diff options
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 4 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-0.txt | 7547 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-0.zip | bin | 162348 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h.zip | bin | 4265958 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/63148-h.htm | 10318 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/cover.jpg | bin | 247723 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_001.jpg | bin | 259066 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_010.jpg | bin | 256433 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_017.jpg | bin | 259976 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_030.jpg | bin | 256689 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_053.jpg | bin | 260094 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_083.jpg | bin | 258931 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_094.jpg | bin | 257122 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_112.jpg | bin | 260955 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_113.jpg | bin | 259213 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_141.jpg | bin | 260708 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_158.jpg | bin | 257370 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_185.jpg | bin | 258803 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_214.jpg | bin | 258768 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_246.jpg | bin | 257071 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_275.jpg | bin | 258199 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/63148-h/images/i_300.jpg | bin | 258830 -> 0 bytes |
24 files changed, 17 insertions, 17865 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7240001 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #63148 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/63148) diff --git a/old/63148-0.txt b/old/63148-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index eb961c1..0000000 --- a/old/63148-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,7547 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook, Men Who Have Made the Empire, by George -Chetwynd Griffith, Illustrated by Stanley L. Wood - - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - - -Title: Men Who Have Made the Empire - - -Author: George Chetwynd Griffith - - - -Release Date: September 8, 2020 [eBook #63148] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - - -***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEN WHO HAVE MADE THE EMPIRE*** - - -E-text prepared by Tim Lindell, Charlie Howard, and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made -available by Internet Archive (https://archive.org) - - - -Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this - file which includes the original illustrations. - See 63148-h.htm or 63148-h.zip: - (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/63148/63148-h/63148-h.htm) - or - (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/63148/63148-h.zip) - - - Images of the original pages are available through - Internet Archive. See - https://archive.org/details/menwhohavemadeem00grifiala - - -Transcriber’s note: - - Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). - - Text enclosed by equal signs is in bold face (=bold=). - - - - - -MEN WHO HAVE MADE THE EMPIRE - - - * * * * * * - -_BY THE SAME AUTHOR._ - - - =VALDAR, THE OFT-BORN. A Saga of Seven Ages.= Imp. - 16mo, cloth gilt. Illustrated by HAROLD PIFFARD. - Price 6s. - - =THE VIRGIN OF THE SUN. A Tale of the Conquest of - Peru.= Crown 8vo, cloth. With Frontispiece by STANLEY - L. WOOD. Price 6s. - - =KNAVES OF DIAMONDS. Being Tales of the Diamond - Fields.= Crown 8vo, cloth. Illustrated by E. F. - SHERIE. Price 3s. 6d. - -LONDON - -C. ARTHUR PEARSON LIMITED - - * * * * * * - - -[Illustration: “ALMIGHTY GOD, OF THY GOODNESS, GIVE ME LIFE AND LEAVE -ONCE TO SAIL AN ENGLISH SHIP ON YONDER SEA!” - - (_See page 54._) _Frontispiece._] - - -MEN WHO HAVE MADE THE EMPIRE - -by - -GEORGE GRIFFITH - -Third Edition - - - - - - -London -C. Arthur Pearson Limited -Henrietta Street, W.C. -1899 - - - - - To - THE GLORIOUS MEMORY - OF - THE MIGHTY DEAD - AND TO - THE HONOUR OF THE LIVING - WHO ARE - CARRYING ON THEIR NOBLE WORK, - THE FOLLOWING PAGES - ARE INSCRIBED. - - - - - “_Fair is our lot--O goodly is our heritage! - (Humble ye, my people, and be fearful in your mirth!) - For the Lord our God Most High - He hath made the deep as dry, - He hath smote for us a pathway to the ends of all the earth!_” - - A SONG OF THE ENGLISH - - - - -CONTENTS - - - I. - PAGE - WILLIAM THE NORMAN 1 - - - II. - - EDWARD OF THE LONG LEGS 21 - - - III. - - THE QUEEN’S LITTLE PIRATE 39 - - - IV. - - OLIVER CROMWELL 71 - - - V. - - WILLIAM OF ORANGE 97 - - - VI. - - JAMES COOK 119 - - - VII. - - LORD CLIVE 143 - - - VIII. - - WARREN HASTINGS 169 - - - IX. - - NELSON 193 - - - X. - - WELLINGTON 223 - - - XI. - - “CHINESE GORDON” 249 - - - XII. - - CECIL RHODES 279 - - - - -LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS - -BY STANLEY L. WOOD - - - “ALMIGHTY GOD, OF THY GOODNESS, GIVE ME LIFE AND - LEAVE ONCE TO SAIL AN ENGLISH SHIP ON YONDER - SEA!” _Frontispiece_ - - _Facing p._ - HE DROVE THE GOOD STEEL THROUGH MAIL AND FLESH AND BONE 10 - - DUKE WILLIAM ROARED OUT THAT HE WAS ALIVE 17 - - EDWARD GRIPPED THE WOULD-BE MURDERER 30 - - THEY CARRIED HIM DOWN TO THE BOATS 53 - - HE SWOOPED WITH HIS CAVALRY ROUND THE REAR OF THE KING’S ARMY 83 - - HE HALTED HIS ARMY ... AND SANG THE HUNDRED AND SEVENTEENTH - PSALM 94 - - MADE HIM REEL IN HIS SADDLE 112 - - “MEN OF ENNISKILLEN, WHAT WILL YOU DO FOR ME?” HE CRIED 113 - - MISSED HIM AND KILLED ANOTHER MAN BEHIND HIM 141 - - INSTEAD OF CHARGING THEY TURNED ROUND AND MADE LANES THROUGH - THE ARMY BEHIND THEM 158 - - HIS ENEMY WENT DOWN WITH A BULLET IN THE RIGHT SIDE 185 - - NELSON AT COPENHAGEN 214 - - THE ORDER THAT SENT THE BRITISH LINE STREAMING DOWN FROM THE - RISING GROUND 246 - - THE LONELY MAN WHO STOOD ON THE RAMPARTS OF KHARTOUM 275 - - THAT HISTORIC INDABA IN THE MATOPPOS 300 - - - - -FOREWORD - - -The Epic of England has yet to be written. It may be that the fulness -of time for writing it has not come yet, or it may be that Britain is -still waiting for her Homer and her Virgil. Perhaps the matured genius -of a Rudyard Kipling, that strong, sweet Singer of the Seven Seas, may -some day address itself to the accomplishment of this most splendid of -all possible tasks, and then, again, it may be that it is his only to -sound the prelude. That is a matter for the gods to decide in their -own good time, but this much is certain--that when this work has been -worthily done the world will hear echoing through the ages such a -thunder-song as has never stirred human hearts before. - -It will begin, doubtless, with the battle-cries of the old Sea-Kings of -the North, chanted to the music of their churning oars and the rush and -roar of the foam swirling away under the bows of their longships, and -from them it will go on ringing and thundering through the centuries, -ever swelling in depth and volume as more and more of the races of men -hear it rolling over the battle-fields of conquered lands, until at -last--as every loyal man of English speech must truly hope--the roar -of the Last Battle has rolled away into eternal silence, and north and -south, east and west, the proclaiming of the Pax Britannica heralds the -epoch of - - “The Parliament of Man, the Federation of the World.” - -But in the meantime, while we are waiting for the coming of the singer -whose master-hand shall blend the song and story of Britain into -an epic worthy of his magnificent theme, materials may be gathered -together, old facts may be presented in new lights, and the great -characters who have played their parts in the most tremendous drama -that has ever occupied the Stage of Time may be re-grouped in such -fashion as will make their subtler relationships more plain, and all -this will make the great work readier to the hand of the Master when he -comes. - -It is a portion of this minor work that I have set myself here to do. -The making of a nation and the building of nations up into empires -is, humanly speaking, the greatest and noblest work that human hands -and brains can find to do, for the making of an empire means, in its -ultimate analysis, the substitution of order for anarchy, of commerce -for plunder, of civilisation for savagery--in a word, of peace for -strife. - -Now, the British Empire as it stands to-day is unquestionably the -greatest moral and material Fact in human history, and hence it is -permissible to assume that the makers of it must, each in his own way, -whether of peace or war, have been the greatest empire-builders the -world has yet seen, and it is my purpose here to take the greatest of -these and tell with such force and vividness as I may, the story of -the man and his work. I am not going to write a series of biographies -arranged in prim chronological ranks, nor am I going to confine myself -to the narration of collated facts so dear to the hearts of educational -inspectors and scholastic examiners. Such you will find already cut and -dried for you in the school-books and in many ponderous tomes, from the -reading of which may your good taste and good sense deliver you! - -I shall seek rather to show you the living man doing the living work -which his destiny called him to do. The man will not always be found -of the best, nor the work, seemingly, of the noblest, but what I shall -seek to show you is that the work _had_ to be done in order that a -certain end might be accomplished, and that the man who did it was, all -things considered, the best and, it may be, the only man to do it. In -so far as I do not do this I shall have failed in the doing of my own -work. - -One more word seems necessary in order to anticipate certain possible -misconceptions. Our empire-making is not yet complete, even at home. -The centuries of strife during which the hammering and welding -together of the nations which now make up the United Kingdom has been -progressing have naturally and necessarily left certain national -jealousies and antipathies behind them, and the last thing that I -should desire would be to arouse any of these. - -There are two kinds of patriotism, a smaller and a greater, a National -and an Imperial. Both are equally good and noble, and it is necessary -that the first should precede the second. But it is equally necessary -that it should not supersede or obscure it, and it is to this later -and greater, this Imperial patriotism that I shall appeal, and I would -ask my readers, whatever their nationality, to remember that on the -burning plains of India and the rolling prairies of Canada, in the vast -expanses of the Australian Bush and the African Veld, there are neither -Englishmen nor Scotsmen, Welshmen nor Irishmen; but only Citizens of -the Empire, brothers in blood and speech, and fellow-workers in the -building up of the noblest and stateliest fabric that human hands have -ever reared or God’s sun has ever shone upon. - - - - -I - -_WILLIAM THE NORMAN,_ - -_PIRATE AND NATION-MAKER_ - - - - -I - -WILLIAM THE NORMAN - - -It may strike those of my readers who have only got their history from -their school-books as somewhat strange that I should begin my record -of British Empire-Makers with a man whom they have been taught to look -upon as a foreigner, an invader, a conqueror, and a ruthless oppressor -of the English. - -The answer is simple, though manifold. The school-books are only filled -with potted facts, and are therefore wrong and unreliable. It has been -well said that England was made on the shores of the Baltic Sea and the -German Ocean. The so-called Englishmen who occupied it at the time of -the Conquest were not Englishmen at all, for the simple reason that the -true English race had yet to be born, and, after it, the true British. - -The England and Scotland of the eleventh century were peopled, not by -nations, but by tribes mostly at bitter and constant war with each -other. There were still Jutes and Angles, Picts and Scots, Danes and -Swedes and Norwegians, each occupying their own little stretch of -country, and governed, more or less effectually, by their chieftains, -in proof of which it is enough to recall the fact that Harold’s last -fight but one was against his own brother, who had come across the -Narrow Seas at the head of a miscellaneous crowd of hungry pirates to -steal as much as he could of the ownerless heritage that Edward the -Confessor had left behind him. - -A good deal of sentiment, more or less born of deftly-written romances, -has glorified the memory of this same Harold. Whether it was deserved -or not does not concern us now, any more than does his right or unright -to the throne of England. It is enough here to grant him all honour as -an able leader of armies, and a man who knew how to snatch victory from -defeat, and glory from disaster by dying like a hero surrounded by the -corpses of his foes. - -The idle question whether he or William had the better right to the -crown of England may be left to those who care for such quibbling. Let -us, at the outset, in the words of the Sage of Chelsea, “clear our -minds of cant.” There is no “right” or “wrong” in these things, saving -only the eternal right of the strongest and wisest--the fittest or -most suitable, in short, to wield power and dominion whether the less -fit like it or not. The peoples are thrust headlong into the fiery -crucible of War, and, on the adamantine anvil of Destiny, the Thor’s -Hammer of Battle beats and crushes them into the shape that God has -designed for them. It seems a rude method, but in many thousands of -years we have found no other, so at least we may conclude that it is -the best one known. - -There is a very deep meaning in the seemingly flippant and almost -impious saying of Napoleon: “God