from that quarter, though undoubtedly any steps towards preserving China as an open country must ultimately have not only the approval but the active support of America.

It is obvious to all who have studied the present crisis that no one Power can act on a policy of its own; the difficulties to be met are too formidable, including, as they do, not only the conflicting interests of other Powers, but the rooted prejudices and internal decay of China herself. Great Britain, so far, stands alone, with the Triple Alliance facing her; and her hope lies in the defection, partial or complete, of Germany from that alliance, or in the enunciation of a policy which may win her the support of Japan and the United States.

What then are the interests which Britain has to defend in China? We have had repeated Ministerial assurances that our rights and interests in that country will be rigidly upheld, but there is as much vagueness as to what this phrase implies as there has been dilatoriness in upholding those rights. In the first place Britain, whose interest in the trade of China is over 60 per cent., or 42,500,000l., desires an open market throughout China, the upholding of all treaties and concessions, and the safety of her subjects throughout the Empire. How is she to attain these ends? The north of China, as we have shown already, is Russian, and although her markets there may be open for a few years they cannot last longer. Shantung is German, and all question of a free and open market for English goods is settled by the monopolies claimed there by the occupiers. There remain the Yangtze Valley and the south of China; but in the latter France has taken up an exclusive position, while in the former, we are told, Britain can only trade as the equal of the other Powers. If she is the equal of Russia, Germany, and France, why is she the only Power without a definite and exclusive sphere in China? The answer has been given by Germany. They have occupied; Britain has not. Lastly, the Government with whom the treaties were made has itself proved faithless, and, moreover, is not in a position to enforce the concessions it has granted. Both treaties and concessions will have to be made good by force or strategy, if they are to operate at all.

But the material interests of Britain in China are not only those connected with trade, enormous though these be. There are other issues at stake, and these affect also the United States, and must influence her policy as well as ours. We have to consider the question, not only of the domination of Asia, but also of the whole Pacific. We have to consider the future of our Indian Empire, should it become the isolated stronghold of

the Anglo-Saxon in Asia, and what our chance of maintaining it would be, if China passed under the control of hostile Powers. We are playing a game in which the stake is the control of one fourth of the human race. Can we afford to lose our part of that control, and hand over to others the enormous resources and advantages to be gained by influence over a people at once so numerous, so industrious, and so full of possibilities as the Chinese? Can we afford to lose all interest in the country inhabited by these people, a country teeming with natural riches, and requiring only a stable government and the opening of communications to develope into one of the most productive in the world?

We have already hinted that the only course now open to this country is to combine actively with those Powers whose interests are like our own, in order to save what we can from the wreck of China. We are no longer in the position to dictate, and it will be well to recognise this fact. What has lost us our prestige is our lack of foresight and want of decision. As regards the former we know from the Blue-books that Mgr. Favier repeatedly warned the ministers in Peking that a terrible outbreak was imminent. That all should have received his warnings with incredulity does not excuse us from our share of blame, for we ought to have been better informed than the rest. As for our influence, that has certainly not been increased by some of our actions-for instance, our humble enquiry whether Russia would approve of the despatch of twenty thousand Japanese to Peking, and the vacillation shown regarding the landing of troops at Shanghai. It has been truly said that in the last few months our prestige in the Far East has suffered more than in the whole period since 1895; and what it was forty years ago can only be realised by reading such books as Sir Henry Loch's 'Narrative of Events in China.' He speaks throughout in measured language of what Britain must do, and hardly mentions other Powers. How are the mighty fallen! We have now neither the confidence of the Chinese nor the friendship of the other Powers to rely on. There are certain moves in the game, however, which would be advantageous to us, and might at the same time meet with the approval, not only of some of the Great Powers, but of a section of China. We must play off one force against another.

We have demonstrated that the interests of three Great Powers are directly opposed to the open declaration of partition. China itself is naturally of the same persuasion. When, therefore, the question arises of the future status of the Chinese

Empire, let Great Britain declare that her policy is the preservation of the eighteen provinces in their integrity, and demand throughout those provinces international freedom, customs, and tariffs. Such a policy, if firmly announced, would meet with the support of Japan and the United States, and could not be openly opposed by Russia, which is for ever posing as the disinterested friend of China, and which, moreover, must regard with distrust the rise of a Greater Germany on her flank.

Such a declaration would clear the situation at once. If vigorously supported it would at all events give us time, and might lead to a reform in China itself, which would indefinitely postpone the dissolution of that Empire. If, however, there is determined opposition on the part of any of the Powers to such a solution, then at once those Powers will stand revealed in their true colours; and they can hardly press for the internationalisation of the Yangtze Valley when they are reserving exclusive rights in their own regions, or prate of the 'integrity of China' when they are refusing to subscribe to the only method of securing that integrity.

