Current Topics

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XII, Issue 9, 20 June 1884, Page 1

Current Topi cs

AT HOME AND ABROAD.

THE SACBBD HEAKT.

To-DAY the Church celebrates the Festival of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The Feast was instituted according to a revelation made to saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, in June, 167S — the passage from her Life, by Father Tickel, S.J., running thus :— ' ' As I was before the Blessed Sacrament,' says this holy soul, 'on a day within tbe Octave of Corpus Christ i, I received from my God excessive graces of Bis love. Feeling myself touched with a desire of making Him some return, and of rendering him love for love, * You cannot make < me any greater return of love,' He said, ' than by doing what I have ' so often asked of you.' And discovering to me His Divine Heart, * Bee this Heart,' he 6aid, • which has loved men so much that It has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming Itself, in order to testify to them Its love ; and in return I receive from the greater part only ingratitude, by reason of the contempt, irreverence, sacrilege, and coldness which they show me in this Sacrament of Love. But what I feel still more is that there are hearts consecrated to Me who use Me thus. On this account, I ask of you that the first Friday after the Octave of Corpus Christi be set apart for a special Feast to honour My Heart, by communicating on that day and making reparation to It by a solemn act to repair the indignities which It hag received during the time It has been exposed on My altars. I also promise you that My Heart shall expand Itself to shed in abundance the influence of Its divine love upon those who shall pay It this honour and procure it to be paid.' " But the science of our own century has also shown us the extent to which the Sacred Heart was consumed and exhausted for us, and has confirmed in a very remarkable manner the visions of the saints. The Jesuit Father Christie, for example, in an essay on the 1 Philosophy of Christianity, included in a volume of essays edited by Cardinal Manning, and published some I years ago, in order to prove the fact of our ■ Blessed Lord's deatl » gives the scientific explanation of the blood and water which St* John saw pouring from the sacred side when the spear of the centurion had pierced if and been withdrawn. What Father Christie tells, us, moreover, we find in substance well summed up in the words of a Protestant authority— that is tbe late J. H. Pooley, a medical doctor of New York,and which have been lately reproduced by our contemporary the Are Maria. They are as follows :—": — " It is well known to physicians that rupture of the heart, though rare, does sometimes occur, so that to us dying of a broken heart is something more than metaphor :it may be a sad reality. This accident may occur, and probably doe 3 most frequently occur, in diseased conditions of the organs ; but such cases do not demand our attention, for no disease or weakness can be predicated of that Heart which was broken for us. But it may also occur in perfectly healthy conditions of the heart and the general system, and then is commonly produced by overwhelming emotions, particularly by opposite or conflicting ones, quickly succeeding one another, or struggling together in the breast. Of the effect of such emotions upon the central organ of the circulation we all know something ; our heart, we say, is light, or heavy as lead, or ready to burst ; and many will easily believe that if such sensations as they have occasionally experienced were much intensified, or long continued, death from this cause might really ensue. It is altogether probable that the sudden deaths recorded in ancient history, from intense and contending passions of the mmd — such as that of Chilo the Lacedemonian, Sophocles the tragedian, and that of Diagorap, as recorded by Aulus Gelius — were caused in this way. But we are not left to mere inference and conjecture in this matter ; there are not wanting well-attested modern instances where sudden death in healthy persons has occurred' under such circumstances, and a. post mortem examination has revealed the fact of rupture or laceration of tbe heart. Let me now direct attention more minutely to the phenoiriena observed in such an examination. The heart and roots of 'thegreat' Vessels which arise from it are enclosed in a membranous' bag 6r sack, called the pericardium, which has no external opening whatever, but is perfectly closed or shut.