fights on the side of the biggest -battalions.” He does--but you must reckon the bigness of the -battalions, not only by their numbers, but by the value of their units, -remembering always that one man with a stout heart and a cause he -honestly believes in is worth a score who have neither heart nor faith. - -Just such a man was William the Norman, son of Robert the Magnificent, -otherwise styled the Devil, and Arlette the Fair, daughter of Fulbert -the Tanner of Falaise. It is in this birth of his that we find the -first clue to his real greatness. He was born of a union unhallowed -by the sanction of the Church, among a people proud beyond all modern -belief of their royal sea-king ancestry. - -How did he come to achieve this almost miraculous triumph over a -prejudice and hostility of which we can now form but a very dim idea? - -We have to look no farther than his cradle to find the answer. Lying -there, the little fellow used to grasp the straw in his baby fists -with such a grip that it could not be pulled away from him. The straw -broke first, and ever in his after life what William the Norman laid -hold of he held on to; and that is why he became the first of our -Empire-Makers. - -No doubt it was the strain of the old pirate blood which ran so -strongly in his veins that made him this. If we have successfully -cleared our minds of cant, we shall see plainly that, since all nations -begin in piracy of some sort, it is natural to expect that the best -pirates will prove the best Empire-Makers. That old strain is, happily, -not yet exhausted. When it is, Great and Greater Britain will be no -more. - -Few men have passed unscathed through such a stormy youth as his was. -When he was seven years old his father, Duke Robert, having exacted -an oath of unwilling fealty from his under-lords to his bonny but -base-born heir, went away on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem from which he -never returned, leaving him to the wardship of his friend, Alan of -Brittany; and soon after Duke Robert’s death became known Alan was -poisoned. After that for a dozen years the boy Duke was in constant -peril of his life. - -One night two lads were lying sleeping side by side in the castle of -Vaudreuil, and in the silence and darkness of the night one of the -Montgomeries, bitter enemies of the Lords of Falaise, to whose hate -Alan of Brittany had already fallen a victim, crept up to the bedside -with a naked dagger, and drove it blindly into the heart of one of the -boys and fled. - -Young Duke William--he was only a lad of twelve then--woke up to find -himself wet with his playmate’s blood, but all unknowing then how -nearly the history of the world had come to being changed by that foul -and happily misdirected dagger-stroke. Had it found his heart instead -there would have been no Norman Conquest, no blending of the two -strains of blood from which has sprung the Imperial Race of earth, no -British Empire, no United States of America--without all of which the -world would surely have been very different. - -Seven more years of plot and intrigue, of strife and turmoil, young -Duke William lived through after this, growing ever keener in mind -and stronger in body, and, as we may well believe, hardening into the -incarnation of ruthless and yet wisely-directed Force which was so -soon to make him a power among men. Before he was twenty he shot his -arrows from a bow which no other man in his dukedom could bend, and he -was already a finished knight, a pattern of the gentleman of his age, -good horseman, good swordsman, gentle towards women and stern towards -men, pure in his morals and moderate in his living; a good Christian -according to his lights and the ideas of his day, and above all -faithful to the ideals that he had set before himself. - -Already at nineteen--that is to say in the year 1044--not only had he -shaped his plans for reducing the disorder of his turbulent dukedom to -discipline, but he had made his designs so manifest that the lawless -lords and robber barons could see for themselves how stern a master he -would make--as in good truth he did--and the deadly work of conspiracy -started afresh. One night when he was sleeping in his favourite castle -of Valognes, Golet, his court fool, came hammering at his bedroom door -with his bauble, crying out that some traitor had let the assassins -into the stronghold. He leapt out of bed, huddled on a few clothes as -he ran to the stable, mounted his horse, and galloped away all through -the night toward Falaise along a road which is called the Duke’s Road -to this day. No sooner was he safe across the estuary of the Oune and -Vire and in the Bayeux district than he pulled his dripping, panting -horse up in front of the church of St. Clement, dismounted and knelt -down to say his prayers and thank God for his merciful deliverance. -Such was the youth who was father to the man justly styled William the -Conqueror. - -It was not long after this that the years of intrigue and plotting -ended in armed revolt. Guy of Burgundy, William’s kinsman and once his -playmate, looked with greedy eyes on the fair lands of Normandy. He -was master of many provinces already, and among his hosts of friends -there were not a few of William’s own under-lords, in whose breasts -still rankled the shame of owning a bastard for their master. To his -side came the Viscount of Coutance, Randolph of Bayeux, Hamon of -Thorigny and Creuilly, and that Grimbald of Plessis whose hand was -to have slain William that night in Valognes, and in the end this -long-gathering storm burst on the grassy slopes of Val-ès-Dunes. - -Master Wace the Chronicler, in his “Roman de Rou,” gives us a brilliant -little picture of that long-past scene where the future Conqueror won -his spurs--of many a brave and gallant gentleman clad _cap-à-pie_ in -shining mail, seated on mighty chargers impatiently pawing the ground, -of long lances gay with fluttering ribbons tied on by dainty hands that -morning, of waving plumes and flaunting pennons, and mild-eyed cattle -grazing knee-deep in the long wet grass in peaceful ignorance of the -bloody work that was about to be done. - -But with all this we have little to do, and one episode must suffice. -The starkest warrior among the rebels was Hardrez, Lord of Bayeux, and -he, like many another, had sworn to slay William that day with his own -hands. The oath had proved fatal to others before it did to him, but -at length his turn came. Young Duke William saw him from afar, and -with lance in rest made for him at a gallop. One of the knights who -had followed Hardrez to battle charged at him in mid-course. The next -moment horse and man went rolling in the grass, and William, dropping -his splintered lance, drew his sword, and, the Lord of Bayeux coming up -at the instant, he drove the good steel with one shrewd, strong thrust -through mail and flesh and bone, and Hardrez never spoke again. - -That stroke won William his dukedom, and the Chronicler, though a man -of Bayeux himself, tells in stirring lines how the young lord and his -faithful knights hunted the flying rebels off the field and rode them -down like sheep. - -This was not the last fight that William had for the mastery of his -own land, but it left his hands free to begin the work that he had set -himself to do, and he did it. To him unity was strength, and he was -ready to go to any lengths to get it. His methods then, as afterwards -in England, were severe--we should call them brutal nowadays, but these -days are not those. - -[Illustration: HE DROVE THE GOOD STEEL THROUGH MAIL AND FLESH AND BONE.] - -When the citizens of Alençon defied him they indulged in the pleasantry -of hanging raw hides over the walls and beating them, shouting out the -while that here there was plenty for the tanner’s son to do. He set -his teeth and swore his favourite oath--by the Splendour of God--that -they should have work enough ere he had done with them. When the city -lay at his mercy he had two-and-thirty of the humourists sent out to -him, and cut off their ears and noses and hands and feet, and had -them tossed over the walls as a sort of hint that he was not quite the -kind of person who could appreciate jokes about his ancestors. It was -an inhuman deed, but history records no other public aspersions of the -good name of Duke William’s mother. - -Yet one more battle the young Duke had to fight before he crossed -the Narrow Seas to the famous field of Senlac. Henry of France, his -titular overlord, and Geoffrey of Anjou, jealous of the fast-growing -power of Normandy, united their forces in an expedition which was half -an invasion and half a plundering raid. Duke William, with infinite -patience, and a quiet, marvellous self-restraint, held his own fiery -temper and the angry ardour of his knights in check, watching the -invaders burn town after town and village after village, and turning -some of his fairest domains into a wilderness. - -He never struck a blow until, one fatal afternoon, he swooped down from -Falaise and caught the French army severed in two by the rising flood -of the river Dive. Then he struck, and struck hard, and when the bloody -work was over, Henry was glad to buy a truce and his liberty from his -vassal with the strong castle of Tillièries and all its lands, and so -heavy hearted was he at his defeat that, as the Chronicler tells us, -“he never bore shield or spear again.” - -Normandy had now become the most orderly and best governed country in -Europe. Robbers, noble and otherwise, were ruthlessly suppressed, and -the poorest possessed their goods in peace, while William himself had -time to turn his thoughts to the gentler, and yet not less important, -concerns of policy and love-making. - -The old story of his courtship of the fair Matilda of Flanders with a -riding whip is evidently a myth manufactured by some Saxon enemy, for -Duke William was in the first place a gentleman, and, moreover, the -lady and her parents were as anxious as he was for the marriage, seeing -that he was now the most desirable of suitors. The truth is that the -Church opposed their union on some shadowy grounds of consanguinity, -and it did not take place until after a courtship of four years. - -And now, having got our pirate Duke happily married and seen him -undisputed lord of his own realm, we may go with him to St. Valery on -the coast of Ponthieu and watch him working and praying and offering -gifts at the old shrine, during those fifteen long days that he watched -the weather-cocks and prayed for the south wind that was to waft his -fleet and army over to the English shore. - -It was on Wednesday, the 27th of September, that the wind at last -veered round. The eager soldiery hailed the change as the granting -of their prayers and the consent of Heaven to the beginning of their -enterprise, and flung themselves into their ships like a great host of -schoolboys setting out on a holiday. Soon the grey sea was covered -with a swarm of craft, and it must have seemed as though the old Viking -days had come back as the great square sails went up to the mast-heads, -and the shining shields were hung along the bulwarks. - -William himself, in his golden ship _Mora_, the present of his own -dear Duchess, led the way with the sacred banner of the Pope at his -mast-head, and the three Lions of Normandy floating astern. The _Mora_ -was lighter heeled or lighter loaded than the rest, for when morning -dawned she was alone on the sea with the Sussex shore in plain sight. -But presently a great forest of masts and clouds of gaily-coloured -sails rose up out of the grey waters astern, and the whole vast fleet -came on, urged by oar and wind, and by nine o’clock that morning the -fore-foot of the _Mora_, close followed by her consorts, struck the -English ground in Pevensey Bay. - -It has often been told how William, as he landed, stumbled and fell on -his hands and knees, and how those near him cried out that it was a -fatal omen. The story may be myth or fact, but nothing could be more -characteristic of the true man than his springing to his feet with both -hands full of sand and laughing out in that great voice of his: - -“Nay, by the Splendour of God, not so. See! Have I not taken seizin of -my new kingdom and lawful heritage?” - -But the army of the so-called English, that they had come to seek was -nowhere to be found, and some days were spent in uncertainty and debate -as to whether they should march on London or await battle on the shore -with their sea communications open, and in the end they took the latter -and the wiser course. - -Meanwhile, as has been said, Harold was away in the North fighting and -beating his brother Tostig and his fellow robbers, and the news of -Duke William’s landing was flying northward to him. It must have been -something of an anxious time for both--the Norman waiting day after -day in that deadly inaction which is most fatal of all things to the -courage and discipline of an army, and Harold hurrying southward at -the head of his victorious troops, knowing that he was about to try -conclusions with the best leader and the finest soldiery in Europe. - -It is of little import here and to us now which of them had the best -right, as the lawyer-quibble has it, to that which they were about to -fight for. The point is that such claims as either had they were going -to submit to the stern and final ordeal of battle--and in good truth a -stern ordeal it proved to be. - -As he came to the South the standard of Harold--the Fighting Man--was -joined by troops of recruits attracted by the fame of his northern -victory, and it was a great and really formidable army which at length -assembled between London and the Sussex coast. Meanwhile the Normans, -after the fashion of the pitiless warfare of those days, were dividing -their time between the building of entrenched camps and ravaging, -plundering, and burning throughout the pleasant Southern land. - -Of