The Thames Star. Resurrexi. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 22, 1896. NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Thames Star, Volume XXVII, Issue 8330, 22 April 1896, Page 2

The Thames Star. Resurrexi. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 22, 1896. NOTES AND COMMENTS.

The South .Africin problem threatens to take a great deal of solving before the present difficulties disappear. It has apparently resolved itself into a question of policy between two great personalities, and there is considerable cause to fear that these two contemporary leaders are acting to cross purposes. The history of South Africa during the past few years has been one of expansion and development, and during this period the names of Mr Cecil Rhodes arid the Chartered Company —names familiar enough in the present crisis—are inseparably bound up with the progress of the country. Rhodes, it is needless to say, is an Imperialist—an empirebuilder of the most daring and successful type. He started in life with the express intention of coloring the African continent red from Cape Town on the south to Cairo on the north, and throughout the whole of his career he has consistently adhered to this purpose. His mission has from first to last been a masterly display of tact and courage, and he has shown himself to be unquestionably the man for the situation, quick to act both on the offensive and defensive, and calm, cool, and collected withal. He has come through many crises entirely through those sterling qualities -which have constituted him, under any circumstances whatever, a natural ruler of men. During his career the epithets of " schemer," " speculator," and " moneygrubber " have been hurled at him. unceasingly, but the gibes are mere fabrications— the outcome of that antipathy which small minds naturally fell when the master mind sets to work to accomplish the task whether they are willing or no. Personally, Rhodes' only object is to make into a great and united nation the marvellous country which has been neglected by its savage owners for centuries, and he will securely lay the foundation stone of thi3 scheme despite the efforts of petty partisans and the recriminations of a ■whole legion of Krugers and Hoffmeyers. With him, as compared with other of our " statesmen," private personal interests are singularly absent. Being unmarried, he has no domestic circle to smuggle into the civil service, and as far as we are aware he has neither sisters, nor cousins, nor aunts to come and claim a share in the spoil. He uses his huge fortune simply as a means of power, and a formidable means it is. Looking back to the past, his first great cow was a clever consolidating operation in mining interests. Since then, always keeping his original object firmly in view, he succeeded in working himself into the highest political position in South Africa, and such was his j genius and so gigantic his ideas, that both have long occupied a recognised place in all the diplomatic Courts of Europe. Such was his position yesterday ; to-day that position, as embodied in the name, has vanished into thin air. " Imperator Cicil," as the press rightly termed him, is imjaerator no longer. By an error of judgment on the part of a servant of proved ability—whose chief error, indeed, Yfas that he failed —the Emperor Premier was hurried into the abyss of formal resignation before anyone had time to breathe, and thus the nominal supremacy of the colony . has passed into the hands of another. But' those who think that Cecil Rhodes has ceased to be a vital active force in the machinery of South Africa are mistaken. The future will dispel that doubt as surely as night follows day—though we would not for a moment attempt to fill the role of a prophet, since the future will reveal itself, bo much for Cecil Rhodes.

And now a word as to his creation—the Chartered Company. At the annual meeting of the company held in London in January last year, Mr Cecil Rhodes explained that the company had now full possession of the vast territory from Mafeking to Tanganyika, that is 1200 miles long, andj 600 broad. He went on to say:—"l might say with respect to that country that I see no future difficulties in so far as risings of the natives are concerned. We have satisfied the people throughout the whole of it, and we may say that we have now come to that point when we can deal, without the risk of war, with the peaceful development of the country. That is what we possess. Now, you might fairly ask, what has it cost us r Your position is somewhat as follows: You have a share capital of £2,000,000, and you have a debenture debt to-day of £6oO,000; and I might point out to you that as against that debenture debt you have paid for the 100 miles of railway in the Crown colony of Bccliuanaland, you have about 14,000 miles of telegraph, you have built Magistrate's Courts in the whole of your territory, you have civilised towns in five or six different parts, and the Beira railway. Although you do not hold their debentures, you have the voting power, and the Beira railway is completed. "We might now fairly say, if you put aside the Mafekiiig railway and the land you hold in the Orow:! colony of Bechuanaland, as apart from the chartered territories, that your debenture

debt can be regarded as about £350,000, lieoause I do not think it an unfair price to put in your assets at Beclmanaland at £300,000, for .since the railway was opened there it has paid its working expenses and 4 per cent. Therefore, in looking at the matter in a purely commercial point of view, you might say, 'we possess a country with all the rights to it, in length 1200 miles and in breadth an average of 500, and we have a debt of about £300,000 or £350,000, because we have an asset, apart from the Crown colony of British Bechuanaland, of about £300,000.' "

This was the position of the Chartered Company in January, 1896, and right np to the close of the year all went merry us the proverbial marriage bell. With the advent of the new year, however, the scene was changed. It was, we believe, on New Year's Day that the dashing Jameson committed the fatal error of crossing the border, and a few days later the forced surrender at Doomkop ushered in a new era in the history of the company. The announcement that the company's Administrator had broken the law of nations by violating the boundaries of an independent state, gave Mr Rhodes > enemies the long-hoped-for opportunity, and they did not hesitate to use it. For a time it looked as if the whole fabric of the master scheme was crumbling to pieces. The disaster, coming like a thunderclap in a clear sky, was shortly followed by the resignation of M? Rhodes, and immediately the muttering*, against the company found ready ears on all' sides. The violent agitation which ensued, aiming at the revocation of the charter, and the angry spirit demonstrated towards Mr Rhodes and his co-directors, are now matters of history. After the first tumult had died away, Mr Rhodes, who had meanwhile hurried to England, had a private interview with Mr Chamberlain. What passed thereat has not transpired, but it was understood that a basis for the future conduct of the company was arrived at, though with what modifications or restrictions is not known. It seems perfectly evident, however, that the views of the Colonial Secretary and the African statesman are on some points widely different; so much ho, that Mr W. T. Stead, who is held to be a henchman of the Honorable Cecil, earnestly discusses in the Review of Reviews the possibility of Rhodesia seceding from the Empire and forming an independent republic—a development he considers quite possible in the event of Mr Chamberlain's attitude baing too rigorous to suit Mr Rhodes' taste. This is, of co»rse, mere bluff, but there are other proofs which point very conclusively in the same direction. For instance, Mr Chamberlain, after the interview referred to, stated in one of his characteristic speeches that Mr Rhodes had returned from South- Africa with " a life's work endangered, possibly destroyed.' 1 This utterance would have been unnecessary as , well impolitic had Messrs Chamberlain and Rhodes been in perfect accord as to the policy of the future, and ■it points to some serious hitch in the negotiations. The fact of the matter is that both are men of dominant will. Both are excellent organisers and Imperialists in the strictest sense, and their policy should be in the main identical, but the iron will which enabled each in his reHpective sphere to climb to the top of the tree, threatens fto pi'ove a formidable barrier to mutual co-operation. That would seem to be the reading of the situation as viewed betweeu the lines of our cable summaries ; and it is sincerely to be hoped that, before the matter is finally settled, the Home authorit'.is ami the uncrowned potentate of Rhodesia will be brought more into touch with each other. For the next few years the history of South Africa will devolve itself round the figures of two mighty personalities—Joseph Chamberlain and Cecil Rhodes, and if their Imperialistic instincts can be induced to co-

incide, a vast African empire is in sight of which the early explorers could form no conception. "