Victorian Worthies

G >> George Henry Blore >> Victorian Worthies

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28

Hofmeyr was a curious man. He had a great understanding of the Dutch
character and a great power of influencing men; but this was not done by
parliamentary eloquence. By one satirist he was called 'the captain who
never appeared on the bridge'; by another he was nicknamed 'the Mole',
because his activity could only be conjectured from the tracks which he
left behind him. A third name current in Cape Town, 'the Blind Man,' was
an ironical tribute to his exceptional astuteness in politics. His organ
was 'the Afrikander Bond', a society formed partly for agricultural,
partly for political purposes, a creature which like a chameleon has
often changed its colour, sometimes working peacefully beside British
politicians, at other times openly conducting an anti-British agitation.
He certainly had no enthusiasm for the British flag, but he probably
realized the freedom which the Colony enjoyed under it, and was clear of
all disloyalty to the Crown. The policy dearest to the farmers of the
Afrikander Bond was the protective system for their agricultural
produce. If Rhodes would support this, he might induce the Dutch to give
him a free hand in his plans for expansion towards the North; and this
was needed, because the problem of the North was becoming urgent, and
Sprigg and his party were blind to its importance.

A glance at the nineteenth-century map will show that the territories of
the Dutch Republic, lying on the less barren side of the continent,
tended to block the extension of Cape Colony and Natal towards the
north, the more so as the Boers from time to time sent out fresh swarms
westward and encroached on native territory in Bechuanaland. The Germans
did not annex Namaqualand till 1885, but already their interest in this
district was becoming evident to close observers. Rhodes's most
cherished dream had been the development of the high-lying healthy
inland regions to the north by the British race under the British flag.
But in those days, when Whitehall was asleep and officials in Cape Town
were indifferent, Rhodes saw that his best chance was to convert the
Dutch in the Colony. He hoped to make them realize that, if they
supported him, the development of the interior might bring trade through
Cape Town, which otherwise would go eastward through Portuguese
channels. The building of railways, the settlement of new lands in which
Dutch and English would share alike, were practical questions which
might interest them, and Rhodes was quite genuine in his desire to see
both races going forward together. 'Equal rights for every civilized man
south of the Zambezi' was his motto, and to this he steadfastly clung.

To describe all the means by which Rhodes worked towards this end would
be impossible. He worked hard at Kimberley to furnish the sinews of war;
he used his personal influence and power of persuasion at Cape Town to
win support from Hofmeyr and others; and he was ready to go to the
frontier at any moment when there was work to be done. His first
commission of this sort had been in Basutoland in 1882, when he helped
the famous General Gordon to pacify native discontent; but the following
year saw him at work on another frontier more directly affecting his
programme. The Boers had again been raiding westwards and had started
two new republics, called Goshen and Stellaland, on the route from
Kimberley to the north. Rhodes travelled to the scene of action,
interviewed Mankoroane, the Bechuana chief, and Van Niekerk, the head of
the new settlement, and by sheer personal magnetism persuaded them both
to accept British control. When the Cape Parliament refused the
responsibility, he referred to the Colonial Office in London, and by the
help of Sir Hercules Robinson, the High Commissioner, he carried his
point. When the new Governor, who was appointed by the Colonial Office,
quarrelled with the Boers, it was Rhodes who made up the quarrel, and
when in 1885 the Transvaal Dutch interfered and provoked our home
Government into sending out an overpowering force under Sir Charles
Warren, it was Rhodes once more who acted as the reconciler, and
effected a settlement between Dutch and British. When the indignant
Delarey,[64] provoked by English blundering, said ominously that 'blood
must flow', Rhodes replied, 'No, give me my breakfast, and then we can
talk about blood'. He stayed with Delarey a week, came to terms on the
points at issue, and even became godfather to Delarey's grandchild. He
was never the man to resort to force when persuasion could be employed,
and he usually won his end by his own means.

[Note 64: General Jacobus Delarey, one of the most successful
commanders in the Great Boer War of 1899-1902.]