course messages and parleyings passed between them. Harold from his -royal house at Westminster bade Duke William come and fight him for his -capital and his kingdom, to which Duke William warily replied: “Come -and drive us into the sea if you can!” This at length King Harold was -forced to attempt. And so it came to pass that, at length, on the 14th -of October, the hosts of the Saxon and the Norman confronted each other -on the field of Senlac by Hastings, on the morrow to strike blows whose -echoes were to ring through many a long century, and to do deeds more -mighty in their effect than either Harold or William dreamt of. - -The Norman host has been called a horde of mailed robbers and -cut-throats, eager only for plunder, and the Saxon army has been almost -canonised as a band of heroes, gathered together to die in defence of -their native land and their lawful king. Yet, strangely enough, the -robbers and cut-throats spent the best part of the night confessing -their sins and praying for victory, as well as in making the best -dispositions to attain it. The patriots spent the same hours feasting -and drinking, and swaggering to each other about the brave deeds they -had done in the North and the greater things they were going to do on -the morrow. - -So the night passes, and the morning dawns grey and chill on the two -now silent hosts. Then from the Norman ranks rises the solemn cadence -of the Te Deum, and as this dies away the archers move out--forerunners -of those stout yeomen whose clothyard shafts were one day to win -Creçy and Agincourt. Then come the footmen with their long pikes, and -after them the mailed and mounted knights, in front of whom rides -Taillefer--Iron-Cutter and Minstrel--tossing his sword into the air and -catching it, and singing the while the Song of Roland and Roncesvalles. -As the archers and pikemen spread out in skirmishing order he sets -spurs to his horse and charges at the Saxon line. He kills two men, and -then goes down under the battle-axe of a third. - -Then the arrows flew fast and thick, and charge after charge was made -upon the palisades of stakes that fenced the Saxon position, high above -which floated the Dragon Standard of Wessex and the banner of the -Fighting Man. - -But the double-bladed Saxon axes were no playthings, and they were -swung by strong and strenuous arms, and every time the Norman -front came up to the breastwork it was hewn down in swathes by the -deep-biting blades. The arrows fell blunted and broken on the big -Saxon shields and stout Saxon armour, and so Duke William, with -that ever-ready resource of his, bade his archers shoot up into the -air, and then down from the grey sky there fell a rain of whirring, -steel-pointed shafts, one of which, winged by Fate, struck gallant -Harold in the eye--doubtless as he was looking up wondering at this new -manœuvre--and, piercing his brain, laid him lifeless in the midst of -his champions. - -[Illustration: DUKE WILLIAM ROARED OUT THAT HE WAS ALIVE.] - -Soon after this a cry went up that Duke William too was dead, and he, -hearing this, tore off his helmet--a somewhat unsafe thing to do in -such a fight--and roared out that he was alive, swearing--as usual by -the Splendour of God--that the land of England should yet be his by -nightfall. - -So they laid on again. William’s horse went down under a pike-thrust. -He clove the pike-man to the chin and asked one of his knights to lend -him his horse. The knight refused, thinking more of his skin than his -loyalty, whereupon William pitched him out of the saddle, swung himself -up, and led another charge against the ever-dwindling ring of heroes -who were still hammering away with their battle-axes--and this time the -stout line wavers and breaks; the mail-clad warriors pour up the slope, -shouting that the day is won; axe and sword ring loud and fast on helm -and mail, the Saxons reel back, closing round the body of their king -and the staff of his banner. - -“_Dex aide! Dex aide! Ha-Rou! Ha-Rou!_” Duke William’s men yell and -roar again as they scramble over heaps of mangled corpses filling the -trenches and blocking the breaches in the palisades. Another moment -or two of brief, bitter, and bloody struggle and the last Saxon ring -breaks and melts away, and Hastings and England are won. - -What followed is history so familiar that few words more from me will -suffice. What Duke William had done in his own land he did after the -same methods in the land that had been the Saxons’. Cruel, bloody, and -savage they were beyond all doubt, but it is a question whether, even -in the doing, they were more disastrous than the ferocious anarchy and -the unceasing plunder and outrage and murder that had disgraced the -weak and divided rule of the Saxon kings. In their effect they were -a thousandfold better. Duke William believed that order was Heaven’s -first law, and, by whatever means he had at hand, he was honestly -determined to make it earth’s as well. And he succeeded, which after -all is not an unsatisfactory test of honest merit. How well he did so -let us ask, not one of his own chroniclers or troubadours, but the man -who wrote the story of his own conquered people, and this is what he -will tell us: - -“Truly he was so stark a man and wroth that no man durst do anything -against his will. Bishops he set off their bishoprics, and abbots off -their abbacies, and thanes in prison. And at last he did not spare his -brother Odo. Him he set in prison. Betwixt other things we must not -forget the good peace that he made in this land, so that a man that was -worth aught might travel over the kingdom unhurt with his bosom full -of gold. And no man durst slay another though he had suffered never so -mickle evil from the other.” - -Such was this grim, stern, Thor’s-Hammer of a man, who by his strength -and cunning hewed into shape that which in after days was to become the -corner-stone of the glorious, world-shadowing fabric which we call the -British Empire. - - - - -II - -_EDWARD OF THE LONG LEGS_ - -“_BURY ME NOT TILL YOU HAVE CONQUERED SCOTLAND_” - - - - -II - -EDWARD OF THE LONG LEGS - - -Two centuries all but nine years have passed away since William the -Conqueror, unwept, if not unhonoured, lost his life in avenging a -paltry joke, and left his work for others to carry on. In the two -centuries not much has been done, although no little show has been made -meanwhile, and a great clash of arms has resounded through the world. - -William the Red has died, as he lived, in a somewhat ignoble and futile -manner. Henry I. has done one good thing, wedding, as it were, in his -own person and that of the Lady Matilda, the two races which were -afterwards to be one. - -Stephen and Matilda have settled their differences and died, after the -shedding of much wasted blood. Henry II., by the hand of Strongbow and -his licensed pirates, has done a piece of good work badly in beginning -that conquest of Ireland which is not to be completed until the Battle -of the Boyne is lost and won. - -Richard Lionheart has won much glory to very small profit in the -magnificent madness of the Third Crusade. The barons, recognising, -however dimly and clumsily, that they are, in good truth, citizens of -the infant State whose lusty, turbulent youth already gives promise -of its future strength and greatness, have become law-lords as well -as landlords, and with mailed hands have guided that unwilling pen of -John’s along the bottom of the parchment on which the Great Charter is -written. - -And, lastly, Simon of Montfort has taken a swift stride through several -centuries and, arriving at the modern idea that the making of nations -and the ordering of the world can be achieved by Talk, has, after -not a little violence and the spilling of considerable blood that -might have been better spent, got together that first Parliament or -Talking-Machine, whose successors have so sorely hindered the progress -of the world and balked the efforts of those appointed by God, and not -by the counting of noses, to do its work. - -So the two noisy and somewhat foolish centuries have rolled away into a -blessed oblivion with a good deal of shouting and swaggering, of strife -and bloodshed, but of little progress, saving that one Roger Bacon has -lived and written a certain book and made himself a name for ever. - -But all this time the work with which we are here most concerned, the -making of an empire, has been waiting for the next God-sent man to come -and do it, and this man was Edward Plantagenet, surnamed Longlegs, -next in lineal succession, not as king, but as Empire-Maker, to him who -won the fight at Senlac and got himself so well obeyed that “no man -durst do anything against his will”--which was a great deal to say of -any one in such days as those. - -Edward of the Long Legs came on to the stage of History with long, -swift, determined, and, in short, wholly characteristic strides. The -Talking-Machine of the good Earl Simon had worked noisily, as is usual -with such machines, and had produced little but sound and fury. - -There was war all round, and the usual anarchy in Ireland and Wales. -Llewelyn, Lord of Snowdon, for instance, had pitted himself gallantly -against the logic of circumstances, and was seeking to reconstruct the -ancient and now impossibly obsolete Celtic empire. - -“_Be of good courage in the slaughter, cling to thy work, destroy -England and plunder its multitudes!_” his bards had sung to him, and -so he had honestly set himself to do, not recognising the fact that -empires are neither made nor re-made by mere methods of miscellaneous -blood-letting. - -To the north, Scotland was divided by schisms and rent by the bitter -jealousies of its nobles and clan-chieftains, savage, rude and poor, -but gallant, strong, and very full of fight, as the English were to -learn later on. - -Over the Narrow Seas the wide domains which William the Norman had -kept with his sword and which the second Henry had greatly increased by -inheritance and marriage, were slipping piecemeal away from the throne -to which they did not of right divine belong, and with which it was -therefore impossible that they should remain. - -Such, in briefest outline, was the scene into which Edward Longlegs -strode, and of which he was to be for thirty-five years the central and -dominating figure. His first look round, as it were, showed him the -nature of the task which it was his destiny to forthwith set about. - -With that clearness of vision without which no man has any chance -of success in the business of empire-making, he instantly pierced -the dust-storms of battle that were rising all about him, and the -mist-clouds of debate which Earl Simon’s Talking-Machine had commenced -to vomit forth, and behind and beyond these he saw a certain Fact, a -prime necessity which had to be faced--in short a real Something of an -infinitely greater importance than tribal warfare, the aspirations of -bard-inspired princelings, or even parliamentary debates. - -This was neither more nor less than the fact that, when the Maker of -all things mapped out this part of the world, it pleased Him in His -wisdom to put England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland into one little -group of islands, and from this fact Edward Longlegs drew the deduction -that the King of Kings had intended them to be under one lordship. - -It seems a simple thing to say now, a fact so patent that the -mention of it seems superfluous. So does the larger fact that the -world is round; but it was a very different matter in the times -and circumstances of Edward Longlegs, and, indeed, his first and -greatest claim to stand next in succession to William the Norman -in the royal line of empire-makers consists in this: that he was -capable of that master-stroke of genius which clearly demonstrated an -imperial principle of which six hundred years of history have been the -continuous and emphatic endorsement. - -No sooner was the bloody fight of Evesham over and the good Earl Simon -had breathed out his generous, if somewhat premature soul in that last -cry of his: “It is God’s grace!” than Edward Longlegs seems to have -set himself to prepare for the task that was to be his. He was not to -be king in name for some seven years more, but as the historian of -the English People with great pertinence remarked: “With the victory -of Evesham, his character seemed to mould itself into nobler form.” -In other words he was, perchance unconsciously, performing that -indispensable preliminary to all really great and true public reforms, -the reformation of himself. - -Hitherto his life had been none of the best. He had been the leader of -a retinue that had made itself something like infamous in the land. -He had intrigued first with one party and then with another. He is -accused of a faithlessness which, it is said, forced the good, though -mistaken, Earl Simon into armed revolt against his liege lord--though -this may, after all, only have been a stroke of wise and necessary -policy, since he possibly saw even then that Chaos would not reform -itself into Cosmos just for being talked at. - -Then again, and with curious resemblance to William of Normandy, and -later of Hastings and England, he had avenged an insult to his mother -by the slaughter of some three thousand men in the rout of Lewes and -a quite unjustifiable indulgence in pillage and slaughter when the -Barons’ War was finally over. - -“It was from Earl Simon,” says John Richard Green in one of those -limpid sentences of his, “as the Earl owned with a proud bitterness -ere his death, that Edward had learnt the skill in warfare which -distinguished him among the princes of his time. But he had learnt from -the Earl the far nobler lesson of a self-government which lifted him -high above them as ruler among men.” - -It seemed, indeed, as though, by this reformation of himself, he was to -typify that reformation of England which it was his