A certain implication, or what has been considered an implication, of that doctrine, namely, that the {216} United States shall abstain from any interference with affairs foreign to her own two Continents, even as she has forbidden the foreigner to interfere with them--this implication she violated, most happily for Europe, in the Great War. But she had already violated it in her own Spanish war, of 1898, which followed on Spain's ineffective attempts to restore reasonably good government in Cuba, that island which lies in a position to guard the Gulf of Mexico and the Panama Canal. Spain was unable to enforce respect for the lives and property of Americans in the island, and, not unjustifiably, the United States, after some years of long-suffering, resolved that the Spanish rule must be overthrown. Even America herself shared in the general surprise that the complete defeat of Spain was so easy; and she was genuinely surprised also to find the sympathy of Great Britain cordially with her in the short war. And as its results, not only Cuba itself, but also the far-off Philippines, those Spanish-owned islands where Portuguese going East and Spaniards going West had unexpectedly met a few centuries before, were given over to the United States. Nearly at the same time certain Samoan Islands and the Hawaiian group of islands were annexed to the United States. Therefore she too must now shoulder her portion of what Kipling has well called "the white man's burden." {217} CHAPTER XVIII THE WHITE MAN'S BURDEN SECTION I.--AFRICA I have taken the above heading for this chapter because it indicates truly the manner in which the dominion of the white man over many of the coloured races has been thrust upon him. There is a good deal of misunderstanding on the subject. Really the world-wide dominion of the British Empire, to take the most conspicuous example, has been forced upon the mother country. There is an idea, and some of our rival nations have specially encouraged it, that those overseas dominions have been won by our aggressive spirit, land-grabbing and desirous of ever acquiring new possessions. Even we ourselves are rather apt to attribute it to the adventurousness of our ancestors; as if they had gone out seeking adventures like the knights-errant of old. If we regard the events as they actually did happen we must confess the process much more prosaic. No doubt very adventurous and heroic deeds were done during its course. We have every right to be proud of our Anglo-Saxon race on their account. But our principal reason for pride is to be found in what the race has done, less in aggression, than in defence. It was Britain that was very largely concerned in humbling the overweening ambition of Spain, in baulking {218} the arrogance of Louis XIV., in thwarting the projects for world empire of Napoleon.