Page:The World's Famous Orations Volume 6.djvu/230

THE WORLD'S FAMOUS ORATIONS her frontiers forward. Was ever hypocrisy so gigantic as yours? To call Russia aggressive, when you are reaching out your hands to grasp more territory in every region of the globe, by every violation of right. It is incontestable that you led the Zulu king to conclude that you favored his claims to this strip of land. But no sooner had you annexed the Transvaal than you turn round upon him in conduct which he calls, and I say, justly calls, something very like perfidy. Now that you are the rulers of the Transvaal, you say he shall not have what you notoriously led him to expect as his just and lawful right.

Where slumbers the public morality of England? I look in vain in the public press of this country for that voice which ought to speak out, when we read the ultimatum—that impudent and insolent missive—of Sir Bartle Frere. I know of nothing more audacious than the document which was sent to provoke this war; yet now the land is agitated from end to end by the story of the terrible disaster at Isandlana, and money is being sought here to-night, not for defense of your South African possessions, but in order to wage a war of vengeance on Cetewayo and give up his people to sword and flame.

I pay my tribute to the gallantry and heroism of those British soldiers who fell beneath their flag. They served their queen and their colors well. But while I admire them, I more admire 220