← catalogue

Cecil Rhodes, Man and Empire-Maker

by Princess Catherine Radziwill · English · Gutenberg #16600 · 369,943 chars · public domain (US)

The Project Gutenberg eBook of Cecil Rhodes, Man and Empire-Maker
    
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: Cecil Rhodes, Man and Empire-Maker

Author: Princess Catherine Radziwill


        
Release date: August 26, 2005 [eBook #16600]
                Most recently updated: December 12, 2020

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16600

Credits: E-text prepared by Jonathan Ingram, Dainis Millers, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net/)


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CECIL RHODES, MAN AND EMPIRE-MAKER ***


E-text prepared by Jonathan Ingram, Dainis Millers, and the Project
Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net/)



Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
      file which includes the original illustrations.
      See 16600-h.htm or 16600-h.zip:
      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/6/0/16600/16600-h/16600-h.htm)
      or
      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/6/0/16600/16600-h.zip)





CECIL RHODES

Man and Empire-Maker

by

PRINCESS CATHERINE RADZIWILL
(CATHERINE KOLB-DANVIN)

With Eight Photogravure Plates

Cassell & Company, Ltd
London, New York, Toronto and Melbourne

1918







[Illustration: THE RT. HON. CECIL RHODES]




CONTENTS

 CHAPTER                                    PAGE

    1. CECIL RHODES AND SIR ALFRED MILNER     1
    2. THE FOUNDATIONS OF FORTUNE            17
    3. A COMPLEX PERSONALITY                 28
    4. MRS. VAN KOOPMAN                      40
    5. RHODES AND THE RAID                   50
    6. THE AFTERMATH OF THE RAID             69
    7. RHODES AND THE AFRIKANDER BOND        82
    8. THE INFLUENCE OF SIR ALFRED MILNER   104
    9. THE OPENING OF THE NEW CENTURY       120
   10. AN ESTIMATE OF SIR ALFRED MILNER     130
   11. CROSS CURRENTS                       144
   12. THE CONCENTRATION CAMPS              157
   13. THE PRISONERS' CAMPS                 170
   14. IN FLIGHT FROM THE RAND              191
   15. DEALING WITH THE REFUGEES            202
   16. UNDER MARTIAL LAW                    214
       CONCLUSION
       INDEX




       LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

       THE RT. HON. CECIL RHODES           Frontispiece

                                            Facing page

       THE RT. HON. W.P. SCHREINER                  32
       PRESIDENT KRUGER                             68
       THE HON. J.H. HOFMEYR                        86
       THE RT. HON. SIR W.F. HELY-HUTCHINSON        98
       VISCOUNT MILNER                             132
       THE RT. HON. SIR LEANDER STARR JAMESON      148
       THE RT. HON. SIR JOHN GORDON SPRIGG         224




INTRODUCTION


The recent death of Sir Starr Jameson reminded the public of the South
African War, which was such an engrossing subject to the British public at
the close of the 'nineties and the first years of the present century. Yet
though it may seem quite out of date to reopen the question when so many
more important matters occupy attention, the relationship between South
Africa and England is no small matter. It has also had its influence on
actual events, if only by proving to the world the talent which Great
Britain has displayed in the administration of her vast Colonies and the
tact with which British statesmen have contrived to convert their foes of
the day before into friends, sincere, devoted and true.

No other country in the world could have achieved such a success as did
England in the complicated and singularly difficult task of making itself
popular among nations whose independence it had destroyed.

The secret of this wonderful performance lies principally in the care
which England has exercised to secure the welfare of the annexed
population, and to do nothing likely to keep them in remembrance of the
subordinate position into which they had been reduced. England never
crushes those whom it subdues. Its inbred talent for colonisation has
invariably led it along the right path in regard to its colonial
development. Even in cases where Britain made the weight of its rule
rather heavy for the people whom it had conquered, there still developed
among them a desire to remain federated to the British Empire, and also a
conviction that union, though it might be unpleasant to their personal
feelings and sympathies, was, after all, the best thing which could have
happened to them in regard to their material interests.

Prosperity has invariably attended British rule wherever it has found
scope to develop itself, and at the present hour British patriotism is far
more demonstrative in India, Australia or South Africa than it is in
England itself. The sentiments thus strongly expressed impart a certain
zealotism to their feelings, which constitutes a strong link with the
Mother Country. In any hour of national danger or calamity this trait
provides her with the enthusiastic help of her children from across the
seas.

The Englishman, generally quiet at home and even subdued in the presence
of strangers, is exuberant in the Colonies; he likes to shout his
patriotism upon every possible occasion, even when it would be better to
refrain. It is an aggressive patriotism which sometimes is quite uncouth
in its manifestations, but it is real patriotism, disinterested and devoid
of any mercenary or personal motives.

It is impossible to know what England is if one has not had the
opportunity of visiting her Dominions oversea. It is just as impossible to
judge of Englishmen when one has only seen them at home amid the comforts
of the easy and pleasant existence which one enjoys in Merrie England, and
only there. It is not the country Squires, whose homes are such a definite
feature of English life; nor the aristocratic members of the Peerage, with
their influence and their wealth; nor even the political men who sit in
St. Stephen's, who have spread abroad the fame and might and power of
England. But it is these modest pioneers of "nations yet to be" who, in
the wilds and deserts of South Africa, Australia and Asia, have
demonstrated the realities of English civilisation and the English spirit
of freedom.

In the hour of danger we have seen all these members of the great Mother
Country rush to its help. The spectacle has been an inspiring one, and in
the case of South Africa especially it has been unique, inasmuch as it has
been predicted far and wide that the memory of the Boer War would never
die out, and that loyalty to Great Britain would never be found in the
vast African veldt. Facts have belied this rash assertion, and the world
has seldom witnessed a more impressive vindication of the triumph of true
Imperialism than that presented by Generals Botha and Smuts. As the leader
of a whole nation, General Botha defended its independence against
aggression, yet became the faithful, devoted servant and the true adherent
of the people whom he had fought a few years before, putting at their
disposal the weight of his powerful personality and the strength of his
influence over his partisans and countrymen.
                                                     CATHERINE RADZIWILL.
    _December, 1917._




CECIL RHODES




CHAPTER I.

CECIL RHODES AND SIR ALFRED MILNER


The conquest of South Africa is one of the most curious episodes in
English history. Begun through purely mercenary motives, it yet acquired a
character of grandeur which, as time went on, divested it of all sordid
and unworthy suspicions. South Africa has certainly been the land of
adventurers, and many of them found there either fame or disgrace,
unheard-of riches or the most abject poverty, power or humiliation. At the
same time the Colony has had amongst its rulers statesmen of unblemished
reputation and high honour, administrators of rare integrity, and men who
saw beyond the fleeting interests of the hour into the far more important
vista of the future.

When President Kruger was at its head the Transvaal Republic would have
crumbled under the intrigues of some of its own citizens. The lust for
riches which followed upon the discovery of the goldfields had, too, a
drastic effect. The Transvaal was bound to fall into the hands of someone,
and to be that Someone fell to the lot of England. This was a kindly throw
of Fate, because England alone could administer all the wealth of the
region without its becoming a danger, not only to the community at large,
but also to the Transvaalers.

That this is so can be proved by the eloquence of facts rather than by
words. It is sufficient to look upon what South Africa was twenty-five
years ago, and upon what it has become since under the protection of
British rule, to be convinced of the truth of my assertion. From a land of
perennial unrest and perpetual strife it has been transformed into a
prosperous and quiet colony, absorbed only in the thought of its economic
and commercial progress. Its population, which twenty years ago was
wasting its time and energy in useless wrangles, stands to-day united to
the Mother Country and absorbed by the sole thought of how best to prove
its devotion.

The Boer War has still some curious issues of which no notice has been
taken by the public at large. One of the principal, perhaps indeed the
most important of these, is that, though brought about by material
ambitions of certain people, it ended by being fought against these very
same people, and that its conclusion eliminated them from public life
instead of adding to their influence and their power. The result is
certainly a strange and an interesting one, but it is easily explained if
one takes into account the fact that once England as a nation--and not as
_the_ nation to which belonged the handful of adventurers through whose
intrigues the war was brought about--entered into the possession of the
Transvaal and organised the long-talked-of Union of South Africa, the
country started a normal existence free from the unhealthy symptoms which
had hindered its progress. It became a useful member of the vast British
Empire, as well as a prosperous country enjoying a good government, and
launched itself upon a career it could never have entered upon but for the
war. Destructive as it was, the Boer campaign was not a war of
annihilation. On the contrary, without it it would have been impossible
for the vast South African territories to become federated into a Union of
its own and at the same time to take her place as a member of another
Empire from which it derived its prosperity and its welfare. The grandeur
of England and the soundness of its leaders has never come out in a more
striking manner than in this conquest of South Africa--a blood-stained
conquest which has become a love match.

During the concluding years of last century the possibility of union was
seldom taken into consideration; few, indeed, were clever enough and wise
enough to find out that it was bound to take place as a natural
consequence of the South African War. The war cleared the air all over
South Africa. It crushed and destroyed all the suspicious, unhealthy
elements that had gathered around the gold mines of the Transvaal and the
diamond fields of Cape Colony. It dispersed the coterie of adventurers who
had hastened there with the intention of becoming rapidly rich at the
expense of the inhabitants of the country. A few men had succeeded in
building for themselves fortunes beyond the dreams of avarice, whilst the
majority contrived to live more or less well at the expense of those naïve
enough to trust to them in financial matters until the day when the war
arrived to put an end to their plunderings.

The struggle into which President Kruger was compelled to rush was
expected by some of the powerful intriguers in South Africa to result in
increasing the influence of certain of the millionaires, who up to the
time when the war broke out had ruled the Transvaal and indirectly the
Cape Colony by the strength and importance of their riches. Instead, it
weakened and then destroyed their power. Without the war South Africa
would have grown more wicked, and matters there were bound soon to come to
a crisis of some sort. The crux of the situation was whether this crisis
was going to be brought about by a few unscrupulous people for their own
benefit, or was to arise in consequence of the clever and far-seeing
policy of wise politicians.

Happily for England, and I shall even say happily for the world at large,
such a politician was found in the person of the then Sir Alfred Milner,
who worked unselfishly toward the grand aim his far-sighted Imperialism
saw in the distance.

History will give Viscount Milner--as he is to-day--the place which is due
to him. His is indeed a great figure; he was courageous enough, sincere
enough, and brave enough to give an account of the difficulties of the
task he had accepted. His experience of Colonial politics was principally
founded on what he had seen and studied when in Egypt and in India, which
was a questionable equipment in the entirely new areas he was called upon
to administer when he landed in Table Bay. Used to Eastern shrewdness and
Eastern duplicity, he had not had opportunity to fight against the
unscrupulousness of men who were neither born nor brought up in the
country, but who had grown to consider it as their own, and exploited its
resources not only to the utmost, but also to the detriment of the
principles of common honesty.

The reader must not take my words as signifying a sweeping condemnation of
the European population of South Africa. On the contrary, there existed in
that distant part of the world many men of great integrity, high
principles and unsullied honour who would never, under any condition
whatsoever, have lent themselves to mean or dishonest action; men who held
up high their national flag, and who gave the natives a splendid example
of all that an Englishman could do or perform when called upon to maintain
the reputation of his Mother Country abroad.

Some of the early English settlers have left great remembrance of their
useful activity in the matter of the colonisation of the new continent to
which they had emigrated, and their descendants, of whom I am happy to say
there are a great number, have not shown themselves in any way unworthy of
their forbears. South Africa has its statesmen and politicians who, having
been born there, understand perfectly well its necessities and its wants.
Unfortunately, for a time their voices were crushed by the new-comers who
had invaded the country, and who considered themselves better able than
anyone else to administer its affairs. They brought along with them fresh,
strange ambitions, unscrupulousness, determination to obtain power for the
furtherance of their personal aims, and a greed which the circumstances in
which they found themselves placed was bound to develop into something
even worse than a vice, because it made light of human life as well as of
human property.

In any judgment on South Africa one must never forget that, after all,
before the war did the work of a scavenger it was nothing else but a vast
mining camp, with all its terrifying moods, its abject defects, and its
indifference with regard to morals and to means. The first men who began
to exploit the riches of that vast territory contrived in a relatively
easy way to build up their fortunes upon a solid basis, but many of their
followers, eager to walk in their steps, found difficulties upon which
they had not reckoned or even thought about. In order to put them aside
they used whatever means lay in their power, without hesitation as to
whether these answered to the principles of honesty and
straightforwardness. Their ruthless conduct was so far advantageous to
their future schemes that it inspired disgust among those whose ancestors
had sought a prosperity founded on hard work and conscientious toil. These
good folk retired from the field, leaving it free to the adventurers who
were to give such a bad name to England and who boasted loudly that they
had been given full powers to do what they liked in the way of conquering
a continent which, but for them, would have been only too glad to place
itself under English protection and English rule. To these people, and to
these alone, were due all the antagonisms which at last brought about the
Boer War.

It was with these people that Sir Alfred Milner found himself out of
harmony; from the first moment that he had set his foot on African soil
they tried to put difficulties in his way, after they had convinced
themselves that he would never consent to lend himself to their schemes.

Lord Milner has never belonged to the class of men who allow themselves to
be influenced either by wealth or by the social position of anyone. He is
perhaps one of the best judges of humanity it has been my fortune to meet,
and though by no means an unkind judge, yet a very fair one. Intrigue is
repulsive to him, and unless I am very much mistaken I venture to affirm
that, in the 'nineties, because of the intrigues in which they indulged,
he grew to loathe some of the men with whom he was thrown into contact.
Yet he could not help seeing that these reckless speculators controlled
public opinion in South Africa, and his political instinct compelled him
to avail himself of their help, as without them he would not have been
able to arrive at a proper understanding of the entanglements and
complications of South African politics.

Previous to Sir Alfred's appointment as Governor of the Cape of Good Hope
the office had been filled by men who, though of undoubted integrity and
high standing, were yet unable to gauge the volume of intrigue with which
they had to cope from those who had already established an iron--or,
rather, golden--rule in South Africa.

Coteries of men whose sole aim was the amassing of quick fortunes were
virtual rulers of Cape Colony, with more power than the Government to whom
they simulated submission. All sorts of weird stories were in circulation.
One popular belief was that the mutiny of the Dutch in Cape Colony just
before the Boer War was at bottom due to the influence of money. This was
followed by a feeling that, but for the aggressive operations of the
outpost agents of certain commercial magnates, it would have been possible
for England to realise the Union of South Africa by peaceful means instead
of the bloody arbitrament of war.

In the minds of many Dutchmen--and Dutchmen who were sincerely patriotic
Transvaalers--the conviction was strong that the natural capabilities of
Boers did not lie in the direction of developing, as they could be, the
amazing wealth-producing resources of the Transvaal and of the Orange Free
State. By British help alone, such men believed, could their country hope
to thrive as it ought.

Here, then, was the nucleus around which the peaceful union of Boer and
English peoples in South Africa could be achieved without bloodshed.
Indeed, had Queen Victoria been represented at the Cape by Sir Alfred
Milner ten years before he was appointed Governor there, many things which
had a disastrous influence on the Dutch elements in South Africa would not
have occurred. The Jameson Raid would certainly not have been planned and
attempted. To this incident can be ascribed much of the strife and
unpleasantness which followed, by which was lost to the British Government
the chance, then fast ripening, of bringing about without difficulty a
reconciliation of Dutch and English all over South Africa. This
reconciliation would have been achieved through Cecil Rhodes, and would
have been a fitting crown to a great career.

At one time the most popular man from the Zambesi to Table Mountain, the
name of Cecil Rhodes was surrounded by that magic of personal power
without which it is hardly possible for any conqueror to obtain the
material or moral successes that give him a place in history; that win for
him the love, the respect, and sometimes the hatred, of his
contemporaries. Sir Alfred Milner would have known how to make the work of
Cecil Rhodes of permanent value to the British Empire. It was a thousand
pities that when Sir Alfred Milner took office in South Africa the
influence of Cecil Rhodes, at one time politically dominant, had so
materially shrunk as a definitive political factor.

Sir Alfred Milner found himself in the presence of a position already
compromised beyond redemption, and obliged to fight against evils which
ought never to have been allowed to develop. Even at that time, however,
it would have been possible for Sir Alfred Milner to find a way of
disposing of the various difficulties connected with English rule in South
Africa had he been properly seconded by Mr. Rhodes. Unfortunately for both
of them, their antagonism to each other, in their conception of what ought
or ought not to be done in political matters, was further aggravated by
intrigues which tended to keep Rhodes apart from the Queen's High
Commissioner in South Africa.

It would not at all have suited certain people had Sir Alfred contrived to
acquire a definite influence over Mr. Rhodes, and assuredly this would
have happened had the two men have been allowed unhindered to appreciate
the mental standard of each other. Mr. Rhodes was at heart a sincere
patriot, and it was sufficient to make an appeal to his feelings of
attachment to his Mother Country to cause him to look at things from that
point of view. Had there existed any real intimacy between Groote Schuur
and Government House at Cape Town, the whole course of South African
politics might have been very different.

Sir Alfred Milner arrived in Cape Town with a singularly free and unbiased
mind, determined not to allow other people's opinions to influence his
own, and also to use all the means at his disposal to uphold the authority
of the Queen without entering into conflict with anyone. He had heard a
deal about the enmity of English and Dutch, but though he perfectly well
realised its cause he had made up his mind to examine the situation for
himself. He was not one of those who thought that the raid alone was
responsible; he knew very well that this lamentable affair had only fanned
into an open blaze years-long smoulderings of discontent. The Raid had
been a consequence, not an isolated spontaneous act. Little by little over
a long span of years the ambitious and sordid overridings of various
restless, and too often reckless, adventurers had come to be considered as
representative of English rule, English opinions and, what was still more
unfortunate, England's personality as an Empire and as a nation.

On the other side of the matter, the Dutch--who were inconceivably
ignorant--thought their little domain the pivot of the world. Blind to
realities, they had no idea of the legitimate relative comparison between
the Transvaal and the British Empire, and so grew arrogantly oppressive in
their attitude towards British settlers and the powers at Cape Town.

All this naturally tinctured native feeling. Suspicion was fostered among
the tribes, guns and ammunition percolated through Boer channels, the
blacks viewed with disdain the friendly advances made by the British, and
the atmosphere was thick with mutual distrust. The knowledge that this was
the situation could not but impress painfully a delicate and proud mind,
and surely Lord Milner can be forgiven for the illusion which he at one
time undoubtedly cherished that he would be able to dispel this false
notion about his Mother Country that pervaded South Africa.

The Governor had not the least animosity against the Dutch, and at first
the Boers had no feeling that Sir Alfred was prejudiced against them. Such
a thought was drilled into their minds by subtle and cunning people who,
for their own avaricious ends, desired to estrange the High Commissioner
from the Afrikanders. Sir Alfred was represented as a tyrannical,
unscrupulous man, whose one aim in life was the destruction of every
vestige of Dutch independence, Dutch self-government and Dutch influence
in Africa. Those who thus maligned him applied themselves to make him
unpopular and to render his task so very uncongenial and unpleasant for
him that he would at last give it up of his own accord, or else become the
object of such violent hatreds that the Home Government would feel
compelled to recall him. Thus they would be rid of the presence of a
personage possessed of a sufficient energy to oppose them, and they would
no longer need to fear his observant eyes. Sir Alfred Milner saw himself
surrounded by all sorts of difficulties, and every attempt he made to
bring forward his own plans for the settlement of the South African
question crumbled to the ground almost before he could begin to work at
it. Small wonder, therefore, if he felt discouraged and began to form a
false opinion concerning the persons or the facts with whom he had to
deal. Those who might have helped him were constrained, without it being
his fault. Mr. Rhodes became persuaded that the new Governor of Cape
Colony had arrived there with preconceived notions in regard to himself.
He was led to believe that Milner's firm determination was to crush him;
that, moreover, he was jealous of him and of the work he had done in South
Africa.

