 that we have made up our minds, that we will stand no nonsense. 
 (Loud cheers.)