life-work to begin. -The new Edward was to be the maker of the new England. - -His first action after the war was characteristic of the man and -the work that he was to do. The cessation of the fighting, as was -usual in those days, had left an undesirable number of truculent -warriors of various ranks wandering at large about the kingdom with -their legitimate occupation gone. Edward, with that instinct of -order characteristic of all true empire-makers, saw in these the -possibilities of disorder, and with a happy combination of wisdom and -adventure turned their swords and lances away from the bodies of their -fellow-citizens by taking them to fight the Paynim in the Holy Land. - -An incident of this excursion has been adorned by one of those pleasant -fictions which, if the paradox may be pardoned, are none the less true -for the fact that they are false. Edward, having sent certain hundreds -of Moslems to Paradise with a perhaps unnecessarily ruthless dispatch, -was considered by the sect of the Assassins to be a person who would be -better dead than alive in Palestine, and so one of them, after several -attempts, succeeded, as one may put it, in interviewing him privately -with a poisoned dagger. The fiction has it that his consort, Eleanor of -Castille, sucked the poison from the wound with her own sweet lips and -so saved his life. - -It is a pretty story, but, unfortunately for its authenticity, no -one seems to have heard of it or thought it worth the telling until -Ptolemy of Lucca told it a good half-century afterwards. But the -truth underlying it remains, and this truth is that Edward Longlegs -was blessed with that greatest of all earthly blessings, a loving and -devoted wife. - -The facts of the matter are few but eloquent. Edward saw the dagger -before it struck him, and gripped the would-be murderer with a grip -worthy the muscles of Lionheart himself. There was a struggle, during -which the dagger-point scratched his arm. A moment after it was buried -in the assassin’s own heart. Then some of Edward’s retainers, hearing -the scuffling, burst into the tent and satisfied themselves that the -wretch had attempted his last murder by the somewhat superfluous method -of knocking out his brains with a foot-stool. - -Soon after this symptoms of poisoning showed themselves, and Edward, in -his usual businesslike way, made his will and his peace with God and -prepared to “salute the world” with becoming dignity. In the end not -Eleanor’s lips but the surgeon’s knife removed the danger, and so once -again a dagger-thrust which had come near to changing the history of -Britain missed its mark. - -It was during his return from this Crusade, as he was journeying -through Calabria, that he met the messengers who told him that his -father was dead and that he was King of England. Charles of Anjou, -who was riding with him at the moment, wondered at the great grief he -showed, and, being himself a man almost incapable of feeling, asked -him why he should show more grief at his father’s death than he had -done for the loss of his baby son who had died a short time before. The -answer was to the point and worthy of the man. - -[Illustration: EDWARD GRIPPED THE WOULD-BE MURDERER.] - -“By the goodness of God,” he said, “the loss of my boy may be made good -to me, but not even God’s own mercy can give me a father again.” - -It was on the same journey that there occurred that curious incident -which is called the “Little Battle of Chalons,” and which is also -instructive in giving us another view of the man who could use such -wise and pious words as these. While he was travelling through Guienne, -the Count of Chalons, one of the best and starkest knights of his age, -sent a friendly message to request the favour of being allowed to break -a lance with him. Edward, though he had been repeatedly warned of plots -against his life by those who had designs on his French dominions, and -though as a king he had a perfect right to decline the challenge of a -vassal, was, as we should say nowadays, too good a sportsman to say no; -but he took the precaution of going to the knightly trysting-place with -an escort of a thousand men--in doing which he was well justified by -the fact that the Count of Chalons was there waiting for him with about -two thousand. - -During the trouble which inevitably followed, the Count of Chalons did -break a lance with Edward, but it was his own lance, and this failing, -he gripped him round the neck in the most unknightly fashion and tried -to drag him from the saddle. The Count was a strong man, but Edward was -a little stronger, so he just sat still, and swinging his horse round, -pulled him out of the saddle instead, after which, to put it into plain -English, he gave him a sound thrashing, and when he at length cried -for quarter, Edward, ever generous in the moment of victory, gave him -the life that he had forfeited by his treachery, but, as a punishment, -which the coroneted scoundrel justly deserved, he compelled him to take -his sword back from the hands of a common soldier, and so disgraced him -for ever in the eyes of his peers. - -It may be added that the Little Battle of Chalons, in spite of the -difference of numbers, ended in something like a picnic for the -English, after which the king betook himself in leisurely fashion to -the throne, and the work that was waiting for him. - -No sooner was the crown upon his head, than he got to his task. The -Prince of Snowdon, now calling himself Prince of Wales, had not only -made himself master of his own country, but had pushed the war into -England and reduced several English towns, the chief of which was -Shrewsbury. Edward called upon him to restore the peace which he had -broken, and to come and do homage for his lands. Llewelyn, in the -plentitude of his pride, told him to come and fetch him. - -Edward took a note of this, but waited two years while he replenished -the royal treasury by more or less justifiable means. During this time, -as it happened, the Prince’s promised bride, Eleanor, daughter of Earl -Simon, fell into his hands. Again and again he summoned the Prince to -perform the act of allegiance, holding his sweetheart meanwhile as a -hostage in honourable captivity. - -At length a fresh defiance from the Welshman roused him to action, and -Longlegs strode swiftly across England and struck out hard and heavy. -A single blow dissipated the dream of Celtic empire for ever. Llewelyn -fled to his mountains and at length sued for peace. By rights his life -was forfeit for rebellion, yet Edward not only forgave him but remitted -the fine of £50,000 which he had imposed on the Welsh chieftains, and -then invited Llewelyn to his court and married him with all due pomp -and circumstance to the daughter of his old enemy--from which it will -be seen that Edward Longlegs, like William the Norman, and indeed all -good and capable empire-makers, was a gentleman. - -Unhappily, Llewelyn repaid the kindness and courtesy by new rebellion, -which ended, as it deserved, in disaster. Merlin had prophesied that, -when money was made round, a Welsh prince should be crowned in London. -During this last revolt Edward had caused round halfpence and farthings -to be coined. When it was over the head of Llewelyn was sent to London -and crowned with a garland of ivy on Tower Hill. - -What Longlegs had thus done with Wales he sought by more devious and -less effective means to do with Scotland. The dispute between Balliol -and Bruce gave him the opportunity of intervention, and of this the -dismal results are too well known to need detailed description at this -time of day. - -Here, again, we have nothing to do with personal right or wrong, or -with the ethics of national independence. The business of empire-making -is too urgent to wait for matters of this kind. It would perhaps have -been better if Edward, after the sack and slaughter of Berwick, had -hurled the whole weight of the English power against the object of his -attack, as William the Norman would have done, and once and for all -crushed the opposition into impotence. - -It would have been bitter and bloody work, as the work of empire-making -is apt to be, but the end might have justified the means. Certainly -some centuries of bloodshed and bitterness would have been saved. The -high ideal of a United Kingdom would have been realised nearly five -hundred years earlier, and the progress of both realms in civilisation, -wealth, and power might have been quickened immeasurably. - -And after all, neither side in the long struggle would have lost -anything worthy of being weighed against the greatness of the gain to -both. There would have been no Stirling Bridge, but then there would -have been no Falkirk; no Bannockburn, but also no Flodden Field. All -this, as it happens, however, was not written in the Book of Destiny, -and so it does not concern us here, since we have to consider how much -of the work of empire-making Edward did, not what he failed to do or -left undone. - -The surrender of Stirling in 1305 apparently completed the conquest of -Scotland, and Edward was for the time being the actual and undisputed -sovereign of the whole country from the Pentland Firth to the English -Channel, and it is probable that the conquest would have been a -permanent one but for the entrance of another power into the field, -and this was nothing less than the English Baronage itself. It was as -though the chiefs of his own army had turned against him, and, in the -fatal dispute which followed, Robert the Bruce saw his opportunity, and -in the end re-won for Scotland that independence which has cost her so -much and which, however precious as a matter of sentiment, was destined -to prove of so little value to her. - -All that is past and done with now, but still no one who holds that an -empire is greater than a nation, even as the whole is greater than its -part, can help looking back with regretful thoughts upon those pages of -our history which would have been so much brighter and more glorious if -those gallant Scots who fought through those long and bitter wars could -have stood, as they have done since, side by side with their brothers -of the South, and so made possible centuries ago the beginning of that -great work in which they have borne so splendid a part. - -Had that been so Edward Longlegs might have been the founder instead -of only one of the makers of the British Empire, and that last piteous -scene by the sandy shores of the Solway Firth would never have been -enacted. - -But though in the end he neither conquered Scotland nor founded the -United Kingdom, he did something else which, as the centuries went by, -proved but little less important, for he began to make the British -Constitution. - -Gallant soldier and great general as he was, he was perhaps an even -greater statesman. He saw far ahead of his times, too far indeed, for -in his enlightened conviction that in the matter of taxation “what -touched all should be allowed of all” we have the real reason for that -revolt of the Baronage, which made a United Kingdom of the Fourteenth -Century an impossibility. - -Yet as law-maker he did work which lasted longer than that which he -did on the battle-field. Like William the Norman, he was a stark man -who knew how to get himself obeyed, and order, no matter how dearly -bought, was the first thing to be got, and he got it. He could “make a -wilderness and call it peace,” as he did over and over again with Wales -and Scotland--and, indeed, to him a wilderness was better than a place -where disorder dwelt--but he also made another peace within his own -realms which was the first forerunner of that which we enjoy to-day. -The laws which he made were for rich and poor, great and small, alike. -The hand that was pitiless in destruction was also ready and strong to -protect. - -The manner of his death is as characteristic as any of the acts, good -or bad, of his life. Old and weak and sick, he made the long journey -from Westminster to the Solway to fulfil the oath which he had sworn at -the knighting of his unworthy son to avenge Bruce’s murder of Comyns -and to punish his rebellion. - -Too feeble to keep the saddle, he was carried in a litter at the head -of the hundred thousand men who were to be the instruments of his -vengeance, but at length the news of victory after victory won by the -Bruce stung him to a fury which for the time was stronger than his -weakness, and at Carlisle the old warrior left his litter and once -more mounted his charger. It is a pathetic sight even when looked at -through the mists of the intervening centuries. We can picture the -gallant struggle that he must have made to sit his horse upright and -to bear without fainting the weight of the armour that was oppressing -his disease-worn and weary limbs. The mailed hand which had struck the -great Count of Chalons down could not now even draw the sword that hung -useless at his side. - -Only one thing remained strong in the man who had once been the very -incarnation of strength. His inflexible will was still unbroken and -unswerving in its devotion to the great ideal and master-project of -his life. Had that will had its way, the flood of English strength -and valour that was rolling slowly behind him would have burst in a -torrent of death and desolation over the war-wasted fields of southern -Scotland, and there can be but little doubt as to what the end would -have been. - -But it was not to be. The Spectre Horseman was already riding by his -side, and, like the wine from a cracked goblet, the dregs of his -once splendid strength ebbed away. At last the skeleton hand was -outstretched, and he who had never been unhorsed by mortal foe was -stricken from the saddle. Yet even then the proud spirit refused to -yield. He took his place in the litter again. With almost dying lips he -ordered the army forward; and, though the end was very near, he did not -submit without a struggle, pathetic