Incredible as it appears, Rhodes believed this absurd fiction, and learned
to look upon Sir Alfred Milner as a natural enemy, desirous of thwarting
him at every step. The Bloemfontein Conference, at which the brilliant
qualities and the conciliating spirit of the new Governor of Cape Colony
were first made clearly manifest, was represented to Rhodes as a desire to
present him before the eyes of the Dutch as a negligible quantity in South
Africa. Rhodes was strangely susceptible and far too mindful of the
opinions of people of absolutely no importance. He fell into the snare,
and though he was careful to hide from the public his real feelings in
regard to Sir Alfred Milner, yet it was impossible for anyone who knew him
well not to perceive at once that he had made up his mind not to help the
High Commissioner. There is such a thing as damning praise, and Rhodes
poured a good deal of it on the head of Sir Alfred.

Fortunately, Sir Alfred was sufficiently conscious of the rectitude of his
intentions and far too superior to feelings of petty spite. He never
allowed himself to be troubled by these unpleasantnesses, but went on his
way without giving his enemies the pleasure of noticing the measure of
success which, unhappily, attended their campaign. He remained inflexible
in his conduct, and, disdaining any justification, went on doing what he
thought was right, and which was right, as events proved subsequently.
Although Milner had at last to give up, yet it is very largely due to him
that the South African Union was ultimately constituted, and that the
much-talked-of reconciliation of the Dutch and English in Cape Colony and
in the Transvaal became an accomplished fact. Had Sir Alfred been listened
to from the very beginning it might have taken place sooner, and perhaps
the Boer War altogether avoided.

It is a curious thing that England's colonising powers, which are so
remarkable, took such a long time to work their way in South Africa. At
least it would have been a curious thing if one did not remember that
among the first white men who arrived there Englishmen were much in the
minority. And of those Englishmen who were attracted by the enormous
mineral wealth which the country contained, a good proportion were not of
the best class of English colonists. Many a one who landed in Table Bay
was an adventurer, drawn thither by the wish to make or retrieve his
fortune. Few came, as did Rhodes, in search of health, and few, again,
were drawn thither by the pure love of adventure. In Australia, or in New
Zealand or other colonies, people arrived with the determination to begin
a new life and to create for themselves new ties, new occupations, new
duties, so as to leave to their children after them the result of their
labours. In South Africa it was seldom that emigrants were animated by the
desire to make their home in the solitudes of the vast and unexplored
veldt. Those who got rich there, though they may have built for themselves
splendid houses while they dwelt in the land, never looked upon South
Africa as home, but aspired to spend their quickly gained millions in
London and to forget all about Table Mountain or the shafts and factories
of Johannesburg and Kimberley.

To such men as these England was a pretext but never a symbol. Their
strange conception of patriotism jarred the most unpleasantly on the
straightforward nature of Sir Alfred Milner, who had very quickly
discerned the egotism that lay concealed beneath its cloak. He understood
what patriotism meant, what love for one's own country signified. He had
arrived in South Africa determined to spare neither his person nor his
strength in her service, and the man who was repeatedly accused both by
the Dutch and by the English party in the Colony of labouring under a
misconception of its real political situation was the one who had from the
very first appreciated it as it deserved, and had recognised its damning
as well as its redeeming points.

Sir Alfred meant South Africa to become a member of the British Empire, to
participate in its greatness, and to enjoy the benefits of its protection.
He had absolutely no idea of exasperating the feelings of the Dutch part
of its population. He had the best intentions in regard to President
Kruger himself, and there was one moment, just at the time of the
Bloemfontein Conference, when a _modus vivendi_ between President Kruger
and the Court of St. James's might have been established, notwithstanding
the difficult question of the Uitlanders. It was frustrated by none other
than these very Uitlanders, who, fondly believing that a war with England
would establish them as absolute masters in the Gold Fields, brought it
about, little realising that thereby was to be accomplished the one thing
which they dreaded--the firm, just and far-seeing rule of England over all
South Africa.

In a certain sense the Boer War was fought just as much against financiers
as against President Kruger. It put an end to the arrogance of both.




CHAPTER II.

THE FOUNDATIONS OF FORTUNE


It is impossible to speak of South Africa without awarding to Cecil Rhodes
the tribute which unquestionably is due to his strong personality. Without
him it is possible that the vast territory which became so thoroughly
associated with his name and with his life would still be without
political importance. Without him it is probable that both the Diamond
Fields to which Kimberley owes its prosperity and the Gold Fields which
have won for the Transvaal its renown would never have risen above the
importance of those of Brazil or California or Klondyke.

It was Rhodes who first conceived the thought of turning all these riches
into a political instrument and of using it to the advantage of his
country--the England to which he remained so profoundly attached amid all
the vicissitudes of his life, and to whose possessions he was so eager to
add.

Cecil Rhodes was ambitious in a grand, strange manner which made a
complete abstraction of his own personality under certain conditions, but
which in other circumstances made him violent, brutal in manner, thereby
procuring enemies without number and detractors without end. His nature
was something akin to that of the Roman Emperors in its insensate desire
to exercise unchallenged an unlimited power. Impatient of restraint, no
matter in what shape it presented itself, he brooked no resistance to his
schemes; his rage against contradiction, and his opposition to any
independence of thought or action on the part of those who were around
him, brought about a result of which he would have been the first to
complain, had he suspected it--that of allowing him to execute all his
fancies and of giving way to all his resentments. Herein lies the reason
why so many of his schemes fell through. This unfortunate trait also
thrust him very often into the hands of those who were clever enough to
exploit it, and who, more often than proved good to Rhodes' renown,
suggested to him their own schemes and encouraged him to appropriate them
as his own. He had a very quick way of catching hold of any suggestions
that tallied with his sympathies or echoed any of his secret thoughts or
aspirations.

Yet withal Rhodes was a great soul, and had he only been left to himself,
or made longer sojourns in England, had he understood English political
life more clearly, had he had to grapple with the difficulties which
confront public existence in his Mother Country, he would most certainly
have done far greater things. He found matters far too easy for him at
first, and the obstacles which he encountered very often proved either of
a trivial or else of a removable nature--by fair means or methods less
commendable. A mining camp is not a school of morality, and just as
diamonds lose of their value in the estimation of those who continually
handle them, as is the case in Kimberley, so integrity and honour come to
be looked upon from a peculiar point of view according to the code of the
majority.

Then again, it must not be forgotten that the first opponents of Cecil
Rhodes were black men, of whom the European always has the conception that
they are not his equals. It is likely that if, instead of Lobengula, he
had found before him a European chief or monarch, Rhodes would have acted
differently than history credits him to have done toward the dusky
sovereign. It is impossible to judge of facts of which one has had no
occasion to watch the developments, or which have taken place in lands
where one has never been. Neither Fernando Cortez in Mexico nor Pizzaro
Gonzalo in Peru proved themselves merciful toward the populations whose
territory they conquered. The tragedy which sealed the fate of
Matabeleland was neither a darker nor a more terrible one than those of
which history speaks when relating to us the circumstances attending the
discovery of America. Such events must be judged objectively and forgiven
accordingly. When forming an opinion on the doings and achievements of
Cecil Rhodes one must make allowance for all the temptations which were
thrown in his way and remember that he was a man who, if ambitious, was
not so in a personal sense, but in a large, lofty manner, and who, whilst
appropriating to himself the good things which he thought he could grasp,
was also eager to make others share the profit of his success.

Cecil Rhodes, in all save name, was monarch over a continent almost as
vast as his own fancy and imagination. He was always dreaming, always lost
in thoughts which were wandering far beyond his actual surroundings,
carrying him into regions where the common spirit of mankind seldom
travelled. He was born for far better things than those which he
ultimately attained, but he did not belong to the century in which he
lived; his ruthless passions of anger and arrogance were more fitted for
an earlier and cruder era. Had he possessed any disinterested friends
capable of rousing the better qualities that slumbered beneath his
apparent cynicism and unscrupulousness, most undoubtedly he would have
become the most remarkable individual in his generation. Unfortunately, he
found himself surrounded by creatures absolutely inferior to himself,
whose deficiencies he was the first to notice, whom he despised either for
their insignificance or for their mental and moral failings, but to whose
influence he nevertheless succumbed.

When Cecil Rhodes arrived at Kimberley he was a mere youth. He had come to
South Africa in quest of health and because he had a brother already
settled there, Herbert Rhodes, who was later on to meet with a terrible
fate. Cecil, if one is to believe what one hears from those who knew him
at the time, was a shy youth, of a retiring disposition, whom no one could
ever have suspected would develop into the hardy, strong man he became in
time. He was constantly sick, and more than once was on the point of
falling a victim of the dreaded fever which prevails all over South Africa
and then was far more virulent in its nature than it is to-day. Kimberley
at that time was still a vast solitude, with here and there a few
scattered huts of corrugated iron occupied by the handful of colonists.
Water was rare: it is related, indeed, that the only way to get a wash was
to use soda water.

The beginning of Rhodes' fortune, if we are to believe what we are told,
was an ice machine which he started in partnership with another settler.
The produce they sold to their companions at an exorbitant price, but not
for long; whereafter the enterprising young man proceeded to buy some
plots of ground, of whose prolificacy in diamonds he had good reason to be
aware. It must be here remarked that Rhodes was never a poor man; he could
indulge in experiments as to his manner of investing his capital. And he
was not slow to take advantage of this circumstance. Kimberley was a wild
place at that time, and its distance from the civilised world, as well as
the fact that nothing was controlled by public opinion, helped some to
amass vast fortunes and put the weaker into the absolute power of the most
unscrupulous. It is to the honour of Rhodes that, however he might have
been tempted, he never listened to the advice which was given to him to do
what the others did, and to despoil the men whose property he might have
desired to acquire. He never gave way to the excesses of his daily
companions, nor accepted their methods of enriching themselves at top
speed so as soon to be able to return home with their gains.

From the first moment that he set foot on African soil Rhodes succumbed to
the strange charm the country offers for thinkers and dreamers. His
naturally languid temperament found a source of untold satisfaction in
watching the Southern Cross rise over the vast veldt where scarcely man's
foot had trod, where the immensity of its space was equalled by its
sublime, quiet grandeur. He liked to spend the night in the open air,
gazing at the innumerable stars and listening to the voice of the desert,
so full of attractions for those who have grown to discern somewhat of
Nature's hidden joys and sorrows. South Africa became for him a second
Motherland, and one which seemed to him to be more hospitable to his
temperament than the land of his birth. In South Africa he felt he could
find more satisfaction and more enjoyment than in England, whose
conventionalities did not appeal to his rebellious, unsophisticated heart.
He liked to roam about in an old coat and wideawake hat; to forget that
civilisation existed; to banish from his mind all memory of cities where
man must bow down to Mrs. Grundy and may not defy, unscathed, certain
well-defined prejudices.

Yet Cecil Rhodes neither cared for convention nor custom. His motto was to
do what he liked and not to trouble about the judgments of the crowd. He
never, however, lived up to this last part of his profession because, as I
have shown already, he was keenly sensitive to praise and to blame, and
hurt to the heart whenever he thought himself misjudged or condemned. Most
of his mistakes proceeded from this over-sensitiveness which, in a certain
sense, hardened him, inasmuch as it made him vindictive against those from
whom he did not get the approval for which he yearned. In common with many
another, too, Cecil Rhodes had that turn of mind which harbours resentment
against anyone who has scored a point against its possessor. After the
Jameson Raid Rhodes never forgave Mr. Schreiner for having found out his
deceit, and tried to be revenged.

Cecil Rhodes had little sympathy with other people's woes unless these
found an echo in his own, and the callousness which he so often displayed
was not entirely the affectation it was thought by his friends or even by
his enemies. Great in so many things, there were circumstances when he
could show himself unutterably small, and he seldom practised consistency.
Frank by nature, he was an adept at dissimulation when he thought that his
personal interest required it. But he could "face the music," however
discordant, and, unfortunately for him as well as for his memory, it was
often so.

The means by which Cecil Rhodes contrived to acquire so unique a position
in South Africa would require volumes to relate. Wealth alone could not
have done so, nor could it have assured for him the popularity which he
gained, not only among the European colonists, but also among the coloured
people, notwithstanding the ruthlessness which he displayed in regard to
them. There were millionaires far richer than himself in Kimberley and in
Johannesburg. Alfred Beit, to mention only one, could dispose of a much
larger capital than Rhodes ever possessed, but this did not give him an
influence that could be compared with that of his friend, and not even the
Life Governorship of De Beers procured for him any other fame than that of
being a fabulously rich man. Barney Barnato and Joel were also familiar
figures in the circle of wealthy speculators who lived under the shade of
Table Mountain; but none among these men, some of whom were also
remarkable in their way, could effect a tenth or even a millionth part of
what Rhodes succeeded in performing. His was the moving spirit, without
whom these men could never have conceived, far less done, all that they
did. It was the magic of Rhodes' name which created that formidable
organisation called the De Beers Company; which annexed to the British
Empire the vast territory known now by the name of Rhodesia; and which
attracted to the gold fields of Johannesburg all those whom they were to
enrich or to ruin. Without the association and glamour of Rhodes' name,
too, this area could never have acquired the political importance it
possessed in the few years which preceded, and covered, the Boer War.
Rhodes' was the mind which, after bringing about the famous Amalgamation
of the diamond mines around Kimberley, then conceived the idea of turning
a private company into a political instrument of a power which would
control public opinion and public life all over South Africa more
effectually even than the Government. This organisation had its own agents
and spies and kept up a wide system of secret service. Under the pretext
of looking out for diamond thieves, these emissaries in reality made it
their duty to report on the private opinions and doings of those whose
personality inspired distrust or apprehension.

This organisation was more a dictatorship than anything else, and had
about it something at once genial and Mephistophelian. The conquest of
Rhodesia was nothing in comparison with the power attained by this
combine, which arrogated to itself almost unchallenged the right to
domineer over every white man and to subdue every coloured one in the
whole of the vast South African Continent. Rhodesia, indeed, was only
rendered possible through the power wielded in Cape Colony to bring the
great Northward adventure to a successfully definite issue.

In referring to Rhodesia, I am reminded of a curious fact which, so far as
I am aware, has never been mentioned in any of the biographies of Mr.
Rhodes, but which, on the contrary, has been carefully concealed from the
public knowledge by his admirers and his satellites. The concession
awarded by King Lobengula to Rhodes and to the few men who together with
him took it upon themselves to add this piece of territory to the British
Empire had, in reality, already been given by the dusky monarch--long
before the ambitions of De Beers had taken that direction--to a Mr.
Sonnenberg, a German Jew who had very quickly amassed a considerable
fortune in various speculations. This Mr. Sonnenberg--who was subsequently
to represent the Dutch party in the Cape Parliament, and who became one of
the foremost members of the Afrikander Bond--during one of his journeys
into the interior of the country from Basutoland, where he resided for
some time, had taken the opportunity of a visit to Matabeleland to obtain
a concession from the famous Lobengula. This covered the same ground and
advantages which, later, were granted to Mr. Rhodes and his business
associates.

Owing in some measure to negligence and partly through the impossibility
of raising the enormous capital necessary to make anything profitable out
of the concession, Mr. Sonnenberg had put the document into his drawer
without troubling any more about it. Subsequently, when Matabeleland came
into possession of the Chartered Company, Mr. Sonnenberg ventured to speak
mildly of his own concession, and the matter was mentioned to Mr. Rhodes.
The latter's reply was typical: "Tell the ---- fool that if he was fool
enough to lose this chance of making money he ought to take the
consequences of it." And Mr. Sonnenberg had to content himself with this
reply. Being a wise man in his generation he was clever enough to ignore
the incident, and, realising the principle that might is stronger than
right, he never again attempted to dispute the title of Cecil John Rhodes
to the conquest which he had made, and, as I believe, pushed prudence to
the extent of consigning his own concession to the flames. He knew but too
well what his future prosperity would have been worth had he remembered
the document.




CHAPTER III.

A COMPLEX PERSONALITY


Rhodesia and its annexation was but the development of a vast scheme of
conquest that had its start in the wonderful brain of the individual who
by that time had become to be spoken of as the greatest man South Africa
had ever known. Long before this Cecil Rhodes had entered political life
as member of the Cape Parliament. He stood for the province of Barkly
West, and his election, which was violently contested, made him master of
this constituency for the whole of his political career. The entry into
politics gave a decided aim to his ambitions and inspired him to a new
activity, directing his wonderful organising faculties toward other than
financial victories and instilling within him the desire to make for
himself a name not solely associated with speculation, but one which would
rank with those great Englishmen who had carried far and wide British
renown and spread the fame of their Mother Country across the seas.

Rhodes' ambitions were not as unselfish as those of Clive, to mention only
that one name. He thought far more of himself than of his native land in
the hours when he meditated on all the advantages which he might obtain
from a political career. He saw the way to become at last absolutely free
to give shape to his dreams of conquest, and to hold under his sway the
vast continent which he had insensibly come to consider as his private
property. And by this I do not mean Rhodesia only--which he always spoke
of as "My country"--but he also referred to Cape Colony in the same way.
With one distinction, however, which was remarkable: he called it "My old
country," thus expressing his conviction that the new one possessed all
his affections. It is probable that, had time and opportunity been granted
him to bring into execution his further plans, thereby to establish
himself at Johannesburg and at Pretoria as firmly as he had done at
Kimberley and Buluwayo, the latter townships would have come to occupy the
same secondary importance in his thoughts as that which Cape Colony had
assumed. Mr. Rhodes may have had a penchant for old clothes, but he
certainly preferred new countries to ones already explored. To give Rhodes
his due, he was not the money-grubbing man one would think, judging by his
companions. He was constantly planning, constantly dreaming of wider areas
to conquer and to civilise. The possession of gold was for him a means,
not an aim; he appreciated riches for the power they produced to do
absolutely all that he wished, but not for the boast of having so many
millions standing to his account at a bank. He meant to become a king in
his way, and a king he unquestionably was for a time at least, until his
own hand shattered his throne.

His first tenure of the Cape Premiership was most successful, and even
during the second term his popularity went on growing until the fatal
Jameson Raid--an act of folly which nothing can explain, nothing can
excuse. Until it broke his political career, transforming him from the
respected statesman whom every party in South Africa looked up to into a
kind of broken idol never more to be trusted, Rhodes had enjoyed the
complete confidence of the Dutch party. They fully believed he was the
only man capable of effecting the Union which at that time was already
considered to be indispensable to the prosperity of South Africa. Often he
had stood up for their rights as the oldest settlers and inhabitants of
the country. Even in the Transvaal, notwithstanding the authority wielded
then by President Kruger, the populace would gladly have taken advantage
of his services and of his experience to help them settle favourably their
everlasting quarrels with the Uitlanders, as the English colonists were
called.

