The naval alliance of France and Russia brings us within measurable distance of a war wherein our existence as an Empire will be at stake, and where we shall need every possible economy of our military resources and all possible care to fight on grounds so clear in public right as to have with us the sympathy and moral approval of the world. It seems to me that to fight about a refusal to evacuate Egypt, after all the promises we have made, would be to choose the weakest ground we could find anywhere for such a conflict. I remember in the early spring of 1882 talking the military side of the case over with Lord Wolseley. It was when an armed occupation was first being thought of. And I remember his emphatic opinion of the strategical mistake we should make in case of a great war by locking up an army on the Nile. Nor do I suppose that the best military opinion has since changed. With regard to the political side, I also believe I am right in affirming that, notwithstanding the general tone of the English press and of irresponsible Tory and Jingo-Radical politicians, the serious sense of our diplomacy and of the Foreign Office admits the impossibility of our permanently holding Egypt as our own. Every responsible statesman from Lord Salisbury downwards would, I feel certain, agree in this. Our pledges are too clear, the importance of Egypt from its geographical position to Europe is too great, the world-wide interests involved in its possession are too distinct to admit of our being allowed an act of such stupendous illfaith for our own private advantage. It is only, in every reasonable mind with a knowledge of all the conditions of the case, a question of time, sooner or later, when we must go. Therefore, why delay?

SHEYKH OBEYD, CAIRO: January 12, 1894.

WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT.

THE

POSITION OF THE LIBERAL PARTY

LIBERALS may look back with reasonable satisfaction to the remarkable session which even now remains incomplete. Under a strain of unusual severity the party has maintained its unity and accomplished the task it had undertaken. It may please the House of Lords to destroy its work and blight the session with barrenness, but nothing can alter the fact that the Liberal Government have succeeded in passing through the House of Commons three of the most important measures with which Parliament has dealt for many a day. The fact is obvious to all, but it is not so clear that its full significance is appreciated. It is the business of the Tory party to minimise it, and they cannot be accused of any lack of ingenuity or diligence in the discharge of the duty. But when they have exhausted all their wellworn pleas the stubborn fact remains. The House of Commons has endorsed the policy of the Government in a manner which twelve months ago would have been pronounced impossible. Had some political seer ventured in January 1893 to predict that 1894 would see Mr. Gladstone's Ministry in power, its prestige undimmed, and its majority unbroken, that the legislative programme of the session would be carried to a successful issue without the formation of a cave, and indeed without any important secession from the ranks of its supporters, and that the party would be more confident at the close of the year than at its commencement, he would have been laughed to scorn as a wild dreamer. Yet this is no more than the truth. There are undoubtedly qualifications, some of which will be frankly pointed out, which must be taken into account before we can get a complete view of the position of the party at the present moment. But these must not cause us to undervalue, the greatness of the success which has actually been achieved.

man.

That this success has been largely due to the personal ascendency of the Prime Minister would not be seriously contested by any sane His opponents are often disposed to magnify his enormous influence partly in order to disparage his colleagues and partly in the hope of persuading the unwary that he is wielding an irresponsible

dictatorship. As to the latter such autocracy will be much more. probable when we have a Prime Minister who has not only a submissive majority in the Commons but who also holds the Upper House in the hollow of his hand. Mr. Gladstone has the supremacy which is accorded to transcendent genius, persuasive eloquence, and, above all, a well-proved nobility of character. Of course he is the corner-stone of the Ministry, but the present session has sufficed to prove that he has colleagues who, though as unable as undesirous to challenge comparison with their chief, are fully equal to the conflict with any other politicians in the field.

Still let it be fully recognised that Mr. Gladstone is a factor in the political problem whose value it would not be easy to exaggerate. The increase of his personal influence during the last year is one of the most noteworthy features in what, to use an Americanism, may fairly be called a 'record' session. His alertness and versatility of mind, his untiring industry, his oratory, so varied in its charms, so persuasive in its appeals, often so impassioned in its vehemence, inspire not only admiration but amazement; but his extraordinary selfrestraint, his gracious courtesy to even the bitterest of his opponents, his conspicuous magnanimity, have secured for him a respect in which there mingled something also of affection and pride from men of all parties. This was the feeling which found expression in the graceful compliment on his eighty-third birthday, in which Mr. Balfour marked the distinction between himself, an opponent of Mr. Gladstone's principles, and those whose personal rancour colours all their political speech and action. It was a memorable sight, such as Parliament can hardly expect to have repeated: that venerable statesman—almost the patriarch of the House, yet not yielding to the youngest in clearness and activity-standing to receive the congratulation of those who often differed from him, but who were constrained to acknowledge a greatness whose glory is reflected on the assembly he leads. It would have been an incident pleasant to remember had one of his former colleagues been capable of rising to the occasion and expressing the regret with which they all had separated from a leader of whom any party must be proud. It would have been an act of genial courtesy; it would have done something to soften the asperities of party strife; it might not have been utterly useless as a stroke of policy. It was not to be; but the loss was that only of those who were unequal to so much nobility. Nothing was necessary to enhance the honour of the statesman in whom the mother of parliaments recognised not only the official leader of the day, but the patriot and the orator worthy to take his place among the most distinguished of her sons.