in its hopeless heroism, to conquer -even Death itself and carry out his purpose in spite of the King of -Terrors. Die he must, and that soon, but his spirit should live after -him and he would still lead his army. - -“Bury me not till you have conquered Scotland!” were almost the last -words he spoke. Though they were disobeyed and Scotland was never -conquered, yet they were well worthy of the iron-hearted man who said -them. - - - - -III - -_THE QUEEN’S LITTLE PIRATE_ - -“_THE MASTER-THIEF OF THE NEW WORLD_” - - - - -III - -THE QUEEN’S LITTLE PIRATE - - -Another couple of centuries with a few added years have slipped -away, and the next scene of the slowly-unfolding drama opens on the -sea instead of the land. The Idea which Edward of the Long Legs had -so clearly conceived and so very nearly realised, the idea that the -frontiers of the United Kingdom of which he had dreamt should be its -sea-coasts has all the time been growing and deepening, for, like all -ideas which faithfully reflect some fact in the universe, it could not -die, and was bound some day to become a fact itself. - -Politically, England and Scotland were still independent kingdoms, but -many old differences had been forgotten and forgiven, and they had -come a great deal closer, as it was fitting that they should do on the -eve of their final union. Moreover, they were one in their dread and -hatred of that cruel and implacable Colossus which, with one foot on -the East and the other on the West, bestrode the world, drawing vast -treasures from hidden El Dorados with which it built countless ships, -and hired and armed innumerable men for the enslavement of mankind. For -now we have reached those “spacious times of great Elizabeth,” when -that lusty young giant of Liberty, recently born into the world, was -girding on his armour, and making him ready to grapple with the powers -of oppression and darkness which were just then most fitly incarnated -in the shape of Spain. - -It is almost impossible for us of the present day to understand clearly -what the Spain of those days was. She was the first naval and military -Power in the world, her ships and armies were everywhere, her wealth -was honestly believed to be illimitable, and moreover she was the -recognised champion of the Catholic Church, whose spiritual thunders -mingled with the roar of her guns, and which supplemented the terror of -her arms by all the diabolical enginry of torture and the awful powers -of the Holy Office. - -The world, in short, was on the eve of great and marvellous doings--on -the one hand so terrible in their deadly earnestness and tremendous -consequences, and on the other so fantastically splendid in their -almost superhuman daring and undreamt-of rewards, that it looked as -though the Fates were preparing some gigantic miracle wherewith to -astound mankind. And so, in sober truth, they were, and the miracle -about to be wrought was the making of what we now call the British -Empire. - -In the beginning of the latter half of the sixteenth century there was -a yellow-haired, blue-eyed, round-faced and sturdily-built youngster -sailing to and fro as ship’s boy in a tiny cockle-shell of a craft -plying with the humbler kinds of merchandise between the Thames and -the coasts of France and Flanders. Whether or not he had heard any of -those wondrous stories which the western gales were wafting across the -Atlantic from the golden Spanish Main we do not know, but probably he -had, and, like many another sailor-lad of his day, he had dreamt wild -dreams of blue seas and bright skies, of white-walled cities crammed -with gold, and of stately galleons staggering across that mysterious -sea stuffed to the deck with the treasures they were bringing to pour -into the coffers of the King of Spain. - -And yet, wild as these dreams may have been, they would have been -commonplace in comparison with the bewildering exploits with which -this same blue-eyed sailor-lad was one day to realise and excel them. -For this was he whose name the mariners of Spain were soon to hear -shrieked out by the voice of the tempest, booming in the roar of guns, -and echoing through the crash of battle. This, in a word, was Francis -Drake--El Draque, the Dragon, child and servant of the Devil himself, -Scourge of the Church and Plunderer of the Faithful. - -As I say, he may or may not have heard the story of the Golden West, -but it is quite certain that he did hear much of the black and terrible -tales which the refugees and exiles from France and the Netherlands -had to tell, for not a few of them crossed over in the little barque -in which he served, and he could not fail to hear what they had to say -of the murders and massacres, the torturing and outrage with which -Spain was disgracing her knightly fame and her ancient faith. They are -horrible enough for us to read even here in the security which that -gallant struggle won for us, and now when we can only hear the shrieks -of the tortured and the groans of the dying echoing faintly across -the gulf of three centuries; but what must they have been to Francis -Drake when he heard them told by those whose eyes had only just before -looked upon the hideous reality--perhaps indeed by some of those racked -and mutilated unfortunates who had managed to escape with their lives -to seek the sheltering hospitality of Gloriana the Queen? Was it any -wonder that deep down in his boyish heart there were planted those -seeds of hate and horror which later on were to bear such terrible -fruit? - -The lad Francis seems to have performed his duties as ship’s boy as -well as he did everything else, whether it was leading the Queen’s -ships to harry the coast of Spain or raging and storming through one of -his piratical raids among the Fortunate Isles of the West, for when -his master died he made him his heir, and so Francis became a trader -on his own account. For a few years he was just a peaceful shipmaster, -making an honest and hard-won living; but all this time events were -arranging themselves in more and more martial array, and the bursting -of the storm was not very far off. - -The actual fighting did not begin in the guise of recognised warfare -for a very considerable time. Spain and England were at peace, each -trying to humbug the other, but between Protestant and Catholic it -was otherwise. Armed cruisers manned by angry Protestants made their -appearance in the Narrow Seas, and whenever they got a chance fell upon -Catholic ships and avenged the sufferings of their fellow-heretics in a -fashion at once prompt and pitiless, and this at length so exasperated -Philip that he closed his ports to English trade, and Drake’s -occupation was gone. Better, in truth, had it been for Philip if he had -left him undisturbed in his business! - -He sold his little vessel, went to Plymouth, and entered the service -of two kinsmen of his, one of whom was soon to prove somewhat of an -empire-maker in his own line and whose name, with certain others -soon to be mentioned, was destined to go down to everlasting fame -indissolubly linked with that of Francis Drake. This was Captain John -Hawkins, and when the young trader reached Plymouth he had just come -back with a shipload of gold and other precious things from his first -venture in slave-trading, and now at least Drake, who was still a lad -in his teens, must have heard something of the wonders of El Dorado. -Yet, curiously enough, when Captain Hawkins went back he did not go -with him. He sailed instead, as a sort of supercargo, in another of -Hawkins’ ships to Biscay, and there a momentous revelation awaited him, -as though to guide him on the path of his destiny. - -At San Sebastian about a score of English sailors, once strong and -stalwart men of Devon, crept out of the dungeons of the Inquisition and -took passage with him home. King Philip had taken off his embargo now, -and these men were the remnant of the crew of a Plymouth ship which he -had seized in port when the embargo was laid on. The others had rotted -to death during the six months that he had bestowed his hospitality -upon them. We can imagine what talks they had on the way home, and no -doubt El Draque bore the stories of these forlorn mariners well in mind -on that most memorable day when he “singed the King of Spain’s beard” -at Cadiz. - -John Hawkins came back from his second voyage richer than ever, and -now all the mariners of the South Coast were beginning to dream golden -dreams which were soon to become yet more golden deeds, and King -Philip, to whom all such ventures were the flattest piracy, began to -fear for his monopoly and instructed his ambassador in London to drop -the hint that foreign trade with the Indies was forbidden, upon which, -foolishly enough, or perhaps not knowing their own true strength, Queen -Bess’s councillors backed down and forbade John Hawkins to start again. - -He, obediently enough, stayed at home, but a certain George Lovell got -together an expedition and slipped out to sea, westward bound. With him -went Francis Drake, at length to see for the first time the blue waters -and green shores of El Dorado. This time, however, it proved anything -but golden for him or his companions, for they came back with shattered -ships and still worse broken fortunes. They had drawn a blank in the -great lottery which half Europe was wanting to gamble in. - -Nothing daunted, he shipped again, this time with George Fenner, bound -for Guiana. Again, financially speaking, the voyage ended in disaster, -but there was one incident in it destined to bear good fruit. A big -Portuguese galleasse, backed up by six gunboats, tried to enforce the -prohibition against foreign trade. Fenner had one ship and a pinnace, -and with these he fought the “Portugals” and thoroughly convinced them -by the logic of shot and steel that he was not the sort of man to be -prohibited from doing anything he wanted to do. - -This forgotten action is really one of great importance. It was -Francis Drake’s first taste of fighting, which in itself means a good -deal, but it was also the beginning of that lordly and magnificent -contempt which the English mariners of that day were soon to feel for -all enemies, no matter how strong they might seem. It was this spirit -which a few years later was to take Sir Richard Grenville - - “With his hundred men on deck and his ninety sick below,” - -into the midst of the fifty-three Spanish ships which he fought for an -afternoon and a night before he surrendered so sorely against his will -and fell dead of his wounds on the deck of the Spanish flagship. It was -this, too, which, when that long seven days’ fight against the Armada -was raging and roaring up the Channel, brought the flag of the Spanish -Rear-Admiral down with a run just because the Little Pirate stamped his -foot on the deck of that same _Revenge_ and said that he was Francis -Drake and had no time to parley. - -Meanwhile the rumblings of the war-storm in Europe had been growing -louder. The Netherlanders were at last turning on their torturers, -Darnley had been murdered and Mary Queen of Scots put in prison, so -Gloriana, feeling herself somewhat at leisure, took a hand in the -next buccaneering expedition. It may be noted here, by the way, that -there was no more ardent buccaneer and slave-trader in her dominions -than Good Queen Bess herself. She lent ships though she withheld her -commission, and her pirates did the rest. If disaster overtook them -or if the Spanish Minister raged against their doings she promptly -disowned them and felt sorry for her ships. But if they came back -happily filled to the hatches with plundered treasure, she took her -dividends and lent more ships. - -It was thus with the expedition which sailed out of Plymouth on October -2, 1567, under the command of Admiral John Hawkins, whose second -officer was Francis Drake. The diplomacy of the times called it the -trading venture of Sir William Garrard and Co., but for all that there -were two ships of the Royal Navy in it, the _Jesus_ and the _Minion_, -and the merchandise it carried consisted mainly of cannon and small -arms, powder and shot, and cold steel. - -The voyage began with a slave-raiding expedition down the Portuguese -coast of Africa, whence with five hundred slaves they crossed to the -Spanish Main. Here, after varying fortunes, they filled their ships -with treasure, and Hawkins turned his prows northward for home. But -while crossing the mouth of the Gulf of Mexico a furious hurricane -burst upon them and drove his gold-and-pearl-laden vessels so far into -it, that he came to the bold decision to put into the Spanish port of -Vera Cruz to refit. - -In the harbour he found twelve great galleons loaded with gold and -silver, waiting for the convoy to escort them to Spain. They were -utterly at the mercy of the English ships, but John Hawkins, pirate -and slave-dealer, was still an English gentleman, so he made a solemn -convention to leave the treasure-ships alone on condition of being -allowed to refit in the harbour. Hawkins was already known in Spain -as the “Enemy of God,” and Don Martin Enriquez, the new Governor of -Mexico, had come out with special orders to abolish him by any means -that might be found the readiest. - -Don Martin seems to have thought that in this case treachery would -suit best, so he signed the convention and gave his word of honour as -a gentleman of Spain that the English ships should be allowed to come -and go unmolested. So for three days the work of dismantling went on -in peace, and on the fourth, half-disabled as they were, they were -attacked. It was a fierce and bloody fight, and it ended in the sinking -of four galleons, the wrecking of the Spanish flag-ship, and the -killing of five or six hundred Spaniards. - -But on the English side only the _Jesus_, the _Minion_, and the -_Judith_ got away and, shot-shattered and half-provisioned, began to -stagger homeward across the wide