s
affecting the Empire as a whole. And alongside of, and in consequence
of, all this, imperial questions have been treated with a new
seriousness in the British parliament, and the offices which deal with
them have ceased to be, as they once were, reserved for statesmen of
the second rank. The new attitude was pointedly expressed when in 1895
Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, the most brilliant politician of his
generation, who could have had almost any office he desired,
deliberately chose the Colonial Office. His tenure of that office was
not, perhaps, memorable for any far-reaching change in colonial policy,
though he introduced some admirable improvements in the administration
of the tropical colonies; but it was most assuredly memorable for the
increased intensity of interest which he succeeded in arousing in
imperial questions, both at home and in the colonies. The campaign
which he initiated, after the South African War, for the institution of
an Imperial Zollverein or a system of Colonial Preference was a
failure, and indeed was probably a blunder, since it implied an attempt
to return to that material basis of imperial unity which had formed the
core of the old colonial system, and had led to the most unhappy
results in regard to the American colonies. But at least it was an
attempt to realise a fuller unity than had yet been achieved, and in
its first form included an inspiring appeal to the British people to
face sacrifices, should they be necessary, for that high end. Whether
these ideas contribute to the ultimate solution of the imperial problem
or not, it was at least a good thing that the question should be raised
and discussed.

One further feature among the many developments of this era must not be
left untouched. It is the rise of a definitely national spirit in the
greater members of the Empire. To this a great encouragement has been
given by the political unity which some of these communities have for
the first time attained during these years. National sentiment in the
Dominion of Canada was stimulated into existence by the Federation of
1867. The unification of Australia which was at length achieved in the
Federation of 1900 did not indeed create, but it greatly strengthened,
the rise of a similar spirit of Australian nationality. A national
spirit in South Africa, merging in itself the hostile racial sentiments
of Boer and Briton, may well prove to be the happiest result of the
Union of South Africa. In In