Had Cecil Rhodes but had the patience to wait, and had he cared to enter
into the details of a situation, the intricacies of which none knew better
than he, it is probable that the annexation of the Transvaal to the
British Empire would have taken place as a matter of course and the Boer
War would never have broken out. Rhodes was not only popular among the
Dutch, but also enjoyed their confidence, and it is no secret that he had
courted them to the extent of exciting the suspicions of the ultra-English
party, the Jingo elements of which had openly accused him of plotting with
the Dutch against the authority of Queen Victoria and of wishing to get
himself elected Life President of a Republic composed of the various South
African States, included in which would be Cape Colony, and perhaps even
Natal, in spite of the preponderance of the English element there.

That Rhodes might have achieved such a success is scarcely to be doubted,
and personally I feel sure that there had been moments in his life when
the idea of it had seriously occurred to him. At least I was led to think
so in the course of a conversation which we had together on this subject a
few weeks before the Boer War broke out. At that moment Rhodes knew that
war was imminent, but it would be wrong to interpret that knowledge in the
sense that he had ever thought of or planned rebellion against the Queen.
Those who accused him of harbouring the idea either did not know him or
else wished to harm him. Rhodes was essentially an Englishman, and set his
own country above everything else in the world. Emphatically this is so;
but it is equally true that his strange conceptions of morality in matters
where politics came into question made him totally oblivious of the fact
that he thought far more of his own self than of his native land in the
plans which he conceived and formulated for the supremacy of England in
South Africa. He was absolutely convinced that his election as Life
President of a South African Republic would not be in any way detrimental
to the interests of Great Britain; on the contrary, he assured himself it
would make the latter far more powerful than it had ever been before in
the land over which he would reign. By nature something of an Italian
_condottieri_, he considered his native land as a stepping-stone to his
own grandeur.

For a good many years he had chosen his best friends among Dutchmen of
influence in the Cape Colony and in the Transvaal. He flattered, courted
and praised them until he quite persuaded them that nowhere else would
they find such a staunch supporter of their rights and of their claims.
Men like Mr. Schreiner,[A] for instance, trusted him absolutely, and
believed quite sincerely that in time he would be able to establish firm
and friendly relations between the Cape Government and that of the
Transvaal. Though the latter country had been, as it were, sequestrated by
friends of Rhodes--much to their own profit--Mr. Schreiner felt convinced
that the Colossus had never encouraged any plans which these people might
have made against the independence of the Transvaal Republic. Rhodes had
so completely fascinated him that even on the eve of the day when Jameson
crossed the Border, Mr. Schreiner, when questioned by one of his friends
about the rumours which had reached Cape Town concerning a projected
invasion of the Transvaal by people connected with the Chartered Company,
repudiated them with energy. Mr. Schreiner, indeed, declared that so long
as Mr. Rhodes was Prime Minister nothing of the kind could or would
happen, as neither Jameson nor any of his lieutenants would dare to risk
such an adventure without the sanction of their Chief, and that it was
more to the latter's interest than to that of anyone else to preserve the
independence of the Transvaal Republic.

    [A] Now High Commissioner for the Union of South Africa.

[Illustration: THE RT. HON. W.G. SCHREINER.]

Talking of Mr. Schreiner reminds me of his sister, the famous Olive
Schreiner, the author of so many books which most certainly will long rank
among the English classics. Olive Schreiner was once upon terms of great
friendship with Mr. Rhodes, who extremely admired her great talents. She
was an ardent Afrikander patriot, Dutch by sympathy and origin, gifted
with singular intelligence and possessed of wide views, which strongly
appealed to the soul and to the spirit of the man who at that time was
considered as the greatest figure in South Africa.

It is not remarkable, therefore, that Rhodes should fall into the habit
of confiding in Miss Schreiner, whom he found was "miles above" the
people about him. He used to hold long conversations with her and to
initiate her into many of his plans for the future, plans in which the
interests and the welfare of the Cape Dutch, as well as the Transvaalers,
used always to play the principal part. His friendship with her, however,
was viewed with great displeasure by many who held watch around him.
Circumstances--intentionally brought about, some maintain--conspired to
cause a cooling of the friendship between the two most remarkable
personalities in South Africa. Later on, Miss Schreiner, who was an ardent
patriot, having discovered what she termed and considered to be the
duplicity of the man in whom she had so absolutely trusted, refused to
meet Cecil Rhodes again. Her famous book, "Trooper Peter Halkett of
Mashonaland," was the culminating point in their quarrel, and the break
became complete.

This, however, was but an incident in a life in which the feminine element
never had any great influence, perhaps because it was always kept in check
by people anxious and eager not to allow it to occupy a place in the
thoughts or in the existence of a man whom they had confiscated as their
own property. There are people who, having risen from nothing to the
heights of a social position, are able to shake off former associations:
this was not the case with Rhodes, who, on the contrary, as he advanced in
power and in influence, found himself every day more embarrassed by the
men who had clung to him when he was a diamond digger, and who, through
his financial acumen, had built up their fortunes. They surrounded him day
and night, eliminating every person likely to interfere; slandering,
ridiculing and calumniating them in turns, they at last left him nothing
in place of his shattered faiths and lost ideals, until Rhodes became as
isolated amidst his greatness and his millions as the veriest beggar in
his hovel.

It was a sad sight to watch the ethical degradation of one of the most
remarkable intelligences among the men of his generation; it was
heartrending to see him fall every day more and more into the power of
unscrupulous people who did nothing else but exploit him for their own
benefit. South Africa has always been the land of adventurers, and many a
queer story could be told. That of Cecil John Rhodes was, perhaps, the
most wonderful and the most tragic.

Whether he realised this retrogression himself it is difficult to say.
Sometimes one felt that such might be the case, whilst at others it seemed
as if he viewed his own fate only as something absolutely wonderful and
bound to develop in the future even more prosperously than it had done in
the past. There was always about him something of the "tragediante,
comediante" applied to Napoleon by Pope Pius VII., and it is absolutely
certain that he often feigned sentiments which he did not feel, anger
which he did not experience, and pleasure that he did not have. He was a
being of fits and starts, moods and fancies, who liked to pose in such a
way as to give others an absolutely false idea of his personality when he
considered it useful to his interests to do so. At times it was evident he
experienced regret, but it is doubtful whether he knew the meaning of
remorse. The natives seldom occupied his thoughts, and if he were reminded
in later years that, after all, terrible cruelties had been practised in
Mashonaland or in Matabeleland, he used simply to shrug his shoulders and
to remark that it was impossible to make an omelette without breaking some
eggs. It never occurred to him that there might exist people who objected
to the breaking of a certain kind of eggs, and that humanity had a right
to be considered even in conquest.

And, after all, was this annexation of the dominions of poor Lobengula a
conquest? If one takes into account the strength of the people who
attacked the savage king, and his own weakness, can one do else but regret
that those who slaughtered Lobengula did not remember the rights of mercy
in regard to a fallen foe? There are dark deeds connected with the
attachment of Rhodesia to the British Empire, deeds which would never have
been performed by a regular English Army, but which seemed quite natural
to the band of enterprising fellows who had staked their fortunes on an
expedition which it was their interest to represent as a most dangerous
and difficult affair. I do not want to disparage them or their courage,
but I cannot help questioning whether they ever had to withstand any
serious attack of the enemy. I have been told perfectly sickening details
concerning this conquest of the territory now known by the name of
Rhodesia. The cruel manner in which, after having wrung from them a
concession which virtually despoiled them of every right over their native
land and after having goaded these people into exasperation, the people
themselves were exterminated was terrible beyond words. For instance,
there occurred the incident mentioned by Olive Schreiner in "Trooper Peter
Halkett of Mashonaland," when over one hundred savages were suffocated
alive in a cave where they sought a refuge.

Personally, I remain persuaded that these abominable deeds remained
unknown to Mr. Rhodes and that he would not have tolerated them for one
single instant. They were performed by people who were in possession of
Rhodes' confidence, and who abused it by allowing the world to think that
he encouraged such deeds. Later on it is likely that he became aware of
the abuse that had been made of his name and of the manner in which it had
been put forward as an excuse for inexcusable deeds, but he was far too
indolent and far too indifferent to the blame of the world, at these
particular moments to disavow those who, after all, had helped him in his
schemes of expansion, and who had ministered to his longing to have a
kingdom to himself. Apart from this, he had a curious desire to brave
public opinion and to do precisely the very things that it would have
disapproved. He loved to humiliate those whom he had at one moment thought
he might have occasion to fear. This explains the callousness with which
he made the son of Lobengula one of his gardeners, and did not hesitate to
ask him one day before strangers who were visiting Groote Schuur in what
year he "had killed his father." The incident is absolutely true; it
occurred in my own presence.

At times, such as that related in the paragraph above, Rhodes appeared a
perfectly detestable and hateful creature, and yet he was never sincere
whilst in such moods. A few moments later he would show himself under
absolutely different colours and give proof of a compassionate heart.
Generous to a fault, he liked to be able to oblige his friends, or those
who passed as such, while the charitable acts which he was constantly
performing are too numerous to be remembered. He had a supreme contempt
for money, but he spoiled the best sides of his strange, eccentric
character by enjoying a display of its worst facets with a "cussedness" as
amusing as it was sometimes unpleasant. Is it remarkable, then, that many
people who only saw him in the disagreeable moods should judge him from an
entirely false and misleading point of view?

Rhodes was a man for whom it was impossible to feel indifference; one
either hated him or became fascinated by his curious and peculiar charm.
This quality led many admirers to remain faithful to him even after
disillusion had shattered their former friendship, and who, whilst
refusing to speak to him any more, yet retained for him a deep affection
which not even the conviction that it had been misplaced could alter. This
is a remarkable and indisputable fact. After having rallied around him all
that was honest in South Africa; after having been the petted child of all
the old and influential ladies in Cape Town; after having been accepted as
their leader by men like Mr. Schreiner and Mr. Hofmeyr, who, clever though
they were, and convinced, as they must have been, of their personal
influence on the Dutch party and the members of the Afrikander Bond, still
preferred to subordinate their judgment to Rhodes'; after having enjoyed
such unparalleled confidence, Rhodes had come to be spurned and rejected
politically, but had always kept his place in their hearts. Fate and his
own faults separated him from these people of real weight and influence,
and left him in the hands of those who pretended that they were attached
to him, but who, in reality, cared only for the material advantages that
their constant attendance upon him procured to them. They poisoned his
mind, they separated him from all those who might have been useful to him,
and they profited by the circumstance that the Raid had estranged him from
his former friends to strengthen their own influence upon him, and to
persuade him that those who had deplored the rash act were personal
enemies, wishful for his downfall and disgrace.




CHAPTER IV.

MRS. VAN KOOPMAN


Among those with whom Rhodes had been intimate from almost the first days
of his establishment in Cape Town and his entrance into political life was
a lady who, for something like half a century, had been enjoying an
enviable position throughout almost the whole of South Africa. Mrs. van
Koopman was a Dutchwoman of considerable means and of high character. She
was clever, well read, and her quick intelligence allowed her to hold her
own in discussion upon any subject against the most eminent men of her
generation. She had never made a secret of her Dutch sympathies, nor of
her desire to see her countrymen given equal rights with the English all
over South Africa. She was on excellent terms with President Kruger, and
with President Steyn, whose personality was a far more remarkable one than
that of his old and crafty colleague.

The leading South African political men used to meet at Mrs. van Koopman's
to discuss the current events of the day. It is related that she was one
of the first to bring to the notice of her friends the complications that
were bound to follow upon the discovery of the gold fields, and to implore
them to define, without delay, the position of the foreign element which
was certain to move toward Johannesburg as soon as the news of the riches
contained in that region became public property.

If the English Government had considered the matter at once the
complications which arose as soon as companies began to be formed would
have been less acute. The directors of these concerns imagined themselves
to be entitled to displace local government, and took all executive power
into their own hands. This would never have happened if firm governmental
action had been promptly taken. The example of Kimberley ought to have
opened the eyes of the Mother Country, and measures should have been taken
to prevent the purely commercial domain of the gold fields from assuming
such strident political activities, and little by little dominating not
only the Transvaal Republic, but also the rest of South Africa.

Mrs. van Koopman had cherished a great affection for Rhodes. Her age--she
was in the sixties--gave an almost maternal character to the tenderness
with which she viewed him. He had made her his confidante, telling her all
that he meant to do for the welfare of the land which she loved so dearly.
She thought he looked upon South Africa with the same feelings of
admiration as she did.

The strength of her belief led Mrs. van Koopman to interest all her
friends in the career of the young Englishman, who appealed to her
imagination as the embodiment of all that was great and good. Her
enthusiasm endowed him with many qualities that he did not possess, and
magnified those which he really had. When he consulted her as to his
future plans she entered closely into their details, discussed with him
their chances of success, advised him and used all her influence, which
was great, in winning him friends and adherents. She trusted him fully,
and, on his part, whenever he returned to Cape Town after one of his
yearly visits to Kimberley, or after a few months spent in the solitudes
of Rhodesia, his first visit was always to the old and gentle lady, who
welcomed him with open arms, words of affection, and sincere as well as
devoted sympathy. She had always refused to listen to disparagement of her
favourite, and would never allow any of the gruesome details connected
with the annexation of Rhodesia to be recited in her presence.

In Mrs. van Koopman's eyes there was only a glorious side to the Rhodesian
expedition, and she rejoiced in the renown which it was destined to bring
to the man who had conceived and planned it. She fully believed that
Rhodes meant to bring English civilisation, English laws, the English
sense of independence and respect for individual freedom into that distant
land. The fact that lucre lay at the bottom of the expedition never
crossed her mind; even if it had she would have rejected the thought with
scorn and contempt.

Although the attacks upon Cecil Rhodes increased day by day in intensity
and in bitterness, Mrs. van Koopman never wavered in her allegiance. She
attributed them to jealousy and envy, and strenuously defended his name.
Mrs. van Koopman, too, rejoiced at any new success of Rhodes as if it had
been her own. She was the first to congratulate him when the dignity of a
Privy Councillor was awarded to him. After the Matabele Rebellion, during
which occurred one of the most famous episodes in the life of Rhodes, Mrs.
van Koopman had been loud in her praises of the man whom she had been the
first to guess would do great things.

The episode to which I refer, when he alone had had the courage to go
unattended and unarmed to meet the savage chiefs assembled in the Matoppo
Hills, had, by the way, done more than anything else to consolidate the
position of the chairman of De Beers in South Africa.

During the first administration of Cape Colony by Mr. Rhodes, when his
accession to the premiership had been viewed with a certain suspicion by
the Dutch party, Mrs. van Koopman made tremendous efforts to induce them
to have full confidence in her protégé. And the attempt succeeded, because
even the shrewd Mr. Hofmeyr had at last succumbed to the constant
entreaties which she had poured upon him. Thenceforward Mr. Hofmeyr became
one of Mr. Rhodes' firm admirers and strong partisans. Under the able
guidance of Mrs. van Koopman the relations between the Dutch party and
their future enemy became so cordial that at last a singular construction
was put upon both sides of the alliance by the opponents of both. The
accusation, already referred to, was made against Rhodes that he wished to
make for himself in South Africa a position of such independence and
strength that even the authority of the Queen might find itself
compromised by it. As has been pointed out, the supposition was devoid of
truth, but it is quite certain that the then Premier of Cape Colony would
not have objected had the suzerainty been placed in his hands by England
and British rule in South Africa vested solely in his person.

During a brief interval in his political leadership Rhodes pursued his
work in Rhodesia. In those days the famous British South Africa Company,
which was to become known as the Chartered Company, was definitely
constituted, and began its activity in the new territories which had come
under its control. Ere long, though, the tide of events brought him again
to the head of the Government. This time, however, though his appointment
had been considered as a foregone conclusion, and though very few had
opposed it, he no longer met the same sympathetic attention and
co-operation which had characterised his first administration of public
affairs. The Colony had begun to realise that Mr. Rhodes alone, and left
free to do what he liked, or what he believed was right, was very
different from Mr. Rhodes under the influence of the many so-called
financiers and would-be politicians who surrounded him.

An atmosphere of favouritism and of flattery had changed Rhodes, whom one
would have thought far above such small things. Vague rumours, too, had
begun to circulate concerning certain designs of the Chartered Company
(one did not dare yet mention the name of its chief and chairman) on the
Transvaal. Rhodes was directly questioned upon the subject by several of
his friends, amongst others by Mr. Schreiner, to whom he energetically
denied that such a thing had ever been planned. He added that Doctor
Jameson, of whom the man in the street was already speaking as the man who
was planning an aggression against the authority of President Kruger, was
not even near the frontier of the neighbouring Republic. The mere idea of
such a thing, Rhodes emphatically declared to Mr. Schreiner, was nothing
but an ill-natured hallucination to create bad blood between the English
and the Dutch. His tone seemed so sincere that Mr. Schreiner allowed
himself to be convinced, and voluntarily assured his colleagues that he
was convinced of the sincerity of the Prime Minister.

The only person who was really alarmed at the persistent rumours which
circulated in Cape Town in regard to a possible attack in common accord
with the leaders of the Reform movement in Johannesburg against the
independence of the Transvaal Republic was Mrs. van Koopman. She knew
Rhodes' character too well not to fear that he might have been induced to
listen to the misguided advice of people trying to persuade him that the
Rhodesian adventure was susceptible of being repeated on a larger and far
more important scale, with as much impunity and as little danger as the
other one had been. Alarmed beyond words by all that she was hearing, she
determined to find out for herself the true state of things, and, trusting
to her knowledge of Rhodes' character, she asked him to call upon her.

Rhodes came a few afternoons later, and Mrs. van Koopman closely
questioned him on the subject, telling him of the tales which were being
circulated not only in Cape Town, but also at Kimberley and Buluwayo and
Johannesburg. Rhodes solemnly assured her that they were nothing but
malicious gossip, and, taking her hands in his own, he repeated that all
she had heard concerning the sinister designs he was supposed to be
harbouring against the independence of the Transvaal had absolutely no
foundation. To add force to his words, he continued that he respected her
far too much to deceive her willingly, and that he would never have risked
meeting her and talking with her upon such a subject had there been the
slightest ground for the rumours which were disturbing the tranquillity of
the inhabitants of Cape Town. When he left her Mrs. van Koopman felt quite
reassured.

Next morning Mrs. van Koopman told her anxious friends that she had
received such assurances from Rhodes that she could not disbelieve him,
and that the best thing which they could do would be to contradict all
statements on the subject of a raid on the Transvaal that might come to
their ears. This occurred on an after-Christmas evening of the year 1895.

When the decisive conversation which I have just related was taking place
between Mrs. van Koopman and Cecil Rhodes, Doctor Jameson and his handful
of eager adventurers had already entered Transvaal territory. The Raid had
become an accomplished fact. It was soon realised that it was the most
deplorable affair that could have occurred for the reputation of Cecil
Rhodes and for his political future. The rebound, indeed, was immediate;
his political career came to an end that day.

The person who was struck most painfully by this disgraceful and cryingly
stupid adventure was Mrs. van Koopman. All her illusions--and she had
nursed many concerning Rhodes--were destroyed at one blow. She never
forgave him. All his attempts to bring about a reconciliation failed, and
when later on he would fain have obtained her forgiveness, she absolutely
refused all advances, and declared that she would never consent willingly
to look upon his face or listen to his voice again. The proud old woman,
whose ideals had been wrecked so cruelly, could not but feel a profound
contempt for a man who had thus deliberately lied to her at the very time
when she was appealing to his confidence. Her aristocratic instincts arose
in indignation at the falsehoods which had been used to dupe her. She
would not listen to any excuse, would not admit any extenuating
circumstances; and perhaps because she knew in the secret of her heart
that she would never be able to resist the pleadings of the man who had
thus deceived her, she absolutely refused to see him.

