Part 10

The question of Canal tolls to many Americans to-day is a matter of only national, not international, politics. They believe tolls should be paid for Canal privileges. They also, however, seek a means of lowering transcontinental freight rates. As only American ships are allowed by law to engage in American coastwise trade, these are the only competitors of the railroads. To free such ships from Canal tolls might be a means toward lowering transcontinental freight rates. Those Americans who so believe are pleased if the Hay-Pauncefoote treaty seems to allow an interpretation favourable to their purpose. Other Americans believe no such interpretation possible, whatever the problems of national economics. To both, however, outside criticism of "violation of treaty" may induce merely the exasperation that leads to refusal to discuss the question.

The difficulty, as our nations are now organized, is that a question of mutual interest is decided by the majority in power in one of the nations. In the present instance it was the United States that {129} controlled the situation. The United States decided. Afterwards the British Isles might, if it wished, protest in terms of whatever mildness or vigour its public policy dictated. The British Government has shown itself forbearing. It protested but did not press its claims in terms incompatible with peaceful relations. The American government, unantagonized, was left in a mood to review the matter and, as seems probable, to alter its previous decision. In some other matter the tables may be reversed. The British Isles may hold in its power the solution of some question of interest to the United States. And the United States may have only the opportunity to remonstrate in its turn against what it considers an "unfair" interpretation of a treaty. Such remonstrance is apt to be tinged with hostility, the thing we wish most of all to avoid. Having no common government, the two nations have no court to decide the case. Were they members of a federation, such machinery would be established and in constant working order.

Separate political existences of seven Pan-Angle nations do not make for peace. If for us is coming the great millennium, so sweetly dreamed of by so many, it will not come the sooner by perpetuating opportunities for discord. A common government over Pan-Angles would be copying what we have already done successfully in smaller "closer unions." Before the formation of one of these, it was stated: "Three choices therefore lie before the people of South Africa. The make-shift regime of the High Commissioner, the jarring separation of the States of South America, the noble union of the States of {130} North America."[130-1] This might be paraphrased. Three choices lie before the Pan-Angles: the make-shift regime of Downing Street and the gambling uncertainties of arbitration boards, the jarring separation we have known in our past, the noble method of union which our race has evolved, tested, and in four separate nations adopted. By solving our international differences of opinion in a federal government we can husband our strength for self-defence as a united power against other civilizations.

Despite our self-esteem we are not the only civilization in the world. There are others who need land for their children, as much or more than we do. These others wish to see the world "bettered" by their ideas. If we are wise we shall recognize these foreign aspirations to be as normal as our own. As we have progressed other civilizations have progressed, even though differently. And difference does not mean inferiority. Once we could believe that our rivals, personal, national, or racial, were bad because different; but nowadays we cannot call it wrong when others, less favourably situated than we in the sunshine of this world, strive like ourselves for comfort. "The tragedy of history is not the conflict between right and wrong, but the conflict between right and right." Each civilization knows it is right. Each is right {131} till another civilization is proved to be not only right, but better. A civilization is better than ours if it shall prove its people able to conquer our people--through cutting off our food by more resourceful trading, thriftier living, or war. As it has always been since the Pan-Angles were a people, the world is now an inter-civilization competition selecting the fittest to survive.

Four nations of men, white like ourselves and holding some of the same ideals, have been in the past our life and death rivals. Spain, Portugal, Holland, and France all were great before we were. They discovered and pre-empted a large part of the world. To the shores of almost everyone of the seven Pan-Angle nations their keels have come with intent to seize land. Our rivals often succeeded and held the land for a time until we grew strong enough to take it from them. Our struggles against these out-run powers make thrilling stories, for they tested the courage, the resources, and the tenacity of the Pan-Angle victors.

Portugal and Spain once shared between them the seas of the world--according to a Pope's decree. They raced in opposite directions to see which first should reach the Antipodes. Macao and Manila, lying opposite each other, show where the two routes terminated. To-day Spain holds no land outside of Europe except the Canaries and odd inconsequential bits of Africa. From before the days of the Armada to the conclusion of the Spanish-American War, Pan-Angles have been plundering Spain. Some of the spoils they kept for themselves, some they gave away. The Ladrones in a recent division were allotted to {132} Germany. Portugal holds more extensive reminders of its former empire. The Azores, the Cape Verdes, Timor and Goa, and strips of East and West Africa show where that nation was once supreme. Both the African areas are bordered by Pan-Angle and German holdings, and it requires no shrewd forecasting to predict their future.[132-1]

Holland holds the Dutch East Indies--a dependency huge in extent and population as compared to the tiny European state,[132-2] but small "compared to the lands adapted for true colonization, long ago relinquished. Holland holds also certain remnants in the Western Hemisphere, as Spain and Portugal do not. But like Spain and Portugal, Holland holds these dependencies not by virtue of its own strength, but by virtue of the matched strength of others, the balance of power leaving Holland for the present undisturbed.

