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works, in the provision of armaments for batteries, and arms and equipment for men, and in some exceptional cases possibly in the provision of gun and torpedo boats.

Before, however, the Colonies can be urged, or indeed expected, to take the necessary measures and incur the large expenditure requisite for such limited defence, they may reasonably inquire whether the Imperial Government has fulfilled its portion of the task by placing the necessary strategical positions in such a condition as to make certain the action of Her Majesty's fleets.

A strong case in illustration of the relative responsibility of the Imperial and Colonial Governments is afforded at the Cape of Good Hope.

The Colony has comparatively little direct interest in Simon's Bay, which is the coaling and refitting port for Her Majesty's ships in South Africa, but it does attach the greatest importance to the defence of the capital and its commercial port in Table Bay. The defence of the two ports, which are only about 27 miles apart the one from the other, although it may be undertaken for each separately, is intimately connected, one being as it were a back door to the other. The defences of both had been entirely neglected since the introduction of rifled artillery, had become obsolete, and were in that condition in the early part of the present year. It was manifest that the Colony could not be called on or expected to place Table Bay in a state of defence, unless Simon's Bay were placed in a like condition. The Imperial Government would not provide the necessary funds for their port, and as a consequence the capital of the Colony and its port were undefended. Both ports, in the time of apprehended danger, were exposed to insult, and instead of being ports in which the valuable commerce which rounds the Cape every year to the extent of 95,000,000l., or about one-seventh of the whole foreign trade of Great Britain, could find a refuge, trading ships within them would have been subject to destruction by a single cruizer in the absence of any of Her Majesty's ships on other duties requiring their presence elsewhere.

An idea prevails, which has found expression in official communications from several Colonies-Tasmania, New Zealand, and Canada, for instance that Her Majesty's ships should protect the more important commercial harbours on their coasts. An example in illustration may be quoted.

In "Australia, 5, 39" it will be seen that the Government of Tasmania expressed their strong conviction that the continuous, or all but continuous, presence of one of Her Majesty's vessels of war in the port of Hobart Town during any war which might occur between England and any European Power, would be in the very highest degree advisable.

In reply to a representation made on the subject to Commodore Hoskins, who commanded on the station, that officer explained the duties of the squadron under his command in the event of war as follows: to meet a hostile squadron wherever it can be found, and endeavour to stop its ravages in limine, and not by dividing and shutting up his ships in the different ports to give the enemy the command of the sea and the power of attacking them separately and in detail.

He added, moreover, that he had a right to expect that the principal ports shall be protected by land forces and batteries, either afloat or on shore, sufficiently strong to protect them against an ordinary cruizing squadron, and by beating it off or delaying it, to give him a better chance of intercepting it, and also to afford him a refuge in case of his being worsted or overpowered in a sea fight. To call on ships to protect the ports, instead of the ports the ships, is to invert the obligation and prevent their performing their proper duties.

Should the enemy, he adds, not send a squadron to these seas, but only single cruizers acting independently against our commerce, corresponding steps would, of course, be taken, but even then, to enable detached vessels to act with vigour and success, it would be necessary for them to have fortified places to fall back upon in case of need.

He can therefore enter into no engagements to give Hobart Town the preference over any other of the ports of the eight Colonies comprised within the sphere of his command, for the protection of whose interests, as well as of the commercial interests of Great Britain in those seas, he has only four ships, including his own pendant ship, under his command.

The principle so well enunciated by Commodore Hoskins is of general application, and holds good equally with respect to the ports of the Dominion of Canada on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts (although the Dominion Government appears also, from the reports of their officers, to be of opinion that their ports should be protected by Her Majesty's ships), of Newfoundland, the West Indies, the coast of Africa, &c.

Repeated representations have been made by the Admiralty to the Secretary of State for War as to the necessity of fortifying the more important coaling stations, which has also been frequently urged by the Defence Committee, of which His Royal Highness the

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