Japan and China having been considered, the rest of Asia is negligible as affecting the destiny of the Pacific except in so far as India can serve as basis of action for British power. An independent Indian nation is hardly one of the possibilities of the future. Religious, racial, and caste distinctions make a united, independent India at present impossible. Unless the British Power carries too far a tendency to conciliate the talking tribes of the Hindoo peninsula at the expense of the fighting tribes, it should hold India by right of a system of government which is good though not perfect, and by reason of the impossibility of suggesting any substitute. In the event of a failure of the British Power, India would still, in all probability, fail to take a place among the great nations of the earth. Either she would fall a victim to some other nation or relapse into the condition, near to anarchy, which was hers before the coming of the Europeans. It is not possible to imagine to-day any European Power other than Great Britain--with the possible exception of Russia--becoming strongly established in the Pacific. France and Germany have footholds certainly. But in neither case is the territory held by them possible of great development, and in neither case is there a chain of strategic stations to connect the Pacific colony with the Mother Country. The despatch of the German "mailed fist" to Kiao-Chou in China some years ago is still remembered as one of the comic rather than the serious episodes of history. The squadron bearing to the Chinese the martial threat of the German Emperor had to beg its way from one British coaling station to another because of the lack of German ports. The influence of South America in the Pacific need not yet be calculated. It is a possible far-future factor in the problem; and the completion of Trans-Andine railways may quickly enhance the importance of Chili and Peru. But for the present South America can take no great part in the Pacific struggle. It is when British influence and American influence in the Pacific come to be considered that the most important factors in the contest for its supremacy enter upon the stage. Let us consider, for the nonce, the two Powers separately.