giving the natives their own separate institutions on parallel lines with institutions for whites.  It may be that on these lines we may yet be able to solve a problem which may otherwise be insoluble.’  It is a solution which owes much to the British experiments of the previous period; and the principle which inspires it was incorporated in the Act of Union.  This is one of the innumerable fruitful experiments in government in which the British system is so prolific.  Again, the problem of the relationship between Indian immigrants and white colonists is an acutely difficult one.  It cannot be said to have been solved.  But at least the fact that the South African Union and the Indian Empire are both partners in the same British commonwealth improves the chances of a just solution.  It helped to find at least a temporary adjustment in 1914; in the future also it may contribute, in this as in many other ways, to ensure that a fair consideration is given to both sides of the thorny question of inter-racial relationship.

The events which led up to, and still more the events which followed, the South African War had thus brought a solution for the South African problem, which had been a continuous vexation since the moment of the British conquest.  It was solved by the British panacea of self-government and equal rights.  Who could have anticipated, twenty years or fifty years ago, the part which has been played by South Africa in the Great War?  Is there any parallel to these events, which showed the gallant general of the Boer forces playing the part of prime minister in a united South Africa, crushing with Boer forces a revolt stirred up among the more ignorant Boers by German intrigue, and then leading an army, half Boer and half British, to the conquest of German South-West Africa?

The South African War had proved to be the severest test which the modern British Empire had yet had to undergo.  But it had emerged, not broken, as in 1782, but rejuvenated, purged of the baser elements which had alloyed its imperial spirit, and confirmed in its faith in the principles on which it was built.  More than that, on the first occasion on which the essential principles or the power of the empire had been challenged in war, all the self-governing colonies had voluntarily borne their share.  Apart from a small contingent sent from Australia to the Soudan in 1885, British colonies had never before—­indeed, no European colony had ever before—­sent men oversea to fight in a common cause:  and this not because their immediate interests were threatened, but for the sake of an idea.  For that reason the South African War marks an epoch not merely in the history of the British Empire, but of European imperialism as a whole.