Rhodes never despaired of being restored to her favour, and would have
given much to anyone able to induce her to relent in her judgment as to
his conduct. Up to the last he made attempts to persuade her to reconsider
her decision, but they all proved useless, and he died without having been
able to win a forgiveness which he craved for many years.

I used to know Mrs. van Koopman well and to see her often. I admired her
much, not only on account of her great talents and of her powerful
intellect, but also for the great dignity which she displayed all through
the Boer War, when, suspected of favouring the Dutch cause to the extent
of holding communications with the rebels all over the Cape Colony, she
never committed any indiscretion or gave cause for any direct action
against her. For some time, by order of the military authorities, she was
placed under police supervision, and her house was searched for papers and
documents which, however, were not found--as might have been foreseen.

All through these trying months she never wavered in her attitude nor in
her usual mode of life, except that she saw fewer people than
formerly--not, as she used playfully to say, because she feared to be
compromised, but because she did not wish to compromise others. More than
once during my visits I spoke to her of Mr. Rhodes and tried to induce her
to relent in her resolution. I even went so far as to tell her that her
consent to meet him would, more than anything else, cause him to use all
his influence, or what remained of it, in favour of a prompt settlement of
the war in a peace honourable to both sides. Mrs. van Koopman smiled, but
remained immovable. At last, seeing that I would not abandon the subject,
she told me in tones which admitted of no discussion that she had far too
much affection for Rhodes not to have been so entirely cut to the core by
his duplicity in regard to her and by his whole conduct in that
unfortunate matter of the Raid. She could trust him no longer, she told
me, and, consequently, a meeting with him would only give her unutterable
pain and revive memories that had better remain undisturbed. "Had I cared
for him less I would not say so to you," she added, "but you must know
that of all sad things the saddest is the destruction of idols one has
built for oneself."

This attitude on the part of the one friend he had the greatest affection
for was one of the many episodes which embittered Rhodes.




CHAPTER V.

RHODES AND THE RAID


After the Raid, faithful to his usual tactics of making others responsible
for his own misdeeds, Cecil Rhodes grew to hate with ferocity all those
whose silence and quiet disapproval reminded him of the fatal error into
which he had been led. He was loud in his expressions of resentment
against Mr. Schreiner and the other members of the Afrikander party who
had not been able to conceal from him their indignation at his conduct on
the memorable occasion which ruined his own political life. They had
compelled him--one judged by his demeanour--to resign his office of Prime
Minister at the very time when he was about to transform it into something
far more important--to use it as the stepping-stone to future grandeurs of
which he already dreamt, although he had so far refrained from speaking
about them to others. Curious to say, however, he never blamed the authors
of this political mistake, and never, in public at least, reproached
Jameson for the disaster he had brought upon him.

What his secret thoughts were on this subject it is easy to guess.
Circumstances used to occur now and then when a stray word spoken on
impulse allowed one to discern that he deplored the moment of weakness
into which he had been inveigled. For instance, during a dinner-party at
Groote Schuur, when talking about the state of things prevailing in
Johannesburg just before the war, he mentioned the names of five Reformers
who, after the Raid, had been condemned to death by President Kruger, and
added that he had paid their fine of twenty-five thousand pounds each.
"Yes," he continued, with a certain grim accent of satire in his voice, "I
paid £25,000 for each of these gentlemen." And when one of his guests
tactlessly remarked, "But surely you need not have done so, Mr. Rhodes? It
was tacitly admitting that you had been a party to their enterprise!" he
retorted immediately, "And if I choose to allow the world to think that
such was the case, what business is it of yours?" I thought the man was
going to drop under the table, so utterly flabbergasted did he look.

It is, of course, extremely difficult to know what was the actual part
played by Rhodes in the Raid. He carried that secret to the grave, and it
is not likely that his accomplices will ever reveal their own share in the
responsibility for that wild adventure. My impression is that the idea of
the Raid was started among the entourage of Rhodes and spoken of before
him at length. He would listen in silence, as was his wont when he wished
to establish the fact that he had nothing to do with a thing that had been
submitted to him. Thus the Raid was tacitly encouraged by him, without his
ever having pronounced himself either for or against it.

Rhodes was an extremely able politician, and a far-seeing one into the
bargain. He would never have committed himself into an open approval of an
attempt which he knew perfectly well involved the rights of nations. On
the other hand, he would have welcomed any circumstance which would result
in the overthrow of the Transvaal Republic by friends of his. His former
successes, and especially the facility with which had been carried out the
attachment of Rhodesia to the British Empire, had refracted his vision,
and he refused--or failed--to see the difficulties which he might
encounter if he wanted to proceed for the second time on an operation of
the same kind.

On the other hand, he was worried by his friends to allow them to take
decisive action, and was told that everyone in England would approve of
his initiative in taking upon himself the responsibility of a step, out of
which could only accrue solid advantage for the Mother Country.

Rhodes had been too long away from England, and his sojourns there during
the ten years or so immediately preceding 1895 had been far too short for
him to have been able to come to a proper appreciation of the importance
of public opinion in Great Britain, or of those principles in matters of
Government which no sound English politician will ever dare to put aside
if he wishes to retain his hold. He failed to understand and to appreciate
the narrow limit which must not be overstepped; he forgot that when one
wants to perform an act open to certain well-defined objections there must
be a great aim in order eventually to explain and excuse the doing of it.
The Raid had no such aim. No one made a mistake as to that point when
passing judgment upon the Raid. The motives were too sordid, too mean, for
anyone to do aught else but pass a sweeping condemnation upon the whole
business.

If he did not, Rhodes ought to have known that the public would most
certainly pass this verdict on so dark and shameful an adventure, one that
harmed England's prestige in South Africa far more than ever did the Boer
War. But though perhaps he realised beforehand that this would be the
verdict, he only felt a vague apprehension, more as a fancy than from any
real sense of impending danger. He had grown so used to see success attend
his every step that his imagination refused to admit the possibility of
defeat.

As for the people who engaged in the senseless adventure, their motives
had none of the lofty ideals which influenced Rhodes himself. They simply
wanted to obtain possession of the gold fields of the Transvaal and to
oust the rightful owners. President Kruger represented an obstacle that
had to be removed, and so they proceeded upon their mad quest without
regard as to the possible consequences. Still less did they reflect that
in his case they had not to deal with a native chief whose voice of
protest had no chance to be heard, but with a very cute and determined man
who had means at his disposal not only to defend himself, but also to
appeal to European judgment to adjudge an unjustifiable aggression.

Apart from all these considerations, which ought to have been seriously
taken into account by Doctor Jameson and his companions, the whole
expedition was planned in a stupid, careless manner. No wonder that it
immediately came to grief. It is probable that if Rhodes had entered into
its details and allowed others to consult him, matters might have taken a
different turn. But, as I have already shown, he preferred to be able to
say at a given moment that he had known nothing about it. At least, this
must have been what he meant to do. But events proved too strong for him.
The fiasco was too complete for Rhodes to escape from its
responsibilities, though it must be conceded that he never tried to do so
once the storm burst. He faced the music bravely enough, perhaps because
of the knowledge that no denial would be believed, perhaps also because
all the instincts of his, after all, great nature caused him to come
forward to take his share in the disgrace of the whole deplorable affair.

Whether he forgave Doctor Jameson for this act of folly remains a mystery.
Personally I have always held that there must have _un cadavre entre eux_.
No friendship could account for the strange relations which existed
between these two men, one of whom had done so much to harm the other. At
first it would have seemed as if an individual of the character of Cecil
Rhodes would never have brought himself to forgive his confederate for the
clumsiness with which he had handled a matter upon which the reputation of
both of them depended, in the present as well as in the future. But far
from abandoning the friend who had brought him into such trouble, he
remained on the same terms of intimacy as before, with the difference,
perhaps, that he saw even more of him than before the Raid. It seemed as
if he wanted thus to affirm before the whole world his faith in the man
through whom his whole political career had been wrecked.

The attitude of Rhodes toward Jameson was commented upon far and wide. The
Dutch party in Cape Town saw in it a mere act of bravado into which they
read an acknowledgment that, strong as was the Colossus, he was too weak
to tell his accomplices to withdraw from public sight until the
ever-increasing difficulties with the Transvaal--which became more and
more acute after the Raid--had been settled in some way or other between
President Kruger and the British Government. Instead of this Rhodes seemed
to take a particular pleasure in parading the trust he declared he had in
Doctor Jameson, and to consult him publicly upon almost all the political
questions which were submitted to him for consideration. This did not mean
that he followed the advice which he received, because, so far as I was
able to observe, this was seldom the case.

To add to the contrariness of the situation, Rhodes always seemed more
glad than anything else if he heard someone make an ill-natured remark
about the Doctor, or when anything particularly disagreeable occurred to
the latter. An ironic smile used to light up Rhodes' face and a sarcastic
chuckle be heard. But still, whenever one attempted to explain to him that
the Raid had been an unforgivable piece of imprudence, or hazarded that
Jameson had never been properly punished for it, Rhodes invariably took
the part of this friend of his younger days, and would never acknowledge
that Doctor Jim's desire to enter public life as a member of the Cape
Parliament ought not to be gratified.

On his side, Doctor Jameson was determined that the opportunity to do so
should be offered to him, and he used Rhodes' influence in order to obtain
election. He knew very well that without it his candidature would have no
chance.

Later on, when judging the events which preceded the last two years of
Rhodes' life, many people expressed the opinion that Jameson, being a
physician of unusual ability, was perfectly well aware that his friend was
not destined to live to a very old age, and therefore wished to obtain
from him while he could all the political support he required to establish
his career as the statesman he fully believed he was. In fact, Doctor
Jameson had made up his mind to outlive the odium of the Raid, and to
become rehabilitated in public opinion to the extent of being allowed to
take up the leadership of the party which had once owned Rhodes as its
chief. By a strange freak of Providence, helped no doubt by an iron will
and opportunities made the most of, Jameson, who had been the great
culprit in the mad adventure of the Raid, became the foremost man in Cape
Colony for a brief period after the war, while Rhodes, who had been his
victim, bore the full consequences of his weakness in having permitted
himself to be persuaded to look through his fingers on the enterprise.

Rhodes never recovered any real political influence, was distrusted by
English and Dutch alike, looked upon with caution by the Cape Government,
and with suspicion even among his followers. The poor man had no friends
worthy of the name, and those upon whom he relied the most were the first
to betray his confidence. Unfortunately for himself, he had a profound
contempt for humanity, and imagined himself capable of controlling all
those whom he had elected to rule. He imagined he could turn and twist
anyone according to his own impulses. In support of this assertion let me
relate an incident in which I played a part.

When the Boer War showed symptoms of dragging on for a longer time than
expected, some Englishmen proposed that Rhodes should be asked to stand
again for Prime Minister, to do which he resolutely refused. Opinions,
however, were very much divided. Some people declared that he was the only
man capable of conciliating the Dutch and bringing the war to a happy
issue. Others asserted that his again taking up the reins of Government
would be considered by the Afrikander Bond--which was very powerful at the
time--as an unjustifiable provocation which would only further embitter
those who had never forgiven Rhodes for the Raid.

A member of the Upper House of Legislature, whom I used to see often, and
who was a strong partisan of Rhodes, determined to seek advice outside the
House, and went to see an important political personage in Cape Town, one
of those who frequented Groote Schuur and who posed as one of the
strongest advocates of Rhodes again becoming the head of the Government
presided over by Sir Alfred Milner. What was the surprise of my friend
when, instead of finding a sympathising auditor, he heard him say that he
considered that for the moment the return of Rhodes at the head of affairs
would only complicate matters; that it was still too soon after the Raid;
that his spirit of animosity in regard to certain people might not help to
smooth matters at such a critical juncture; and that, moreover, Rhodes had
grown very morose and tyrannical, and refused to brook any contradiction.
Coming from a man who had no reason to be friendly with Rhodes, the
remarks just reported would not have been important, but proceeding from a
personage who was continually flattering Rhodes, they struck me as showing
such considerable duplicity that I wrote warning Rhodes not to attach too
much importance to the protestations of devotion to his person that the
individual in question was perpetually pouring down upon him. The reply
which I received was absolutely characteristic: "Thanks for your letter.
Never mind what X---- says. He is a harmless donkey who can always make
himself useful when required to do so."

The foregoing incident is enlightening as to the real nature of Cecil
Rhodes. His great mistake was precisely in this conviction that he could
order men at will, and that men would never betray him or injure him by
their false interpretation of the directions which it pleased him to give
them. He considered himself so entirely superior to the rest of mankind
that it never struck him that inferior beings could turn upon him and rend
him, or forget the obedience to his orders which he expected them to
observe. He did not appreciate people with independence, though he admired
them in those rare moments when he would condescend to be sincere with
himself and with others; but he preferred a great deal the miserable
creatures who always said "yes" to all his vagaries; who never dared to
criticise any of his instructions or to differ from any opinions which he
expressed. Sometimes he uttered these opinions with a brutality that did
him considerable harm, inasmuch as it could not fail to cause repugnance
among any who listened to him, but were not sufficiently acquainted with
the peculiarities of his character to discern that he wanted simply to
scare his audience, and that he did not mean one single word of the
ferocious things he said in those moments when he happened to be in a
particularly perverse mood, and when it pleased him to give a totally
false impression of himself and the nature of his convictions in political
and public matters.

It must not be lost sight of when judging Mr. Rhodes that he had been
living for the best part of his life among people with whom he could not
have anything in common except the desire to make money in the shortest
time possible. He was by nature a thinker, a philosopher, a reader, a man
who belonged to the best class of students, those who understand that
one's mind wants continually improving and that it is apt to rust when not
kept active. His companions in those first years which followed upon his
arrival in South Africa would certainly not have appreciated any of the
books the reading of which constituted the solace of the young man who
still preserved in his mind the traditions of Oxford. They were his
inferiors in everything: intelligence, instruction, comprehension of those
higher problems of the soul and of the mind which always interested him
even in the most troubled and anxious moments of his life. He understood
and realised that this was the fact, and this did not tend to inspire him
with esteem or even with consideration for the people with whom he was
compelled to live and work.

Men like Barney Barnato, to mention only this one name among the many,
felt a kind of awe of Cecil Rhodes. This kind of thing, going on as it did
for years, was bound to give Rhodes a wrong idea as to the faculty he had
of bringing others to share his points of view, and he became so
accustomed to be considered always right that he felt surprised and vexed
whenever blind obedience was not given. Indeed, it so excited his
displeasure that he would at once plunge into a course of conduct which he
might never have adopted but for the fact that he had heard it condemned
or criticised.

It has been said that every rich man is generally surrounded by parasites,
and Cecil Rhodes was not spared this infliction. Only in his case these
parasites did not apply their strength to attacks upon his purse; they
exploited him for his influence, for the importance which it gave them to
be considered by the world as his friends, or even his dependants. They
appeared wherever he went, telling the general public that their presence
had been requested by the "Boss" in such warm terms that they could not
refuse. It was curious to watch this systematic chase which followed him
everywhere, even to England. Sometimes this persistency on the part of
persons whom he did not tolerate more than was absolutely necessary bored
him and put him out of patience; but most of the time he accepted it as a
necessary evil, and even felt flattered by it. He also liked to have
perpetually around him individuals whom he could bully to his heart's
content, who never resented an insult and never minded an insolence--and
Rhodes was often insolent.

Another singular feature in a character as complex as it was interesting
was the contempt in which he held all those who had risen under his very
eyes, from comparative or absolute poverty, to the status of millionaires
possessed of houses in Park Lane and shooting boxes in Scotland. He liked
to relate all that he knew about them, and sometimes even to mention
certain facts which the individuals themselves would probably have
preferred to be consigned to oblivion. But--and here comes the singularity
to which I have referred--Rhodes would not allow anyone else to speak of
these things, and he always took the part of his so-called friends when
outsiders hinted at dark episodes which did not admit of investigation. He
almost gave a certificate of good conduct to people whom he might have
been heard referring to a few hours before in a far more antagonistic
spirit than that displayed by those whom he so sharply contradicted.

I remember one amusing instance of the idiosyncrasy referred to. There was
in Johannesburg a man who, having arrived there with twenty-five pounds in
his pockets--as he liked to relate with evident pride in the fact--had, in
the course of two years, amassed together a fortune of two millions
sterling. One day during dinner at Groote Schuur he enlarged upon the
subject with such offensiveness that an English lady, newly arrived in
South Africa and not yet experienced in the things which at the time were
better left unsaid, was so annoyed at his persistency that she interrupted
the speaker with the remark:

"Well, if I were you, I would not be so eager to let the world know that I
had made two millions out of twenty-five pounds. It sounds exactly like
the story of the man who says that in order to catch a train at six
o'clock in the morning he gets up at ten minutes to six. You know at once
that he cannot possibly have washed, whilst your story shows that you
could not possibly have been honest."

I leave the reader to imagine the consternation produced among those
present by these words. But what were their feelings when they heard
Rhodes say in reply:

"Well, one does not always find water to wash in, and at Kimberley this
happened oftener than one imagines; as for being honest, who cares for
honesty nowadays?"

"Those who have not lived in South Africa, Mr. Rhodes," was the retort
which silenced the Colossus.

This man of the get-rich-quick variety was one of those who had mastered
the difficult operation of passing off to others the mines out of which he
had already extracted most of the gold, an occupation which, in the early
Johannesburg days, had been a favourite one with many of the inhabitants
of this wonderful town. One must not forget that as soon as the fame of
the gold fields of the Transvaal began to spread adventurers hastened
there, together with a few honest pioneers, desirous of making a fortune
out of the riches of a soil which, especially in prospectuses lavishly
distributed on the London and Paris Stock Exchanges, was described as a
modern Golconda. Concessions were bought and sold, companies were formed
with a rapidity which savoured of the fabulous. Men made not only a
living, but also large profits, by reselling plots of ground which they
had bought but a few hours before, and one heard nothing but loud praises
of this or that mine that could be had for a song, "owing to family
circumstances" or other reasons which obliged their owner to part with it.

The individual who had boasted of the intelligent manner with which he had
transformed his twenty-five pounds into two solid millions had, early in
his career, invested some of his capital in one of these mines. Its only
merit was its high-sounding name. He tried for some time without success
to dispose of it. At last he happened to meet a Frenchman, newly arrived
in Johannesburg, who wanted to acquire some mining property there with the
view of forming a company. Our hero immediately offered his own. The
Frenchman responded to the appeal, but expressed the desire to go down
himself into the shaft to examine the property and get some ore in order
to test it before the purchase was completed. The condition was agreed to
with eagerness, and a few days later the victim and his executioner
proceeded together to the mine. The Frenchman went down whilst Mr. X----
remained above. He walked about with his hands in his pockets, smoking
cigarettes, the ashes of which he let fall with an apparent negligence
into the baskets of ore which were being sent up by the Frenchman. When
the latter came up, rather hot and dusty, the baskets were taken to
Johannesburg and carefully examined: the ore was found to contain a
considerable quantity of gold. The mine was bought, and not one scrap of
gold was ever found in it. Mr. X---- had provided himself with cigarettes
made for the purpose, which contained gold dust in lieu of tobacco, and
the ashes which he had dropped were in reality the precious metal, the
presence of which was to persuade the unfortunate Frenchman that he was
buying a property of considerable value. He paid for it something like two
hundred thousand pounds, whilst the fame of the man who had thus cleverly
tricked him spread far and wide.