France, the most recent of these four rivals of the Pan-Angles, to-day holds dependencies of {133} greater area than those of the three other rivals combined.[133-1] Over lands on, or islands near, every continent, the French flag flies. Only the flags of the British Isles and of Russia are to-day further flung. No one feels confident of despoiling France at will, and the British Isles regards its late rival as an effective ally. Yet the French hold no true colonies, lands in which France grows again in a new life. Canada and Louisiana are now the nurseries of a vigorous Pan-Angle stock.

Towards these four out-run powers we harbour no unfriendly sentiments. They, alone or combined, can no longer hurt us. We have grown so large and control so vast an area and population that we forget that these rivals once threatened our existence. The place-names they gave and many of their words, now part of the English language, hardly recall the old struggles. So thoroughly have we taken the lands they claimed, that with our own history we associate such names as Columbus, Da Gama, Magellan, Van Diemen, Tasman, Champlain, and La Salle. With our former competitors we can make alliances, if we wish, for the sake of guarding them and ourselves from the powers that loom out of the future.

But because of such friendly alliances we must not lose sight of the truth. Our present supremacy we hold not by the courtesy of these our former rivals, but by the might of our forefathers, who by their strength procured lands for us. The past secured to us the present. The visible method was war. "Between the [English] Revolution and {134} the Battle of Waterloo, it may be reckoned that we waged seven great wars, of which the shortest lasted seven years and the longest about twelve. Out of a hundred and twenty-six years, sixty-four years, or more than half, were spent in war."[134-1] At the end of these wars the Pan-Angles had outrun their rivals.[134-2] That century and a quarter witnessed the steady extension of the Pan-Angle control in North America."The struggle was literally worldwide. Red men scalped each other by the Great Lakes of North America, and black men fought in Senegal in Africa; while Frenchmen and Englishmen grappled in India as well as in Germany, and their fleets engaged on every sea. The most tremendous and showy battles took place in Germany; and, though the real importance of the struggle lay outside Europe, still the European conflict in the main decided the wider results. _William Pitt_, the English minister, who was working to build up the great British empire, declared that in Germany he would conquer America from France. He did so."[134-3] Taxation in Massachusetts during one of the years of this war was equivalent to an income tax of 66 per cent.[134-4] After Waterloo for over half a century this extension continued. In this struggle for our world domination, in which American and Britannic Pan-Angles each did their share, we showed we were fighters. We fought to win. We won.

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During and after our struggles with these four white nations, we have had lesser struggles with peoples of other colours. Our successes in these struggles have added to our self-satisfaction. Thus far our efforts against the red, brown, and black have not been too great for us. In America the red man had land we needed; we drove him out. In New Zealand the brown man's country was one we could thrive in; we installed ourselves there. In India and through the East the brown man had rich territories; we subdued him, we helped him to increase in numbers, we sold him more of our goods. The same can be said of the blacks in various tropical regions. In Australia the black man had lands suitable for whites, and we occupied them. In South Africa we have done the same, and, though the possession of the whites is hardly as yet undisputed, we bear there as elsewhere a mien of self-reliant superiority.

Our successes have brought us the material benefits we see in the well-fed prosperity of our peoples. The non-material benefits it is difficult to estimate. So naturally do we accept both, that the thoughtless among us assume such comfort to be the normal lot of good people such as we are. We are content with our present portion--the best the world provides--and would counsel others to be content with theirs. We think we are a peaceful people, and deprecate as bad form the huge expenditures made by European nations for military and naval preparations. Some Americans contemplate their small army as though their nation were by that proved virtuous, much as though the learned Babu, contemplating the fur-clad {136} Eskimo, should pride himself on his own tropical attire. Like the sons of wealthy shopkeepers who disdain to demean themselves by trading, we Pan-Angles forget sometimes on what harsh foundations was laid our present exemption from harshness.

