Page:Democratic Ideals and Reality (1919).djvu/199

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
THE RIVALRY OF EMPIRES
187

facilities, and they can be paralleled elsewhere. The Lancashire cotton industry continues by virtue of momentum.

The result, however, of all specialisation is to make growth lop-sided. When the stress began after 1878, British agriculture waned, though British industry continued to grow. But presently lop-sidedness developed even within British industry; the cotton and ship-building branches still grew, but the chemical and electrical branches did not increase proportionately. It was not only that German penetration designedly robbed us of our Key industries, for the ordinary operation of specialisation in a world which was becoming industrially active outside Britain was bound to produce some such contrasts. Britain developed vastly those industries into which she gradually concentrated her efforts. Therefore she, no less than Germany, became 'market-hungry,' for nothing smaller than the whole world was market enough for her in her own special lines.

Britain had no tariff available as a basis for bargaining; in that respect she stood naked before the world. Therefore, when threatened in some vital market, she could but return threats of sea-power. Cobden probably foresaw this in his later days when he