—these circumstances made the English sailor. It is probable that the developed characteristics of the successful sailor, coupled with a long experience in the management of people of divers races, begot the aptitude for administration which is now so marked a feature in their character that, in the art of government, Englishmen have little to learn from other nations. England has always had rivals on the sea, and we only keep our position there by great national sacrifices, by a splendid organization, by the most perfect system of training that we can devise, and by the prestige of many hard-fought battles. Sea-power alone will not preserve the Empire, and, considering the enormous interests which depend upon the successful maintenance of our position, it does seem passing strange that we have, hitherto, trusted to the genius of the race to acquire by experience a knowledge which it has never been thought necessary to teach.
We speak of men being born administrators, but it only means that, of the many who are set to the work of government, without any special training, some pick up the threads quickly and, with experience, become really efficient. Still, it is hardly fair on the governed, especially in remote parts of the Empire, where the people can only make themselves heard with difficulty, that the experience should be gained at their expense, when a little preliminary teaching would save both parties from the painful results of even well-intentioned blunders. That course might be regarded as typical of English absence of method, if it were not that we have an object-lesson of a contrary kind in the British Navy. But it is certainly characteristic of American methods that, directly the Republic took over the Philippines, an American University sent a capable representative to visit the English, French, and Dutch Colonies in the immediate neighbourhood of the newly-acquired territories, with instructions to collect and record all possible information in regard to the government of those dependencies.
