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can only be placed by a General against trained troops with very considerable caution.

Well, then again, in regard to Australia, there was a military Committee of Inquiry which was assembled last year by the Commonwealth Govern- ment to report on the organisation and the state of instruction of the guards of the various Australian States. Those reports point out much that daresay might have been said with equal truth of our organisation here no more than 15 or 20 years ago, but I hope we have progressed here. The troops vary very much in quality, and are deficient as regards the departmental corps which are necessary to accompany them in the field, Army Service Corps and Ordnance, and Army Medical Departments. In some States there are none. Victoria has only a reserve of 17 rounds of small arms aminunition per rifle. Western Australia only 28 rounds reserve, and again there has not been any military administrative staff to deal with supply or other arrangements, and only in one State is there periodical inspection of ammunition and warlike storos. The Engineer units do not receive a continuous annual training, and like the great variety of arisaments and ammunition, anybody who reads those reports will see that however magnificent the material, however loyal and patriotic the feeling, you can only treat contingents which are got together on the spur of the moment, and hastily improvised, as a moral force, a moral support to the Empire at a critical moment, but not one on which the Empire would be justitied in relying in any way to the exclusion of its own regular troops, and my point is that cases must and will arise in which we shall have to ask, in which we shall require a larger force than we have of our own, and in which the Colonies who send it us on the ground that they think us worthy of support in a particular emergency should be prepared to send us reliable forces.

Now, your time is of value, and I do not want to enlarge on the many other features which are put before me by my military advisers on this subject, but what I would ask is this, that out of this very large number of men who are only trained in some degree in the Colonies, we must look, even if it was for only one in four to be specially trained, and to be held in readiness for such an emergency. I propose that those men should be trained with a liability to overses service, that they should realise that they are a part of the Army Reserve of the Imperial Force, that their services are absolutely pledged in the event of the Government to which they belong proferring assistance to the Imperial Forces in the emergency. that they should receive such training as might be agreed upon between our military authorities and the Government concerned, and that they should be fully organised and fully equipped with a view to acting together and drilling together in the battalions or regiments with which they would take the field. to not want to go into the details of the question, because I think perhaps it is a question where we want first to have the principle decided. I do not want to into the questions of what their status would be with regard to other

go corps; whether there should be any attachment to the regiments at home; whether there should be any exchange of units which has often been talked about, and was talked about at this Conference in 1897; whether the officers who are to accept service in this particular force should have any claim on Imperial Commissions.

I would ask

per annum.

All those I think are questions which we must take up and deal with, but, of course, there is the great question of expenditure. I would point out that this is not a large financial question. The number of men asked for is so comparatively small that it is unlikely that there would be a difficulty in getting men to pledge themselves, and the reserve pay which we give after all only amounts to 91. per man That reserve pay, over a force of 20,000 men, would only amount to 180,000 a year over the whole of the Colonies, and I am by no means prepared to say, in looking to the last paragraph of Mr. Seddon's motion, that it would not be a fair thing to ask the Imperial Government to assist in that respect in case they really had a call on those troops. Of course, if these troops are entirely under the control of the Colonial Government, and if their Colony says, which it very possibly would, “We will not pledge ourselves to send you any men until we know the emergenoy and until we have the assent of our Parliament for agreeing to

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"take part in that particular emergency," it would probably be held that so long as the Colonial Government kept the control as to the employment of the troops, they should pay them. For ourselves, if it is held that any troops are part of our recognised Army Reserve, I think it would not be unreasonable for the Imperial Exchequer to bear some portion of the charge. I will not develop the question further, but I would point out that when I have spokop of 180,000. divided between the whole of the Colonios, I am speaking of a relatively small figure compared to that which has been. recently added to our Estimates. On ↑ most careful review by the Cabinet of the necessities of the case within two years-the years 1900 and 1901-we have added no less than 9,000,000l. sterling to the Peace Estimates for the Army, and therefore the expenditure which I suggest may possibly not be grudged by the Colonies, though I think it may be met by retrenchment in some other quarters. In respect of figures it would only represent an expenditure in the whole of the Colonies of one-fiftieth of the sum which, in two years, the Imperial Government has had to take upon its shoulders. I would only urge before I sit down that these proposals are dictated not in the least by any idea of ontoring into an ambitious competition with other nations as to the extent of our land armaments. But up to now Great Britain has always been the last in the field. Wo cannot afford to be the last in the field. If wo aro forced into defensive action for any of our dependencies we are bound to be able to strike as quickly or quicker than any other Powers. That is the object of the whole of our present organisation at the War Office, which has advanced most rapidly within the last two or three years, and I sincerely trust that the Colonial Governments may see their way to giving us, in this particular form, the support which they have given us in so unstinted a manner under the circumstances of the late war.

Sir FREDERICK BORDEN; I scarcely expecte to make a statement at this stage. However, perhaps I fay as well say what I have to say now. am sure we all sympathise fully with the wish expressed by the Secretary of State for War to perfect in every possible way the defences of the Empire. I think the Colonies, the larger Colonies, at any rate, have shown their sympathy in the most practical manner with that view, and with that desire. (Mr. Seddon, hear hear.) Perhaps as I am not charged with discussing the question of the policy of this proposal, I may proceed at once to refer to the position of affairs in Canada. I cannot speak for any other Colony, because I am not sufficiently acquainted with them, but having been Minister for Defence in Canada lor six years, I am, to soine extent, familiar with the conditions there, and, I think, with the feelings of the Militia and the people generally with reference to this matter. The Secretary of State for War has referred to the condition of the Militia"in Canada as a defensive force, and has quoted one or two extracts from the last report which has been issued by the general officer commanding the military, which I find are also in this paper to which he then referred. I think that that extract is somewhat mis- leading; rather unfair. General O'Grady Haly was referring in detail to the condition of the Militia, but I think that if the whole report were carefully read, the inference would be that the Militia of Canada is in at any rate a much more effective condition than it was five or six years ago, and that its present position when compared with five or six years ago gives promise that within a very short time, within the very near future, it will be an effective force. I may say with reference to that, that the object we have in view is to make that force self-contained, self-reliant, absolutely complete within itself, The Secretary of State has referred to the fact that we have adopted the Ross rifle. I should not go into that here, but I may say it was only done after having submitted the whole question to a Committee composed of the.. best men we have, one of whom certainly was an expert who had been educated in this country, and who is at the head now of our Arsenal in Quebec-Major Guadet, and the report made by that Committee was that the rifle known as the Ross rifle was at least as good as and in some respects better than the service rifle in this country. The cartridge fired by it is the same as that fired by the service rifle-so-called in this country, and I might point

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