While his great work in 1883-5 was on the northern frontier he was
growing to be a familiar figure among politicians at Cape Town. We have
an impression of him as he appeared on his entrance into politics. 'He
was tall, broad-shouldered, with face and figure of somewhat loose
formation. His hair was auburn, carelessly flung over his forehead, his
eyes of bluish grey, dreamy but kindly. But the mouth--aye, that was the
unruly member of his face--with deep lines following the curve of the
moustache, it had a determined, masterful, and sometimes scornful
expression.... His style of speaking was straight and to the point. He
was not a hard hitter in debate--rather a persuader, reasoning and
pleading in a conversational way as one more anxious to convince an
opponent than to expose his weakness. He used little gesture: what there
was, was most expressive, his hands held behind him, or thrust out,
sometimes passed over his brow.'[65] Such success as he had in
Parliament he owed less to art than to nature, less to oratorical gifts
than to force of character; but this brought him rapidly to the front.
As early as 1884 he was in the Ministry, and despite his long absences
over his northern work he was judged to be the only man who could become
Prime Minister in the parliamentary crisis of 1890. There was, by that
year, little question that he was the most influential man in South
Africa. He had a large holding in the Transvaal goldfields, discovered
in 1886; he was head of the great De Beers Corporation of Kimberley; and
he was chairman of the newly-created Chartered Company. To many it
seemed impossible that one man could combine these great financial
interests with the position of First Minister of the Colony; but at
least it was clear that the interests of the companies were subordinated
to national aims, that the money which he obtained from mines was spent
on imperial ends, and that his political position was never used for the
promoting of financial objects.

[Note 65: _Cecil Rhodes: a Monograph and a Reminiscence_, by Sir
Thomas Fuller (Longmans & Co., 1910)]

But it is time to return to the development of the north, the greatest
of his schemes and the one dearest to his heart. The year 1885 had
secured Bechuanaland to the river Molopo as British territory, while a
large stretch farther north was under a British protectorate. One danger
had been avoided. The neck of the bottle was not corked up: a way to the
interior was now open. The next factor to reckon with was the Matabele
nation and its chief, Lobengula. They were a Bantu tribe, fond of
fighting and hunting, an offshoot of the Zulus who fought us in 1881.
They had a very large country surrounding the Matoppo hills, and
Lobengula ruled the various districts through 'indunas' or chiefs, who
had 'impis' or armies of fighting men at their disposal. To the
north-east of them lay the weaker tribe of the Mashona, who paid tribute
to Lobengula and whose country was a common hunting-ground for the
Matabele braves. Over the latter, so long as he did not check too much
their love of fighting, Lobengula exercised a fairly effective control.
He himself was a remarkable man, strong in body and mind. Sir Lewis
Michell describes him as he appeared to English visitors: 'A somewhat
grotesque costume of four yards of blue calico over his shoulders and a
string of tigers' tails round his waist could not make his imposing
figure ridiculous. In early days he was an athlete and a fine shot; and
though, as years went on, his voracious appetite rendered him
conspicuously obese, he was every inch a ruler.... Visitors were much
struck by his capacity for government: very little went on in his wide
dominions of which he was not instantly and accurately informed.' He was
an arbitrary ruler, but not cruel to Europeans, of whom a few, like the
famous hunter Selous, visited his capital from time to time. He clearly
held the keys to the north, and it was with him that Rhodes had now to
deal.

The first step was the mission sent out by Rhodes and Beit early in
1888, headed by their old associate Rudd. He and his two fellow-envoys
stayed some months with Lobengula watching for favourable moments and
trying to win his favour. They shifted their quarters when the king did
so, touring from village to village, plied the king and his indunas with
offers and arguments, and finally in October they obtained his signature
to a treaty giving full and unqualified rights to the envoys for working
minerals in his country. In return they covenanted to give him money,
rifles, ammunition, and an armed steamboat.

The next step was to get the support of the British authorities in
London for that political extension which was dearer to Rhodes than the
richest mines and the biggest dividends. In this he was greatly helped
by his consistent supporter, Sir Hercules Robinson, who held office in
Africa for many years, studied men and matters at first hand, and had a
juster estimate of Rhodes and his value to the Empire than the officials
in Whitehall. The method of proceeding was by chartered company, the old
Elizabethan method, which still has its value to-day, as it relieves the
home Government of the expense of developing new countries, yet reserves
to it the right to control policy and to enter into the harvest. The
Company was to build railways and telegraphs, encourage colonization and
spread trade; the Government was to escape from the diplomatic
difficulties which might arise with neighbours if it were acting under
its own name.

