As already stated, the conditions which some years ago made the mastery of the Pacific unimportant to India no longer exist, and the safety of the Indian Empire depends almost as closely on the position in the Pacific as the safety of England does on the position in the Atlantic. But, except by making some references in future chapters on strategy and on trade to her resources and possibilities, I do not propose to attempt any consideration of India in this volume. That would unduly enlarge its scope. In these days of quick communication, both power and trade are very fluid, and there is really not any country of the earth which has not in some way an influence on the Pacific. But so far as possible I have sought to deal only with the direct factors. Having noted the British possessions in the North Pacific, it is necessary to turn south and study the young "nations of the blood" below the Equator before estimating British Power in the Pacific. CHAPTER VII THE BRITISH CONTINENT IN THE PACIFIC Those who seek to find in history the evidence of an all-wise purpose might gather from the fantastic history of Australasia facts to confirm their faith. Far back in prehistoric ages, this great island was cut adrift from the rest of the world and left lonely and apart in the Southern Pacific. A few prehistoric marsupials wandered over its territory and were hunted by poor nomads of men, without art or architecture, condemned by the conditions of their life to step aside from the great onward current of human evolution. Over this land the winds swept and the rains fell, and, volcanic action having ceased, the mountains were denuded and their deep stores of minerals bared until gold lay about on the surface. Coal, copper, silver, tin, and iron too, were made plentifully accessible. At the same time enormous agricultural plains were formed in the interior, but under climatic conditions which allowed no development of vegetable or animal types without organised culture by a civilised people. Nature thus seemed to work consciously for the making of a country uniquely fitted for civilisation by a White Race, whilst at the same time ensuring that its aboriginal inhabitants should not be able to profit by its betterment, and thus raise themselves to a degree of social organisation which would allow them to resist an invading White Race. In the year when Captain Cook acquired the Continent of Australia for Great Britain, it was ripe for development by civilised effort in a way which no other territory of the earth then was; and yet was so hopelessly sterile to man without machinery and the other apparatus of human science, that its aboriginal inhabitants were the most forlorn of the world's peoples, living a starveling life dependent on poor hunting, scanty fisheries and a few roots for existence.