The most amusing part of the story consists in its _dénouement_. The duped
Frenchman, though full of wrath, was, nevertheless, quite up to the game.
He kept silence, but proceeded to form his company as if nothing had been
the matter. When it was about to be constituted and registered, he asked
Mr. X---- to become one of its directors, a demand that the latter could
not very well refuse with decency. He therefore allowed his name to figure
among those of the members of the board, and he used his best endeavours
to push forward the shares of the concern of which he was pompously
described on the prospectus as having been once the happy owner. As his
name was one to conjure with the scrip went up to unheard-of prices, when
both he and his supposed victim, the Frenchman, realised and retired from
the venture, the richer by several hundreds of thousands of pounds.
History does not say what became of the shareholders. As for Mr. X----, he
now lives in Europe, and has still a reputation in South Africa.

This story is but one amongst hundreds, and it is little wonder that,
surrounded as he was with men who indulged in this charming pastime of
always trying to dupe their fellow creatures, Rhodes' moral sense relaxed.
It is only surprising that he kept about him so much that was good and
great, and that he did not succumb altogether to the contamination which
affected everything and everybody around him. Happily for him he cherished
his own ambitions, had his own dreams for companions, his absorption in
the great work he had undertaken; these things were his salvation.
Rhodesia became the principal field of Rhodes' activity, and the care with
which he fostered its prosperity kept him too busy and interested to
continue the quest for riches which had been his great, if not his
principal, occupation during the first years of his stay in South Africa.

Although Cecil Rhodes was so happily placed that he had no need to bother
over wealth, he was not so aloof to the glamour of politics. He had always
felt the irk of his retirement after the Raid, and the hankering after a
leading political position became more pronounced as the episode which
shut the Parliamentary door behind him after he had passed through its
portals faded in the mind of the people.

It was not surprising, therefore, to observe that politics once more took
the upper hand amidst his preoccupations. It was, though, politics
connected with the development of the country that bore his name more than
with the welfare of the Cape Colony or of the Transvaal. It was only
during the last two years of Rhodes' existence that his interest revived
in the places connected with his first successes in life. Rhodes had been
convinced that a war with the Boers would last only a matter of a few
weeks--three months, as he prophesied when it broke out--and he was
equally sure, though for what reason it is difficult to guess, that the
war would restore him to his former position and power. The illusion
lingered long enough to keep him in a state of excitement, during which,
carried along by his natural enthusiasm, he indulged in several
unconsidered steps, and when at last his hope was dispelled he accused
everybody of being the cause of his disappointment. Never for a moment
would he admit that he could have been mistaken, or that the war, which at
a certain moment his intervention might possibly have avoided, had been
the consequence of the mischievous act he had not prevented.

When the Bloemfontein Conference failed Rhodes was not altogether
displeased. He had felt the affront of not being asked to attend; and,
though his common sense told him that it would have been altogether out of
the question for him to take part in it, as this would have been
considered in the light of a personal insult by President Kruger, he would
have liked to have been consulted by Sir Alfred Milner, as well as by the
English Government, as to the course to be adopted during its
deliberations. He was fully persuaded in his own mind that Sir Alfred
Milner, being still a new arrival in South Africa, had not been able to
grasp its complicated problems, and so had not adopted the best means to
baffle the intrigues of President Kruger and the diplomacy of his clever
colleague, President Steyn. At every tale which reached Cecil Rhodes
concerning the difficulties encountered by Sir Alfred, he declared that he
was "glad to be out of this mess." Yet it was not difficult to see that he
passionately regretted not being allowed to watch from a seat at the
council table the vicissitudes of this last attempt by conference to
smooth over difficulties arising from the recklessness displayed by people
in arrogantly rushing matters that needed careful examination.

[Illustration: PRESIDENT KRUGER]




CHAPTER VI.

THE AFTERMATH OF THE RAID


Toward the close of the last chapter I referred to the Raid passing from
the forefront of public memory. But though, as a fact, it became blurred
in the mind of the people, as a factor in South African history its
influence by no means diminished. Indeed, the aftermath of the Raid
assumed far greater proportions as time went on. It influenced so entirely
the further destinies of South Africa, and brought about such enmities and
such bitterness along with it, that nothing short of a war could have
washed away its impressions. Up to that fatal adventure the Jingo English
elements, always viewed with distrust and dislike in the Transvaal as well
as at the Cape, had been more or less held back in their desire to gain an
ascendancy over the Dutch population, whilst the latter had accepted the
Jingo as a necessary evil devoid of real importance, and only annoying
from time to time.

After the Raid all the Jingoes who had hoped that its results would be to
give them greater facilities of enrichment considered themselves
personally aggrieved by its failure. They did just what Rhodes was always
doing. The Boers and President Kruger had acted correctly in this
enterprise of Doctor Jameson, but the Jingoes made them responsible for
the results of its failure. They went about giving expression to feelings
of the most violent hatred against the Boers, and railed at their
wickedness in daring to stand up in defence of rights which the British
Government had solemnly recognised. It became quite useless to tell those
misguided individuals that the Cabinet at Westminster had from the very
first blamed Rhodes for his share in what the English Press, with but few
exceptions, had declared to be an entirely disgraceful episode. They
pretended that people in London knew nothing about the true state of
affairs in South Africa or the necessities of the country; that the
British Government had always shown deplorable weakness in regard to the
treatment meted out to its subjects in the Colonies, and that both Rhodes
and Jameson were heroes whose names deserved to be handed down to
posterity for the services which they had rendered to their country.

It is true that these ardent Jingoes were but a small minority and that
the right-minded elements among the English Colonials universally blamed
the unwarranted attack that had been made against the independence of the
Transvaal. But the truculent minority shouted loud enough to drown the
censure, and as, with a few notable exceptions, the South African Press
was under the influence of the magnates, it was not very easy to protest
against the strange way in which the Raid was being excused. I am
persuaded that, had the subject been allowed to drop, it would have died a
natural death, or at worst been considered as an historical blunder. But
the partisans of Rhodes, the friends of Jameson, and personages connected
with the leading financial powers did their best to keep the remembrance
of the expedition which wrecked the political life of Rhodes fresh before
the public. The mere mention of it was soon sufficient to arouse a tempest
of passions, especially among the Dutch party, and by and by the history
of South Africa resolved itself into the Raid and its memories. You never
heard people say, "This happened at such a time"; they merely declared,
"This happened before, or after, the Raid." It became a landmark for the
inhabitants of Cape Town and of the Transvaal, and I could almost believe
that, in Kimberley at any rate, the very children in the schools were
taught to date their knowledge of English history from the time of the
Raid.

The enemies of Cecil Rhodes, and their number was legion, always declared
that the reason why he had faced the music and braved public opinion in
England lay in the fact that, for some reason or other, he was afraid of
Doctor Jameson. I have referred already to this circumstance. Whilst
refusing to admit such a possibility, yet I must own that the influence,
and even the authority exercised by the Doctor on his chief, had something
uncanny about it. My own opinion has always been that Rhodes' attitude
arose principally from his conviction that Jameson was the only one who
understood his constitution, the sole being capable of looking after his
health. Curious as it may seem, I am sure the Colossus had an inordinate
fear of death and of illness of any kind. He knew that his life was not a
sound one, but he always rebelled against the idea that, like other
mortals, he was subject to death. I feel persuaded that one of the reasons
why he chose to be buried in the Matoppo Hills was that, in selecting this
lonely spot, he felt that he would not often be called upon to see the
place where he would rest one day.

This dread of the unknown, so rare in people of his calibre, remained with
him until the end. It increased in acuteness as his health began to fail.
Then, more than ever, did he entertain and plan new schemes, as if to
persuade himself that he had unlimited time before him in which to execute
them. His flatterers knew how to play upon his weakness, and they never
failed to do so. Perhaps this foible explains the influence which Doctor
Jameson undoubtedly exercised upon the mind of Rhodes. He believed himself
to be in safety whenever Jameson was about him. And so in a certain sense
he was, because, with all his faults, the Doctor had a real affection for
the man to whom he had been bound by so many ties ever since the days when
at Kimberley they had worked side by side, building their fortunes and
their careers.

By a curious freak of destiny, when the tide of events connected with the
war had given to the Progressive English party a clear majority in the
Cape Parliament, Jameson assumed its leadership as a matter of course,
largely because he was the political next-of-kin to Rhodes. The fact that
at that time he lived at Groote Schuur added to his popularity, and he
continued whilst there the traditional hospitality displayed during the
lifetime of Rhodes. That he ultimately became Prime Minister was not
surprising; the office fell to his share as so many other good things had
fallen before; and, having obtained this supreme triumph and enjoyed it
for a time, he was tactful enough to retire at precisely the right moment.

The Raid indirectly killed Rhodes and directly obliterated his political
reputation. It lost him, too, the respect of all the men who could have
helped him to govern South Africa wisely and well. It deprived him of the
experience and popularity of Mr. Schreiner, Mr. Merriman, Mr. Sauer and
other members of the Afrikander Bond who had once been upon terms of
intimacy and affection with him.

It must never be forgotten that at one period of his history Rhodes was
considered to be the best friend of the Dutch party; and, secondly, that
he had been the first to criticise the action of the British Government in
regard to the Transvaal. At the very moment when the Raid was contemplated
he was making the most solemn assurances to his friends--as they then
believed themselves to be--that he would never tolerate any attack against
the independence of the Boers. If his advice had been taken, Rhodes
considered that the errors which culminated at Majuba with the defeat of
the British troops would have been avoided. He caused the same assurances
to be conveyed to President Kruger, and this duplicity, which in anyone
less compromised than he was in regard to the Dutch party might have been
blamed, was in his case considered as something akin to high treason, and
roused against him sentiments not only of hatred, but also of disgust.
When later on, at the time of the Boer War, Rhodes made attempts to
ingratiate himself once more into the favour of the Dutch he failed to
realise that while there are cases when animosity can give way before
political necessity, it is quite impossible in private to shake hands with
an individual whom one despises. And that such persons as Mrs. van Koopman
or Mr. Schreiner, for instance, despised Rhodes there can be no doubt.

They were wrong in doing so. Rhodes was essentially a man of moods, and
also an opportunist in his strange, blunt way. Had the Dutch rallied round
him during the last war it is certain that he would have given himself up
body and soul to the task of trying to smooth over the difficulties which
gave such an obstinate character to the war. He would have induced the
English Government to grant to all rebel colonists who returned to their
allegiance a generous pardon and reinstatement into their former rights.

Even while the war lasted it is a fact that, in a certain sense, Rhodes'
own party suspected him of betraying its interests. I feel almost sure
that Sir Alfred Milner did not trust him, but, nevertheless, he would have
liked Rhodes as a coadjutor. If the two men were never on sincerely
cordial terms with one another it was not the fault of the High
Commissioner, who, with that honesty of which he always and upon every
occasion gave proof, tried to secure the co-operation of the great South
African statesman in his difficult task. But Rhodes would not help Sir
Alfred. But neither, too, would he help the Dutch unless they were willing
to eat humble pie before him. In fact, it was this for which Rhodes had
been waiting ever since the Raid. He wanted people to ask his forgiveness
for the faults he himself had committed. He would have liked Sir Alfred
Milner to beg of him as a favour to take the direction of public affairs,
and he would have desired the whole of the Dutch party to come down _in
corpore_ to Groote Schuur, to implore him to become their leader and to
fight not only for them but also for the rights of President Kruger, whom
he professed to ridicule and despise, but to whom he had caused assurances
of sympathy to be conveyed.

During the first period of the war, and especially during the siege, Cecil
Rhodes was in Kimberley. He had gone with the secret hope that he might be
able from that centre to retain a stronger hold on South African politics
than could have been the case at Groote Schuur, in which region the only
authority recognised by English and Dutch alike was that of Sir Alfred
Milner. He waited for a sign telling him that his ambition was about to be
realised in some way or other--and waited in vain. It is indisputable that
whilst he was shut up in the Diamond City Rhodes entered into secret
negotiations with some of the Dutch leaders. This, though it might have
been construed in the sense of treason against his own Motherland had it
reached the knowledge of the extreme Jingo party, was in reality the
sincere effort of a true patriot to put an end to a struggle which was
threatening to destroy the prosperity of a country for which he had
laboured for so many years.

In judging Rhodes one must not forget that though a leading personality in
South Africa, and the chairman of a corporation which practically ruled
the whole of the Cape Colony and, in part, also the Transvaal, he was,
after all, at that time nothing but a private individual. He had the right
to put his personal influence at the service of the State and of his
country if he considered that by so doing he could bring to an end a war
which threatened to bring destruction on a land that was just beginning to
progress toward civilisation. It must be remembered that his was the only
great personality in South Africa capable of opposing President Kruger and
the other Dutch and Boer leaders. He was still popular among many
people--feared by some, worshipped by others. He could rally round him
many elements that would never coalesce with either Dutch or English
unless he provided the impetus of his authority and approval. If only he
had spoken frankly to the Boer leaders whom he had caused to be
approached, called them to his side instead of having messages conveyed to
them by people whom he could disavow later on and whom, in fact, he did
disavow; and if, on the other hand, Rhodes had placed himself at the
disposal of Sir Alfred Milner, and told him openly that he would try to
see what he could do to help him, the tenseness of the situation would
almost certainly have been eased.

In a position as intermediary between two adversaries who required his
advice and influence to smooth the way toward a settlement of the terrible
South African question Rhodes could have done incalculable service and
added lustre to his name. But he did not, and it is not without interest
to seek the reason why the Colossus was not courageous enough to embark
upon such a course. Whether through fear of his actions being wrongly
interpreted, or else because he did not feel sure of his ground and was
apprehensive lest he might be induced to walk into a trap, Cecil Rhodes
never would pronounce himself upon one side or the other. He left to
well-wishers the task of reconciliation between himself and his enemies,
or, if not that, at least the possibility for both once more to take
common action for the solution of South African difficulties. The
unfortunate side of the whole affair lay in the fact that the Boer and
Bond leaders each remained under the impression that in the Raid affair it
was against their particular body that Rhodes had sinned, that it was
their cause which he had betrayed. Accordingly they expected him to
recognise this fact and to tell them of his regret.

But this was not Rhodes' way: on the contrary, he looked to his
adversaries to consider that they had wronged him. Both parties adhered
firmly to their point of view; it was not an easy matter to persuade
either of them to take the initiative. Each very well knew and felt it was
an indispensable step, but each considered it should be taken by the
other.

This brings me to make a remark which probably has never yet found its way
into print, though some have spoken about it in South Africa. It is that
Cecil Rhodes, whilst being essentially an Empire Maker, was not an Empire
Ruler. His conceptions were far too vast to allow him to take into
consideration the smaller details of everyday life which, in the
management of the affairs of the world, obliges one to consider possible
ramifications of every great enterprise. Rhodes wanted simply to sweep
away all obstacles without giving the slightest thought to the
consequences likely to follow on so offhand a manner of getting rid of
difficulties.

In addition to this disregard of vital details, there was a tinge of
selfishness in everything which Rhodes undertook and which gave a personal
aspect to matters which ought to have been looked upon purely from the
objective. The acquisition of Rhodesia, for instance, was considered by
him as having been accomplished for the aggrandisement of the Empire and
also for his own benefit. He sincerely believed that he had had nothing
else in his mind when he founded the Chartered Company, than the desire to
conquer a new country and to give it to England; but he would certainly
have felt cruelly affronted if the British Government had ever taken its
administration into its own hands and not allowed Rhodes to do exactly
what he pleased there. He loved to go to Buluwayo, and would spend weeks
watching all that was being done in the way of agriculture and mining. In
particular, he showed considerable interest in the natives.

The Colonial Office in London was treated by Cecil Rhodes with the utmost
disdain on the rare occasions when it tried to put in a word concerning
the establishment of British rule in the territories which he gloried in
having presented to the Queen. It was sufficient to mention in his
presence the possibility of the Charter being recalled to put Rhodes into
a passion. No king or tyrant of old, indeed, treated his subjects with the
severity which Rhodes showed in regard to the different civil officials
and military defenders of the Rhodesia he loved so much and so unwisely.

It is curious that Rhodes never allowed speculation a free hand in
Rhodesia as he had done at Kimberley or at Johannesburg. He was most
careful that outsiders should not hear about what was going on, and took
endless precautions not to expose the companies that worked the old
dominions of poor King Lobengula, to the sharp criticism of the European
Stock Exchanges. Their shares remained in the hands of people on whose
discretion Rhodes believed that he could rely, and no one ever heard of
gambling in scrip exciting the minds of the inhabitants of Buluwayo or
Salisbury to anything like the degree stocks in Transvaal concerns did.

In Rhodesia Rhodes believed himself on his own ground and free from the
criticisms which he guessed were constantly uttered in regard to him and
to his conduct. In the new land which bore his name Rhodes was surrounded
only by dependants, whilst in Cape Colony he now and then came across
someone who would tell him and, what was worse, who would make him feel
that, after all, he was not the only man in the world, and that he could
not always have everything his own way. Moreover, in Cape Town there was
the Governor, whose personality was more important than his own, and whom,
whether he liked it or not, he had to take into consideration, and to
whom, in a certain sense, he had to submit. And in Kimberley there was the
De Beers Board which, though composed of men who were entirely in
dependence upon him and whose careers he had made, yet had to be
consulted. He could not entirely brush them aside, the less so that a
whole army of shareholders stood behind them who, from time to time, were
impudent enough to wish to see what was being done with their money.

Nothing in the way of hampering critics or circumscribing authorities
existed in Rhodesia. The Chartered Company, though administered by a
Board, was in reality left entirely in the hands and under the control of
Rhodes. Most of the directors were in England and came before public
notice only at the annual general meeting, which was always a success,
inasmuch as no one there had ever ventured to criticise, otherwise than in
a mild way, the work of the men who were supposed to watch over the
development of the resources of the country. Rhodes was master, and
probably his power would have even increased had he lived long enough to
see the completion of the Cape to Cairo Railway, which was his last hobby
and the absorbing interest of the closing years of his life.

The Cape to Cairo Railway was one of those vast schemes that can be
ascribed to the same quality in his character as that which made him so
essentially an Empire Maker. It was a project of world-wide importance,
and destined to set the seal to the paramount influence of Great Britain
over the whole of Africa. It was a work which, without Rhodes, would never
have been accomplished. He was right to feel proud of having conceived it;
and England, too, ought to be proud of having counted among her sons a man
capable of starting such a vast enterprise and of going on with it despite
the violent opposition and the many misgivings with which it was received
by the general public.




CHAPTER VII.

RHODES AND THE AFRIKANDER BOND


To return to the subject of the negotiations which undoubtedly took place
between Rhodes and the leaders of the Afrikander Bond during the war, I
must say that, so far as I know, they can rank among the most
disinterested actions of his life. For once there was no personal interest
or possible material gain connected with his desire to bring the Dutch
elements in South Africa to look upon the situation from the purely
patriotic point of view, as he did himself.

It would have been most certainly to the advantage of everybody if,
instead of persisting in a resistance which was bound to collapse, no
matter how successful it might appear to have been at its start, the
Boers, together with the Dutch Afrikanders, had sent the olive branch to
Cape Town. There would then have been some hope of compromise or of coming
to terms with England before being crushed by her armies. It would have
been favourable to English interests also had the great bitterness, which
rendered the war such a long and such a rabid one, not had time to spread
all over the country. Rhodes' intervention, which Sir Alfred Milner could
not have refused had he offered it, backed by the Boers on one side and by
the English Progressive party in the Colony on the other, might have
brought about great results and saved many lives.