Upon opening the chest oE a person who has died from rupture of the heart, the firsb thing observed is this pericardium or heart sack, more or less distended, sometimes enormously so, by the blood which . has been forced into it through the opening in the ruptured heart. Thn blood thus contained in the pericardium undergoes the process of coagulation or congealing, just as it would do outside of the body, in a bowl, for instance, and separates into two parts,— a clear, .light coloured fluid called serum, and a thicker red portion called etassajneh' turn or clot,— or, to express it in popular language, blood and watdr, —this very phrase', indeed being used even in medical accounts of such cases. This is no mere theoretical dessription derived from reading, for I myself have witnessed what I now describe. Some years ago' l madea^wsi mortem, examination of a man who died suddenly of rupture of the aorta, one of the great vessels of the heart, within the pericardium. The pericardium in this case ' contained a large quantity— fully a pint, I should think— of fluid ; and . on beirig opened there flowed out, side by side, without mingling, a clear fluid like water, and a thicker, dark red fluid like blood. What the knife of a physician does in an ordinary examination was roughly performed in our Saviour's case by the soldier's spear ; and in the brie case as in the other there came forth blood and water. In this way, .and in this way only, have I ever been able to account, in my own mind, for the blood and water, which, it seems to me, must have been considerable in quantity to have attracted the attention of the Apostle John, and been by him deemed worthy of special record All other attempts to explain it, I may simply say, without stopping to specify them, are far-fetched and improbable. Death from . rupture of the heart occurs suddenly, often when, the powers of mind and body are active, the former generally in convulsive exercise. Such persons generally bring their hands suddenly and forcibly to the <jhest and utter a loud cry. These phenomena, except the, movement of the hands, which were fixed, upon the Cross, correspond with what are related of our Saviour's death." Father Christie's speculations, nevertheless, as to how the dread event might ocour, should hardly be omitted. "It might, indeed, be said," he writes, " that the mental agony our Lord endured was without parallel, and its vehemence might produce that effect which, in other .cases, was facilitated by disease ; it might be said that an agony which produced a sweat of blood might, when still more intensified in the last conflict, and attended with the constrained position which is enumerated by scientific men among the conditions favourable to the rupture of the heart, result in a rupture which evidently would differ from recognised cases of a like kind only in degree. But, over and above this answer, it is to be remarked, though our Lord was free from disease, He was liable to exhaustion and the effects of exhaustion. He experienced • weariness,' as St. John tells us. when he sat by Jacob's Well, and weariness implies a certain alteration, by over-exercise, of the muscular substance. Such alteration, therefore, in the muscular tissue of the heart would not be incompatible with our exclusion of disease from the body oE our Lord ; and" such alteration would be the natural consequence of a life such as that led by Jesus Chrht. In contrast to the Baptist, indeed, and in a certain point of view, Ha came, as He Himself said, ' eating and drinking ' ; but the true meaning of these words must agree with a life spent in watching, and mortification, and self-denial, and of continual suffering and grief of soul : there were forty days fast, and the praying all night long on the mountain«top, and the v? ant of a place where to lay His head, and incessant journeyings and preachings ; ,the natural consequence of such a kiud of life might well be the Aveakening of the tissne and muscular fibres oE the heart, such as to take away all improbability from tbe supposition that the immediate physical cause of our Lord's death was the breaking of His Sacred Heart." Father Christie also mention?, as Dr. Pooley has done, that cases of rupture have taken place when no weakness of the heart's muscular tissue could be detected. But, however the matter be, whether It were broken as the effects of spffering that had gone before, or by the excess of present anguish, there is at least sufficient to show us how great are the claims of the Sacred Heart to our adoration, and to confirm tbe revelation to St. Margaret Mary. " See this Heart," he said, " which has loved men so much that It has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming Itself, in order lo testify to them Its love.''

WHAT DOEh IT MATTKB?

