to form unholy alliances, and as a wandering star must fall within the attraction of some strange centre. This is the history of all secret societies, made up of such men, and hence the powers of darkness from which such societies spring, wage a fierce war against the household, whether it be the household of the natural man, or the "Household of Faith."

In the ages which built up society, family ties and household rule were further extended and strengthened by extraordinary measures-such as adoption, service, &c. &c.; but now, one by one, even ordinary ties are disappearing, and little more will soon remain than that necessary one which binds the infant to its mother for a few months longer after birth; and this, too, is disappearing, not even through the charity of a hireling, but by a mechanical contrivance and the keep of a cow; if, then, children come further to be subjected to the process of national adoption, instead of being nurtured by their natural and spiritual fathers, there will issue from the schools of such adoption fitting materials to inaugurate "the age of iron and blood" which is already shadowed forth. The Pall Mall Gazette of the 2nd of March remarks with becoming design: "The religious difficulty seems to crop up everywhere in the councils of nations and in the councils of local authorities, and how it is ever to be settled except by Physical Force is a question which excites no small uneasiness in unpolemical circles." In a late meeting of Home Rulers, physical force was alsoalluded to as a possible solution for the Irish question.

The difficulties of the times we live in can be comprehended only by recalling the primary law of existence, and dwelling on the unity of that conception. Things exist only by and through a head or centre of rule to which science gives the name of Law. The forms, density, and rest of inert matter, depend no less on their various centres of attraction than the higher forms of organised beings are determined by the centres of control round which they are held and grouped. It could scarcely be otherwise and creation be the work of One Will, which called it forth from chaos to circle and cluster in myriad forms round the same word which first begot and since sustains its being. This Law, therefore, though the same in universal action, differs in form, manner, and degree, in animate and inanimate nature; for as there is Good and Evil there is also corresponding Will and Choice, and the power of discrimination which results therefrom is the superior prerogative of all organised beings; it is called instinct in the brute, which selects its food and knows its seasons; it is called reason in the natural man; and in the supernatural order of things, this supreme use of judgment is expressed by the gift of grace. Now regarding Evil, its strength and its weakness both lie in its being bound by the organisation which rules all creation, even as a stranger can only act through the laws of the country he visits; hence Sin cannot detach beings from their natural centres of life, except by binding them within the orbit of its own attraction, through the ignorance or malice of their own free will; were it otherwise Evil were stronger than Good, in its power to resolve Creation again into chaos, and there could be no punishment for Sin as there would be no beings to punish; but Evil is antagonistic to Good, and draws its strength from the power of perverting beings from lawful to unlawful obedience. To understand, then, the Law under which we live, to love and follow it for its own sake, is wisdom, safety, and the peace of society; and this Law is the rule of every homestead, from whence it goes forth, rules over the nation, and then, embracing the aggregate of nations from the rising to the setting sun, it enfolds them in the bonds of an eternal brotherhood, as it is written: "GOD hath made of one blood all the dwellers on the earth."

With regard to the influence and fascination which social disorders exercise through means of a false phraseology, drawing men thereby from lawful to unlawful obedience, an example is found in the opening word of the motto chosen above, where nationality stands for the intelligible word, nation; but nation, though a noun of multitude, is a living fact, subject to law, responsible for its acts, inspiring love as the seat of home and kindred only can inspire. Again, a multitude of households is a fact, and can be estimated in the aggregate as fit or unfit to form an independent self-governing unit, and mount up into the vast family of nations; but a "nationality" is nowhere, and its fascination with the multitude is in proportion to its mistiness, to their inability of comprehending what it stands for, and to the self-conceit and pride which all empty words engender. Hence lawless desires dwell under its shadow, and the instincts of the animal can be freely indulged; for "Nationality" knows no Decalogue, it is responsible to no law, and in its name crimes become possible which men, as a nation, would repudiate. Within these last few months "Nationality" has robbed 47 convents in Italy of libraries containing 616,016 volumes of valuable works. It has left its track of blood and iron over the fairest provinces of Europe. It has entered the Holy of Holies, and disputes rule with the servants of the living GOD, and it now seeks to rob households of their natural and spiritual children to brand them with its seal. "Nationality," too, has made it possible for Home Rulers to forget the nation they profess to serve in a recent allusion to physical force, and bids fair to lead them into courses which may compromise those liberties which the only government in Europe now preserves to the Church. One question more about Home Rule. Where is that Rule to come from amongst a people that takes no count of the violation of a Treaty it had solemnly guaranteed? And especially when that violation compromises those very principles of local liberty and internal Rule which they are organised to uphold! If the voice and press of England and Scotland have been silent to the public cry of the persecuted populations of the Bernese Jura, that Irish party professing Home Rule, if it were fit for any Rule at all, would at least have asserted the first right and duty of a nation, viz., that of protest, where the sanctity of a Treaty was being violated; and the effect on their political position, which such a return to morality and public law would have produced, can be estimated by the following paragraph from the Times :

"If Ireland chooses to be represented by the Home Rule members, she must make up her mind to have her conduct judged by their political character, their acts and aims, and their accepted code of public honour."