There should be no quibbling as to money compensation for outrages committed. The Powers should make it clear that, in addition to punishment of the guilty chiefs, the only real compensation must be that of sweeping reforms, and the opening of all parts of the Empire to foreigners. China is already taxed to the utmost, and burdened with a heavy foreign debt, so that a money indemnity of forty or fifty millions is out of the question.

One of the most politic steps which might be taken in connexion with this proposal is the moving of the capital to Nanking, or some other central point. The change of dynasty, so lightly talked of in many quarters, is a very different matter, and is an absolute impossibility at present, owing to the peculiar constitution of China and the absence of any opposition or pretender to the throne. The transfer of the capital would not outrage Chinese feelings: such a step has been contemplated by the Empress-Dowager herself, and there are precedents in past history. Moscow and Kiyôto are instances adduced by Mr. Mitford in his reflections on the subject; and in Chinese history itself similar examples occur. The advantages of this move would be to place the Powers on equal footing in the capital, and to diminish the Manchu and Russian influence. It would inaugurate the period of reform and development, and would certainly prolong the days of the long-lived Empire.' We are not sufficiently optimistic

Vol. 192.-No. 384.

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to hope that it would accomplish a miracle in China, but from our point of view it would be invaluable. It would stave off the moment when Russia might otherwise become protectress of China; and meanwhile much may happen in the Far East.

The alternative is plain. If the Powers refuse to support us in maintaining the integrity of the eighteen provinces, and to give practical demonstration of that support by sacrificing their exclusive spheres, then we, too, must adopt a sphere, and we must make it plain that we are determined to go just as far in the protection of our sphere as any other Power.

We do not pretend that either of these policies is ideal, but to choose one or other of them is our only course. The cloud of minor questions-missionaries, concessions, the opening of waterways, the remodelling of the consular service, and so forth-may be put aside until we have decided on the chief point do we intend to stay in China? If we stay, we shall find plenty to do in regard to all these matters, and on their right handling will depend much of our future success; but we must understand that these are not the points actually at issue to-day.

Some of the rival European Powers may, of course, object to our proposal of Integrity throughout the eighteen provinces,' on the ground that they have everything and we nothing to lose by such a self-denying ordinance. But the alternative is plain-unless indeed we are tamely to accept the humiliating position offered us and to acknowledge to the world that we alone are in China on sufferance. That would be the beginning of the end, and the end would not be long delayed. Is it an end that any Briton can contemplate with equanimity? The burden and the risk of Empire are great, but the risk of shirking the burden, of evading the responsibilities involved, is greater still. It is the risk that, if we do not act betimes, the burden may become ten times heavier, or the Empire itself pass away.

ART. XIII. THE GENERAL ELECTION.

The

Third Salisbury Administration. London Vacher and Sons, 1900.

A

By H. Whates.

BOUT a quarter of a century ago, Mr. Bright, speaking at Birmingham on the respective claims of the two historic parties to the confidence of the people, observed that in private life character is supposed to go for something.' He was dealing with the sphere of domestic reform, and the lesson which he wished to drive home was that, in considering the qualifications of public men to do its work, a nation should have regard to their past records as well as to their present professions. It was a perfectly sound lesson, though Mr. Bright's application of it, even in favour of the still unbroken Liberal party, in 1876, was not beyond challenge. At the General Election of 1900, of which, as we go to press, only one result remains to be recorded, the issue of character, or, in other words, political record-at least in regard to the Imperial, if not the domestic, sphere-has rightly gone for something,' indeed almost for everything.

At the several stages of their existence, nations, like individuals, have to determine which of the duties and interests lying before them are vital and which secondary. Their subsequent history is determined in accordance with the wisdom or unwisdom, the nerve or the hesitation, with which they make such choices. At the close of a war by which the military resources of the United Kingdom, as at present organised, have been taxed to the uttermost, and in which, even so, there has been ample scope for the services of substantial contingents eagerly offered by the great self-governing Colonies, the paramount business before the British nation must be that of effecting a settlement by which the fruits of so much effort and sacrifice and nobly loyal co-operation shall be made absolutely secure. That the nation was of that opinion had been made clear, for several months before the Dissolution, by abundant evidence, including signs of impatience at what was thought an unnecessary delay in the annexation of the Boer Republics to the Queen's dominions, and of satisfaction when that incorporation was proclaimed.

These signs were not lost on the Opposition, and placed them under the necessity of committing themselves on a question on which many of them were very anxious to defer any binding declaration. It was impossible to invite the electors to consider them, even by courtesy, as a party capax