There are a few considerations arising oat of the discussion concerning the Benevolent Institution, as it has bo far appeared in the bunedin dailies, which it worth while to note. In the first place, we nod some of the writers expressing surprise or disgust, as the case may be, that Presbyterianism should be confounded with Methodism and that both should not be distinguished from some other species of doctrine also belonging to the sects. — To Catholics, nevertheless, a 8 we have before said, the distinctions are totally inconsiderable ; whether the sects break their spiritual eggs at the big end or the little one, is necessarily a matter of indifference to them, and one name can convey to them no less and no more an idea of error, than another.— But even if there had been anything more than a mere accidental confusion in the matter, there would still have been sufficient precedent to plead. — The celebrated Sydney Smith, for example, nearly eighty years ago writing in the Edinburgh Revi&tv spoke as follows :—" We shall use the general term of Methodism to designate these three classes of fanatics, (Armenian and Oalvinistic Methodists and Evangelical clergymen of the Church of England,) not troubling ourselves to point out the finer shades and nicer discriminations of lunacy, bub treating them all as in one general conspiracy against, common sense and rational orthodox Christianity." — Sydney Smith indeed adds that he had known many truly religious persons of manly, rational, and serious, characters, both in the Presbyterian and Episcopal churches, but people who take the advantage of the unprotected condition of poor little children to rob them of their parents' faith andjproselytise them can hardly be accredited with any such character and may well ba classed among the fanatics to whom it is lawful to apply a general name according to the Canon o^ St. Paul's. — Whether sach fanatics may be call Methodists or Presbyterians or any other name, or all indifferently will naturally depend upon the particular experience of those speaking of them — Bnt let us hope that there is something more than a mere idle pretence in the indignation expressed by our evangelical friends t 0 whatever sect they belong, at the notion that Catholic children have been proselytised. There is at least something gained if the shameful deed in question has at length been perceived by them to be a dhameful deed, and one against whose committal they are anxious to defend the memory of a friend. It is not long since they would openly have gloried in the action, and, whether in pretence or in earnest they now seem anxious to disclaim it — tture is certainly a change for the better.— But the sects, it would appear, are undergoing a change, for the Evangelicalism that has so far been the great motive of their fanaticism is dying, and in some respects we may, therefore, look out for their improvement. The London Spectator, for example, speaks concerning the decline of Evangelicalism as follows: — "It is dying away as fast among the orthodox Nonconformists as it is in the Church of England. It is dying away almost as fast in the Presbyterian Church of Scotland as it is amongst the orthodox Nonconformists. The power of the most potent of our present religious convictions works against Evangelicalism instead of, as it once did, perhaps, in its favour." And again the Spectator writes : "To sum up, it has always been, we think, of tha very essence of tne Evangelical procedure to bring into the strongest and most absolute contrast ' the filthy rags ' of human nature, on the one hand, and the free gift of the divine grace and atonement on the other hand. Evangelicals would hardly admit the possibility of any process of sanctification preceding conversion 5 they would hardly admit the possibility of anything gradual and natural in the character of conversion ; they would hardly admit the possibility that the body could become the channel of God's influence over the mind, as well as the mind the channel of God's influence over the body ; and they would hardly admit the possibility that in the Bible, which they regard as God's book, and identify almost absolutely with God, there is anything human, really imperfect, really ambiguous, least of all, really erroneous. Thus their ' conception of religion is essentially a etude and abrupt one, which severs man far too absolutely from God, and renders it almost impossible to regard any permanent relation between God and man as possible at all except by a sheer miracle of grace, which it is the next thing to impious to pretend to understand or to bring about. In such a world as we have been living in for the last fifty years, Buch a view of religion has been growing daily less and less tenable, and we do not wonder, therefore, that the worthies of the Evangelical type of Christianity are daily dying off and leaving no successors behind them." — If Mr. James llacfie, then, has left behind him in Danedin a circle of friends to excuse, rather than boldly glorify his conduct, we see that the natural course of things following the decline of Evangelicalism prevails here also. — But if while Mr. James Macfie was still alive and " Evangelicalism " still flourished some confusion prevailed as to whether he should be called a Presbyterian or a Methodist or some other name that has not as yet been mentioned, those who misnamed him may be justified by the example of the famous Canon of St. Paul's. — They also excusably refrained from searching into the " finer shades and nicer discriminations of lunacy," but took it for granted that the gospeller in

question belonged to one or other of those shades and discriminat.ons that, as they evidently bad reason to believe, were less fine and nice.

ETASGBLICAIiISM.