Achin and Elmina,

H. R.

SINCE we last wrote about the handing over of Achin to the Dutch in payment for their cession of their rights under the King of ASHANTI Over Elmina,* papers have been laid before the House of

The article in the October number of this Review (1873) on this subject was in error in stating that there must have been a secret article in the Treaty of February, 1871, with the Dutch, relating to Achin. A separate Treaty was signed on the 2nd of November, 1871, "for the settlement of their mutual relations," the first Article of which is Her Britannic Majesty desists from all objections against the extension of the Netherland dominion in any part of the Island of Sumatra and consequently from the reserve in that respect contained in the notes exchanged by the Netherland and British Plenipotentiaries at the conclusion of the Treaty of the 17th of March, 1824." There must, however, have been a secret understand. ing; as this Treaty was subsequent by so many months to the former.

Lords called "Correspondence relative to the Relations between Great "Britain and Acheen." These papers are of no value whatever, for they contain no explanation of the abandonment of Achin, and no answer to the question put to the Earl of GRANVILLE why he had abrogated the Treaty of 1824. These papers only contain the Treaty of Alliance between the East India Company and Achin of 1819, signed by Sir STAMFORD RAFFLES, the Treaty between Great Britain and Holland of March 17, 1824, with a note addressed by the British Plenipotentiaries to the Netherlands Plenipotentiaries, dated March 17. This note contains the following passage: "A Treaty concluded in the "year 1819 by British Agents with the King of ACHEEN is incom"patible with Article III. of the present Treaty. The British Pleni"potentiaries therefore undertake that the Treaty with Acheen shall as soon as possible be modified into a simple arrangement for the "hospitable reception of British vessels and subjects in the Port of "Acheen. . . . . And they express their confidence that no measures "hostile to the King of ACHEEN will be adopted by the new possessor "of Fort Marlborough."

66

Then follows the reply of the Netherlands Plenipotentiaries dated the same day, containing the following passage:

"If the Government of Great Britain conceives it to be a real advantage, that by disengaging itself according to the principles "sanctioned by the Treaty which is about to be signed, from the con"nexions which were formed by its agents four or five years ago, in "the Kingdom of Acheen, it secures by some new clause the hos"pitable reception of British vessels and subjects in the ports of that kingdom, the undersigned hesitate not to declare that on their part they do not see any difficulty in it, and conceive that they may "assert, at the same time, that their Government will apply itself "without delay to regulate its relations with Acheen in such a manner "that that State, without losing anything of its independence, may offer "both to the sailor and the merchant that constant security which can only be established by the moderate exercise of European in"fluence."

No negotiation, however, was undertaken with the King of ACHIN to obtain the abrogation of the Treaty with him of 1819; he therefore is justified in calling upon England to observe that Treaty, as he has done in a letter dated April 1, 1873, given at page 2 of these

papers.

After the Treaty of 1824 there is a copy of a Treaty between the Netherlands and Achin of March 30, 1857. This Treaty has twice been denounced by public telegrams from Penang, once on the authority of the Achin Vizir, as a Dutch forgery.

Though there is nothing valuable in these papers there is, however, one most remarkable document dated July 15, 1873, and signed by Viscount ENFIELD. It is a letter written by Lord GRANVILLE'S direction to the Under-Secretary of the Colonial Office, Mr. HERBERT. This letter states as a reason why the King of ACHIN cannot claim the active alliance of Great Britain under any existing Treaty, that that Treaty, i.e., of 1819, had not been uninterruptedly observed by the

two contracting parties, and goes on to say that Great Britain, in the year 1824, entered into a Treaty with the Netherlands entirely inconsistent with it, and that the Treaty of 1819 had been broken by the Sultan of ACHIN by his concluding a Treaty with the Netherlands in 1857, which we have said above is strongly denied by the Achinese. According to this view any Power may get rid of troublesome treaty stipulations by itself breaking one of them.

