Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1913-04-03

Call it coincidence. if you Will, or make
it the basis of a serious political argu-
ment, if you prefer, the fact exists tnat
during the three most glorious epochs OF
English history the crown was worn by
woman. The Elizabethan era, the days
of good Queen Anne and the Victorian
epoch are the periods of Englands great
est grandeur. Not in one, but in many,
perhaps in all. the lines of human en-
deavor the progress of the English people
during these reigns made all that had
gone before seem sluggish. In literature
in exploration and conquest in commerce
and the industrial arts, and. above all. in
the political thought that leads Great
Britain ever nearer to pure democracy,
the record of these queenly regimes stands
unapproached and unapproachable.
Sees Kingdom Grow to Empire.
In her sixty-four years on the throne
Victoria saw Great Britain grow from a
kingdom to an empire. More than
twelve million square miles and popula-
ton estimated at 2400co.OOO came under
British rule while she was queen. Though
Australia and New Zealand were part Of
the British empire at her accession. their
actual settlement and development were
under her, and to a great extent the same
thing is true of British North America.
When she was crowned it took months
for her foreign office to communicate with
her most distant possessions. When she
died the news was flashed over mountains
and under oceans to the very antipodes
in few seconds. She saw the stage
coach give place to the locomotive: the
wooden ship with towering sails of snowy
canvas to the lean ocean greyhound of
steel feeding on coal from British mines
In her youth cottagers spun and wove
the fabrics worn by the people: in her adj
vanced years great cities grew up wher-
ever water power or cheap coal would
drive the whirling bobbins and clanking
looms in great factories where thousands
of women worked Electricity was a
youth: mans most serviceable slave in
her age.
Progress Under Her Reign.
Mankind progressed /, in brotherly love
while she reigned at Windsor. Child la
Dor was regulated, If not wholly prohib-
tied; women were no longer permitted
to work in mines; the negro, however
savage, was free wherever the British
flag waved; her ships were the chief
factors in suppressing the African slave
trade on the high seas, and her influence
was thrown on the side of the anti
the states. In the main her voice was
always for peace, though once embroiled
In war she never sought peace save with
honor. If she stood by while the ruling
classes of England with heavy hand
plotted out the Dutch republics of South
Africa, she at least aided in giving to the
conquered a snare in the new govern
| ments erected, SO that at this writing
one of the most successful of the Boer
generals is prime minister of the chief
colony. 1t is as though we had made
Aguinaldo governor general of the Philip
pines.
Queen Victoria was the granddaughter
of George III, who died insane, and the
niece of George w and of his brother,
William Nv, who succeeded him. The
promoters of the modern science-or fad
of eugenicS may find in her something Of
an argument for their theories. For she
was in a sense bred for the throne. In
the latter days of the reign of George III
British statesmen awOke to the fact that
there were but few royal heirs. That
king had been prolific enough as a par
| ure to have children reduced the num-
Der of direct heirs to three-the Dukes
of Clarence, Kent and cambridge. For
the good of the nation, therefore, these
| princes were. obliged to marry straight
way and produce progeny, lest the Sue
cession to the throne should fail. -:
dutifully performed this patriotic serv-
! ice, in part at least, but it was the for
| tune Of the Duke of Kent, who married
German widow, the Princess of Lem
| ingen, to furnish the successor to the
throne. When his daughter was born
there were four lives between her and
| the crown. All four were blotted out
before she had entered her nineteenth
year.