Now that the decline of Evangelicalism is pro nounced to be in its last stages, the article written by Sydney Smith in the Edinburgh Review for January 1808 is of peculiar interest. "We learn from it the consternation with which the growing system ,was looked upon by the orthodox of the day; and what were- their fears arising from the aspect under which it presented itself to them. The Methodists also, it seems,'bad their particular War-cry, and published certain magazines which were circulated to what was then regarded as the enormous number of from eighteen to twenty-thousand each a month. The extracts from these magazines given by the writer, however, do not strike us now, after the experience of threequarters of a century, as so very extraordinary or alarming, and we may, perhaps, on the whole, take them as rather milder than much that has since been printed. They consist chiefly of interpositions of Providence, special judgments, spiritual experiences, with some visions, and miraculous occurrences. A clergyman, for example, drops down dead at a card table ;' a young man who swears is stuDg by a bee on the tip of the tongue ; a violent storm prevents one Captian Scott from preaching in a certain chapel ; an innkeeper dies, and is carried to his grave exactly at the moment he had appointed for a cock-fight. One case, however, given by the writer is of unusual horror, and he hardly speaks too strongly of it : "The following," he says, '« we consider to be one of the most shocking histories we ever read. God only knows how many such scenes take place in the gloomy annals of Methodism. The case was that of a young man who had been for some years believed to be " under powerful convictions of his miserable condition as a sinner." He had, however, committed some transgression that preyed upon his mmd — " On the Lord's Day he was in great agony of mind. His mother was sent for, and some religious friends visited him ; but all was of no avail. That night was a night beyond conception. The horror which he endured brought on all the symptoms of raging madness. He desired the attendants not to come near him, lest they should be burnt. He said that the ' bed-curtains were in flames, — that he smelt the brimstone, — that devils were come to fetch him, — that there was no hope for him, for that be had sinned "against light and conviction, and that he should certainly go to hell.' It was with difficulty he could (be kept in bed. An apothecary being sent for, as soon as he entered the house and heard his dreadful howlings, he enquired if he had not been bitten by a mad dog. His appearance, likewise, seemed to justify such a suspicion, his countenance resembling that of & wild beast more than that of a man." Medical treatment, nevertheless, resulted in attending his physical condition, and a confession made by him to the doctor seemed to have some such effect upon his mind. " His nervous system, however, had received such a shock that his recovery was doubtful ; and it seemed certain that, if he did recover, he would sink into a state of idiocy. He survived this interview but a few days." — The effects of the system generally, as we learn from the writer, were, moreover, such as have since been noticed in connection with Evangelical revivals, and insanity was largely increased by it. "In a man. of common imagination," he write 3, "the terror and the feeling which it first excited, must necessarily be soon separated : but where the fervour of impression is long pressrved, piety ends in bedlam. Accordingly there is not a mad-house in England where a considerable part of the patient* have not been driven to insanity by the extravagance of these people. We cannot enter such places without seeing a number of honest artisans, covered with blankets, and calling themselves angels and apostles, who, if they had remaiaed contented with the instruction of men of learning and education, would still have been found masters of their own trade, sober Christians, and useful member? of society." That Evangelicalism or Methodism should die out in a natural kind of way after it had run its course, hardly entered into the calculations of the writer, and he, on the contrary, took a gloomy view of the ends to which it would probably lead. •' To what degree will Methodism extend in this country," he asks. This question is not easy to answer. That it has rapidly increased within these few years, we have no manner of doubt; and we confess we cannot see what i i likely to impede its progress. The party which it has formed in the Legislature, and the artful neutrality with which they give respectability to their small numbers — the talents of some of this party, and the un impeached excellence of their characters, all make it probable that fanaticism will increase rather than diminish. The Methodists have made an alarming inroad into the Church, and they are attacking the Army and Navy. The Principality of Wales and the Bast India Company they have already acquired. All mines and subterraneous places belong to them ; they creep into hospitals and small schools, and so work their way upwards. It is the custom of the religious neutrals to beg all the little livings, particularly in the North of England > from the minister for the time being ; and from these fixed points

they make incursions upon the happiness and common sense of the vicinage. We most sincerely deprecate such an event ; but it will excite in us no manner of surprise if a period arrives when the churches of the sober and orthodox part of the English clergy are completely deserted by the middling and lower classes of the community. "We do not prophesy any such event, but we contend that it is not impossible— hardly improbable. If such, in future, should be the situation of this country, it is impossible to say what political animosities may not be ingrafted upon this marked and dangerous division of mankind into tbe godly and the ungodly. At all events, we are quiie sure that happiness wilt be destroyed, reason degraded, sound religion banished from the world ; and that, when fanaticism becomes too foolish and too prurient to be endured (as is at last sure to be the case), it will be succeeded by a long period of the grossest immorality, atheism, and debauchery."— Methodism, however, hardly succeeded to the extent the writer feared, and there seems no particular reason for us now to anticipate that its final extinction will be followed by a grosser state of public morals than that which has all along been co-existent with it— for that such a state has co-existed with it, the acknowledged raison d'etre of its latest development, and, perhaps, its convulsive stage immediately preceding death, the Salvation Army, affords us sufficient testimony. As for the system itself there is very little cause for us to regret its approaching disappearance.— Of true religion no system not openly atheistic or pagan could possibly be more destitute, and none les? calculated to influence the human character for good.— The man who adopted it was left pretty much as he would otherwise have been. If his character was mild and benevolent he shaped his religion to his character, and in his amiability it found an adornment that seemed to make it attractive.— The ideal characters connected with the system have been tho?e presented to us by George Eliot in Mr. Tryan and Dinah Morri?. but it is impossible not to see that it was not the religion professed by these creations of genius that gave to them their beauty, and that tbe influence they exercised over other people was not that of their religion but a personal influence wholly independent of it. If the character, on the other hand, were harsh and unfeeling it remained so, and a divine inspiration was found to excuse every cruel impulse or unkind action. Evangelicalism, then, as we have seen on the evidence of the famous Sydney Smith had not much to recommend it in its rise, anl the experience of some three-quarters of a century is on record to show us that its fall is but little to be mourned over.

