e in their decisions, than because she had
studied out the situation at first hand. British statesmen have made
mistakes here and there, but since the tragic day when through ignorance
of the situation they failed to recognize the rights of British
colonists on the American continent to have a voice in the government of
the country, they have not erred by refusing their Dominions overseas
the privilege of governing themselves where they have proved their
capacity for so doing. But there was a bold and world-startling faith
manifested when they granted self-government to the Boers within a short
time after the war ended. True, these same statesmen had led up to it by
the ministry of reconciliation exercised by the high-souled Kitchener
with a Canadian Mounted Policeman, Colonel Steele, a noted
administrator, as Chief of the South African Constabulary. And these and
others who worked with them to remove bitterness and misunderstanding
from the minds of the conquered Boers had supporting evidence of
good-will on the part of the conquerors in the fact that our soldiers
had acted chivalrously in the enemy's country during the years of war,
so that no woman or child in all that region was ever knowingly hurt or
molested. All this with the gift of responsibility transformed our
gallant enemies into loyal friends who stood by us splendidly in the
recent war, and who contributed to the councils of the Empire in a
critical hour the magnificent ability and statesmanship of Botha, Smuts
and others.

Meanwhile, in the homeland here in Canada, the steadfast, unflinching
and imperturbable Mounted Police were doing their duty just as
pronouncedly as their comrades on the veld. They had practically all
wanted to go if required, but the Government had interposed and, as we
have already quoted, it was not a question of who should go, but who
_must_ stay at home. And they were greatly needed here, for nothing is
gained by consolidating the Empire abroad if we allow it to disintegrate
right under our eyes and around our own threshold. The Pax
Britannica--the orderliness of British rule--had to be preserved in the
vast spaces of the North and West of Canada. Thousands of potentially
lawless men were surging through our mining country in the Yukon,
challenging Canadian administration with the dictum that huge frontier
mining camps had necessarily to be outlaw regions where every man did
that which was right in his own eyes. And it became the