Gentlemen, the occasion which has brought us together is an extremely interesting one. We are here to congratulate Natal, its Government and its people, and to congratulate ourselves on the completion of a great work of commercial enterprise and civilisation, which one of our colonies has brought to a successful conclusion, giving once more a proof of the vigour and the resolution which have distinguished all the nations that have sprung from the parent British stock. Since this is the first occasion upon which I have publicy appeared in my capacity as Minister for the Colonies, may I be permitted to offer a few words of a general application. I think it will not be disputed that we are approaching a critical stage in the history of the relations between ourselves and the self-governing colonies. We are entering upon a chapter of our colonial history, the whole of which will be one of the most important in our colinial annals, since upon the events and the policy which it describes, will depend the future of the British Empire. That Empire, gentlemen, that world-wide dominion to which no Englishman can allude without a thrill of enthusiasm and patriotism, which as been the admiration, and perhaps the envy of foreign nations, hangs together by a thread so slender that it may well seem that even a breath would sever it. There have been periods in our history, not so very far distant, when leading statesmen, despairing of possibility of maintaining anything in the nature of a permanent union, have looked forward to the time when the vigorous communities to which they rightly entrusted the control of their own destinies would grow strong and independent, would assert their independence, and would claim entire separation from the parent stem. The time to which they looked forward has arrived soon than they expected. These great communities, which have within them every element of national life, have taken their rank amongst the nation of the world.