AFFAIRS IN : NEW CALEDONIA

It is interesting to learn that the French Government have extended the classes of undesirable citizens who are to be banished to New Caledonia, and possibly other islands iv our seas. In addition to the other incurables we are to have for our neighbours, and in a large degree also peihaps our future fellow-colonists, vagabonds and beggais. Verily our population bids fair to beincreased in an extremly charming and profitable manner .—But at. least it is an ill wind that blows nobody good, as the saying ii, and it will be of some advantage to those colonies associated with transportation that their inhabitants will no longer have the monopoly of doubtful antecedents.— None of us will know before long whom we have got for our friends and acquaintances. It would seem, moreover, that, even as things aie. and without waiting for the addition of the recidivistes, matters in New Caledonia are far from promising, and that tliere is a population growing up which of itself will be quite sufficient to send out into all the colonies round about an element of very considerable corruption. The London Times, for example, gives as some paiticulars respecting the convicts who are now in the island alluded to and they are anything rather than reai-suring. Under the civilising rule of the Eupublic in Prance, we are told there has during the last five years been a yearly average of 300 men tiied for murder in various degrees, but so parental is the Government.it seldom happens that the person convicted is executed and in consequence it may be calculated that during the Presidency of M. Grevy over a thousand murderers have beeu sent to New Caledonia. And there oa the whole, they have hardly fared badly ; The Times translating from an article by M: Denis in the Nouvelle Revue, speaks as follows.—" Arriving at Noumea the convict is sent to the camp of Montravel where he rests for ten days and gets his kit. After that he is told off to some kind of work, and enjoys almost complete liberty. The convicts go to their work in bands of 40 or 50 ; they may char, smoke, drink wine and tafia. At night they are lockad np in wards, but it is difficult to exercise any am v < illance over them . Games of hazard are forbidden, yet a rort of lantqnenet called La VendSvw is played every night. Sometimes the lite of an obnoxious warder or official is the stake of the game, but frequently large 'sums of money are lost. It came to our knowledge that one night a convict lost 1,200f. which he paid on the following day in gold. There is no discovering where all this gold comes from, but the convicts seem to be abundantly sup. plied with it. Those who are caught trying to escape to Australia . have always plenty of louis in their pockets " J3ut with plenty of louis in their pockets escape should by no means

