Page:The Siege of London - Posteritas - 1885.djvu/80

68 The magnificent Empire of India had passed into the hands of Russia. In that country, no less than in England itself, Englishmen had made a magnificent stand against the foe. But it was all useless. Russia, tearing up all treaties, discarding all promises, falsifying all pledges, and displaying the cloven hoof now that there was no longer any necessity for concealing it, swept with a hurricane's wrath through the length and breadth of the land, and, as it was impossible for help to come from the Mother Country, India became Russian. So also with the Cape. Taking advantage of the death struggle in which England was engaged, the Boers rose en masse and obtained possession of the whole of South Africa. Gibraltar was given by the French back to Spain, and Malta would have become French had not Germany stepped forward and insisted on its remaining British territory. In Egypt, however, France proclaimed a Protectorate, and also took Cyprus; and, lastly, England's navy was reduced by treaty to one-third of its former strength. England's misfortune had been Ireland's opportunity, and she had aided France in every possible way; but when the division of the kingdom took place French ambition overcame French promises. Ireland had hoped for independence; but, in order to keep England in subjection, France declared her intention to make Ireland a French colony, and so Ireland, having tried to sit upon two stools, fell between them never more to rise.

Thus, then, was the once greatest nation of the earth humiliated and dismembered. The syren voices of incompetent statesmen had charmed her to her destruction, and now she had nothing to do but to bind up her wounds, and turn wistful and longing eyes to the future, which might some day give her the power to burst her shackles, and shake the earth with a mighty shout of freedom. That day may be very far off. Nay, it may never come; but, still, there is not a single Englishman whose heart beats true but who lives for it, works for it, yearns for it, and prays for it; and little children, lisping at their mothers' knees, are taught to ask the Supreme Ruler to give England deliverance, and to allow her once more to take her stand as a great and strong nation amongst the nations of the earth.