‘Every section of the British Empire,’ Sir George detailed this point, ’having complete self-government would contain its own life within itself, would offer the highest opportunities to the labours of its citizens.  Whenever you constitute a new centre of authority you create a basis of general activity, which, in its turn, has off-shoots.  There would be more employment; the waste lands of the Old World, and the still untilled ones of the New World, would be taken up.  Federation is not the mere grouping of us together, but the settlement of problems that have long been forcing themselves to the front.  Difficulties which we can ill solve now, which appear to block our path, we should be able to settle with ease.’

Sir George discerned an element, not fully dreamt of, which would immensely strengthen the federal idea.  It was the influence of women, growing to be a powerful factor in the affairs of the world.  This sweet authority would tend to keep nations from plunging into scenes of bloodshed.  It would be a blessed assistance towards the peace of the world in times of excitement, and so a bulwark for federation, which was the creator of peace.

Finally, the rise of the Anglo-Saxon, by means of federation, would benefit the world in respect to religion and language kernels of all advancement.  It would mean the triumph of what, if carried out, was the highest moral system that man in all his history had known—­Christianity.  And it would imply the dominance of probably the richest language that ever existed, our own English.

So speaking, Sir George Grey summed up:  ’Given a universal code of morals and a universal tongue, how far would be the step to that last great federation, the brotherhood of mankind, which Tennyson and Burns have sung to us?’

Note.  Those who desire to study Sir George Grey’s full and final scheme for Anglo-Saxon federation, may refer to the ‘Contemporary Review’ of August 1894, where it appeared as an article by the present writer.

XIX WAITING TO GO

’I am just waiting my time to go, meanwhile doing what little I can that may be useful to my fellow-men.’

These were the words of Sir George Grey, and none could better express the closing years of his life.  If he might sow, in some wayside garden, an idea for the common happiness, he counted that a day on the active list.  It made him feel young again, blowing the old fires red and rosy.  Ever, he held to his tryst with Dean Stanley.

‘One evening,’ it had been made, ’the Dean and myself were walking round Westminster Abbey, as the doors were being closed.  It was during my visit to England, after my last Governorship, and the Dean was full of the restorations then being carried out on the Chapter House.  Naturally, I had the keenest interest in whatever affected the ancient seat of the House of Commons, regarding it as a shrine of constitutional government.