be difficult to them ; indeed it may be suspected that it is not only connived at, but provided for in some very efficient quarters. O£ the particular nature of the convicts, again, who it is not impossible may come to favour us with their presence— even leaving the recidivistes out of the consideration, we may, for example, take one M. Jugeau, the record of whose lifj in New Caledonia— for the cause of his transportation is not given— is the following :— " His first conviction was to sis years' penal servitude for a murderous assault which caused death. One year of this term was remitted, and he was discharged on the 20th of January, 1881. On the 2nd December, of the same year he murdered at Dumbea a free convict named Jeanniard, in order to rob him of 130f. The sentence of death passed upon him for this was commuted by the President of the Eepublic, and soon after this he was condemned to 40 years' penal servitude for robbery with violence and attempt to escape." The sentence to additional penal servitade passed on a man already undergoing a life-sentence is a mere mattec of form, and M. Jugeau, after it had been passed was as free to play la Vendome or to devise plans for escaping to Australia as he had been before. We are told further of an irrepressible male in the Island of Nou " who has been sentenced four times to death, and is none the worse of it." JAnd yet. again of a certain M. Pierrard, who has been three times sentenced to 27 years penal servitude. It seems, moreover, that so favourably had transportation to New Caledonia been reported of among French criminals at home, a number of convicts in the penitentiaries committed murder for the purpose of being sent out there. But if the Pilgrim Fathers whose descendants are to possess the land be of such a nature the mothers of the future race are hardly unworthy of them. " Periodically the Ministry of Marine and the Home Office call upon the Governors and matrons of female penitentiaries to supply them with a certain number of women willing to marry convicts. The women must be young, so the choice is limited. It is made without any reference to character. On arriving in New Caledonia, the matrimonial candidates are sent to the Josephine Convent at Bourail and there the bachelor ticket-of-leave men may come to see them. The girls are so anxious to get out of prison that they generally choose the first man who proposes ; on the other hand, the poor nuns who find it grievous work to manage their houseful of abandoned women have a direct interest in seeing the worst behaved ones married off first. Immediately a woman gets married she is free. Sometimes on the day after her wedding she deserts her husband, and starts off for Noumea to resume her old life of profligacy." In every respect, then, the future of New Caledonia is fully provided for— and we see how great an advantage the Australian colonies enjoy in being within easy reach of it — even apart from the arrival of the recidivlstes.

A CAUTION TO NOUMEA.

But what is the remedy proposed for the evil influences of New Caledonia ? It is at least bold, and worthy oE a more adventurous age than the rather humdrum one in which our lots are cast. A correspondent of the London Times, in sbort. proposes that if things comes to the worst, the Australian colonies shall embark their volunteers en board their swift steamers and sail straight away to destroy the French settlements. He thinks the forces of the colonies could go on their destructive errand and be safe home again before a French fleet would have time to reach our hemisphere in order to interfere with them. Afterwards he believes that, at a pinch, the colonies could resist the French as Ihe American States resisted England.— And as experience in the matter fails us, and in a.ll probability always will continue to fail us, we are unable to contradict him. The conception of an Australian Washington, nevertheless, is difficult to form, for nothing that the exigencies of peaceful times have produced has in any degree appeared to resemble the character in question;— But even if it were paid for at the price of a bloody war the change to such a type from that of a Parke?, a Graham Berry or a Grey— the summit to which colonial statesmanship may bo maintained so far to have risen might still be found anything but extreme.— The threat contained in the letter of "An Australasian, 1 * however, is that which the most coafounds us.— The champion acknowledges in the same breath that his boast of a willingness to sustain the struggle unaided against the power of indignant France is mere emptiness. England, he says, would be compelled to defend her colonies on the pain of losing them —a loss that " would surely be the first scene in the downfall of the British Empire." This loyal subjeot-, nevertheless, is willing to inflict the loss in question on England should she refuse her aid, and what is more he would cast in the fortunes of the colonies with those of the United States. "As I have shown," he says, " England would be compelled to join in the struggle ; nor if England shrunk from what would be her manifest interest and duty would Australasia necessarily be single-banded. It cannot be doubted that if slie threw herself into the arms of the United States, that great and expanding Eepublic would not fail to grasp sn opportunity which would raise America into the first rank among naval Powers, and convert the whole -Pacific into an American lake." — Let our editors

beware, then, of spurring England on to demand of the United States- a reckoning concerning the dynamitards, for they know not the moment when they may find their own colonies pursuing the tenor of their way also beneath the stars and stripes, and bound to the fortunes, and implicated in the liabilities of Cousin Jonathan. But behold Australian loyalty, behold the brazen face with which complaint is made of Irish disaffection. In tbe very columns of the Times themselves an appeal is made to the protection of America against England, and a total secession is threatened, to the downfall of the British Empire. In an Irish paper a like utterance would cause a shriek of "rebellion," and would almost earn a Coercion Act for the country. It may, nevertheless, be reasonably doubted as to whether the United States would incur the enmity of France even for the advantage of obtaining the suzerainty of these colonies— and perhaps, on the whole, it may be quite as well for us not to embark our volunteers for the purpose of burning Noumea to the ground nu|jl we have obtained the full and free support of the Imperial Government. We very much doubt as to whether a Washington would really arise to get us out of the scrape in which we had rashly involved ourselves.