Seven Lectures on the United Kingdom for use in India: Reissued for use in the United KingdomMackinder, Halford John
History
Seven Lectures on the United Kingdom for use in India: Reissued for use in the United Kingdom
Mackinder, Halford John
Great Britain
In three ways therefore India draws great profit from her share in
the British Empire. In the first place she is saved the cost of
defending her sea border from foreign invasion. In the second place
the sea road lies peacefully open for a vast commerce with the rest
of the world. And in the third place, by means of the railways from
her ports to her land frontiers she is able to defend those frontiers
not only by the Indian Army, but, if necessary, by all the strength
of the other parts of the Empire brought over the seas and carried
quickly to the threatened point. Never before has the peace of India
been so secure at so small a cost. This is the strength which comes
from standing not alone, but as one of the league of nations which is
known as the British Empire. It is a splendid thought to think of the
many separate races, each living their own lives according to their
own traditions, which are now held peacefully together within the
British Empire. In Britain itself you must remember that there are
the English, the Scotch, the Irish, and the Welsh, just as in India
there are the Rajputs, the Sikhs, the Mahrathas, the Bengalis, and
many other races. Once the English and the Scotch used to fight one
another; but now there is peace in Britain as there is in India. Yet
throughout the British Empire all men are free to think and say what
they like.
[Sidenote: 5. Map of the Railways of India.]
[Sidenote: 6. Sutlej Bridge.]
[Sidenote: 7. Bhor Ghat Reversing Station.]
The Empire is held together to-day chiefly by means of railways on
the land and steamships on the sea. The railways of India end at the
foot of the mountains. In the plains they cross the broad rivers by
long bridges. In the Deccan they descend to the sea by ways that are
cut into the mountain face. Here we have a bridge over the Sutlej, on
the Delhi railway, and here the curious Reversing Station on the Bhor
Ghat above Bombay, where the steepness of the ground does not allow
space for the railway to bend on its way down the mountain side.
The modern capitals of India are naturally on the coast, for it is
there that the life of India comes into contact with the life of the
world over the sea. In these capitals, protected by the Fleet, the
commerce borne by the railways connects with the ocean-borne commerce.
[Sidenote: 8. Map showing the Unity of the Ocean.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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