form of colonial government are all parts of a single whole, which is itself quite simple. The golden rule, Molesworth seems to say throughout these speeches, is," Do as you would be done by." Treat your colonists as equals, fellow-subjects, fellowcitizens. But if you do this, such a system as that of dumping your moral and social filth upon the colonists' land becomes an impossibility. From an economic standpoint much might be said for transportation, but when once the absolute immorality and injustice, from the point of view of the colonies, is realised, it stands condemned. But a mere negative attitude is not enough; it is necessary to see whether the economic advantages of transportation may not be obtained in another way. But here we have ready to hand the Wakefield system of dealing with the public lands, so as to provide a labour fund for the colonies. It is not necessary to enter here into the details of the Wakefield system of disposing of the colonial lands. Few will be found at the present day to deny that the manner in which in the British North American colonies the lands had been recklessly given away was lamentable, and that to provide an emigration fund from the proceeds of their sale was most expedient. The actual amount of the "sufficient " price, necessary to retain immigrants as labourers for hire for a reasonable time, may be difficult to calculate, and Merivale and M. Paul LeroyBeaulieu have adduced strong arguments to show that the system is not applicable to every kind of land or in all circumstances; but it cannot now be denied that the measures advocated by Gibbon Wakefield, Charles Buller, Ward and Molesworth,

would, had they received a fair trial, have done much to hasten the growth of the colonies in population and wealth. It is true that something was done in this direction, from the first action of Lord Howick, in 1831, till the colonies were themselves allowed the full disposal of their public lands; but, considering the constant flow of emigration to the United States which went on during the period between 1830 and 1855, and the immense potential resources of the British Empire, it seems certain that a bolder use of the revenue derived 8: from the lands might have diverted a considerable proportion of this flow to British channels. Be this as it may, whatever else he advocated, emigration, both as a remedy for social distress at home. and as a means of building up a Greater Britain beyond the seas, was never far from the thoughts of Sir William Molesworth. Thus, discussing the question on which he differed most from the Imperialist of to-day, the question of South Africa, after setting out his views as to the uselessness of Cape Colony to Great Britain, with its endless. series of native wars, Molesworth went on: “If, however, public money is to be spent at the Cape of Good Hope, it would be better both for this country and the colony that it should be spent on emigration. If we were to reduce our military force at the Cape by 1,500 men and were to send there in their stead 9,000 emigrants a year, there would in all probability be a reduction in our expenditure on account of that colony; and the rapid increase of the population would enable the colonists to guard their frontier effectually against the Kaffirs." Had this advice been followed, British

preponderance in Cape Colony would have been secured by sheer weight of numbers, and the racial troubles, which later took so dangerous a character, need never have arisen.

But if money and energy were to be expended upon the sending forth of people to the colonies, this could only be justified upon the assumption that those sent out remained free citizens, with all the rights and privileges of Englishmen. The fierce crusade carried on by Buller and Molesworth against the Colonial Office was inspired by the conviction that the system of government through the Colonial Office involved the denial of these elementary rights. It is not necessary to adopt Molesworth's views on past colonial history. He believed-following authorities, who were, it may be contended, equally in error-that under the old English system of colonial government all was for the best in the best of all possible worlds; until the folly of George Grenville and of Townshend closed the gates of this Paradise, and condemned English colonial policy to an outer world where it became enmeshed in the toils of a meddling Colonial Office. In fact the relations between the Mother Country and the colonies under the old system, so far from being on a basis of equality, were grounded on the most galling of inequalities, viz., restrictions upon trade. So far from being simple in character, such relations were, as any one may satisfy himself by a glance at such a book as Pownall's "Administration of the Colonies," complicated in the extreme. It is true that the old system tolerated local self-government, and so far merited the eulogies of the colonial reformers; but

it constantly interfered with purely local mattersas, to give a single instance, by vetoing triennial or septennial bills-and the form in which selfgovernment was given was such as inevitably to lead to friction between the Governor, who became more and more a governor in name, and the Legislature, which more and more invaded the province of the executive. It is curious that in their righteous zeal to obtain for the colonies responsible government the colonial reformers overlooked the moral of the old history, which surely was the danger of conferring power and then denying responsibility. The true argument from the past history would have been more to the purpose than the commonplaces in which, here alone, they indulged.

It is interesting to compare the proposals of Sir William Molesworth with regard to the government of the Australian colonies with the practice which now prevails of leaving the self-governing colonies. complete independence in the management of their own local concerns. It should be noted, however, that, even now, the internal constitution of the Canadian Dominion could not be, to any great extent, amended without the intervention of the Imperial Legislature. An Imperial Act would still be necessary were it desired to mend or to end the Canadian Senate, to alter the proportionate representation of the Provinces, or to remove the seat of government from Ottawa. Under the Australian Commonwealth Act of 1900, on the other hand, power is given to the colonists themselves to alter their constitution. Any such alteration, before it can become law, must have been approved of by a

majority in both Houses, and must have been afterwards sanctioned by a majority of the electors entitled to vote for the House of Representatives. Although the right of disallowing colonial measures remains, so far as the letter is concerned, still in force," the truth," according to a work of authority, "is that the Home authorities will now interfere only in two cases-(1) where, in the opinion of the law officers of the Crown, a colonial enactment is ultra vires; and (2) where, if a colonial enactment stands, Imperial interests would be directly prejudiced." It is thus manifest that modern practice very closely corresponds with Molesworth's proposals. Whether it would have been wise to tie the hands of the Home authorities by hard and fast regulations is a question upon which there is room for difference of opinion. It was not unnatural that, with its past record, Molesworth should feel distrust of the Colonial Office, but the Colonial Office of later days has become a very different place from the dismal abode with its sighing chamber denounced by Charles Buller, and at the present time the work of no department is carried on with greater efficiency or tact. The objection to rigid regulations, such as those in Molesworth's Bill, is that, in conceivable circumstances, Imperial issues might be involved in a measure on its face purely local in character. Molesworth, who had never known an English public school education, and who had been brought up at the feet of philosophers, found it hard to tolerate the want of logic and system in English methods of procedure; but English methods at least possess the qualities of their defects, and the elasticity and insensible