Apart from its short-visioned inconsistency, this attitude may betray us into dangers. The English-speaking peoples have fallen into a sense of security, assuming the continuance of our present peace as the normal condition of affairs. We pride ourselves that we mind our own business with success. And from minding it for so long, and with so slight a chance of having it disarranged by outsiders, we have grown accustomed to pursue without doubts our way to greater individual freedom. We are oblivious sometimes of the fact that all our efforts for greater individual freedom are of no avail if some other nation may deprive us of the wherewithal to individualize:--Our land, our trade, and our political system. "To live well a people must first live; and an ideal that ignores the primary conditions of national existence is a castle in the air."[136-1]

Since the throes of the eighteenth century, North America has been developed and Australia and New Zealand have prepared themselves for large populations--all undisturbed by fear of invasions. In these newer countries have been nurtured many of the ideals of the race. There, have been tested not only the federal idea, but also many political and social reforms, such as those whose names are associated with Australasia, but which find a congenial {137} habitat in other branches of the race. In peace we have thus been aiding each other, as we have so often in war. And it is well for us that this reign of peace has continued so long, not merely because peace is to be desired, but because of the strength it allows to accumulate for struggles to come. That this long peace is unusual, that struggles will come, history teaches.

Tacitus tells us of a Teuton tribe, "just and upright." "Unmolested by their neighbors, they enjoyed the sweets of peace, forgetting that amidst powerful and ambitious neighbors the repose, which you enjoy, serves only to lull you into a calm, always pleasing, but deceitful in the end. When the sword is drawn, and the power of the strongest is to decide, you talk in vain of equity and moderation: those virtues always belong to the conqueror. Thus it happened to the Cheruscans: they were formerly just and upright; at present they are called fools and cowards." [137-1]

We, unmolested by our neighbours, are now enjoying "the sweets of peace." Is there anything we are forgetting? Are we backing the Pax Britannica and the Pax Americana with sufficient power to ensure their maintenance? Shall we continue to be called "just and upright"?

We still have land to which to extend our population. Our prosperity is still undimmed. No one is our proved superior in civilization. Recent wars have not contributed to our military reputation, but our faith in our naval superiority has not been shaken and our pride of race intensifies.

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Yet slowly a consciousness is creeping over us by way now of London, now of Brisbane, now of Durban, or again of Vancouver or San Francisco, that all is not as safe for us as it once was. Once we could afford to squabble a bit in the family; now we feel we must stop such silly behaviour. To all of us has come this feeling. It is not merely the appearance of Germany in the North Sea or the South Pacific, nor the desire of Asiatic Indian coolies for entrance to the Transvaal, nor the willingness of these and other Asiatics to share with us the wealth of North America. These are but signs. They forebode coming dangers whose extent we cannot foresee.

Out of the future loom menacing forms, hardly more tangible and comprehensible to us than were the Teutonic hordes to the Romans. What latent energies lie hidden in the north and east we can only fearfully surmise. There, perhaps, are peoples multitudinous in numbers and unmeasured in resources. Their faiths and ideals are not ours. To be subject to them would be no illusion.

Across the north of Europe and Asia stretches Russia--a land of eight and one-half million square miles,[138-1] larger than all the Pan-Angle area were either Australia, Canada or the United States omitted from the total.[138-2] Its population of 168,000,000[138-3] outnumbers the Pan-Angle whites {139} by 22,000,000.[139-1] Russia is self-supporting in that within its borders are food and fuel for years to come. In Siberia are ample coal and iron fields. Petroleum, of such growing importance in these days of aerial navigation, Russia has in plenty. The growth of the Russian power has been practically simultaneous with that of the Pan-Angles, for in 1913 was celebrated the third centenary of Romanoff rule. What was once the small state of Muscovy has extended its borders and pushed back its frontier, until now it presents by far the largest stretch of contiguous territory under one rule in the world. It has, moreover, room for internal development. Only the fighting edges of Siberia are filled with settlers, most of them ex-soldiers and their families. The interior is scantily populated against the time when the advance of the frontier shall be checked.

The significance of this growth has not been ignored in Europe. Statesmen have acted or have feared to act according to their conjectures of Russian desires and powers. For years Russia has been, and indeed still is, the bugbear of the British on the Indian and Persian frontiers. Urged by the British Isles, Japan, fighting for its very existence, checked Russia. The resulting loss to that country was insignificant. It could receive many such checks and still be a formidable rival. Russia's success against Pan-Angles would mean not only to them the material loss of lands and food, but to the whole world the loss of some measure of individual liberty, for the unity and strength of that great country are founded on {140} characteristics the antitheses of those which make the Pan-Angles great.

But a danger greater than Russia has thrown its shadow in our path. The white race once felt assured that it was the chosen race among mankind. It met the red, brown, and black races never to its own ultimate disadvantage, and often, it was convinced, for their good. It felt a similar destiny toward the yellow races. It insisted that they open their doors to the white man's trade and took them to school in the white man's ways. Now the white race apprehensively wonders if it has made a mistake, if destiny is at last on the other side.