No blame, therefore, ought to attach to Cecil Rhodes for wishing to
present the Boer side of the case. It would, indeed, have been wiser on
the part of Mr. Hofmeyr and other Bond leaders to have forgotten the past
and given a friendly hand to the one man capable of unravelling the
tangled skein of affairs.

At that period, whilst the siege of Kimberley was in progress, it is
certain that serious consideration was given to this question of common
action on the part of Rhodes and of the two men who practically held the
destinies of the Transvaal in their hands--de Wet and General Botha, with
Mr. Hofmeyr as representative of the Afrikander Bond at their back. Why it
failed would for ever remain a mystery if one did not remember that
everywhere in South Africa lurked hidden motives of self-interest which
interfered with the best intentions. The fruits of the seed of distrust
sown by the Raid were not easy to eradicate.

Perhaps if Mr. Rhodes had stood alone the attempt might have met with more
success than was actually the case. But it was felt by all the leading men
in the Transvaal that a peace concluded under his auspices would result in
the subjection of the Boers to the foreign and German-Jew millionaires.
This was the one thing they feared.

The Boers attributed to the millionaires of the Rand all the misfortunes
which had fallen upon them, and consequently the magnates were bitterly
hated by the Boers. And not without reason. No reasonable Boer would have
seriously objected to a union with England, provided it had been effected
under conditions assuring them autonomy and a certain independence. But no
one wanted to have liberty and fortune left at the mercy of adventurers,
even though some of them had risen to reputation and renown, obtained
titles, and bought their way into Society.

Unfortunately for him, Rhodes was supposed to represent the class of
people referred to, or, at any rate, to favour them. One thing is
certain--the great financial interests which Rhodes possessed in the Gold
Fields and other concerns of the same kind lent some credence to the idea.
All these circumstances prevented public opinion from expressing full
confidence in him, because no one could bring himself to believe what
nevertheless would have come true.

In the question of restoring peace to South Africa Rhodes most certainly
would never have taken anyone's advice; he would have acted according to
his own impulse, and more so because Doctor Jameson was not with him
during the whole time Kimberley was besieged. Unfortunately for all the
parties concerned, Rhodes let slip the opportunity to resume his former
friendship with Mr. Hofmeyr, the only man in South Africa whose
intelligence could measure itself with his own. And in the absence of this
first step from Rhodes, a false pride--which was wounded vanity more than
anything else--prevented the Bond from seeking the help of Rhodes. This
attitude on the part of each man would simply have been ridiculous under
ordinary circumstances, but at a time when such grave interests were at
stake, and when the future of so many people was liable to be compromised,
it became criminal.

In sharp contrast to it stood the conduct of Sir Alfred Milner, who was
never influenced by his personal feelings or by his vanity where the
interests of his country were engaged. During the few months which
preceded the war he was the object of virulent hatred on the part of most
of the white population of the Colony. When the first disillusions of the
war brought along with them their usual harvest of disappointments the
personality of the High Commissioner appeared at last in its true light,
and one began to realise that here was a man who possessed a singularly
clear view on matters of politics, and that all his actions were guided by
sound principles. His quiet determination not to allow himself to be
influenced by the gossip of Cape Town was also realised, and amid all the
spite shown it is to his honour that, instead of throwing up the sponge,
he persevered, until at last he succeeded in the aim which he had kept
before him from the day he had landed in Table Bay. He restored peace to
the dark continent where no one had welcomed him, but where everybody
mourned his departure when he bade it good-bye after the most anxious
years he had ever known.

When Sir Alfred accepted the post of Governor of the Cape Colony and
English High Commissioner in South Africa, he had intended to study most
carefully the local conditions of the new country whither fate and his
duty were sending him, and then, after having gained the necessary
experience capable of guiding him in the different steps he aspired to
take, to proceed to the formidable task he had set for himself. His great
object was to bring about a reconciliation between the two great political
parties in the Colony--the South African League, with Rhodes as President,
and the Afrikander Bond, headed by Messrs. Hofmeyr (the one most in
popular favour with the Boer farmers), Sauer and Schreiner.

In the gigantic task of welding together two materials which possessed
little affinity and no love for each other, Sir Alfred was unable to be
guided by his experience in the Motherland. In England a certain
constitutional policy was the basis of every party. At the Cape the
dominating factors were personal feelings, personal hatreds and
affections, while in the case of the League it was money and money alone.
I do not mean that every member of the League had been bought by De Beers
or the Chartered Company; but what I do maintain is that the majority of
its members had some financial or material reason to enrol themselves.

In judging the politics of South Africa at the period of which I am
writing, one must not forget that the greater number of those who then
constituted the so-called Progressive party were men who had travelled to
the Cape through love of adventure and the desire to enrich themselves
quickly. It was only the first comers who had seen their hopes realised.
Those who came after them found things far more difficult, and had
perforce to make the best of what their predecessors left. On the other
hand, it was relatively easy for them to find employment in the service of
one or the other of the big companies that sprang up, and by whom most of
the mining and industrial concerns were owned.

[Illustration: THE HON. J.H. HOFMEYR]

When the influence of the De Beers increased after its amalgamation with
the other diamond companies around Kimberley, and when Rhodes made up his
mind that only a political career could help him to achieve his vast
plans, he struck upon the thought of using the money and the influence
which were at his disposal to transform De Beers into one of the most
formidable political instruments the world had ever seen. He succeeded in
doing so in what would have been a wonderful manner if one did not
remember the crowd of fortune-seeking men who were continually landing in
South Africa. These soon found that it would advantage them to enrol under
Rhodes' banner, for he was no ordinary millionaire. Here stood a man who
was perpetually discovering new treasures, annexing new continents, and
who had always at his disposal profitable posts to scatter among his
followers.

The reflex action upon Rhodes was that unconsciously he drifted into the
conviction that every man could be bought, provided one knew what it was
he wanted. He understood perfectly well the art of speculating in his
neighbours' weaknesses, and thus liked to invite certain people to make
long stays at his house, not because he liked them, but because he knew,
if they did not, that they would soon discover that the mere fact of being
the guest of Mr. Rhodes procured for them the reputation of being in his
confidence. Being a guest at Groote Schuur endowed a man with a prestige
such as no one who has not lived in South Africa can realise, and,
furthermore, enabled him to catch here and there scraps of news respecting
the money markets of the world, a proper understanding and use of which
could be of considerable financial value. A cup of tea at Groote Schuur
was sufficient to bring about more than one political conversion.

Once started the South African League soon became a power in the land, not
so strong by any means as the Afrikander Bond, but far more influential in
official, and especially in financial, circles. Created for the apparent
aim of supporting British government in Cape Colony, it found itself
almost from the very first in conflict with it, if not outwardly, at least
tacitly. After his rupture with the Bond consequent upon the Raid, Rhodes
brought considerable energy to bear upon the development of the League. He
caused it to exercise all over the Colony an occult power which more than
once defied constituted authority, and proved a source of embarrassment to
British representatives with greater frequency than they would have cared
to own. Sir Alfred Milner, so far as I have been able to see, when taking
the reins, had not reckoned upon meeting with this kind of government
within a government, and in doing so perhaps did not appreciate its
extent. But from the earliest days of his administration it confronted
him, at first timidly, afterwards with persistence, and at last with such
insolence that he found himself compelled to see what he could do to
reduce to impotence this organisation which sought to devour him.

The problem which a situation of the character described thrust upon Sir
Alfred was easier to discuss than to solve. The League was a power so wide
that it was almost impossible to get rid of its influence in the country.
It was controlled by Rhodes, by De Beers, by the Chartered Company, by the
members in both Houses who were affiliated to it, by all the great
financial establishments throughout South Africa--with but a solitary
exception--by the principal industrial and agricultural enterprises in the
country. It comprised political men, landowners, doctors, merchants,
ship-owners, practically all the colonists in Rhodesia, and most of the
English residents of the Transvaal. It controlled elections, secured
votes, disposed of important posts, and when it advised the Governor the
Legislature had to take its remarks into consideration whether or not it
approved of them. Under the regime of the days when the League was formed
it had been able to develop itself with great facility, the dangers which
lurked behind its encroachment on the privileges of the Crown not being
suspected. But Sir Alfred Milner discovered the menace at once, and with
the quiet firmness and the tact which he always displayed in everything
that he undertook proceeded to cope with the organisation.

Sir Alfred soon found himself confronted by the irritation of Rhodes, who
had relied on his support for the schemes which he had nursed in regard to
the Transvaal. I must here explain the reason why Rhodes had thrown his
glances toward the Rand. One must remember the peculiar conditions in
which he was placed in being always surrounded by creatures whom he could
only keep attached to his person and to his ambition by satisfying their
greed for gold. When he had annexed Matabeleland it had been principally
in the expectation that one would find there the rich gold-bearing strata
said to exist in that region. Unfortunately, this hope proved a fallacious
one. Although thousands of pounds were spent in sinking and research, the
results obtained were of so insignificant a nature, and the quantity of
ore extracted so entirely insufficient to justify systematic exploitation,
that the adventurers had perforce to turn their attention toward other
fields.

It was after this disillusion that the idea took hold of Rhodes, which he
communicated to his friends, to acquire the gold fields of the Rand, and
to transform the rich Transvaal into a region where the Chartered Company
and the South African League would rule. Previous to this, if we are to
believe President Kruger, Rhodes had tried to conclude an alliance with
him, and once, upon his return from Beira to Cape Town, had stopped at
Pretoria, where he paid a visit to the old Boer statesman.

It is quite likely that on this occasion Rhodes put in a word suggesting
that it would be an advantage to the Transvaal to become possessed of an
outlet on the sea-board, but I hardly think that Kruger wrote the truth in
his memoirs in stating that when mentioning Delagoa Bay Rhodes used the
words, "We must simply take it," thus associating himself with Kruger.
Cecil Rhodes was far too cute to do any such tiling, knowing that it would
be interpreted in a sense inimical to his plans. But I should not be
surprised if, when the President remarked that Delagoa was Portuguese, he
had replied, "It does not matter, and you must simply take it." This would
have been far more to the point, as it would have hinted to those who knew
how to read between the lines that England, which Rhodes was persuaded was
incarnated in himself, would not mind if the Transvaal did lay hands on
Delagoa Bay. Such an act would furnish the British Government with a
pretext for dabbling to some effect in the affairs of the Transvaal
Republic.

Such a move as this would have been just one of these things which Rhodes
was fond of doing. He felt sometimes a kind of malicious pleasure in
whispering to others the very things likely to get them into trouble
should they be so foolish as to do them. In the case of President Kruger,
however, he had to deal with a mind which, though uncouth, yet possessed
all the "slimness" of which so many examples are to be found in South
Africa.

Kruger wrote, "Rhodes represented capital, no matter how base and
contemptible, and whether by lying, bribery or treachery, all and every
means were welcome to him if they led to the attainment of his ambitious
desires." But Oom Paul was absolutely wrong in thinking that it was the
personage he was thus describing who practised all these abominations. He
ought to have remembered that it was his name only which was associated
with all these basenesses, and the man himself, if left to his better
self, would never have condescended to the many acts of doubtful morality
with which his memory will remain associated in history.

I am firmly convinced that on his own impulse he would never, for
instance, have ventured on the Raid. But, unhappily, his habit, when
something "not quite" was mentioned to him, was to say nothing and to
trust to his good luck to avoid unpleasant consequences arising out of his
silence. Had he ventured to oppose the plans of his confederates they
would have immediately turned upon him, and ... There were, perhaps, past
facts which he did not wish the world to remember. His frequent fits of
raging temper arose from this irksome feeling, and was his way--a futile
way--of revenging himself on his jailors for the durance in which they
kept him. The man who believed himself to be omnipotent in South Africa,
and who was considered so powerful by the world at large, was in reality
in the hands of the very organisations he had helped to build.

It was not Cecil John Rhodes' will which was paramount in the South
African League. Kruger spoke absolutely the truth when he asserted that it
was essential "to know something about the Chartered Company before it was
possible to realise the true perspective of the history of South Africa
during the closing years of the last century." Another of Kruger's
sweeping assertions--and one which he never backed by anything
tangible--was when he further wrote that Rhodes was "one of the most
unscrupulous characters that ever existed, whose motto was 'the end
justifies the means,' a motto that contains a creed which represents the
whole man." Rhodes by nature was not half so unscrupulous as Kruger
himself, but he was surrounded by unscrupulous people, whom he was too
indolent to repulse. He was constantly paying the price of his former
faults and errors in allowing his name to serve as a shield for the
ambitions of those who were in no way worthy of him and who constantly
abused his confidence.

The habit became ingrained in the nature of Cecil Rhodes of always doing
what he chose without regard to the feelings and sentiments of others. It
persisted during the whole of the war, and would probably have proved a
serious impediment to the conclusion of peace had he lived until it became
accomplished. This characteristic led him, after all his intrigues with
the Dutch party and the Bond, to throw himself once more into the arms of
the English Progressive party and to start a campaign of his own against
the rebel Colonials and the Dutch inhabitants of the Transvaal.

While the siege of Kimberley lasted, even while he was seeking to become
reconciled to the British element, Rhodes asserted himself in a strongly
offensive manner. He sent to Sir Alfred Milner in Cape Town reports of his
own as to the military authorities and dispositions, couched in such
alarming tones that the High Commissioner became most uneasy concerning
the possible fate of the Diamond City. These reports accused the officers
in charge of the town of failing in the performance of their duties, and
showing symptoms of abject fear in regard to the besieging Boer army. It
was only after an explanation from Sir Redvers Buller, and after the
latter had communicated to him the letters which he himself had received
from Colonel Kekewich, the commander of the troops to whom had been
entrusted the defence of Kimberley, that Sir Alfred was reassured.

The fact was that Rhodes became very impatient to find that his movements
were watched by the military authorities, and that sometimes even the
orders which he gave for what he considered the greater security of the
town, and gave with the superb assurance which distinguished him, were
cancelled by the responsible officials. Disgraceful scenes followed.
Rhodes was accused of wishing to come to an arrangement with Cronje, who
was in charge of the besieging troops, in order to bring the war to an end
by his own efforts.

I never have been able to ascertain how much of real truth, if any, was in
the various accusations made against Cecil Rhodes by the English General
Officers, but they were embodied in the message which was alleged to have
been flashed across to Kimberley after the battle of Modder River by Lord
Methuen, but which was supposed by those whom it concerned to have been
inspired by the Commander-in-Chief:

"Tell Mr. Rhodes," the heliograph ran, "that on my entry into Kimberley he
and his friends must take their immediate departure."

Two years later, in November, 1902, Sir Redvers Buller, when speaking at
the annual dinner of the Devonians in London, remarked that he must
protest against the rumours which, during the siege of Kimberley, had been
spread by some of its residents that the Imperial authorities had been in
a perpetual state of "funk." The allusion was understood to refer to Mr.
Rhodes by his partisans, who protested against the speech. Rhodes, indeed,
during his whole life was never in greater disfavour with the English
Government than after the siege of Kimberley; perhaps because he had
always accused Whitehall of not understanding the real state of things in
South Africa. The result of that imperative telegram, and Rhodes' belief
as to its source, was bitter hatred against Sir Redvers Buller. It soon
found expression in vindictive attacks by the whole Rhodesian Press
against the strategy, the abilities, and even the personal honesty of Sir
Redvers Buller.

Whether Rhodes, upon his arrival in London, attempted to hurt the General
I do not know, but it could be always taken for granted that Rhodes could
be a very bad enemy when he chose.

Upon his return to Groote Schuur he seemed more dissatisfied than ever
with the Home Government. He was loud in his denunciations and unceasing
in his criticisms. Sir Alfred, however, like the wise man he was,
preferred to ignore these pinpricks, and invariably treated Rhodes with
the utmost courtesy and attention. He always showed himself glad to listen
to Rhodes and to discuss with him points which the Colossus thought it
worth while to talk over. At that time Rhodes was in the most equivocal
position he had ever been in his life. He could not return to Kimberley;
he did not care to go to Rhodesia; and in Cape Colony he was always
restive.

At this period all kinds of discussions used to take place concerning the
ultimate results of the war and the influence which it would have on the
future development of affairs in the Transvaal. The financiers began to
realise that after the British flag had once been raised at Pretoria they
would not have such a good time of it as they had hoped at first, and now,
having done their best to hurry on the war, regretted it more than anybody
else. The fact was that everybody in South Africa, with the exception of
the Boers themselves, who knew very well their own resources, had believed
that the war would be over in three months, and that the Transvaal would
be transferred into a Crown Colony where adventurers and gold-seekers
would have a fine time.

Rhodes himself had more than once expressed his conviction that the
destruction of the Boers would not take more than three months at the
most, and this assurance was accepted as gospel by most of the financiers
of Johannesburg. An exception was Mr. F. Eckstein, the general manager and
partner in the concern of Wernher, Beit & Co., and one of the ablest
financiers in that city. From the first he was quite pessimistic in regard
to the length of time the war would take.

As the war dragged on without there seeming any chance of its being
brought to a rapid conclusion, it became evident that England, after all
the sacrifices which she was making, would never consent to leave the
leaders of the movement--the ostensible object of which had been to grant
to the Uitlanders certain privileges to which they had no right--as sole
and absolute masters of the situation. In fact, the difficulties of the
war made it evident that, once peace was proclaimed, public opinion at
home would demand that the Transvaal, together with the Orange Free State,
should be annexed to the British Empire in view of a future federation of
the whole of South Africa, about which the English Press was already
beginning to speak.

That South Africa should not remain a sphere of exploitation sent shivers
down the spines of the financiers. The South African League was observed
to become quite active in discovering rebels. Their zeal in this direction
was felt all over Cape Colony. Their aim was to reduce the register in
order to bring about a considerable falling off of voters for the
Afrikander Bond, and thereby substantially influence the results of the
next election to the Cape Parliament.

At this period certain overtures were made once again to the Bond party.
They proceeded apparently from men supposed to act on their own
initiative, but who were known to be in favour at Groote Schuur. These
advances met with no response, but when the rumour that they had been made
spread among the public owing to an indiscretion, Rhodes hastened to deny
that he had been a party to the plan--as was his wont when he failed to
achieve. All the same, it is a fact that members of the House of Assembly
belonging to the Afrikander party visited Groote Schuur in the course of
that last winter which Rhodes spent there, and were warmly welcomed.
Rhodes showed himself unusually gracious. He hoped these forerunners would
rally his former friends to his side once more. But Rhodes was expecting
too much, considering ail the circumstances. Faithful to his usual
tactics, even whilst his Afrikander guests were being persuaded to lend
themselves to an intrigue from which they had hoped to win something,
Rhodes was making himself responsible for another step likely to render
the always strong hatred even more acute than ever. More than that, he was
advocating, through certain underground channels, the suspension of the
Constitution in Cape Colony.

[Illustration: THE RT. HON. SIR W.F. HELY-HUTCHINSON]

The particulars of this incident were only disclosed after the war was
over. The whole thing was thrashed out in Parliament and its details
communicated to the public by Mr. David de Waal, one of the truest friends
Mr. Rhodes ever had. The discussion took place after Sir Alfred Milner had
been transferred to Johannesburg and Sir Walter Hely-Hutchinson had taken
his place in Cape Town. The South African League had become more active
than ever, and was using all its influence to secure a majority for its
members at the next general election. The Bond, on its side, had numerous
adherents up country, and the stout Dutch farmers had remained faithful to
their old allegiance, so there was no hope that they would be induced,
even through the influence of money, to give their votes to the
Progressives. The only things which remained were: a redistribution of
seats, then a clearing out of the register, and, lastly, a suspension of
the Constitution, which would have allowed the Governor a "free" hand in
placing certain measures on the statute book. The most influential members
among the executive of the South African League met at Cotswold Chambers,
and Rhodes, who was present, drew up a petition which was to be presented
to the Prime Minister. Sir Gordon Sprigg, who filled that office, was a
man who, with all his defects, was absolutely incapable of lending himself
to any mean trick in order to remain in power. When Sir Gordon became
acquainted with the demands of the League he refused absolutely to take a
part in what he maintained would have been an everlasting blot on the
reputation of the Government.

