[TO THE EDITOR 01 THE "SPECTATOR. "] Sr4,—I think most of
your readers will be in agreement with the main portion of " Ex-Lancer's " excellent letter in your last issue, but may I be permitted to take exception to the portion which declares that the Empire's honour is in safe keeping with any Government that may be formed from any party, and that there is no risk of its true interests, dignity, or power being imperilled P Curiously enough, the review of the Life of Lord Granville in the same issue controverts "Ex-Lancers" opinion in view of the policy and action, or want of action, of a Liberal Government in the past. It shows how the tame, spiritless policy of the Liberal Govern- ment which took no steps to retrieve the disaster of Majuba Hill, and no adequate measures to rescue Gordon, far from gaining us friends, alienated the most powerful Continental Cabinets. It will be in the memory of many of us how it seemed that Great Britain could be " squeezed " into almost anything. This resulted in a national reversion to " Jingoism," which brought us to the verge of war a few years later. It is true that the spirit and common-sense of the nation resented this weak policy; perhaps it had almost as much to do with its conversion to Conservatism as the Home-rule question. The towns and boroughs at this period, for the first time, almost universally returned Conservative Members, and the long Conservative-Unionist regime has followed. But how much mischief might have happened before the nation set itself right! We may, no doubt, feel absolute confidence in several of the most prominent Liberal leaders ; but though in the period referred to it was the heads of the party, Mr. Glad- stone and Lord Granville, who were weak-kneed and hyper- sentimental over foreign politics, in these days it is from the tail that danger is to be anticipated.—I am, Sir, &c., Gno. CHRYSTIE, Colonel. Short Heath Lodge, Farnham, Surrey.
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