Atlantic. On the way the _Judith_ was -lost, and took to the bottom with her all the proceeds of many months -of trading and fighting and privation. - -So the expedition came back poorer than it went, and Spain laughed -aloud, but, as will be seen, somewhat too soon. Drake got home first, -and no sooner did he land at Plymouth than he took horse for London. -It so happened that a little while before Spanish ships carrying a -huge amount of money to pay Alva’s army in the Netherlands, had been -driven into the Thames by the Protestant rovers lately mentioned, and -Gloriana, who never liked to let a good thing go, had held on to it on -one pretext or another until Drake came hot-footed and angry-hearted to -tell of the treachery of Vera Cruz. - -Gloriana wanted nothing better. Her buccaneering venture had been a -failure and here was a way of paying herself for the two ships she -had risked, so she turned upon the Spanish Ambassador and told him -point blank that until the injury done to her “honest merchants” was -redressed she would hold the treasure in pledge. Naturally after that -not a groat of it ever got to Alva or his soldiers. - -That year, which was 1569, Drake went to Rochelle with Sir Thomas -Wynter. The next summer he married Mary Newman, and a month or two -later he was again steering to the westward in two little vessels, the -_Dragon_ and the _Swan_. The next year he went again, with the _Swan_ -alone, and this time he came back with a certain idea in his head which -was magnificent to the point of absurdity. The adventures of the last -two or three years had deepened his contempt for Spanish prowess, and -now he laughingly proposed to go back, not to kill the goose that laid -the King of Spain’s golden eggs, but to rifle the nest in which they -were deposited. This was Nombre de Dios, the strongest city in the New -World, and the richest to boot. - -The means employed were, as was usual in this age of wonders, -ridiculously inadequate to the end to which they were devoted. Of late -years certain bold mariners have sought to win an ephemeral notoriety -by crossing the Atlantic in open boats. Francis Drake set out on a -serious and momentous expedition to the Spanish Main in the _Pasha_ of -70 tons followed by the _Swan_ of 25--that is to say in a couple of -fishing-boats. These two cockle-shells were manned by seventy-three men -all told, only one of whom had reached the age of thirty. It must have -looked more like a parcel of lads going afloat on a holiday spree than -an expedition with which all the world was soon to ring. - -There is no space here to tell of all that befel these absurd -adventurers on their devious and tedious way to Nombre de Dios, though -no romancer ever imagined such a story as their adventures make. So it -must suffice to say that on July 29th he started out across the Isthmus -of Darien at the head of seventy-three men to attack a strong city as -big as Plymouth, and with these he actually fought his way into the -town, established himself in the centre of it and held it for some -hours. - -[Illustration: THEY CARRIED HIM DOWN TO THE BOATS.] - -If his men had been the seasoned buccaneers of his later raids he -would probably have taken it altogether, but they unhappily found in -the Governor’s house a stack of silver bars twelve feet high, ten feet -broad, and seventy feet long. This was a little too much for the nerves -of the Devon boys, but Drake would not let them touch it, since the -town was not yet theirs. Then a fearful rain-storm came on just about -dawn and put out their matches and ruined their bow-strings, and then -a terrible misfortune happened. Drake had been severely wounded in the -leg, but he had concealed his hurt until the supreme moment came, and -then, as he was leading his handful of heroes to the last attack, he -went down with his boot full of blood. Something very like a panic now -took his men, not for their own sakes but for his. In vain he stormed -at them, and cried angrily: - -“I have brought you to the door of the Treasure-house of the World! -Will ye be fools enough to go away empty?” - -“Your life is more precious to us and England than all the gold of the -Indies!” they replied, and so by kindly force they carried him down to -the boats and rowed away, having accomplished perhaps the most splendid -failure in history. - -The fame of this exploit instantly echoed through the whole Spanish -Main and thence across the Atlantic to Europe. A few days later he -avenged his failure at Nombre de Dios by cutting a big ship out from -under the guns of Cartagena. Then he vanished, leaving no other trace -behind him than the poor little abandoned _Swan_. For the next few -months nothing was seen of him, though his hand was felt far and wide -along the coast. Spanish store-ships disappeared, dispatch boats were -intercepted, and coast-towns were raided with bewildering rapidity and -effectiveness. - -But all this time the deadly tropical fever was playing havoc with his -little handful of men. His brother John died of it, and man after man -was struck down till at last, out of the seventy-three who had sailed -with him from Plymouth, he could only muster eighteen fighting men when -he at length started to plunder the mule-train from Panama. - -On the fourth day of the journey a very memorable thing happened, for -that noon he reached the top of the dividing ridge of the Isthmus, and -lo! there before him, only a few miles away, lay the smooth, shining -expanse of the Pacific Ocean, that long-hidden, jealously-guarded sea -on which his were the first English eyes that had ever gazed. He did -just what such a man would have done in such circumstances. He fell on -his knees and, raising his hands to heaven, cried aloud: - -“Almighty God, of Thy goodness, give me life and leave once to sail an -English ship on yonder sea!” - -Years afterwards the prayer was granted, and not only did he sail on -the Golden Sea, but crossed it while he was making the first voyage -that an Englishman ever made round the world. - -Were I writing a book instead of an essay I could tell of the -plundering of the mule-trains, of the taking of Vera Cruz--where, to -the astonishment of the Spaniards, he would not allow a single woman or -an unarmed man to be hurt--and Nombre de Dios, which did not resist him -so well the second time. It must, however, be enough to say that this -time everything ended happily for the remnant that survived, and that -on Sunday morning, August 9, 1573, while the good folks of Plymouth -were in church, they heard a roar of artillery from the batteries -followed by an answering salute from the sea and, straightway quitting -their devotions, they ran out to learn the good news that Gloriana’s -Little Pirate had come back safe at last and well loaded up with -plunder. - -His next venture was nothing less than that famous voyage of his round -the world, with the fairy-story of which we have here nothing to do -save to say that the fame of it, no less than the enormous treasure, -the plunder of a hundred ships and a score of towns, with which the -poor sea-worn, worm-eaten, wind-weary _Golden Hind_, staggered one -Michaelmas morning into Plymouth Sound, at last convinced Queen Bess -that in her dear Little Pirate--whom, by the way, she had never yet -openly recognised--she had a champion who was worth a good many -thousands of King Philip’s soldiers and sailors. - -But now the first of Drake’s open rewards was to be his. The _Golden -Hind_ was hauled on to the slips at Deptford, and Gloriana and her -court dined on board. When the dinner was over she bade her Little -Pirate kneel before her, touched him on the shoulder with his own sword -and bade him rise Sir Francis Drake. The Spaniards, by the way, had -another title for him, no less honourable in his eyes, and this was -“the Master-Thief of the New World.” - -For some considerable time nothing happened beyond the failure of one -or two trifling expeditions--which failure was Gloriana’s fault, and -not Drake’s--and the setting of a price of £40,000 by favour of the -King of Spain on the Little Pirate’s head--an investment of which Drake -was soon to pay the dividend in the craft-crowded harbour of Cadiz. - -Meanwhile, matters between England and Spain were going from bad to -worse. For a few months unscrupulous intrigue, backed up by wholesale -lying, hampered Drake most sorely in the preparation of that great -work which was nothing less than the establishment of the sea-power -of England. Everything that the fickleness of his mistress, the -weathercock support of so-called friends at court, and the still more -dangerous machinations of English statesmen in the pay of Spain could -do, was done. The fleet, to his unutterable rage and disgust, was -even placed on a peace-footing, despite the fact that the noise of the -Armada’s preparations was still sounding across the Narrow Seas. - -But at last, by some means or other, a certain Spanish spy had got -himself suspected and stretched on the rack. Now the rack, as an aid -to cross-examination, is not an ideal instrument, but it certainly -served its purpose this time, for the spy in his torment gave away -all the details of a vast scheme which embraced an alliance between -France, Spain, and Scotland, together with a general Catholic uprising -in England, which was to take place simultaneously with the Triple -Invasion. - -Never had England, and with her the cause of liberty, stood in such -great and deadly peril. Gloriana at last flung diplomatic dalliance -to the winds, stopped her lying and chicanery, kicked the Spanish -Ambassador out of the country, and let her Little Pirate loose. Yet -even now there was another lull before the storm, and this lull Philip -took advantage of to invite a fleet of English corn-ships to his ports, -where he seized them to feed that ever-growing sea-monster which he was -going to pit against El Draque. - -This settled the matter. Drake, only half ready for sea, put out with -every ship that could move for fear more orders would come to stop -him and, with an insolent assurance which augured well for the great -things that he was about to do, actually ran his ships into Vigo Bay -and forced the Spanish Governor to allow him to finish his preparations -in Spanish waters. Then he turned his eager prows westward, stopping -on the way at the Cape Verde Islands to lay waste Vera Cruz and make -Santiago a heap of ashes. - -Five years before young William Hawkins had been taken prisoner here -and burnt alive with several of his crew, and this was El Draque’s way -of wiping out the old score. - -Then he sped on again, spent Christmas at Santa Dominica, refitted -his ships and refreshed his men, and then fell like a thunderbolt on -the famous city of Santo Domingo, the oldest in the Indies, founded -by Columbus himself and ruled over by his brother. It was this that -the Little Pirate had been preparing for during those other mysterious -voyages of his. The blow was as crushing as it was unexpected, and the -prestige of Spain in the West never recovered from it. The town was -utterly stripped and dismantled by the victors. Fifty thousand pounds -in cash, two hundred and forty guns of all calibres, and an immense -amount of other spoil was brought away, and the whole fleet, after -living at free quarters for a month, sailed southward, completely -refitted and re-victualled, as usual, at the Spaniards’ expense. - -When the news got to Europe, it was said that Philip had had “such -a cooling as he had never had since he was King of Spain.” It is -both interesting and instructive to learn that not the least part of -the booty took the shape of a hundred English sailors who were found -toiling as slaves in the Spanish galleys. - -Reinforced by these, Gloriana’s Little Pirate crossed the Caribbean Sea -and fell on Cartagena, the capital of the Spanish Main, and now the -richest city in the Indies. Paralysed by the insolence of the attack, -it soon fell under its fury and real strength. The booty was enormous, -but the moral effect was still greater. The new-born sea-power of -England had vindicated itself with triumphant suddenness, and Drake, -having picked up the unfortunate remnants of Raleigh’s colony in -Virginia--the time for colonising not having come yet--entered -Plymouth Sound again in the _Elizabeth Bonaventura_ at the head of his -loot-laden fleet, and reported his arrival, piously regretting that on -the way home he had missed the Spanish plate-fleet by twelve hours “for -reasons best known to God.” - -“A great gap hath been opened which is very little to the King of -Spain’s liking,” was the Little Pirate’s own comment on the brilliant -achievement which had ushered a new power into the world. He might also -have put it another way, and said that with his well-directed shot -he had plugged the source whence flowed the golden stream of Spanish -wealth, for indeed it was nothing less than this. The Spanish Colossus -suddenly found itself with empty pockets, Spanish credit was ruined -at a single blow, the Bank of Seville closed its doors, and when King -Philip tried to raise a loan of half a million ducats, he was flatly -refused. - -How hard hit he was may be seen from the fact that instead of hurling -the whole strength of his laboriously-prepared Armada on the English -coasts, he asked for explanations. Gloriana, with an almost splendid -mendacity, disowned her Little Pirate once more and swore she had -nothing whatever to do with him. But this Drake expected, and went on -with his own plans, having no doubt honestly paid up the Queen’s full -share of the plunder. - -A few months more of diplomatic dodgery followed, and then came the -final opening of Gloriana’s eyes. A letter stolen from the Pope’s own -cabinet proved to her beyond all possibility of doubt that the Great -Armada was intended for the invasion of England and nothing else. -Then she called her Little Pirate to her again and took