devotion to the Union and the flag, fostered by long dwelling upon the ideas, by innumerable Fourth of July orations, often doubtless vainglorious, sometimes perhaps grotesque, but whose living force and overwhelming results were vividly apparent, as the fire leaped from hearthstone to hearthstone throughout the Northern States. Equally in the South was apparent how tenacious and compelling was the grip which the constant insistence upon the predominant claim of the State upon individual loyalty had struck into the hearts of her sons. What paper bonds, treaties, or alliances could have availed then to hold together people whose ideals had drifted so far apart, whose interests, as each at that time saw them, had become so opposed? Although I am convinced firmly that it would be to the interest of Great Britain and the United States, and for the benefit of the world, that the two nations should act together cordially on the seas, I am equally sure that the result not only must be hoped but also quietly waited for, while the conditions upon which such cordiality depends are being realized by men. All are familiar with the idea conveyed by the words "forcing process." There are things that cannot be forced, processes which cannot be hurried, growths which are strong and noble in proportion as they imbibe slowly the beneficent influence of the sun and air in which they are bathed. How far the forcing process can be attempted by an extravagant imagination, and what the inevitable recoil of the mind you seek to take by storm, is amusingly shown by Mr. Carnegie's "Look Ahead," and by the demur thereto of so ardent a champion of Anglo-American alliance--on terms which appear to me to be rational though premature--as Sir George Clarke. A country with a past as glorious and laborious as that of Great Britain, unprepared as yet, as a whole, to take a single step forward toward reunion, is confronted suddenly--as though the temptation must be irresistible--with a picture of ultimate results which I will not undertake to call impossible (who can say what is impossible?), but which certainly deprives the nation of much, if not all, the hard-wrought achievement of centuries. Disunion, loss of national identity, changes of constitution more than radical, the exchange of a world-wide empire for a subordinate part in a great federation,--such _may_ be the destiny of Great Britain in the distant future. I know not; but sure I am, were I a citizen of Great Britain, the prospect would not allure me now to move an inch in such a direction. Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird.