Lord Cromer's final word to his audience contains an appeal
with which we are in hearty sympathy, and which on many occasions we have done our best to bring to public notice. There never was a time, he declared, when united action among moderate men was more necessary than at present. But such unity could not be obtained until the real lesson of the last General Election was taken to heart, and until the Tariff Reform question was definitely laid on the shelf. Could not we agree to differ, and let the Tariff Reform question sleep ? " I am convinced that if, unfortunately, effect is given to a policy of Protection or Preference, subse- quent events will show that Free-trade, and not either Protec- tion or Preference, is the only wise political basis on which a policy of Imperialism can be conducted, and that the reversal of our Free-trade policy will exercise the most far-reaching, and, in my opinion, the most deplorable, effect on the conduct of our internal affairs."