The third step was to make a way into the country and to start actual
work. Lobengula's consent was given conditionally: the first expedition
was to avoid his capital, Bulawayo, and to go by the south-east to
Mashonaland. The chief knew how difficult it might prove to hold in his
impis when, instead of a solitary Selous, some hundreds of Europeans
began to cross their hunting-grounds. And so it proved. Lobengula had to
pretend later that he had not consented to their passage, and the
expedition had to slip through the dangerous zone before they could be
recalled authoritatively. By May 1890 a column of nearly one thousand
men was ready to start from Khama's country; and in June their equipment
was approved by a British officer. On September 11, after a march of
four hundred miles through trackless country (some of it unknown even to
Selous, their guide), the British flag was hoisted on the site of the
modern town of Salisbury. It is a chapter of history well worth reading
in detail, but Rhodes himself could not be there: the heroes of the
march were Jameson and Selous. The other half of Rhodesia, Matabeleland,
was not added till a few years later; but British enterprise had now
found the way and overcome the worst difficulties. 'Occupation Day' is
still kept as the chief festival of the Colony.

Further extension was inevitable. The Matabele impis would not forgo
their old habit of raiding amongst the Mashonas. Jameson's complaints
received only partial satisfaction from Lobengula. He himself did not
want war, but he failed to control his men, and in September 1893 the
Chartered Company was driven to fight. They had on the spot about nine
hundred men and some machine-guns. Against these the Matabele with all
their bravery could effect little. In two engagements they threw away
their lives with reckless gallantry, and then they broke and fled.
Lobengula himself was never heard of again. His rearguard cut up a small
party of British who were too impetuous in pursuit, but by the end of
the year the country was at peace. In 1894 Matabeleland was added to the
territory of the Chartered Company, in 1895 the term 'Rhodesia' came
into use for postal purposes, and in 1897 it was officially adopted for
administrative purposes.

The jealousy of the Portuguese, who claimed the 'Hinterland' behind
their East African colony, though they had never occupied it, caused a
good deal of ill feeling, and very nearly led to hostilities both in
Africa and Europe. The Boers formed schemes for raiding the new lands
before they could be effectively occupied, and had to be headed off. The
Matabele impis continued for months in a state of excitement; and their
forays made it far too dangerous for Rhodes or for others to go up there
for some time. But Rhodes himself said that he had less trouble with
natives, with Dutch, and with Portuguese, than he had with compatriots
of his own, who claimed to have received concessions from native chiefs
and intrigued against him in London. But here his peculiar gifts came
out, his patience, his persuasive power, his readiness to pour out money
like water for a worthy end. Some he beat, others he bought; and in all
cases he maintained his position against his rivals. Robinson, Rudd,
Jameson, Selous, had all done their parts well, and Rhodes gave them
full credit and generous praise; but the mind and the will that planned
and carried out the whole movement, and added a province to the British
Empire, was unquestionably his own.

Rhodes was Prime Minister of Cape Colony from 1890 to 1895; and during
this time he was obliged to be more often at Cape Town. It was in 1891
that he first leased the property lying on the eastern slopes of Table
Mountain where he built 'Groote Schuur', the famous house which he
bequeathed to the service of the State. Here he gradually acquired 1,500
acres of land, laying them out with a sure eye to the beauty of the
surroundings, and to the pleasure of his fellow-citizens. Here he lived
from time to time, and received all kinds of men with boundless
hospitality. No one can fully understand him who does not read the
varying impressions of the friends and guests who sat with him on the
'stoep', under the trees in his garden, or high up on the mountain side,
where he had his favourite nooks. The visitors saw what they had eyes to
see. One would note his foibles, his blunt manner, his slovenly dress,
his want of skill at billiards, his fondness for special dishes or
drinks. Another would be impressed by his library with its teak
panelling, by the books which he read and the questions which he asked,
by his love for Gibbon and Plutarch, by his interest in Marcus Aurelius
and other writers on high themes. Others again tell us of his relations
to his fellow-men, how recklessly generous he was to young and old, to
British and Dutch, and how his generosity was abused: how his
acquaintances preyed upon him; how, for all that, he kept his true
friendships few in number and he held them sacred. In fact, loyalty to
friends meant more to Rhodes than loyalty to principles. His temper was
impatient, especially in the last years of physical pain; he often tried
to take short cuts to his ends, believing that his ends were worthy and
knowing that life was short. He made many mistakes, but he retrieved
them nobly. He was in some ways rough-hewn and unpolished, but he was a
great man.

