SPAIN.
IT is refreshing to hear of Spain doing anything besides re- pudiating debts and conniving at the Slave trade. With the new expedition against the Moors a new life will commence for the army and the nation.. The army that has only been an aggregate of badly officered. regiments, partisans of this or that general aspiring to Palace favour, Will have a chance of earning in Africa a repute for bravery not stained with the blood of fellow-citizens. And the nation will find something to talk about besides the pec- cadilloes of the Queen or the intrigues of the King Consort's con- fessor. One must naturally wish the Spaniards success. The nest of pirates who haunt the southern shores of the Mediterranean have long merited a signal chastisement, and we can see no Eng- lish reason why Spain may not annex the whole Empire of Morocco at least we shall not object to their bringing back to Europe those door-keys which it is said the Moors still keep of the houses in Granada and other old Morisco-Spanish cities. If they could bring back the lost genius and craft which made Moorish Spain a bright spot when Europe wasa dark place full of " boy crusades " and murderous superstitions. It is a very foolish extension of the sound sympathy for nationality to give that proud name and the respect accruing to it to every stubborn tribe that tights for its in- dependence. Wherever civilization fightsagainst scattered hordes, who infest territories they cannot occupy and claim lands they cannot till, the wishes of all practical men aro for the success which will bring the arts of peace and the ways of progress in its train. England in India, France in Algeria,, Russia in the Cau- casus, England and France in China, and now Spain in Morocco extend the area of world-wide industry by every concession snatched with armed hand from peoples who are unable or un- willing to join the comity of nations. It is worthy of note how this sense of the superiority binds in one family of " Europeans" the races frequently hostile of this continent. There have been Frenchmen or Russians who have aided Indians against us ; there have doubtless been Poles and Englishmen aiding the Circassians against Russia ; but these are exceptional cases to which attaches no glory, of which the nation never boasts, and of which indi- viduals are ashamed. He would be rather an over brazen-faced Englishman who would call himself an aide of Sohamyl or Abd- el-Kader, and no Frenchman has openly admitted that he has resisted the English in India. The suspicion now not generally credited that Russians aided the Mongols on the Tiensin-hoa shows in the way it is put forward that those who report it be- lieve they could say nothing worse of the Russians.
Previous page
