CECIL RHODES

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 102, 27 October 1936, Page 19

CECIL RHODES

A RULER OF NATIVES

WAYS WITH THE MATABiLE

WOODLESS VICTORY

When the Boers invested Kimberiey they, almost captured. Cecil JEHiodee. for he entered the beleaguered town on the Jast train that re,aqjiG<i that famous (Jiamond-minlng centre, says a writer in tlie Melbourne "Age." Rhodes owned the JCimberley mines, he represented the district in the Cape Parliament, 'end his supremacy there was never contested, He never UKed the military caste, and. when during the siege he insisted on running the town on the lines he thought best he speedily involved himself in quarrels with the military authorities. He narrowly escaped arrest, and when Kimberley was relieved Lord Methuen Ejent a message, saying, "On' my entry into Kimberley Mr.: Hn"oHes; must take his immediate' departure." Then, • when Kimberley was relieved, Rhodes sent an offer to Roberts and Kitchener to forward ■ them •' supplies,- "provided :I have full power, and no one to interfere with me." His offer ended, "Reply sharp, as otherwise I am going to Cape Town." Rhodes- disliked military methods. He had a method of his own in dealing with" troublesome1' native tribesmen. This was well exemplified in his manner of annexing Pondoland, a British Protectorate between' the Cape and Natal.. It was always ■'■understoodI'that at the "right moment" Pondoland .was to be annexed to the Cape. Rhodes decided that the "right moment" had come, whenjSigcau,. the. paramount chief, chose to insult Sir.Henry Loch, the British High Commissioner, when he' was touring Pondoland. What was Rhodes's method? Not by force of arms. Rhodes, whq was. Premier of Cape' Colony at the time, travelled down ;t6 Pondoland »on a-'-coaeh drawn by eight-cream-coloured-horses, with machine-guns and eight policemen. .On entefing"l'dWd6laiidr;he"ahnt)i:mced that he intended to annex the country. He pent for Sigcau. Sigcau came. KEPT HIM WATTING. Rhodes kept him waiting for three days, the exact time '• Sigcau had kept Sir: Henry LocWiwaiting.: He-- then offered to show Sigcau: what would happen to him arid'his tribe'if'there was ■ any furthei1' unpleasantness;'; He took Sigcau to where the machine-guns were trained on amealie field, opened fire on the mealies, and'brought down the mealie cropi.' Sigcaiti lesson, and ceded the country. Pondoland was annexed without the loss of °a life, and atV cost tothe Cape Government of under £7000. "I do not'ask-for congratulations," said Rhodes. How Rhodes suppressed the Matabele rising after the Jameson raid is perhaps one of the greatest epics in British history. Two years earlier Matabeleland had been annexed and incorporated into Rhodesia. Jameson [iad departed on his raid with his Rhodesian policemen, and had been forced to surrender, the administration of the native territory had been harsh, locusts had swept the land, and now came the dreaded rinderpest, which decimated the herds. Infected cattle had to be killed. This brought famine to the native tribes. They could not understand this wanton slaughter, except as "another example of the white' man's dwil.is.bnPS3," .'.Maddened into action, the Matabcle obeyed the voice of M'limo, their prophet, and rose against the white people. They did to death ?0Q white setters. Rhodes had just returned from England,- where Harcourt,. in the House- of Commons, had indicted the raiders, and in a letter to; Chamberlain had declared, "As long as Rhodes remains as managing director ;.qf the chartered company there can be no'peace in South Africa. He is in his own persoa the red flag—perhaps I should say the black flag." JOINED THE COLUMN.' With malaria still'on him, Rhodes joined a column marching to the relief of the settlers. The starving, slaugh* tering Matabele bid among the hills of the Mstoppos, and from these desolate fastnesses, and from secret caves, came out to fight and kill. Imperial troops had come to the aid of the Rhodesians, and within a fortnight the new force had lost 20 per cent, of its 1000 men. There was. talk of sending more troops. The cost spelt ruin to the chartered company. Rhodes felt to th«. point of passion the responsibility he owed to the settlers, their stock slaughtered and their lives endangered. Had he brought them into this wilderness «wrejy to be ruined and killed? His hoa« our and his pride were at stake. Rhodes worked out a plan that seemed to his friends indeed desperate. He proposed to go alone, and unarmed among the Matabele, where they lay in the Matoppps, and talk to. them. He had always held that dealing was betJ ter than fighting.' He uijnt 8 young and devoted native, a Tembu, to find out what chance there was of dealing with the Matabele. The. Tembu came back with the news-that those native chiefs he had seen would meet Rhodes it he went to them wtih no more than three companions and unarmed. The chiefs had conveyed this intelligence through an old woman, kaberigula's stepmother, and it is the portrait of this old crone, almost repulsive in appearance, which was the sole portrait of a woman ever to' be found in Rhodes's house at Groote .Schuum. MEMOEJES OF DINGAAN, There were men who thought that Rhodes should not ■ go, They remembered what Dingaan had done to the Voprtrekkers---the Juring and the kill' ing. Rhodes said he had no such fears, With the three white men permitted him, he set out on horseback for the meeting place. One of Rhodes's companions was Colenbrander, who had gone with Lobengula's indunas to England, to protest against the charter, but had later acted as the company's agent at Lobengula's kraal. He was the interpreter. Another companion was Vere Stent, a JQUr« nalist, who recorded the proceedings; the Tembu, on foot, guided them. They entered the hills, and • passed through a cutting whose path lay between" high-crested rocks on one side, and oh ; the other a wooded valley. Among the rocks they saw watching natives, Their path led to a small open space; They dismounted^Rhodes thought this would give the concealed natives confidence—sat on an ant heap, and waited. Black men appeared. Men and flag came towards Rhodes. He turned With exultation to his comr panions. "This is one of the moments in life that make it worth living," he said. • ■■•■■'.■ i • ■ '. There were twenty MatabeJe, chiefs and their • attendants, and they sat round. Rhodes in s■semi-circle. ;The chief, Somabulane,". spoke, Time is notiiing to a native. Ha gave Rhodes the saga, from the beginning, of the Matabele. Old Somabulane ended: "You came. You conquered. The strongest takes the land, We understood. We lived under you. And you treated us as dogs. Should. we not choose to die? Is it not better to be wiped out than live as dogs?" BRITISH MISDEEDS. "Ask them," s»id Rhodes to Colenbrander, "by whom and hour they were mads dog*." Som«bulane recited a>4iai, *tiAh%. i^<^4*:imjnett*H

