Front Matter

"No man was safe, no life was sure."

About This Book

"The Empire upon which the sun never sets." We all know these words, and we say them with a somewhat proud and grand air, for that vast Empire is ours. It belongs to us, and we to it.

But although we are proud of our Empire it may be that some of us know little of its history. We only know it as it now is, and we forget perhaps that there was a time when it did not exist. We forget that it has grown to be great out of very small beginnings. We forget that it did not grow great all at once, but that with pluck and patience our fellow-countrymen built it up by little and by little, each leaving behind him a vaster inheritance than he found. So, "lest we forget," in this book I have told a few of the most exciting and interesting stories about the building up of this our great heritage and possession.

But we cannot

We cannot in one day grid the whole world about, following the sun in his course, visiting with him all the many countries, all the scattered islands of the sea which form the mighty Empire upon which he never ceases to shine. No, it will take us many days to compass the journey, and little eyes would ache, little brains be weary long before the tale ended did I try to tell of all "the far-away isles of home, where the old speech is native, and teh old flag floats." So in this book you will find stories of the five chief portions of our Empire only, that of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and India. But perhaps some day, if you greet these stories as kindly as you have greeted those of England and of Scotland, I will tell you in another book more stories of Our Empire.

The stories are not all bright. How should they be? We have made mistakes, we have been checked here, we have stumbled there. We may own it without shame, perhaps almost without sorrow, and still love our Empire and its builders. Still we may say,

Oxford, 1908