After Rhodes' death, when the question of the suspension of the
Constitution was raised by the Progressives in the House of Assembly, it
was discussed in all its details, and it was proved that the South African
League, in trying throughout the country to obtain signatures to a monster
petition on the matter, had resorted to some more than singular means to
obtain these signatures. Mr. Sauer, who was the leader of the Bond party
in the Chamber, revealed how the League had employed agents to induce
women and sometimes young children to sign the petition, and that at the
camp near Sea Point, a suburb of Cape Town, where soldiers were stationed
previous to their departure for England, these same agents were engaged in
getting them to sign it before they left under the inducement of a fixed
salary up to a certain amount and a large percentage after it had been
exceeded, according to the number of the names obtained in this way. When
trustworthy people of unimpeachable character wrote to the papers
denouncing this manoeuvre the subsidised papers in Cape Town, and the
Rhodesian Press, refused to publish the affidavits sworn on the subject,
but wrote columns of calumnies about the Dutch Colonials, and, as a
finishing stroke, clamoured for the suspension of the Constitution.

The speech of Mr. Sauer gave rise to a heated debate, during which the
Progressive members indignantly denied his assertions. Then stepped in Mr.
David de Waal, that friend of Rhodes to whom I have already referred. He
rose to bring his testimony to the facts revealed by Mr. Sauer, who was
undoubtedly the most able leader which the Afrikander party possessed,
with the exception, perhaps, of Mr. Merriman.

"In February, 1902," he said, "there was a meeting in Cotswold Chambers
consisting of the twenty-two members of the House of Assembly who went by
the name of 'Rhodes' group.' It was at first discussed and ultimately
decided to wait on the Prime Minister and to interview him concerning the
expenditure of the war, which had reached the sum of £200,000 monthly.
Then, after some further discussion, we came to the conclusion to meet
once more. This was done on February 17th. You must remember that war was
still raging at the time. At this second meeting it was agreed to
formulate a scheme to be submitted to the Government which proposed the
suspension of the Constitution in regard to five clauses. The first was to
be this very suspension, then a new registration of voters, a
redistribution of seats, the indemnity to be awarded to the faithful
English Colonials, and, finally, the reestablishment of the Constitution.
As to this last I must make a statement, and that is, that if I had known
that it was meant to withdraw the Constitution for more than one month I
would have objected to it, but I was told that it would be only a matter
of a few days."

At this point Mr. de Waal was interrupted by a Progressive member, who
exclaimed that Dr. Jameson had denied that such a thing had ever been said
or mentioned.

"I know he has done so," replied Mr. de Waal, "but I will make a
declaration on my oath. A committee was then appointed," he went on,
"which waited on the Prime Minister and presented to him this very same
petition. Sir Gordon Sprigg, however, said that he would not be ruled by
anyone, because they had a responsible Government. The Committee reported,
when it returned, that the Prime Minister was opposed to any movement
started on the basis of the petition which they had presented to him, and
that he would not move an inch from his declaration, saying energetically,
'Never! I shall never do it!' Sir Gordon Sprigg had further pointed out
that the result of such a step would be that the Cape would become a Crown
Colony and would find itself in the same position as Rhodesia."

Perhaps this was what Rhodes and the South African League had wished, but
the publication of the details connected with this incident, especially
proceeding from a man who had never made a secret of the ties which had
bound him to Rhodes, and who, among the latter's Dutch friends, had been
the only one who had never failed him, drove the first nail into the
coffin of Rhodesian politics.

It was common knowledge that de Waal had steadfastly stood by Rhodes even
during the terrible time of the Raid. Moreover, he was a man of high
integrity, who alone among those who had attached themselves to the
destinies of the Empire Maker had never taken part in the financial
schemes of a doubtful nature which marked the wonderful career of Rhodes.
This declaration opened the eyes of many persons who, to that day, had
denied the political intrigues which had been going on at Cotswold
Chambers. Afterwards it became relatively easy for Sir Alfred Milner to
clear the atmosphere in South Africa and to establish public life on
sounder principles than the pure love of gain. It cannot be sufficiently
regretted that he should not have done so before Rhodes' death and thus
have given Rhodes--and, incidentally, the country for which Rhodes had
done so much in the way of material development--the opportunity to shake
off his parasites and become a real factor in solidifying the great area
in which he was such an outstanding personality.




CHAPTER VIII.

THE INFLUENCE OF SIR ALFRED MILNER


The occult power exercised by the League on the inner politics of South
Africa could not fail to impress Sir Alfred Milner most unpleasantly.
Frank himself, it must have often been absolutely repulsive to him to have
to do with people whom he feared to trust and who believed that they could
bring into political life the laxities of the mining camp. Though not
aware of it, even before he landed in Cape Town the Progressives had made
up their minds to represent him as determined to sweep the Dutch off the
face of the earth.

Believing Sir Alfred to be the confederate of Rhodes, the Boers, too,
would have nothing to do with him. Whilst the Bloemfontein Conference was
going on President Kruger, as well as the leaders of the Afrikander Bond,
were overwhelmed with covert warnings to distrust the High Commissioner.
Whence they emanated is not a matter of much doubt. Sir Alfred was accused
of wanting to lay a trap for the Boer plenipotentiaries, who were told to
beware of him as an accomplice of Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, whose very name
produced at Pretoria the same effect as a red rag upon a bull. Under these
circumstances the Conference was bound to fail, and the High Commissioner
returned to Cape Town, very decidedly a sadder and most certainly a wiser
man.

Now that years have passed since the Boer War it is possible to secure a
better perspective, in the light of which one can question whether it
would have been possible to avoid the conflict by an arrangement of some
kind with the Boer Republics, Personally, I believe that an understanding
was not out of the question if the strong financial interests had not
opposed its accomplishment; but at the same time a patched up affair would
not have been a happy event for either South Africa or for England. It
would have left matters in almost the same condition as they had been
before, and the millionaires, who were the real masters on the Rand, would
have found a dozen pretexts to provoke a new quarrel with the Transvaal
Government. Had the Boer Executive attempted to do away with the power of
the concerns which ruled the gold mines and diamond fields, it would have
courted a resistance with which it would have been next to impossible to
deal. The war would still have taken place, but it might have occurred at
a far less favourable moment. No arrangement with President Kruger, even
one most propitious to British interests, could have done away with the
corruption and the bribery which, from the first moment of the discovery
of the gold fields, invaded that portion of South Africa, and this
corruption would always have stood in the way of the establishment of the
South African Union.

Sir Alfred Milner knew all this very well, and probably had an inward
conviction, notwithstanding his efforts to prevent the war, that a
conflict was the only means of breaking these chains of gold which
shackled the wheels of progress. At so critical a time the support of
Rhodes and his party would have been invaluable. And Sir Alfred would have
welcomed it. Cecil Rhodes, of course, had declared himself officially in
accord with the High Commissioner, and even praised him to a degree of
fulsomeness. But the ulterior motive was simply to excite the Dutch party
against him. The reputation of Sir Alfred Milner as a statesman and as a
politician was constantly challenged by the very people who ought to have
defended it. Rhodes himself had been persuaded that the Governor harboured
the most sinister designs against his person. The innuendo was one of the
most heinous untruths ever invented by his crowd of sycophants.

An opportunity came my way, by which I was able to convince myself how
false was the belief nourished by Rhodes against Milner. During the course
of a conversation with Sir Alfred, I boldly asked him whether he was
really such an enemy of Rhodes as represented. I was surprised by the
moderate tone in which he replied to my, after all, impertinent question.
The remarks which we then exchanged filled me with the greatest admiration
for the man who so nobly, and so worthily, upheld British prestige in
South Africa under the most trying circumstances. Milner was an entirely
honest man--the rarest thing in the whole of Cape Town at that anxious
period--and after one had had the advantage of discussing with him the
political situation, one could only be filled with profound respect for
him and for his opinions, actions and conduct. Far from working against
Rhodes, as Sir Alfred had been represented to me as doing, I convinced
myself that he was keenly anxious to be on good and, what is more
important, on sincere terms with him. Sir Alfred had not the slightest
feeling of animosity against the Dutch. On the contrary, he would have
liked them to become persuaded of his desire to protect them against
possible aggression by the Jingoes, whose offensive conduct none more than
himself assessed at its true value.

But what was the real situation? He found his every action misconstrued;
whatever he did was interpreted in a wrong sense, and those who should
have shared his aims were plotting against him. The position was truly
tragic from whatever side it was viewed, and a weaker or less honest man
would assuredly have given up the struggle.

A few days after my conversation with Sir Alfred Milner, which took place
during the course of a dinner at Government House, I took opportunity to
mention it to Rhodes. I tried to clear his mind of the suspicions that I
knew he entertained in regard to the High Commissioner. Cecil Rhodes
listened to me with attention, then asked me in that sarcastic tone of
his, which was so intensely disagreeable and offensive, whether I was in
love with Sir Alfred, as I had so suddenly become his champion. Then he
ended, "You are trying to make me believe the impossible." I did not allow
him, however, to ruffle me, as evidently was his desire, but replied that
when one came to know better those whom one had only met occasionally,
without ever having talked with them seriously, it was natural to amend
one's opinion accordingly. I told him, too, that my earlier
misapprehension had been intensified by a certain lady who posed as
Rhodes' greatest friend, and who had been loud in her denunciations of the
High Commissioner, long before I had ever met him. But now, I added, I had
come to the conclusion that Sir Alfred had been terribly maligned.

At this point Rhodes interrupted me with the remark: "So you think that he
is a paragon. Well, I won't contradict you, and, besides, you know that I
have always defended him; but still, with all his virtues, he has not yet
found out what he ought to do with me."

"What can one do with you, Mr. Rhodes?" I asked with a smile.

"Leave me alone," was the characteristic reply, in a tone which was
sufficient for me to follow the advice, as it meant that the man was
getting restive and might at any moment break out into one of those fits
of rage which he so often used as a means to bring to an end a
conversation in which he felt that he might not come out as victor.

A few days later a rabid Rhodesian who happened to be staying at Groote
Schuur approached me. "You have been trying to convert Mr. Rhodes to Sir
Alfred," he remarked.

"I have done nothing of the kind," I said. "I am not a preacher, but I
have been telling Mr. Rhodes that he was mistaken if he thought that he
had an enemy in the High Commissioner."

"Had you any reason to suppose that he considered him one?" was the
unexpected question.

"Well, from what I have seen it seemed to me that you have all been doing
your best to persuade him that such was the case," I retorted, "and why
you should have done so passes my comprehension."

The conversation dropped, but the incident confirmed me in my opinion that
strong forces were at work to sow enmity between Rhodes and Sir Alfred
Milner for fear the influence of the High Commissioner might bring Rhodes
to look at things differently. As things stood at the moment, Rhodes was
persuaded that the High Commissioner hated him, was jealous of him, wanted
him out of his path, and never meant to allow him under any circumstances
whatever to have any say in the settlement of South African affairs. This
conviction, which was carefully nourished from the outside, evoked in his
mind an absurd and silly rage to which no man of common sense, unblinded
by vanity, could have fallen victim. I would not be so foolish as to deny
to the famous Life Governor of De Beers either abundant common sense or
outstanding intelligence, but here was a man gifted with genius who, under
the impulse of passion, could act and speak like a child.

Rhodes looked upon the High Commissioner as a nuisance unfortunately not
to be set aside. What exasperated him, especially in regard to the High
Commissioner, was the fact that he knew quite well that Sir Alfred Milner
could assume the responsibility for concluding peace when that time
arrived. Rhodes always hoped that his personal influence on the English,
as well as among the Bond party, would enable him to persuade the leaders
of the rebel movement in Cape Colony to lay down their arms and to leave
their interests in his hands. Should such a thing have happened, Rhodes
thought that such a success as this would efface the bad impression left
by the Raid. He grudgingly admitted that that wild adventure had not
pleased people, but he always refused to acknowledge that it was the one
great and unredeemable mistake of his life. I remember once having quoted
to him the old French motto which in the Middle Ages was the creed of
every true knight:

                   "Mon âme à Dieu,
                    Mon bras au roi,
                    Mon coeur aux dames,
                    L'honneur à moi!"

"Ah, yes! In those times one could still think about such things," he
simply remarked, which proved to me that he had no comprehension of the
real sense of the beautiful words. The higher attributes of mind did not
trouble him either in the hours of his greatest triumphs or in the moments
when Fortune ceased to smile upon him. He thought he had something far
better: ambition, love of domination, the desire to eclipse everybody and
everything around him. I do not mention money, because Rhodes did not care
for money intrinsically.

Yet the man was great in spite of all his defects. Particularly in the
rein he gave to his thoughts during nights spent in the solitude of the
karroo, when the stars were almost the only things which he could look
upon, their immensity the only companion worthy of himself. One could
almost believe Cecil Rhodes was possessed of a dual personality. At one
moment he lived in the skies in regard to his own future prospects and the
great deeds he wished to perform, about which he never ceased to think.
The next he was on this earth, dabbling in the meannesses of humanity,
taking a vicious pleasure in noticing the evil about him and too
frequently succeeding, somehow, in wounding the feelings of those who
liked him best, and then wondering how it happened that he had so few
friends.

On account of these characteristics, notwithstanding all his wonderful
faculties, Cecil Rhodes will never remain an historical figure like the
Count of Egmont during the Revolt of the Netherlands, or Mirabeau at the
time of the French Revolution. Undoubtedly he achieved great things, but
nothing truly beautiful. I do not think that even the warmest of his
admirers can ever say that the organising and amalgamation of De Beers or
the conquest of Matabeleland had anything beautiful about them. Still,
they were triumphs which no one except himself could have achieved. He
undoubtedly erected an edifice the like of which had never been seen in
modern times, and he opened to the ambitions and to the greed of the world
new prospects, new sources of riches, which caused very many to look upon
him as truly the god of material success.

Rhodes can be said to have revolutionised Society by bringing to the
social horizon people who, but for the riches he placed within reach of
their grasping fingers, would never have been able to emerge from their
uncultured obscurity.

People have said to me, "How generous was Rhodes!" Yes, but always with a
shade of disdain in the giving which hurt the recipients of his charity.
One of the legends in the Cape is that half those whom Rhodes helped had
been his victims at one time or the other.

It was no wonder that Cecil Rhodes was an embittered man when one reflects
how many curses must have been showered upon his head. The conquest of
Matabeleland had not gone by without evoking terrible enmities; and the
amalgamation of De Beers, in consequence of which so many people who had
spent thousands of pounds in acquiring plots of ground where they had
hoped to find diamonds, and who had later to part from them for a mere
song, were among the things never forgiven him by those whom the
speculations had ruined. Later on came the famous Bill which he caused to
be adopted in both Houses of Legislature concerning the illicit buying of
diamonds, the I.D.B. Act.

The I.D.B. enactment destroyed one of the fundamental principles in
British legislature which always supposes a man to be innocent until he
has been proved guilty. It practically put the whole of Cape Colony under
the thumb of De Beers. The statute was not wisely framed. It could be
invoked to remove persons whose presence in Kimberley was inconvenient.
Therefore the I.D.B. Act drew on the head of Rhodes and of his colleagues
torrents of abuse. It is, unfortunately, certain that cases happened where
diamonds were hidden surreptitiously among the effects of certain persons
who had had the imprudence to say too loudly that they meant to expose the
state of things existing in Kimberley; and in consequence innocent men
were sentenced to long terms of imprisonment.

I heard one story in particular which, if true, throws a terrible light on
the state of affairs in the Diamond City. A young man of good connections,
who had arrived from England to seek his fortune in South Africa, was
engaged in Kimberley at a small salary by one of the big diamond mining
concerns. After about three or four months' sojourn he felt so disgusted
that he declared quite loudly that as soon as he could put by sufficient
money to pay his passage back to Europe he would do so, there to make it
the business of his life to enlighten his compatriots as to what was going
on in South Africa. He threatened, too, to warn his countrymen against
those who used to deluge England with prospectuses praising, in exalted
terms, the wonderful state of things existing in South Africa and dilating
upon the future prospects of Cape Colony. Old residents warned him he
would do better to restrain his wrath until he was out of reach of
interested parties; he did not listen to them, with the result that one
morning detectives appeared in the house where he lodged, searched his
room, and--found some diamonds hidden in a flower pot of geraniums which
was standing in his window and which the daughter of his landlady had
given him that very morning. No protestations of the unhappy young fellow
availed him. He was taken to Cape Town and condemned to seven years'
imprisonment, the end of which he did not live to see, as he died a few
months after he had been sentenced.

The story was freely current in South Africa; and, true or not, it is
unquestionable that a large number of persons suffered in consequence of
the I.D.B. Act, no more serious proofs being offered that they had taken
or concealed diamonds than the fact that the stones had been found in
unlikely places in their rooms. Books without number have been written
about the I.D.B. Act, a great number evidently evincing hatred or revenge
against Mr. Rhodes and his lieutenants.

The famous De Beers Company acquired a position of overwhelming strength
in the social, economical and political life of South Africa, where
practically it secured control of everything connected with finance and
industry. De Beers built cold storage rooms, a dynamite factory, ice
houses, interested itself in agriculture, fruit-growing, farming and
cattle-breeding all over the Colony. It managed to acquire shares in all
the new mining enterprises whether in the Transvaal or in Rhodesia.
Politically it controlled the elections, and there were certain districts
in the Cape Colony where no candidate unsupported by De Beers could hope
to be elected to a seat in Parliament. The company had its own police,
while its secret service was one of the most remarkable in the world,
having among its archives a record of the private opinions of all the
people enjoying any kind of eminence in the country. In presence of De
Beers the Governor himself was overshadowed; indeed, I do not think that
if the Home Government had tried to oppose the organisation it would have
had much chance of coming out on top.

Sir Alfred Milner was the first man who saw that it would be impossible
for England to have the last word in South Africa unless those who, both
in Cape Colony and in the Transvaal, were the real masters of the
situation were broken, and financial concerns persuaded to occupy
themselves solely with financial matters. Though Sir Alfred was wise
enough, and prudent enough, not to allow his feelings on the subject to
become public property, Rhodes was shrewd enough to guess that he would
encounter a resolute adversary in the person of the High Commissioner.
Perhaps had he kept his suspicions to himself instead of communicating
them to others he might have been persuaded in time to recognise that
there was a great deal in the opinions which Sir Alfred held as to the
participation of financial organisations in political matters. If only
each could have had a chance for a frank understanding, probably Milner
would not have objected to Rhodes continuing to control the vast machine
into which the diamond mines amalgamation had grown, so long as it
confined its operations to commerce.

If Government is exercised by a single person it is possible for it to
possess the elements of justice and equity, and to be carried out with few
mistakes of such gravity as would compromise the whole system. But,
unfortunately, the South African autocracy meant an army of small
autocrats, and it was they who compromised Rhodes and then sheltered
themselves behind his gigantic personality from the unpopularity and
detestation which their actions aroused in the whole of South Africa.