It is impossible to put in a short compass the many important questions
with which he dealt. His policy towards the natives was moderate and
wise. He wished to educate them and then to trust them; to restrict the
sale of liquor among them and to open to them the nobler lessons of
civilization; to give them the vote when they were educated enough to
use it well, but not before; to apply to them too his motto of 'Equal
rights for every civilized man south of the Zambezi'. His policy towards
the Dutch was to establish identity of interest between the two nations
and so to secure friendly relations with them; to draw them into
co-operation in agriculture, in railways, in colonization, in export
trade, in imperial politics. He did his best to win over the Orange Free
State by a policy of common railways, and even to break down the sullen
opposition of the Transvaal. But the latter proved impossible. President
Kruger leant more and more upon Dutch counsellors from Holland; he
looked more and more to Delagoa Bay and turned his back upon Cape Town:
and the antagonism became more acute. In 1895 Mr. Chamberlain initiated
a new era at the Colonial Office. He was actively awake to British
interests in all parts of the globe; and President Kruger, who had tried
to check trade with Cape Town by stopping the Cape railway at his
frontier, and then by closing the 'Drifts' or fords over the Vaal, was
compelled to give way and to keep to the agreements made with the
Suzerain State.

A still more serious question was the treatment of the 'Uitlanders' or
alien European settlers in the Transvaal. Though the Boer rulers took an
increasingly large share of their earnings, they restricted more and
more the grant of the franchise. In taxation, in commerce, in education,
there was no prospect between the Vaal and the Limpopo of 'Equal rights
for all civilized men' or anything like it. In June 1894 the High
Commissioner frankly told Kruger that the Uitlanders had 'very real and
substantial grievances'; in 1895 they were no less substantial, and
agitation was rife in Johannesburg. On December 28, Jameson at the head
of an armed column left Pitsani on the borders and rode into the
Transvaal to support a rising against the Boer Government. The
Uitlanders were not expecting him; no rising took place, and Jameson's
small column was surrounded some miles west of Johannesburg,
outnumbered, and forced to surrender. The Jameson Raid, for which Rhodes
was generally held responsible, attracted all eyes in Europe as in
Africa. How President Kruger used his advantage against the Uitlanders,
among whom Col. Frank Rhodes was a leader, can be read in many books:
here we need only relate how the event affected the Premier of Cape
Colony. He resigned office at once and put himself at the disposal of
the Government. Despite his past record he was judged by the Dutch,
alike in the Cape and in the Transvaal, to have been the author of the
Raid, and all chance of his doing further service in reconciling the two
races was at an end. The beginning of 1895 saw him at the height of his
ambition. The end of it saw his power shattered beyond repair.

His behaviour in this crisis enables us to know the real man. For a few
days he kept aloof, unapproachable, overcome by the ruin of his work. He
made no attempt to conciliate opinion: in moments of bitterness he
scoffed at the 'unctuous rectitude' of certain politicians who were
improving the occasion. But he spoke frankly to those who had the right
to question him. He went to London in February and saw Mr. Chamberlain,
the Colonial Secretary, and his Directors. He admitted that he was at
fault. Believing that Kruger would always yield to a show of force, he
had been responsible for putting troops near the border to exercise
moral pressure. But neither then nor at any time had he given Jameson
orders to invade the Transvaal, or to precipitate an armed conflict,
which he believed to be unnecessary. Such was his consistent statement,
and he was ready to face, when the time should come, the Parliamentary
committees appointed by the British and South African Houses to report
on the Raid. Meanwhile he put all brooding away and looked round for
some practical work. Fortunately he found it in the most congenial
sphere. His colony of Rhodesia, to which he had gone straight from
London, was threatened with disaster from a great native outbreak. The
causes were various. Rinderpest had spoiled one of the chief native
industries, and superstition had invented foolish reasons for it; also
the rumours, which were spreading about the Raid, made the natives
believe that the British power was shaken. The Mashonas, as well as the
Matabele, took part in the revolt which began early in April 1896. To
meet it the colonists mustered their full strength, while General
Carrington was sent out from home with some regular troops. Several
engagements in difficult country followed: the enemies' forces were
quickly broken up, and by the end of July the time for negotiation was
come.

