that self-willed, but singularly able and honest public man, to affirm that he had not given the subject much thought and attention. Of all his numerous political publications on the colonies, that entitled "The Coming Event, or Freedom and Independence for the Seven United Provinces of Australia," published in 1870, is the least like an elongated party pamphlet, and the nearest approach to a reasoned political treatise. This elaborate work Dr. Lang, in a glowing dedication, addressed "to the Electors of the City of Sydney,"—that city from which, fifteen years afterwards, the Australian Contingent sailed to the assistance of the mother country in the Soudan.
It must occur to any thoughtful mind that some explanation is necessary of the glaring failure to propagate this faith in the coming independence of these great self-governing colonies. Why, if Sir James Stephen's theory was correct, has there been such a lamentable reaction? Why do we find Liberal statesmen like the late Mr. Forster and Lord Rosebery deviating from the creed of their immediate predecessors, and vying with the Conservatives in their advocacy of a formless but patriotic policy of Imperial Confederation? To these questions, answers