I feel personally convinced that if, during the period which immediately
followed upon the relief of Kimberley and of Lady smith, Rhodes had
approached Sir Alfred and frankly told him that he wanted to try his luck
with the Dutch party, and to see whether his former friends and colleagues
of the Afrikander Bond could not be induced to listen to reason, the High
Commissioner would have been only too glad to meet him and to explain his
views on the whole question. Instead of doing so, Rhodes, carried away as
he always was by this everlasting desire to be the first everywhere, did
not even give a thought to the wisdom of confiding to anyone the efforts
which he undoubtedly made to induce the Bond leaders to trust him again.

There was a moment when things got very near to an understanding between
Rhodes and Sir Alfred. This was when Mr. Sauer himself entertained the
thought of letting Rhodes sway the future by making with the English
Government conditions of a peace which would not wound to the quick the
feelings of the Dutch part of the population of the Colony.

A circumstance, apparently insignificant, destroyed all the hopes that had
been entertained by several who wished the Colossus well. Certain papers
were brought to Rhodes; these contained information likely to prove of use
to him as well as to the English Government. After he had read them he
asked that they should be left with him until the following day. The
person in charge of the documents had been asked not to part with them
even for a single hour, as it was important that no one should be able to
copy documents which might seriously compromise certain people. Therefore,
she refused. Rhodes thereupon flew into a terrible passion and demanded to
know the reason for the apparent distrust. When told that it was not so
much a question of distrust as the impossibility of breaking a promise
once given, he exclaimed that he would have nothing more to do with the
whole business, and started almost immediately afterwards his agitation
for the suspension of the Constitution in Cape Colony. But--and this is an
amusing detail to note--Rhodes used every possible effort to obtain
possession of the papers he had been allowed to see, going so far as to
have the house searched of the person who had refused to allow him to keep
the documents--a revenge which was as mean as it was useless, because the
papers in question had been at once returned to their rightful owners.

The request made by Rhodes to keep these documents produced a very bad
impression on those who had begun to entertain hopes that he might be
induced to throw the weight of his personality into the scale of a
settlement. It confirmed the suspicions held by the Afrikander party ever
since the Raid.

They say that everyone is afforded once the chance of one's lifetime. In
the case of Rhodes, he certainly missed by that action the one opportunity
of reinstating himself once again upon the pinnacle whence the adventure
of Doctor Jameson had caused him to fall.

I remember that whilst these events were going on a political man, well
acquainted with all details of the endeavour to secure a reconciliation
between the Afrikander Bond and Rhodes, came to see me one evening. We
talked over the whole situation. He told me that there were people who
thought it would be a good thing to inform Sir Alfred Milner of what was
going on, in the hope that he might give Rhodes an inkling that he knew
that intrigue was rife at Groote Schuur, and at the same time express to
Rhodes with what satisfaction he personally would view the good offices of
the Colossus to influence both the South African League and the Afrikander
Bond. But we agreed that it was quite impossible. Such a course would not
inspire the High Commissioner with an exalted idea as to our morality in
matters of trust, and, besides, it would not be playing the game in regard
to Rhodes and his group. So the matter dropped; but Rhodes suspected, and
never forgave us or any of those whose thoughts ran on the same lines.

Whether Sir Alfred Milner ever learned who had been trying to persuade the
master of Groote Schuur to seek his co-operation in what would have been
the noblest deed of Rhodes' life, I have not been able to ascertain to the
present day. To tell the truth, I never tried to do so, the matter having
lost all interest except as a matter of history.




CHAPTER IX.

THE OPENING OF THE NEW CENTURY


Such were the preoccupations, the intrigues and the emotions which, all
through that monotonous winter of 1900-1901, agitated the inhabitants of
and the visitors to Groote Schuur. Rhodes himself seemed to be the one man
who thought the least about them. It is certain that he felt hurt in his
pride and in his consciousness that the good which he had wanted to do
failed to be appreciated by those whom he had intended to benefit. But
outwardly he made no sign that the matter interested him otherwise than
from a purely objective point of view, that of the statesman who thinks
that it is part of his duty to put his services at the disposal of his
country whenever required to do so. He felt also slightly surprised to
find, once he had expressed his willingness to use the experience of South
African affairs which he had acquired and which no one in the Cape
possessed with such thoroughness, that the people who had appealed to him,
and whom he had consented to meet half-way, would not give him the whole
of their confidence; indeed, they showed some apprehension that he would
use his knowledge to their detriment.

When one reviews all the circumstances that cast such a tragic shade over
the history of these eventful months, one cannot help coming to the
conclusion that there was a good deal of misunderstanding on both sides
and a deplorable lack of confidence everywhere. Rhodes had entirely lost
ground among his former friends, and would not understand that it was more
difficult, even on the part of those who believed in his good intentions,
to efface the impression that he had been playing a double game ever since
the Raid had deprived him of the confidence and support which previously
were his all over Cape Colony.

The whole situation, as the new century opened, was a game of cross
purposes. Sir Alfred Milner might have unravelled the skein, but he was
the one man whom no one interested in the business wished to ask for help.
And what added to the tragedy was the curious but undisputable fact that
even those who reviled Rhodes hoped he would return to power and assume
the Premiership in place of Sir Gordon Sprigg.

In spite of the respect which Sir Gordon Sprigg inspired, and of the
esteem in which he was held by all parties, it was generally felt that if
Rhodes were once more at the helm he might return to a more reasonable
view of the whole situation. In such an office, too, it was believed that
Rhodes would give the Colony the benefit of his remarkable gifts of
statecraft, as well as wield the authority which he liked so much to
exercise, for the greater good of the country in general and of the
British Government in particular. I believe that if at that moment Cecil
Rhodes had become the head of the Cabinet not one voice, even among the
most fanatic of the Afrikander Bond, would have objected. Those most
averse to such a possibility were Rhodes' own supporters, a small group of
men whose names I shall refrain from mentioning.

All true friends of Rhodes, however, must surely have felt a keen regret
that he wasted his talents and his energy on those entangled and, after
all, despicable Cape politics. The man was created for something better
and healthier than that. He was an Empire Maker by nature, one who might
have won for himself everlasting renown had he remained "King of
Rhodesia," as he liked to call himself. There, in the vast solitudes which
by his enterprise and foresight had become a part of the British Empire,
he ought to have gone on uninterruptedly in the glorious task of bringing
civilisation to that hitherto unknown land. For such work his big nature
and strange character were well fitted, and his wide-ranging mind
appreciated the extent of the task. As he used to say himself sometimes,
he was never so happy and never felt so free and so much at peace with the
world and with mankind as among the Matoppo Hills.

The statesmanlike qualities which Cecil Rhodes undoubtedly possessed were
weakened by contact with inferior people. It is impossible to create real
politicians and sound ones at the same rapid pace as financial magnates
sprang up at the Cape as well as in the Transvaal. The class who entered
politics had as little real solidity about them as the houses and
dwellings which were built at a moment's notice from corrugated iron and a
few logs. They thought that they understood how to govern a nation because
they had thoroughly mastered the mysteries of bookkeeping in problematical
financial undertakings.

I remember one afternoon when, talking with Rhodes in the grounds of
Groote Schuur, he took me to the summer-house which he had built for
himself, whence one had a beautiful view over the country toward Table
Mountain. He leaned on the parapet of the little observatory which
surmounted the summer-house and lost himself in a day dream which, though
long, I felt I had better not interrupt. I can see his face and expression
still as, with his arms crossed over his chest, he gazed into space,
thinking, thinking, and forgetting all else but the vision which he was
creating in that extraordinary brain of his. I am sure that he remained so
for over twenty minutes. Then he slowly turned round to me and said, with
an accent indescribable in its intensity and poignancy:

"I have been looking at the North, at my own country--"

"Why do you not always remain there?" I exclaimed almost involuntarily, so
painfully did the words strike me.

"Because they will not let me," he replied.

"They? Who?" I asked again. "Surely you can do what you like?"

"You think so," he said, "but you do not know; there are so many things;
so many things. And they want me here too, and there is this place ..."

He stopped, then relapsed once more into his deep meditation, leaving me
wondering what was holding back this man who was reputed to do only what
he chose. Surely there would have been a far better, far nobler work for
him to do there in that distant North which, after all, in spite of the
beauties of Groote Schuur, was the only place for which he really cared.
There he could lead that absolutely free and untrammelled life which he
loved; there his marvellous gifts could expand with the freedom necessary
for them to shine in their best light for the good of others as well as
for his own advantage. In Rhodesia he was at least free, to a certain
extent, from the parasites.

How could one help pitying him and regretting that his indomitable will
did not extend to the courage of breaking from his past associations; that
he did not carry his determination far enough to make up his mind to
consecrate what was left of his life to the one task for which he was best
fitted, that of making Rhodesia one of the most glorious possessions of
the British crown. Rhodes had done so much, achieved so much, had
conceived such great things--as, for instance, the daring inception of the
Cape to Cairo Railway--that it surely could have been possible for him to
rise above the shackling weaknesses of his environment.

So many years have passed since the death of Rhodes that, now, one can
judge him objectively. To me, knowing him so well as I did, it seem that
as his figure recedes into the background of history, it acquires more
greatness. He was a mystery to so many because few had been able to guess
what it was that he really meant, or believed in, or hoped for. Not a
religious man by any means, he yet possessed that religion of nature which
pervades the soul of anyone who has ever lived for long face to face with
grandeurs and solitudes where human passions have no entrance. It is the
adoration of the Greatness Who created the beauty which no touch can
defile, no tongue slander, and nobody destroy. Under the stars, to which
he confided so much of the thoughts which he had kept for himself in his
youth and early manhood, Rhodes became a different man. There in the
silence of the night or the dawn of early morning, when he started for
those long rides of which he was so fond, he became affectionate, kind,
thoughtful and tender. There he thought, he dreamt, he planned, and the
result of these wanderings of his mind into regions far beyond those where
the people around him could stray was that he revealed himself as God had
made him and such as man hardly ever saw him.

Rhodes had always been a great reader; books, indeed, had a great
influence over his mind, his actions and opinions. He used to read slowly,
and what he had once assimilated he never forgot. Years after he would
remember a passage treating of some historical fact, or of some social
interest, and apply it to his own work. For instance, the idea of the Glen
Grey Act was suggested to him by the famous book of Mackenzie Wallace
dealing with Russia,[B] in which he described the conditions under which
Russian peasants then held their land. When Rhodes met the author of the
aforementioned volume at Sandringham, where both were staying with the
then Prince and Princess of Wales, he told him at once, with evident
pleasure at being able to do so, that it was his book which had suggested
that particular bit of legislation.

    [B] "Russia" (Cassell).

Another occasion I remember when Rhodes spoke of the great impression
produced upon his opinions by a book called "The Martyrdom of Man,"[C] the
work of Winwood Reade, an author not very well known to the general
public. The essay was an unusually powerful negation of the Divinity.
Rhodes had, unfortunately for him, chanced across it just after he had
left the University, and during the first months following upon his
arrival in South Africa he read it in his moments of leisure between
looking for diamonds in the sandy plains of Kimberley. It completely upset
all the traditions in which he had been nurtured--it must be remembered
that he was the son of a clergyman--and caused a revolt against the
teachings of his former masters.

    [C] Published in the U.S.A., 1875.

The adventurous young man who had left his native country well stocked
with principles which he was already beginning to find embarrassing, found
in this volume an excuse for becoming the personage with whom the world
was to become familiar later on, when he appeared on the horizon as an
Empire Maker. He always kept this momentous book beside him, and used to
read it when he wanted to strengthen himself in some hard resolution or
when he was expected to steel his mind to the performance of some task
against which his finest instincts revolted even whilst his sense of
necessity urged him onward.

Talking with me on the occasion I have referred to above, in respect to
this volume which had left such weeds in his mind, he expressed to me his
great enthusiasm about the ideas it contained, and spoke with unmeasured
approval of its strong and powerful arguments against the existence of a
Deity, and then exclaimed, "You can imagine the impression which it
produced on me when I read it amid all the excitement of life at Kimberley
not long after leaving Oxford University." And he added in a solemn tone,
"That book has made me what I am."

I think, however, that Rhodes exaggerated in attaching such influence to
Reade's essay. He was very interested in the supernatural, a feature which
more than once I have had occasion to observe in people who pretend that
they believe in nothing. I suspect that, had he been able to air the
doubts which must have assailed him sometimes when alone in the solitudes
of Rhodesia, one would have discovered that a great deal of carelessness,
of which he used to boast in regard to morality and to religion, was
nothing but affectation. He treated God in the same offhand way he handled
men, when, in order to terrify them, he exposed before their horrified
eyes abominable theories, to which his whole life gave the lie. But in his
inmost heart he knew very well that God existed. He would have felt quite
content to render homage to the Almighty if only this could have been done
incognito. In fact, he was quite ready to believe in God, but would have
felt extremely sorry had anyone suspected that such could be the case. The
ethical side of Cecil Rhodes' character remained all through his life in
an unfinished state. It might perhaps have been the most beautiful side of
his many-sided life had he not allowed too much of what was material, base
and common to rule him. Unwillingly, perhaps, but nevertheless certainly,
he gave the impression that his life was entirely dedicated to ignoble
purposes. Perhaps the punishment of his existence lay precisely in the
rapidity with which the words "Rhodesian finance" and "Rhodesian politics"
came to signify corruption and bribery. Even though he may not have been
actually guilty of either, he most certainly profited by both. He
instituted in South Africa an utter want of respect for one's neighbour's
property, which in time was a prime cause of the Transvaal War. Hated as
he was by some, distrusted as he remained by almost everybody, yet there
was nothing mean about Cecil Rhodes. Though one felt inclined to detest
him at times, yet one could not help liking and even loving him when he
allowed one to see the real man behind the veil of cynicism and irony
which he constantly assumed.

With Rhodes' death the whole system of Rhodesian politics perished. It
then became relatively easy for Sir Alfred Milner to introduce the
necessary reforms into the government of South Africa. The financial
magnates who had ruled at Johannesburg and Kimberley ceased to interest
themselves politically in the management of the affairs of the Government.
They disappeared one after the other, bidding good-bye to a country which
they had always hated, most of them sinking into an obscurity where they
enjoy good dinners and forget the nightmare of the past.

The Dutch and the English elements have become reconciled, and loyalty to
England, which seemed at the time of the Boer War, and during the years
that had preceded it, to have been confined to a small number of the
English, has become the rule. British Imperialism is no mere phantom: the
Union of South Africa has proved it to have a very virile body, and, what
is more important, a lofty and clear-visioned soul.




CHAPTER X.

AN ESTIMATE OF SIR ALFRED MILNER


The conditions under which Sir Alfred Milner found himself compelled to
shape his policy of conciliation were beset with obstacles and
difficulties. An understanding of these is indispensable to the one who
would read aright the history of that period of Imperial evolution.

The question of the refugees who overwhelmed Cape Colony with their
lamentations, after they had been obliged to leave the Transvaal at
the beginning of the hostilities--the claims of the Rand
multi-millionaires--the indignation of the Dutch Colonists confined in
concentration camps by order of the military authorities--the Jingoes
who thought it would be only right to shoot down every Dutch
sympathiser in the country: these were among the things agitating the
South African public mind, and setting up conflicting claims
impossible of adjustment without bitter censure on one hand or the
other. The wonder is that, amid all these antagonistic elements, Sir
Alfred Milner contrived to fulfil the larger part of the tasks which
he had sketched out for himself before he left England.

The programme which Sir Alfred planned to carry out proved, in the long
run, to have been thoroughly sound in conception and practice, because it
contained in embryo all the conditions under which South Africa became
united. It is remarkable, indeed, that such a very short time after a war
which seemed altogether to have compromised any hope of coalescing, the
Union of South Africa should have become an accomplished fact.

Yet, strange as it may appear, it is certain that up to his retirement
from office Sir Alfred Milner was very little known in South Africa. He
had been so well compelled by force of circumstances to lead an isolated
life that very few had opportunity to study his character or gain insight
into his personality. In Cape Town he was judged by his policy. People
forgot that all the time he was at Government House, Cape Town, he was a
man as well as a politician: a man whose efforts and work in behalf of his
country deserved some kind of consideration even from his enemies. It is
useless to discuss whether Sir Alfred did or did not make mistakes before
the beginning of the war. Why waste words over events which cannot be
helped, and about which there will always be two opinions? Personally, I
think that his errors were essentially of the kind which could not have
been avoided, and that none of them ever compromised ultimately the great
work which he was to bring to a triumphant close.

What I do think it is of value to point out is the calmness which he
contrived always to preserve under circumstances which must have been
particularly trying for him. Another outstanding characteristic was the
quiet dignity with which he withstood unjustifiable attacks when dealing
with not-to-be-foreseen difficulties which arose while carrying on his
gigantic task. Very few would have had the courage to remain silent and
undaunted whilst condemned or judged for things he had been unable to
alter or to banish. And yet this was precisely the attitude to which Sir
Alfred Milner faithfully adhered. It stands out among the many proofs
which the present Viscount Milner has given of his strong character as one
of its most characteristic features, for it affords a brilliant
illustration of what will, mastered by reason, can do.

Since those perilous days I have heard many differing criticisms of Lord
Milner's administration as High Commissioner in South Africa. What those
who express opinions without understanding that which lies under the
surface of history fail to take into account is the peculiar, almost
invidious position and the loneliness in which Sir Alfred had to stand
from the very first day that he landed in Table Bay. He could not make
friends, dared not ask anyone's advice, was forced always to rely entirely
upon his own judgment. He would not have been human had he not sometimes
felt misgivings as to the wisdom of what he was doing. He never had the
help of a Ministry upon whom he could rely or with whom he could
sympathise. The Cabinet presided over by Sir Gordon Sprigg was composed of
very well-intentioned men. But, with perhaps one single exception, it did
not possess any strongly individualistic personage capable of assisting
Sir Alfred in framing a policy acceptable to all shades of public opinion
in the Colony, or even to discuss with him whether such a policy could
have been invented. As for the administration of which Mr. Schreiner was
the head, it was distinctly hostile to the policy inaugurated by Mr.
Joseph Chamberlain, which Sir Alfred represented. Its members, indeed, put
every obstacle in the Governor's way, and this fact becoming known
encouraged a certain spirit of rebellion among the Dutch section of the
population. Neither one Ministry nor the other was able to be of any
serious use to Milner, who, thus hampered, could neither frame a programme
which accorded with his own judgment nor show himself in his true light.

[Illustration: VISCOUNT MILNER]

All these circumstances were never taken into consideration by friends or
foes, and, in consequence, he was made responsible for blunders which he
could not help and for mistakes which he was probably the first to
deplore. The world forgot that Sir Alfred never really had a free hand,
was always thwarted, either openly or in secret, by some kind of
authority, be it civil or military, which was in conflict with his own.

It was next to an impossibility to judge a man fairly under such
conditions. All that one could say was that he deserved a good deal of
praise for having, so successfully as he did, steered through the manifold
difficulties and delicate susceptibilities with which he had to contend in
unravelling a great tangle in the history of the British Empire.

The Afrikander Bond hated him, that was a recognised fact, but this hatred
did Sir Alfred more good than anything else. The attacks directed against
him were so mean that they only won him friends among the very people to
whom his policy had not been acceptable. The abuse showered by certain
newspapers upon the High Commissioner not only strengthened his hands and
his authority, but transformed what ought to have remained a personal
question into one in which the dignity as well as the prestige of the
Empire was involved. To have recalled hi

Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/16600