During the past week the newspapers have published many telegrams
in regard to the possibility of New South Wales and Victoria in conjunction offering a 'Dreadnought' to the Empire. It would seem, however, that such reports are at any rate premature ; and a telegram from Sydney in Friday's Times seems to suggest that Australia will prefer to make her contribution to the maritime defence of the Empire by some enlargement of the policy of an Australian Navy, already adopted in principle by the Commonwealth. It would also seem as if Canada would prefer to act in some such way as this, rather than adopt the precedent of New Zealand. As we said last week, it is for the Colonies to act as they may think best. Whatever they do will be accepted by the Mother- country with sincere "pleasure, but what the Mother-country will care about far more than the particular nature of the gift is the spirit which has prompted it and the devotion to the Empire displayed so instantly by the daughter-States. We have always felt that the world would not realise the strength of the ties that unite the various communities of the British Empire ' till some Moment of peril arrived. The justice of that belief is proved by what has happened even on the rumour of peril.
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