THE EXTENSION OF EMPIRE. John Bull Paints Thibet Red.

Free Lance, Volume V, Issue 221, 24 September 1904, Page 6

THE EXTENSION OF EMPIRE. John Bull Paints Thibet Red.

JOHN Bull's paint-pot is never empty, and his paint-brush never long idle. He took both on that Thibetan mission of his, and he's going to paint another dab of red on the map of the world. He is going to get hated a bit more, if possible, over that Thibetan incident. He will be execrated as the champion land-grabber of the world, and feared as the man who can hold A when its grabbed. It seems a bit rough on the Thibetans for John Bull to let daylight in on their aged filth and hoary methods, upset their mysteries, and pry into their religious secrets. ■Jr +- * But John Bull has India, and he is going to keep it John Bull probably reasons that it is better to slay 3 few Thibetans m order to make India safe from Russian aggression 01 Chinese encroachment than to steep Asia m the blood of either nation and its own. Of course, we art sorry for the Thibetans, and all fcljat sort of thing, and half-a-million seems a lot of money for a few insanitary fanatics to raise, but the slowgoing Britisher who 1 doesn't know anything, merely because he isn't a Yankee or a colonial, had arranged beforehand for the immediate establishment of commercial relations between Thibet and Britain, so> that the fanatics will probably be wearing English boots and Irish collars soon, and will wake up to find tha,t their ancient mystery and dirt weren't a patch on modern civilisation * * *■ In about three years from now the intrepid bamboo gunners, who hurled pebbles out of those fearsome weapons, will be "marking time" at trc command of a cockney sergeant, and the sacred palaces of the Llamas will resound with the intellectual pleasantries of "Tommy " Thibet has always been the danger spot, and unquestionably the Slav has had his greedy eye on that opening into India. In this connection, it should t.. understood that the eye of John Bull is not greedy. John Bull wants to lift the heathen to the heights of civilisation enjoyed by Atkins, and to save the Hindoo from the civilisation of the knout. So you see, somehow or other the end justifies the means, as all British means are justified by the end. Slow-goang old Britain doesn't want any Russian railway over the Thibetan mountain range. So it demands, while its finger is still on the trigger, that Thibet shall not lease o- sell any land to anybody — except the British.

It can be easily proved that the British, even If they didn't want to protect India, were perfectly justified m giving the Thibetans a general clean up. It is obvious that nothing much m the way of progress has happened since before the Christian era, and for Britain to* have allowed such sinfulness for another couple of thousand years would have been gross wickedness. Then, of course, it wouldn't have done to let Russia civilise Thibet, because her religion differs essentially from ours, and we're sticklers for religion ' Also, her methods, are hardly so civilised On the whole, it is a lucky thing for Thibet to have John Bull i.' act the policeman for her, and give her a free and clean life.