Page:The World's Famous Orations Volume 5.djvu/289

 LOREBURN

��regard to those questions for ourselves. We are charged with being indifferent to the British Empire. Some other critics, and particularly Mr. Chamberlain, appear to take pleasure in showing how unjust and how unfriendly Liberals are to their colonial fellow countrymen. Nothing of the kind.

I desire, and believe we all desire, unf eignedly and without reserve, to maintain in their present happy relations the ties that subsisted between us and our colonial kindred. We heartily wish and mean that those relations shall subsist for ever, and we are not content to contemplate any other future. But we think it not wise to for- bear from facing facts. We have to look at things as they are, and not as we wish them to be.

There are certain things we ought to remem- ber in connection with them. One is that since the end of the Napoleonic wars ninety years ago, almost all the wars and expeditions this country has engaged in, have been due either to India or to the other colonies and dependencies of the crown. Almost with one exception, save for the Indian wars, the cost of all those wars has fallen almost exclusively upon the people of the United Kingdom.

They were small countries and young coun- tries, and required the protection of the mother country. But it is a fact that ought to be re- membered that our dangers of collision with other countries arose by reason of their colonial

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