counsel with -him, with the result that the next time he hoisted his flag he did -so on board the great _Merchant Royal_ at the head of twenty-three -sail including five battleships, two first-class cruisers, seven -second-class, and about a dozen gunboats. Nor did he go this time as -the Queen’s licensed pirate but as her Admiral of the Fleet, duly -commissioned in her name to burn, sink, and destroy, and to use all -means whatever to prevent the various divisions of the Armada coming -together. - -Even now, at the last minute of the eleventh hour, treachery almost did -its work, for there was an Opposition and Peace-at-any-price Party in -those days, as there has been in later ones. Drake seems to have known -what was coming, for, when the Queen’s messenger dashed into Plymouth -bearing the fatal orders, he had gone. - -Happily there was no telegraph in those days. If there had been it -would probably have proved the ruin of England and the triumph of -Spain. As it was the next news that came was from Drake himself, -telling, laconically as usual, how he had “singed the King of Spain’s -beard in Cadiz.” When the facts came out, the said singeing was seen -to amount to the destruction by burning and sinking of 12,000 tons -of shipping, including some of the finest ships of war that floated. -The whole English fleet had, as had now become the custom on such -occasions, been revictualled at Spanish expense, and four large ships -full of provisions were captured intact. - -From Cadiz the triumphant Admiral raged up and down the terror-stricken -coast, storming strongholds, and burning and scuttling the store-ships -of the Great Armada. He went to Lisbon, where Santa Cruz, said to be -the greatest sea-captain in Europe, lay, and, after vainly challenging -him to come out and fight, politely offered to convoy him and his -fleet to England “if by chance his course should lie that way.” The -fact was that the Colossus was paralysed. Drake had struck out straight -at its heart, and so doing had proved two principles of no small moment -to the making of the British Empire: first, the true frontiers of a -maritime nation are its enemies’ coasts; second, the only effective -method of defence for such a nation is attack. - -It was on his way home from this expedition, storm-shattered and -disgusted at missing the Plate-Fleet, which had once more slipped -through his fingers, that Gloriana’s Little Pirate took the richest -prize of his life. This was the _San Felipe_. She was the King of -Spain’s own treasure-ship, and she came, not from the West, but from -the East. Though he knew it not, Drake had that day done a very great -thing for England and the making of her Empire, for not only did the -_San Felipe_ carry treasure and rich stuffs to the value of something -like a million and a quarter of our money, but she had on board -dispatches, letters, and account-books which let the English merchants -into all the secrets of Spain’s East Indian trade, and led to the -almost instant formation of the Honourable East India Company, itself -an Empire-Maker of no small account. - -The epic of the Elizabethan era was now beginning to hurry towards its -climax. But Gloriana was still surrounded by traitors, and even now -temporising was the order of the day. She was cast down by remorse -for the execution of Mary Queen of Scots, and she even reprimanded her -Little Pirate for doing her too good service, and told Philip that he -was in disgrace for exceeding instructions. - -It was in vain that Drake and the other friends of England prayed -and entreated and stormed and swore. In vain they pointed across the -Narrow Seas to Parma in the Netherlands at the head of 30,000 of the -finest troops in Europe, and to the ports of Spain and Portugal, once -more swarming with shipping and echoing with the noise of warlike -preparations. For a time the liars and traitors had things their own -way again. Drake and Howard implored her to let them get their ships -fitted and go and fight the Armada in its own ports. No, she would do -nothing. And she did nothing till at last arrived that fatal evening on -which-- - - “There came a gallant merchant-ship full sail to Plymouth Bay.” - -Golden weeks and priceless opportunities had been wasted by the fatal -lethargy of the Court. Drake and Howard, instead of falling, as they -longed to do, on the wind-bound Armada in Vigo Bay, and doing with it -as Drake had done at Cadiz, were kept on the defensive, straining like -bloodhounds at the leash, knowing that every moment that the good wind -lasted was heavily fraught with fate for England and perhaps the world. - -At length the wind went round, and Drake, marvelling in angry wonder -“how God could have sent a south-west wind just then,” found himself -baffled and beaten back, while Medina-Sidonia with his released Armada -sailed triumphantly for the Channel. There was only one thing now to -do if England was to be saved. Valour and heroism, self-devotion and -skill, must repair the damage that treason, lying, and weakness of -head or heart had done. By this time the Armada should have been a -crushed and tangled mass of burning wreckage, and so it would have -been if Drake had had his way, and now here it was stronger than ever, -its ships covering the hitherto Inviolate Sea; and there was Parma, -with his transports still undestroyed, only waiting to join hands with -Sidonia to once for all strangle the Heretic in their pitiless grip. - -In the mighty and memorable fight that followed, our Little Pirate -commanded on his own ship, the immortal _Revenge_. With almost -incredible labour and skill the English fleet was somehow worked and -warped out to the westward until, when that famous Sunday morning -dawned, the sun looked, as has been truly said, upon a sight glorious -for England. There was the great Armada, crescent-shaped, rolling up -the Channel, and there, right in the wind’s eye and on its rear, were -two English squadrons, and a third was gallantly advancing out of -Plymouth. - -This one, with true Elizabethan insolence, steered right across the -front of the huge fleet, firing into such of the Dons as came within -range. Then it went about, and joined the other English ships to -windward. - -Every one has read of the long, running, seven-day fight that followed; -every one knows how the little, light-heeled English ships ran in and -out among the great unwieldy galleons, tempting them out of their -formation, and, having isolated one, fell on her like a pack of dogs -on a wolf; and how, in spite of all that the English Admiral and his -captains could do, the ever-changing wind and the ever-succeeding calms -so helped the Spaniards, that in the end they reached the Straits of -Dover but little worse off than they started. - -If Drake could have had his way, these tactics would have been pushed -farther, and every mile of the way would have been disputed; but Lord -Howard, though a brave man, lacked the all-daring assurance of the -conqueror of Santo Domingo and Cartagena. He would not fight until he -had joined with Seymour and Wynter in the Straits. So it came about -that on the seventh day--that is to say, Saturday afternoon--the Great -Armada, the poorer only by some dozen craft that had been captured -or battered into wreck and ruin, was sailing gloriously past Calais -with the French and English land well in sight, and Dunkirk, the -trysting-place with Parma, only eighteen miles away. - -England has never passed through such anxious hours as she did that -afternoon and night. It seemed as though, after all, her new-found -sea-strength had failed her, and that, despite all the brilliant -exploits of Gloriana’s Little Pirate in the West, he was powerless -to protect her nearer home. What would have happened in the ordinary -course of events no one now knows, for the Spaniards, stricken by some -inexplicable madness, suddenly altered the whole course of events by -what can only be called a freak of idiocy. - -Medina-Sidonia, after having accomplished the most brilliant feat of -seamanship that his age had seen, gave orders for the Armada to anchor! -A few hours more and its work would have been done, with what results -to England one scarcely cares to picture. So unexpected was this piece -of priceless good fortune by the English captains that they had to drop -their own anchors within range of the Spanish guns to save entangling -themselves with the big Spanish ships. - -All Sunday the two fleets lay within sight of each other; anxious -councils of war were held on both sides, and so night fell without a -shot being fired or anything done. By midnight the tide was swirling -strong and swift from the English to the Spanish ships, and Drake was -busy preparing his crowning piece of devilry for the edification of the -Dons. - -At about one o’clock on that calm, moonless morning, patches of -flickering, leaping flame began to show among the twinkling English -lights, and these grew swiftly higher and broader, and a few minutes -later the terrified Dons saw eight fire-ships crowned mast-high with -leaping flames, come reeling and roaring into their midst. - -Then there was cutting of cables and slipping of moorings, and -labouring with frantic haste to get the ships under sail. Galleon -crashed into galleasse, and galleasse into cruiser in the wild haste -and fatal confusion. - -Marvellous to say, not a single Spanish ship took fire, but behind -the fire-craft there was something more terrible and deadly still--El -Draque and his guns. At the supreme moment Lord Howard weakly and -foolishly turned aside to capture or sink a disabled galleasse. If the -rest of the fleet had followed him there might have been no Battle of -Gravelines, and the Trafalgar of the Sixteenth Century might never have -been fought. But, as has been well said, it was the hour for which -Francis Drake had been born. He set the _Revenge_ on the wind, and, -followed by the rest of the squadron, bore down in grim and ominous -silence on the huddled, entangled Dons. Within pistol range of the -great _San Martin_ the _Revenge_ burst into sudden thunder and flame, -and drove on enwreathed in smoke. In her wake ship after ship came -on in perfect order, each raining her iron storm into the rent and -splintering sides of the Dons as they passed. - -Then from Dover way came the roar of guns telling that Wynter and -Seymour had got to work, and so for three hours they went at it, the -Little Pirate ever first, and revelling in the work that he loved to -do for his dear England. He had forgotten all his mistress’s slights -and fickleness, all the harm that Court traitors had done him, all his -suffering and privation on the windless seas and burning lands of the -West. It was the hour of England’s fate and his own, and there he was -in the thick of it, and he was happy. - -After three hours Howard and his laggards came up, and the fight roared -on flank and front and rear. Although the school-books say but little -about it, there had never been such a sea-fight in the world before, -nor one on whose end such great issues hung. The Spaniards, caught -between El Draque and the sands of Dunkirk--which to them was something -worse than being between the devil and the deep sea--fought with all -their ancient valour, but ship after ship, as the battle roared on -through the day, went down riddled with shot or took fire and blew up, -till at length out of the forty battleships and cruisers which Sidonia -had somehow got together to protect his rear, only sixteen were left, -and they were little better than shot-shattered, fire-blackened hulks. - -The powder on both sides was nearly done, but so too was the work of -Drake and his ships. Fathom by fathom the north-west wind was driving -the Dons on to the mud-banks of the Netherland shore, and the Little -Pirate in his well-named _Revenge_ was hanging on their weather quarter -watching--and I doubt not praying--for the moment of their final ruin. - -And yet he was not to see it, for when there was but five fathoms of -water between the Spanish keels and the Dutch mud the north-wester -dropped to a calm, a fresh south-wester sprang up in its place, and -for the fourth time in seven days the Armada was saved from utter -destruction by those fickle winds to which a pious sentiment has -ascribed its ruin. - -Down went the Spanish helms, and round came the dripping, labouring, -Spanish prows, and ere long all that was left of King Philip’s fleet -was staggering away to the northward to begin that awful voyage round -the north of Scotland and past the wild Irish coast from which so few -were to return. Meanwhile the Little Pirate hung on to the heels of the -flying Armada for two days and nights, until at length a tempest came -rolling up over the Dogger Bank, and he ran in for safety under the -Scottish shore, cheerfully leaving the Dons to the winds of heaven, and -the rocks that were waiting to finish what his own guns had begun. - -With the victory of Gravelines, Drake’s work as an Empire-maker comes -to an end. The expedition to Portugal, for all its booty, was a failure -and did nothing to enhance his fame. If his advice had been taken -Spain might have been crushed and humbled for ever, but such was -the hopeless weakness and vacillation at Court that, even after the -Armada had shown her the true designs of Philip, Gloriana got into -negotiations with him again. Over and over again her Little Pirate -besought her to give him the means of striking the blow that should -crush Spain and make England undisputed mistress of the seas, but it -was not to be, and so at length, sick and sore at heart, he sailed away -again to his beloved West, never to return. - -There is nothing in this last expedition of his that is noteworthy -save its continued misfortunes. It seemed as though when the little -_Revenge_ went down, as she did in the midst of the fifty-three Spanish -ships which she had fought “for a day and a night,” she