Those who argue for separation in the colonies, as well as men like the late Mr. Bright at home, rest their case largely upon the view that the mother-country carries permanently along with her the entanglements of a traditional foreign policy which is chiefly European, and with which it is unfair to involve young communities in parts of the world remote from Europe[3]. This view seems based on past history more than on the facts of the present. More and more every day Britain tends to become a world power, and it is this fact rather than her European position which dominates her policy. She faces Europe much more in the interest of her colonies than in the support of ancient traditions. We have only to read the news from day to day, or the summary of national policy for a year as it is presented in a Queen's Speech, to see that Lord Salisbury was within the strict limit of fact when he told a deputation but a few months since that his work in the Foreign Office had made him {93} deeply sensible of 'the large portion of our foreign negotiations, our foreign difficulties, and the danger of foreign complications which arise entirely from our colonial connections; and the effect is that from time to time we have to exercise great vigilance lest we should incur dangers which do not arise from any interest of our own, but arise entirely from the interests of the important and interesting communities to which we are linked.' The difficulty with the United States in the Behring Sea and the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and with the French in Newfoundland; the complicated negotiations with Germany, Portugal, and other powers, European and native, in Africa, chiefly entered into in behalf of colonies or colonizing companies, are, to take the very latest illustrations, quite sufficient to give definiteness to Lord Salisbury's statement[4]. To some sincere thinkers in the colonies the value of British protection seems slight compared with the risks entailed by the Imperial connection. They believe that the true and evident policy for these young countries is to break off this connection and so free {94} themselves from its dangers. Having no reason to quarrel with anybody they anticipate with independence not only the immunity which they have enjoyed from war, but the further relief from the fear of war. Commerce carried on without naval protection; internal safety secured without expense on military organization; a neutral flag respected by all belligerents; the settlement of all differences by friendly arbitration, seem to them not unreasonable expectations. The dread of some Englishmen, on the other hand, is that they may be drawn into wars in which they have no direct interest by the action of individual colonies.