China is the wonder of history, both ancient and modern. Civilization after civilization has battered at its gates, taken some trifle only to lose it, and has departed. Chinese civilization has continued unharmed by its transient rivals. Each of these rivals has pondered over China's strangeness, and has failed to impress foreign ideals on its people. The Arab, Malay, Portuguese, Dutch, French, English, American, German, and now the Japanese and the Russian people, have taken trifles. Of these Macao, French Cochin-China, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Kiaochow, Wei-Hai-Wei, Formosa, and Tibet are modern examples. How long it will be before these land-takings revert to the Celestial Empire remains to be seen. "The old negative, anti-foreign prejudice is giving way to a positive sentiment of national ambition. With a population--according to the last census--of over 430,000,000 of the cheapest and most industrious workers in the world, China is bound sooner or later to dominate the East, unless she becomes divided {141} against herself. And this the pressure from the greedy competition of foreign powers seems certain to prevent."[141-1]

To-day China is perhaps to become definitely a republic. No one knows what China can or will do. The white race realizes that its problem now is no longer how to distribute among its nations the lands of the yellow races, but how to prevent the yellow races from distributing its lands among themselves. Men who can endure arctic cold and tropical heat with like fortitude and profit, may soon become a factor in the defensive problem of the Pan-Angles.

"The history of China, ancient and modern, is an eternal series of paroxysms; its keynote is bloodshed and famine, with periods of peace and prosperity purchased by the slaughter of countless innocents. Its splendid civilization, based on an unassailable moral philosophy and the canons of the Sages, has ever proved powerless against the inexorable laws of nature, the pitiless cruelty of the struggle for life. . . ."[141-2] It seems not impossible that the Chinese may seek to ameliorate their condition, to lessen "the pitiless cruelty of the struggle for life" by overflowing into the lands now held by the Pan-Angles. By what means could we save ourselves from being crushed before the advance of a people our superiors in thrift and industry and in ability to render the soil productive, and who are three times our number?

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Russia and China may be the active foes of our children. We can bequeath them only such aid in their struggle as our foresight dictates. Meanwhile we have problems of our own demanding more immediate solution.

Russia and China are the rivals of to-morrow.

Japan and Germany are the rivals of to-day.

To Japan the Pan-Angles should doff their hats as to their peers. Radically different, they are not our inferiors. Japan has forged ahead materially at a rate that Pan-Angles have never in their history approached. In 1853, when the American Pan-Angle Admiral Perry forced foreign commerce on Japan, the land was a feudal area given over to devastating civil wars. The privileges that the white races after 1853 exacted have been gradually and entirely taken back. Japan now stands as a world power. Its people are increasing rapidly. It builds its own ships. The three fastest merchant steamers on the Pacific to-day are Japanese.[142-1] No one forgets, and it is hoped that no Pan-Angle underestimates, the medical ability and the discipline that backed the bravery and the patriotic spirit of the Japanese in their life-and-death struggle against Russia. The Japanese have taken Formosa and Korea from China, and have held the last-named acquisition against Russia, taking also from Russia the southern half of Sakhalin. As Scotland, Wales, and England have been called Great Britain, so the Japanese have called their home group "Dai Nippon," Great Japan.

Japan, the Dai Nippon group of islands, has a {143} geographical area of about 150,000 square miles, or three-quarters the size of Germany, or slightly greater than the area of the British Isles. Its population of forty-nine millions is three-quarters that of Germany, or about one-ninth more than that of the British Isles, or five-sixths that of the whites of the Britannic nations, or over one-third the white population of the Pan-Angle world. Although Formosa and Korea, and possible portions of Manchuria, are to be considered to-day as dependencies of Japan, the fact remains that Great Japan as a power, despite slight differences of dialect, contains a homogeneous people actuated by the same spirit. The population is now overburdening the land of Japan. Japan must have either more land or more trade in order to feed its people, or it must reduce its standard of living--or lessen the population by emigration.

In Japan's search for more land, Asia offers few inducements.[143-1] From Japan to the west lies China, full to overflowing with people. From Japan to the north and north-west lies Russia-in-Asia under various names. Outside of Asia the allurements increase. From Japan to the southward lie the Philippines, now a Pan-Angle dependency, and the islands of the East Indies,--mostly Dutch, some German, one Portuguese, some French, and some Pan-Angle. This network of islands paves the route from Japan to almost empty Australia and fertile New Zealand. To the eastward, across the Pacific, lie the Hawaiian Islands, the key of the Pacific, containing 80,000 Japanese, which is 45 per cent. of a population {144} of which only a small per cent. are white.[144-1] Further to the eastward lie Alaska, British Columbia, and the Pacific Slope of America--all comparatively empty. Mexico contains Japanese to await there the tide of international events. South of the Panama Canal is a whole continent with its many open places. The Japanese are not a tropical people. They want temperate, arable lands. The best lands for Japan to annex are controlled by Pan-Angles.