The policy of England has always been an aggressive one. While for nearly seventy years she has professed a friendship and national harmony with the United States, she has not ceased to plant her colonies and establish sentry boxes on every sea-girt island, that she could control, within a short voyage of our coast; while she has Gibraltar to command the entrance to the Mediterranean, a garrison at the Cape of Good Hope to control the passage to the Indies, she also maintains on the Bahamas and the Bermudas, in her well-equipped garrisons, vigilant sentinels whose eyes are ever watching the western continent in obedience to the royal behest; and in the magnificent island of Jamaica she has established, and maintained at enormous expense, a fortified and well-garrisoned naval station, which practically controls the Caribbean sea, the Gulf of Mexico, Central America, and even the contemplated canal itself; and yet not content with all this readiness and armament for aggressive war, she creeps still nearer the coveted prize and on the Bay Islands, almost in sight of the proposed canal, she plants her royal banner, and holds the key as the mistress of the situation; so that in case of war between the two countries she is well prepared for a quick and vigorous blow at the life of this republic. She may have no occasion for many years to strike such a blow, but she will wait in readiness; and woe be to that national simplicity which puts its faith in princes, and takes no heed for the future. What, then, is the duty of this republic in regard to the Central American problem? Shall we abrogate the patriotic principles contained in the declarations of the Monroe doctrine, and confess that we have no definite American policy? Shall we withdraw from the honorable and patriotic position of defender and upholder of republicanism on this continent, and permit the royal wolves of devastation to run wild over our sister republics, because, forsooth, in an evil hour, we were led into an alliance which, under the name of a treaty, has embarrassed our action, clouded our judgment, and involved our self-respect? Shall the great American Nation, with its untold resources, its magnificent capabilities, and its sublime faith in the manifest destiny of this republic, calmly submit to the errors, mistakes, aye, blunders of its aforetime rulers, and under a mistaken sense of honor continue to be bound hand and foot by the terms of that pernicious treaty which might well be called the covenant of national disgrace?