THE LATE B. BARNATO.

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 2180, 29 October 1897, Page 3

THE LATE B. BARNATO.

In the "Contemporary Review" Mr Harry RaymoaJ has an article full of interesting detail about the late Mr Barnato. "If you are going to fight," he said, "always get in first blow. If a man is going to hit you, hit him first and say, 'lf you try that I'll hit you again.' It is or no use you're standing off and saying. 'lf you hit me I'll hit you back.' D'ye understand?" "Yes, I understand,"- I answered; "but you are quoting Kingsley in 'Westward Ho!'" "Who was Kingsley and Westward Ho ?" he sharply queried. After I had explained and quoted the passage from Drake's letter to Amyas Leigh, he said, "Ah! I did not know anything of Kingsjey, but when he wrote that he knew what life was, and he was right, and I am right, though it is o.ueer for me to get a supporter in one of your parsons. If he was a true man he would also have to agree with our law of 'an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.* but being a Christian of course he couldn't do that. Pah! never let a man wrong you without getting square, no matter how long you wait; and never wrong a man if you can help it. because he will wait his time to get back on you and at the worst possible moment. I don't care whether it is Jew or Gentile, it is all the same."

Mr Barnato, says Mr Raymond, was a very keen, critic of both the Transvaal Government and the Uitlanders, as was inevitable in view of his large interests =o bound up with the welfaie of the State | and the whole community. He was ■ satisfied with the Transvaal Gold Law, "one of the best in the world;" but the dynamite and other monopolies were not merely unjust, they were stupid, as preventing the working of many low-grade mining properties which would otherwise be affording employment to black and white, and thus increasing the resources of the State. The constant use of the Netherlands Railway Company, too, to foster other than English trade and English ports, was a cause of great irritation to him, and he could never un-' derstand why the Government did not strictly maintain both letter and spirit of the London Convention. The agitation of the Uitlanders with regard to the Education and Franchise questions he ridiculed. "If people wanted a complete system of English schools, let them pay for it, and he would do his part; but they could not expect a Dutch Government to treat its own language as a foreign one." Again: "Men did not come to the Transvaal to vote, they came to earn money. The franchise would cost money and blood to obtain, and would never add 6d a month to any on«*s wages." He had always kept on fairly good terms with the President of the Transvaal and the Executive Council.but did not hesitate to express himself vigorously and in idiomatic English when they favored an attempt to push a rival water scheme for Johannesburg. With the events of December, IS9S, and January. 1596, he had no sympathy at all. His share in getting the sentences on the Reform leaders reduced is narrated as follows:—When the sentences were delivered he furiously denounced the President for having broken a solemn pledge, while, he said, the Executive and the specially hired judge had conspired together for deliberate treachery. Not content with fearlessly dinning these charges into the ears of Mr Kruger himself, he publicly repeated vi-.em to the crowd at the railway station as he was leaving for Johannesburg. Words were ,to him, however, always subordinate, and he at once ordered the shutting down of every mine, and closing of every ; workshop of which he had control, if the ! prisoners were not released within a fortnight. Before the expiration of this period he had an interview with Mr Kruger. and the following day the period of notice was extended; but before it had elapsed the commutation of sentences was announced, and all fines, except for A. Woolls Sampson unci Karri Davie?, had been paid. He regarded this as a direct tribute to his power. i "No one else could have done," he said, ; "what I have done. If all the men

(financial houses) here had combined, they might in two months' time have been stronger than ine; but no one but BarnatO could say in a moment off his own bat, K you don't release these men I will shut up half the mines and throw more white men idle than you have burghers in the State." Curiously enough, he had a superstition against building. Fays Mr Raymond. 'He had to the full the old prejudice against house-building, and if he indeed had any superstition it was in this. He yet made many announcements of building of palaces from motives of policy. At Johannesburg many plans were prepared and sites selected, but it was only within the last two years that work was really commenced in laying out thirteen acres of gardens. Even this was solely for the purpose of booming the villa lots he owned in the vicinity. When he was in Johannesburg a little more than a year ago, 1 showed him a print of the elevation of his Park Lane house, which had been issued with, I think, the -Building News.' T shall have the finest entrance hall, stairs, and dining-room in London,' he said. 'So you are really building at last?' •Building?' he queried .sharply ; 'oh, yes. 1 am building. 1 must.'"