But the chiefs of the Matabele had retired into their fortresses in the
Matoppo hills and could not be reached. To send small columns to track
them down might mean needless loss of life: to keep the forces in the
field right through the winter was ruinous to the Company's finances.
Rhodes offered his own services as negotiator, and they were accepted.
The man who could carry his point with Jewish financiers and Dutch
politicians might hope to achieve his ends with the simpler native
chiefs. But it was a sore trial of patience. He moved his own tent two
miles away from the British troops to the foot of the hills, sent native
messengers to the chiefs, and waited. During this time he was not idle:
he put in a lot of riding and of miscellaneous reading: his mind was
actively employed in planning roads and dams for irrigation, in scheming
for the future greatness of the country. It was six weeks before a chief
responded. Gradually they began to drop in and to hold informal meetings
round the tent, putting questions, replying to Rhodes's jokes, relapsing
into fits of silence, oblivious as all savages are of the value of time.
He would spend hours day after day in this apparently futile way;
accustoming them to his presence, coaxing them into the right humour. At
last he persuaded them to meet him in a formal 'indaba', which must have
been a dramatic scene. Alone he stood facing them, boldly reproaching
them with their bad faith and cruel acts. They stated their grievances:
some were admitted: satisfaction was promised. In the end peace was
proclaimed and the delighted natives greeted him uproariously with the
title of Lamula 'm Kunzi (Separator of the Fighting Bulls). The
discussions were not over till the end of October, and it was a month
later ere Rhodes was able to leave the country and face the Committee in
London--a very different gathering in very different surroundings. His
work during these two months was perhaps the greatest of his life; and
that he should have been able to concentrate all his powers upon it so
soon after the shattering blow of the Raid is a great tribute to his
essential manliness and patriotism.

The two Committees, sitting in London and Cape Town, agreed to censure,
though in modified terms, Rhodes's conduct over the Raid; but he still
retained the respect of the bulk of his countrymen, and on his return
the citizens of Cape Town gave him an enthusiastic welcome. They and he
were looking ahead as well as behind: they felt that his services were
still needed for the establishing of a United South Africa under the
British flag. But in this respect his work was done. The Cape Dutch were
more and more influenced by their sentiment for the Transvaal, and
racial feeling ran high. Rhodes severed himself from all his old Dutch
colleagues and became more of a party leader. Meanwhile Kruger watched
the breach, assured himself of Dutch support, made no concessions to the
Uitlanders, repelled all overtures from Mr. Chamberlain, and steered
straight for war. Rhodes, despite his knowledge of the Dutch, made the
mistake of believing up to the last moment that Kruger would give way
and not fight; but, when the war broke out in 1899, he went up to
Kimberley to take his share of the work and the danger. The siege lasted
about four months, and Rhodes, though he failed to work harmoniously
with the military commandant, rendered many services to the town, thanks
to his wealth, influence, and knowledge of the place. When the town was
relieved in February 1900, he went to Rhodesia and spent many months
there. Though he was urged by his followers to return to politics, Cape
Town saw little of him; when he was not in the north, he was mostly at
his seaside cottage at Muizenberg, half-way between the capital and the
Cape of Good Hope. The heart complaint, from which he had suffered
intermittently all his life, had rapidly grown worse; his last year was
one of great suffering, and in March 1902 he breathed his last at
Muizenberg with Jameson and a few of his dearest friends around him. He
was buried in the place which he had himself chosen amid the Matoppo
hills. On a bare hill-top seven gigantic boulders keep guard round the
simple tombstone on which his name is engraved. After the English
service was over, the natives celebrated in their own fashion the
passing of the great chief who had already been enshrined in their
imagination.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28