police and of the. higher authorities, ending with an account ol bis visit with his indunas to Bulawayo to pay his respects to the/ Chief Magistrate. Outside the courthouse, they had sat for hours unattended to. When white people had visited his kraal he had kiljed that they might eat, but when his people became hungry as they waited the Chief Magistrate had sent tc say the town was ''full of stray dogs-r-dog. to dogr^we.might Kill those and eat them if we could catch them." "So I left Bulawayo that night, my father,'1 ended Somabulane, "and when next I came to visit the Chief Magistrate it was with my impis behind me, no soft words, in their, mouths, but the assegai in their hands, Who blames me?" Certainly Rhodes did not, He promised Somabulane that the. native police would go, that white officials would not offend again, "Now I want to know," added Rhodes, "is it peace? Are the eyes whit??" Somabulane threw down a reed he wag carrying in token of submission, "There is my assegai. There is my rifle." It wa§ the prelude to those ■ indabas in the Matoppos that were to save-Rhodesia and renew trust in ■ Rhodes. THE OTHER KRAALS. A week later Rhodes met ■ more Matabele chiefs. Some were still "seeing blood," , were hostile and armed. To these he intimated that the/ must lay down their arms< He dismounted, sat on a boulder as one who is aware that he must be obeyed. The old men harangued the young men; the young men threw down their assegais, sticks and rifles, called Rhodes their chief and their father, and gave him the name by which he was henceforth to be known among them, "Lamula. 'Mkunai, Separator of the Fighting Bulls," Next day Rhodes travelled to the kraals of those whose eyes . were "still red." Weeks passed ere all the chiefs had given their submission. His patience was endless. To the last recalcitrant tribesmen he sent this message; "Tell them they are fools; they are children. If. they do not want peace, why do they not come down here, jji the nigM and murder me and all of US? tell them if they went peaqe, then why do they not all come and shake hands with me, and they could go back to their wives and children and be happy." They came and talked, and Rhodes thus won a bloodless victory over the whole of the Matabeles. It was during these indabas that Rhodes, riding out one day with Earl Grey, the new Administrator, found his tomb. Upon this, hiU of granite in the, Mafoppos, Rhodes stood muttering of its peace, its chaotic grandeur, and the littleness of man. "I shall be, buried here," he said to Grey. And there today lies the tomb of Rhodes. When tho coffin was lowered with chains into thq rocks the, MaUbele who swarmed the hill cried, "Our father is dead," and gave him, alone of white men, before or since, the royal salute of "Bayete!"