Excerpta.

Kaikoura Star, Volume XIV, Issue 753, 6 July 1894, Page 7

Excerpta.

The Command of the Sea.

The sea in itself is a barren territory. It is not coveted for itself by any Power, civilised or uncivilised. Its only commercial or material value is that of its fisheries, and these belong for the most part to its territorial regions, and not to its broad strategical expanse. But the political and strategical value of the sea is its value as a highway. If it could not be traversed by ships, no Power would seek to command it. If it could not be traversed by British ships, the British .Empire would cease to exist. Furthermore, for the British Empire to continue to exist not only must the sea he traversed by British ships, but in time of war it must be commanded by British ships. Strategic freedom of transit must be secured in order that commercial freedom of transit may be maintained.

For England to surrender the command of the sea in time of war would mean two things. It would mean on the one hand that England itself was liable to invasion, and on the other that every trans-marine portion of the British Empire was open to military assault; and as a consequence of this it would mean further that the maritime commerce of the Empire had ceased to exist. No other great Power of the world is exposed in the same degree to these extreme consequences. To any other Power the obtaining of the command of the sea as against England can only be a means to an end, that end being the overthrow of the British Empire. To England it is and must be an end in itself, that end being the highest of all political ends for a nation ; namely, the maintenance of the national existence. If we lost the command of the sea beyond recovery, we might not be immediately invaded, but the bonds of Empire would ipsefacto be sundered. We might avert invasion by concession ; but assuredly no concession short of a dismemberment, or even a dissolution of the Empire, would satisfy an enemy who had finally vanquished us at sea. It is thus no rhetorical expression, but a plain statement of essential fact, that by the Navy we must stand or fall.— Quarterly Review.

‘ Gush ’ on Music.

This is how they praise the singer in Cornish local papers : * Then came before the audience a woman of fine presence—a blonde, with milk white teeth, and whose ’throat was like the swan.’ She sang as if she was impelled by the same natural force which causes the nightingale, the thrush, the lark, and the canary to send up a gush of music from a well that never runs dry.’

Said an exasperated father at the dinner table :

‘ You children turn up your noses at everything on the table. When I was a boy, I was glad enough to get dry bread to eat.’

* I say, pa, you are having a much better time of it, now you are living with us, ain’t you ?’ remarked little Tommy.

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