Were Mr. Gladstone a score of years, or even a decade, younger than he is, there would be little reason for anxiety as to the future of the party. But it is simply impossible that the extraordinary efforts

of the last few years can be continued. We hope that he may long remain as a Nestor in camp and Cabinet. But the active work of the party must necessarily fall to younger men. Happily there is at present no sign of his withdrawal from political life, and we may hope that his wise counsels will steer us safely through the difficulties of the immediate future.

Those difficulties it would be folly for Liberals to ignore. Hitherto they have held their positions and even improved them. Indeed it is hard to see how they could have done better with the forces at their disposal. But the fight in which the real issue will be whether the House of Lords is to wrest from the Commons and the people of England the rights which have been won by centuries of conflict and suffering is yet in the future. The final struggle, come when it may, will demand all the moral and intellectual force which Liberalism has at its disposal. The conditions under which it will have to be waged will depend, to a considerable extent, on the Peers themselves, and especially on the attitude they take in relation to other questions besides Home Rule. To what extent the country will support them in resisting Home Rule, is an uncertain problem. That it will sustain them in a non possumus on all British questions is incredible. Wise and timely concessions may delay the attack or break its force when the time comes for it to be delivered. The disposition at present seems to be to an uncompromising attitude everywhere, and this has been fostered by the foolish talk of men who were trained in Liberal traditions, and ought to have been among the last to sport so recklessly with the first principles of representative government. But there is no occasion to waste much indignation even on Liberal Unionists. There is a great deal of human nature in all parties as in all men. There were doubtless numbers of strong democrats among the workmen at Crewe who were so violent in their support of the House of Lords against the wishes of their fellow-workmen and the verdict of the House of Commons. While the power is there, a minority will always be eager to use it. The only remedy is to get rid of the power.

That the democracy will in the hour of its triumph permit the sceptre to be wrested from its hands is not to be supposed. The House of Lords must learn to live at peace with the democracy, or it will not live at all. The contest may be protracted, and will probably pass through many vicissitudes before the final decision is reached. In the meantime the future of the Liberal party is mainly in its own hands, and will be affected largely by the extent to which it is able to secure unity in its own ranks. Its foes are too often those of its own household, and they are to be found both at its extreme left and its extreme right. Of late the danger has chiefly been from the former. The Unionist schism has changed the centre of gravity, and the pendulum has swung somewhat violently in the direction of

Radicalism with a distinct Socialist tinge. Representatives of this extreme have been tempted to regard themselves as the party, and to speak accordingly.

Nothing could well be more unfortunate. The Liberal party, if it is to be true to its own spirit and principle, must necessarily be of the composite order. Sir Henry James complains that the Ministry are given to listen to every faddist or particularist, and carry out his views. That is not true; but it is true that faddists must gravitate to the army of progress, and ought to find a home there, so long as they do not urge their particular 'fads' to the sacrifice of the general ·· good. What is to be complained of just now is that 'faddists' and some who are not to be so described, but whose questions are hardly ready for immediate settlement, are impatient, and in their impatience: exacting and impracticable. Take a case which has come up while this article was in preparation—the resolution of the Miners' Federation as to an Eight Hours Bill for miners. If I criticise it, it is not because I am not in sympathy with its object; but when I find its advocates insisting that if the Government do not at once promise to force a Bill through in the next session an amendment shall be moved on the Address, though the result should be the overthrow of the Ministry, I must demur. Was ever policy more suicidal? In the first place the power of the Ministry is limited. It cannot manufacture time, and a large proportion of that which is at its disposal is already mortgaged beyond possibility of redemption. Under these circumstances it is required to undertake a new and most contentious work. If it refuse, a hostile amendment to the Address is to be proposed. Let us suppose that it succeeds-what then? The Ministry will resign, but will the Eight Hours Bill be advanced a single stage? On the contrary it wil lbe prejudiced in the eyes of numbers who were disposed to regard it with favour. A Government which is friendly to its principle, and has taken very decided action in accordance with it, will be overthrown; a reactionary party will be installed in power; and, so far as the Miners' Federation is concerned, the last state will be worse than the first. And this is practical politics!

There are not many certainties about our political future, but if there is one point on which it is possible to speak with confidence it is that policy of this kind must spell disaster to the cause of progress. Between Liberals and the Labour party there need not be, ought not to be, any antagonism. The Labour party has no warrant to ask for legislation which would be unjust to any other class of the community; Liberals are bound by all their principles to secure for it whatever is equitable in its own demands. There may be some friction when the point at which concession must cease has to be defined; but with honest purpose on both sides there should be no division. It is here, no doubt, that the chief danger lies, and it is increased by