Part 5 (1/2)
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 circ.u.mstances 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 pa.s.sed 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 n.o.bly, and so worthily, upheld British prestige in South Africa under the most trying circ.u.mstances. 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 a.s.sessed 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 a.s.suredly 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 pa.s.ses 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 circ.u.mstances 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 pa.s.sion, 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 a.s.sume 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 ame a Dieu, Mon bras au roi, Mon coeur aux dames, L'honneur a 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.