IMPERIAL DEFENCE.
India are by many considered liable to serious attack by hostile navies, which would assail their ports and prey on the shipping on their coasts. Halifax is the only port in these Colonies which can possibly be considered within the radius of action of fleets in European waters. The ports of the Cape Colony, of India, of Australia and New Zealand, possess an important element of safety from attack in their distance from Europe. The bases of the enemy in their neighbourhood are few. The naval force maintained by foreign powers in the Eastern seas, whether in the India Ocean, in the China Sea, or the Pacific, is quite insignificant compared with that maintained by the British Empire. It is clear that no power could withdraw a fleet of ironclads for operations in distant seas without abandoning to us the absolute command of European waters and without setting free a proportionate number of British battleships. Attacks on commerce by one or two cruisers, keeping generally out of sight of the coasts, are the most probable form which the operations of an enemy would take on the coasts of India, Australia, or South Africa. Occasional raids on territory might be made with the object of obtaining supplies; but it may be safely asserted that few captains of cruisers would waste ammunition on bombardment with the chance of falling in with an enemy's cruiser before they could return to their base to obtain a fresh supply. Against attacks on commerce the best form of defence is an active naval defence, by ships which are able to pursue and fight the cruisers of the enemy wherever they may be found. In accepting the localisation of the vessels of the special Australian squadron in deference to the wish of the Colonies, we have acted on a
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