The Times. PUBLISHED ON TUESDAY AND FRIDAY AFTERNOONS. FRIDAY, JUNE 29, 1917 LINKS OF EMPIRE.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 6, Issue 288, 29 June 1917, Page 2

The Times. PUBLISHED ON TUESDAY AND FRIDAY AFTERNOONS.

FRIDAY, JUNE 29, 1917 LINKS OF EMPIRE.

"We nothing extenuate, nor ift down auaht in malice."

The return of Mr Massey and Sir Joseph Ward—to both of whom we extend a hearty welcome home—marks the passing of another milestone in the march of Empire. The importance to the Dominion of having been allowed to send twu delegates to the heart of the Empire to sit upon the Imperial War Cabinet and the Imperial War Conference can scarcely be exaggerated. It luings us at a single step to our majority. \'o longer need we look upon ourselves as merely children, allowed a certain amount of freedon of action within our own narrow boundaries but strictly under tutelage in regard to outside affairs, but rather as partners junior partners no doubt—yet with an undisputed right to be consulted and to give our opinion in all things concerning the prosecution of the great adventure the Empire has undertaken. At the close of the youth African war a well-known newspaper correspondent, " Smiler " Hayes, at a public dinner in London electrified his audience by getting up and gravely proposing J the health of Paul Kiuger, add- j ing calmly when the burst of indignation which greeted his i unexpected toast had subsided— | " the man who welded the Em i pi re." t

There is do doubt that Hayes, \ ill his whimsical way, sounded the right note. The over-sea colonies, just then first beginning under the able tuition of Joseph Chamberlain, the greatest Colonial Secretary of all time, to think Imperially commenced to discern that the day was arriving when they must help to shoulder the responsibilities of Empire if they were to share its privileges. No longer hiding their faces behind their Mothers' skirts they toddled out boldly into the open with their handful of men.

Compared with what we are now engaged in the South African war was little more than a series of affairs of outposts, but It taught us that In time of trouble the loosely knitted bonds of Empire could become as rigid as links of steel. Yet it needed a greater master of legions than Oom Paul to make us comprehend we had emerged from childhood. He taught us to toddle ; Wilhelm has taught us to march. And in the smoking ruins ot Flanders and Servia he has shown us what the penalty of forgetting the lesson he has given us will be.

So now has come the era of the New Imperialism- No longer irresponsible infants to be alternately spoiled and thwarted, Britain's colonies now stand side by side with their dam, as proud to shave her dangers as they are to take part in her councils. The genius of the British race gathered together the materials for our Empire, but it is Wilhelm who has really built it for us, and thus has wrought his own destruction. The mission that Mr Massey and Sir Joseph Ward have safely returned from is only the begin" nlug ol a comprehensive scheme of giving the self-governing Dominions a permanent place in the councils of the Empire. When the war ends there will be weighty problems of tariffs and mutual preferential trade to be settled, and we may now feel assured that our representatives will always have a voice in ar-

ranging them. However profoundly anv of us may differ from Mr Massey or Sir Joseph Ward, or even from both upon questions of domestic politics, no one will veuture to dispute their fitness for the task they have had iu hand. Since the war began there has been no question that each of them has been possessed of the spirit of hue and sane Imperialism. No doubt they have been proud to represent at Home a country that hasgiven so ungrudgingly in the common cause of its bravest and its best, and equally, no doubt, New Zealand has cause to congratulate herself that the Links of Empire of her own choosing have acquitted themselves with so much credit.