Now that Earl GRANVILLE is no longer minister it will not be possible to put any further questions to him, but what the country will wish to know, at least those who still care for the diligent and capable administration of its affairs, is why or on what grounds he acceded to the proposals made to him by the Dutch Minister, or on his behalf, by his colleague the Secretary of State for the Colonies, to purchase Elmina by the sacrifice of Achin. Either Lord GRANVILLE took this step following his own unassisted judgment, or he did it after consulting with the permanent staff of the Foreign Office. The first hypothesis would, if true, be the more fortunate for the country, as the unhappy result of this cession to Holland will not encourage another Secretary of State to take measures of this importance whilst in ignorance of the consequences. The second hypothesis would, if the correct one, show that the Foreign Office is still more inefficient than it is generally supposed to be, and that Mr. HAMMOND, whose duty it should have been been to remonstrate with Lord GRANVILLE against this cession, let it pass, or perhaps approved of it. It must be remembered that Lord GRANVILLE'S two under-secretaries have been promoted to the House of Lords; and as there are no reasons whatever for this grounded on the personal merits or position of these two individuals, the reasons must be sought for in this Achin and Elmina blunder. Perhaps it was thought desirable to remove Lord ENFIELD from a place where he might have to answer Mr. DISRAELI, or it was necessary to reward him for giving his signature to such a letter as that laid before the House of Lords. As to Mr. HAMMOND, Mr. DISRAELI's accusation of unequalled folly or ignorance is not one that could easily be brought against him; it is more probable that he advised Lord GRANVILLE against the transaction, and that his remonstrances having not been attended to, it has been necessary to silence him by removing him to another and a safer place. Though the Times may think we have heard enough about the Straits of Malacca, it is not likely that Lord GRANVILLE will hear the last of it, until he makes a clean breast of it and explains his motives for the cession. All that fell from Mr. GLADSTONE during the elections, shows that he is not in the secret of the matter and had nothing to do with it, and does not understand it even yet. His accusation of Lord DERBY was an answer suggested to him after Mr. DISRAELI's attack, probably without any details, for Lord DERBY's letter next day in the Times, short as it was, was enough to show that his projected Treaty differed toto cœlo from Lord GRANVILLE'S. Mr. GLADSTONE then tried to find arguments for himself, and appears to have looked for the first time at the map of the Malay Straits; but a map on a small scale

cannot supply the knowledge required, of history and local circumstances, and the narrower parts of the Straits of Malacca cannot enter into competition as a naval station with Achin, which has constantly sent forth powerful armaments. It is as though some person ignorant of English history were to have said in the days of King ALFRED that it was unnecessary to watch or fortify the Humber because the North Sea was very wide at that point, and that the place to be watched was ;Dover; and this same argument may be repeated hereafter when Russia may have got possession of the Varanger Fiord, and Prussia has obtained Antwerp. H.

Specimens of the Correspondence of Foreign Affairs Committees.

A selection from this Correspondence has been printed for the use of the Committees. We have space only for the following.

No. 3.

Drill-street, Keighley, Jan. 25, 1874. SIR,-I beg to inclose P. O. order for 30s. in payment for Diplomatic Review. I have sold 225.

On Sunday night, a fortnight ago, Mr. DRIVER, Mr. SHARP, Mr. W. ROBINSON, Mr. E. ROBINSON, from Keighley; Mr. PETTY, from Sutton; Mr. WILSON, Mr. SMITH, and two others from Cononley went to a district secular meeting at Kildwick, by appointment.

Those from Keighley did not know the purpose of meeting till their arrival. Mr. WILSON was chairman. It then came out that we were called together to discuss "their principles and ours."

I was a little time before I could see my way out of the difficulty. The room was crowded, and I did not like to lose an opportunity with such a large company.

I was called upon to begin the "discussion." I had hardly decided how to begin when I got upon my feet to speak; but, as I stood, a conversation I had in the afternoon with Mr. PETTY and another, suddenly occurred to me. The subject being the Commandment, "Thou shalt not kill."

I took that for a text, and went on to describe the difference between killing by assault and killing in defence: how the executioner was covered by the judge's warrant. I then applied the rule to nations, illustrating by the Ashantee War, and charging every man in that room with being a murderer. This had a wonderful effect; one man rose to his feet, who seemed to tremble in every limb. He declared that, so far as he was concerned, the matter should not be allowed to remain where it was, that he would investigate the subject for himself, and report to them in three weeks, at which meeting we were invited to attend.

Mr. W. ROBINSON followed, by giving one of the neatest and most logical and conclusive addresses that I have heard for a long time. He is a very promising young man indeed. I fear I should only spoil it by attempting to describe it, and therefore will not make the attempt. Several persons spoke during the evening. At the end of two hours those from Keighley were obliged to leave to catch the train. A hearty vote of thanks was given to us for attending, and we were requested to meet them again in three weeks.

On Wednesday night last I had a special invitation to attend the Friends' Meeting House, to hear an address from one of their body on the Ashantee War. Mr. PICKLES and I went; it was a very good address, except that he did not deal with the legal aspect of his subject, which gave Mr. PICKLES and myself a fair opportunity of doing so, which we did not lose, and we received the thanks of the chairman for what we said.

The Peace Society have announced a public meeting on Friday night next, on the Ashantee War and Reduction of the National Expenditure. I am put on the bills as one of the speakers. How my name has been put there I cannot explain, but I have