of parliaments, has sent forth her children to possess and fructify the waste places of the earth. How a desert in every direction has been turned into a paradise of plenty those who are present can best tell. I believe that, great as have been the changes which have already occurred, our children are destined to see even still more glorious accomplishments. One of the greatest statisticians of modern times, a man of singularly sober judgment, has calculated that ere the next century has reached its close the English speaking population of the globe will have already exceeded one hundred millions of human beings. Of these, in all probability, forty millions will be found in Canada alone, and an equal proportion along the coast of Africa and in our great Australian possessions. If these great communities are united in a common bond of interest, if they are co-ordinated and impelled by a common interest, what an enormous influence, as compared with that of any other nationality, whether for good or evil, whether considered from a moral or material point of view, are they destined to exercise! But, gentlemen, that they will remain Englishmen who can doubt! The chops and changes on an accelerated momentum of human progress forbid all accurate prediction. These enormous forces, operating over such a large space, defy all prescience and human wisdom to direct the current of events; but one thing, at all events, is certain, and that is that these great communities will be deeply impressed by English ideas, by English literature, by English institutions and by English habits of thought. That this shall long continue to be the case is, I am sure, the earnest wish of those whom I am addressing. It is their desire that our statesmen should so conduct the relations of this country with their colonial dependencies as to cherish and maintain those affectionate ties by which they are so remarkably and distinctly bound to the Mother Country. One thing, at all events, is certain: that the people of England will never again allow their Government to repeat the error which resulted in the separation of the United States. Whatever may be our present relations with the great transatlantic republic, it is certain that, had it not been for the violent disruption that occurred, those relations would now have been even more mutually advantageous. The catastrophe, unhappily, was brought about by the Ministry of the day being incapable of appreciating and understanding the force and direction of colonial sentiment. Now, my lords and gentlemen, I believe that statesmen can make no greater mistake than not accurately to comprehend the enormous part which sentiment plays in human affairs. By far the greater number of the wars which have devastated the globe have been produced and generated by outraged sentiment rather than by the pursuit of material advantages. Even commerce itself,