had taken her -old commander’s good luck down with her. At last on the deadly island -of Escudo de Veragua the two guardian demons of El Dorado, fever and -dysentry, struck him down with many another of his men. He lived to get -away, but not for long, and six days afterwards, when his fleet came to -anchor off Puerto Bello, the heroic Little Pirate breathed his last and -his gallant soul went to its account, passing away from earth on the -very spot that had been the scene of his first sea-fight and his first -victory. - - - - -IV - -_OLIVER CROMWELL_ - -“_HEALER AND SETTLER_” - - - - -IV - -OLIVER CROMWELL - - -“He is perhaps the only example which history affords of one man having -governed the most opposite events and proved sufficient for the most -various destinies.” - -No man’s character was ever so completely and so tersely summed up as -the great Oliver’s is here in these few words of a critic belonging -to another race and nation, and, as regards his varied destinies, it -may be added that no man ever was raised up and set to work by the -Controller of human destinies as opportunely as he was. - -History shows no parallel to it, not even in the oft-quoted story of -Cincinnatus, and certainly in all the long array of our rulers there -is none other whose story is so crammed with wonders or who crowded so -many notable and pregnant acts into the busy days of a few years as -this gentleman-farmer of Huntingdonshire, who at forty-three left his -farming and vestry-meetings and the like and girded on his sword to go -and fight the good fight of freedom, and who at fifty-two laid it aside -to prove himself as good a statesman and ruler as he had been soldier -and general. - -His claim to a foremost place among the Makers of Britain is a twofold -one, for he was a restorer, a reinvigorator, as it were, of this realm, -as well as a very considerable widener of it. When the futile and -inglorious reign of “the most learned fool in Christendom” came to an -end, all the brilliant promise of the Elizabethan age had been wofully -obscured, and the glories of the great Queen and her pirates looked -like those of a summer sun setting behind a bank of fog. - -As Macaulay justly put the case: “On the day of the accession of James -I. England descended from the rank which she had hitherto held and -began to be regarded as a Power hardly of the second order.... He -began his administration by putting an end to the war which had raged -many years between England and Spain, and from that time he shunned -hostilities with a caution which was proof against the insults of his -neighbours and the clamour of his subjects.” - -How different this from the gallant days of Gloriana and her knights! -And yet this poor crowned and sceptred ninny aspired to be a despot -even as his son after him did. It is true that these realms were -beginning to need a despot and that badly, but not such a one as could -ever have been born of that hopeless House of Stuart. A despot who is -a strong man may be good or evil as he uses his opportunities and his -powers, but the whole stage of history has not yet held a despot who -was also a weak man who did not prove himself at once a curse to his -country and the world. - -The story of the feeble violence and silly cunning with which Charles -the First sought to enforce that ridiculous theory of his about the -Divine Right of Kings has been too often and too variously told for us -to need to trouble with it here. There _is_ a Divine Right of Kings, as -the great Oliver was very soon to show with most unmistakable and most -unanswerable logic, but the kind of king who really has Divine rights -does not usually have them because he is the son of his father, and -especially of such a father as James the First of England and Sixth of -Scotland. - -Our present concern is with the fact that this Empire of ours, in a -most critical state of its process of making which came very near to -one of unmaking, was saved and transformed from weakness to strength by -the substitution of the real despotism of the Lord Protector from the -sham or histrionic despotism of Charles the First. - -The fact was that the body-corporate of this infant empire was assailed -by the worst of all national disorders, internal disintegration. -England, the very heart and centre of it, was about to be rent in twain -by the frenzied and pitiless talons of civil war, and that is a war in -which the right side--which, of course, is always the best side--must -not only win, but utterly crush and pulverise the other unless wreck -and chaos irretrievable are to follow. - -This was the central idea that the Great Oliver grasped just as Edward -of the Long Legs had grasped his brilliantly premature idea of the -United Kingdom. He was the latest of that series of iron-handed men -that had begun with William the Norman. The watchword of his whole -public life was “healing and settling.” The wounds of his country had -to be healed and its disorders settled, no matter by what means, so -long as it was done, and in this deep-rooted conviction we see at a -glance his kinship with the other Empire-makers who had gone before him. - -Of his early life there is little to be said, though it is noteworthy -that he was once fined £10 for neglecting a summons to appear at the -King’s coronation and receive the honour of knighthood. He little -thought then that he would one day find it his duty to refuse the crown -and sceptre of England. - -Every one who has read even the school-books knows that when the -war actually began all the apparent advantages were on the side of -the Royalists. Though the first battles afforded the extraordinary -spectacle of mere conflicts of amateur soldiers, few of whom had ever -seen a real fight before, the Cavaliers, trained to horsemanship and -the use of arms, and versed in all manly sports, made far finer -fighting material than the raw levies of the Parliament. Had this -difference continued victory must have remained, as it began, with the -Royalists, with results to the nation that could hardly have failed to -be of the very worst sort. This is what Cromwell himself says on this -all-important subject: - -“At my first going out into this engagement I saw our men were beaten -at every hand. Your troops, said I, are most of them old, decayed -serving-men, and tapsters and such kind of fellows, and, said I, their -troops are gentlemen’s sons, younger sons and persons of quality. Do -you think that the spirits of such base, mean fellows will ever be able -to encounter gentlemen that have honour and courage and resolution in -them? You must get men of spirit and, take it not ill what I say--I -know you will not--of a spirit that is likely to go on as far as -gentlemen will go, or else you will be beaten still.” - -These wise words, which, by the way, were said to no less a man than -John Hampden himself, form a key to all the battles of the Civil -War. No sooner did Oliver come on to the field as a plain captain of -yeomanry horse than his keen, if untaught, eye instantly recognised the -one great virtue and strength of the Royalist party. They had an Idea, -a devotion, a principle for the sake of which men were ready to sell -their lands, melt their plate, beggar their families, and lose their -own lives, and men so equipped could only be successfully met and -withstood by men who, as he himself put it in that quaintly eloquent -phraseology of his, “made some conscience of what they did,” and -thereupon he set himself to find such men and make soldiers of them. - -How well he succeeded the following extract from a contemporary -news-letter written some ten months after the outbreak of war will -sufficiently tell: - -“As for Colonel Cromwell”--promotion, it will be seen, was somewhat -rapid in those stormy days--“he hath two thousand brave men, well -disciplined. No man swears but he pays his twelve pence. If he be drunk -he is set in the stocks, or worse. If one calls the other Roundhead he -is cashiered; insomuch that the countries where they come leap for joy -of them and come in and join with them. How happy it were if all the -forces were thus disciplined!” - -On the field of Marston Moor, Prince Rupert nicknamed Cromwell “Old -Ironsides,” and from that day to this the most invincible troops that -ever marched to battle have been named after him. Years afterwards, -when his work and theirs was done, their leader was able to say of -them: “From that day forward they were never beaten and wherever they -were engaged against the enemy they beat continually.” - -This is literally true. Whether in skirmish or battle, at home or -abroad, whether pitted against the disorderly chivalry of the Loyalists -or the rigid discipline of the finest Continental troops; whether -storming a breach or bearing the brunt of a half-lost battle, these -psalm-singing, hard-hitting Crusaders of the new Church Militant not -only were never beaten, but never once failed to hurl the enemy back in -confusion and disaster. - -In them, in short, that stubborn English valour which has since pushed -its way all over the world was first _disciplined_. They formed the -first model ever seen of an English regiment, a combination of many -units of strength and valour moving and fighting as one, and the fact -that “Old Ironsides” was the first man thus to add discipline to valour -is in itself no small portion of his title to fame as an Empire-Maker. - -The first occasion on which these Ironsides made their mark in battle -is one of even greater importance than the battle itself, for it -marks the entrance on to the stage of history of the first regularly -disciplined English regiment, the parent of those who, on a thousand -fields since then, have proved themselves worthy of their grim but -splendid ancestors. It was the first time, too, that they had a chance -to try conclusions with Rupert and his Cavaliers, hitherto unconquered -and irresistible. - -It was July 2, 1644, on a dull and storm-threatening afternoon, that -Cavalier and Roundhead first met in a really serious fashion. Compared -with what was now to be done Edgehill and all that had come after it -had been trifles, for so far the conflicts had been those of amateurs -at the art of war, each engaged, as it were, in licking the other into -shape, and the conclusion that they now had to try was which of them -had got into the best shape. There were about four-and-twenty thousand -each of them as they stood through the anxious hours of that summer -afternoon on either side of a ditch running across Marston Moor, each -watching for a chance to attack, but feeling, no doubt, that the doings -of the next few hours would decide an issue which needed a certain -amount of thinking over. - -The two armies were drawn up upon what is now the regulation pattern, -right and left wings and centre. Cromwell with his Ironsides on the -left of the Parliamentary army faced Rupert on the right of the -Royalists, and he was supported by the infantry of what was then known -as the Eastern Association. The King’s centre was held by Newcastle, -and against it was the Parliamentary centre reinforced by nine thousand -Scots infantry. The Royal left wing was composed of Goring’s cavalry -regiments and was faced by the Parliamentary right wing under the two -Fairfaxes. - -During the afternoon there was an exchange of cannon shots which -doesn’t seem to have done very much harm on either side. Prince Rupert, -with his usual impetuosity, had been for some hours wanting to get -over the ditch and try conclusions with the Ironsides, who were posted -on a little eminence amidst standing corn, and who had wiled away the -anxious hours of waiting with mutual exhortations and psalm singing, -not a little to the amusement of Rupert and his gallant scapegraces, -who were yet to learn that these close-cropped, grim-visaged Puritans -could ride and fight a great deal better than they could sing. - -The King’s older generals, no doubt contemplating Continental -etiquette, had decided that it was too late to fight that evening and -had withdrawn to their quarters. Cromwell, laughing at etiquette as -he did at everything else that was not of practical utility, saw his -chance, jumped the ditch, and went hot-footed and hot-handed into -Rupert’s ranks. A bullet scored his neck, and hearing some one cry -out that he was wounded he shouted: “All’s well. A miss is as good as -a mile!” and charged on. Whether or not he was the first to use this -now favourite expression I am not able to say, but at least it was -characteristic. - -The charge was met in a fashion worthy of Rupert and the gallant -gentlemen who followed him, and we learn that after the first onset the -Ironsides reeled back, but it was only for a moment. Some Scots cavalry -came up behind them, they surged forward again, discipline and valour -did their work, and a few minutes afterwards Prince Rupert and his -merry men had met more than their match, and, ere long, to use his own -words, Colonel Cromwell “had scattered them before him like a little -dust.” The remnants of them were chased and cut down with a ruthless -severity which was then part of the Puritan character, almost to the -gates of York, eight miles away. - -But Cromwell, profiting by the mistakes which Rupert himself had made -in his headlong charges, kept his men well in hand, and when once the -Royalist right wing was broken, led them round to see how the battle -had gone on the Parliamentary right and centre. - -If he had not done so Marston Moor might have replaced Charles Stuart -on the throne of England. Goring had broken up Fairfax’s cavalry as -completely as Oliver had broken up Rupert’s. He had flung them back -upon their infantry supports, breaking these in turn, after which he -flung himself with the seemingly triumphant Royalists of the centre on -the Scots Infantry, taking them in flank and almost routing them, too. -Only three regiments of them out of nine held their ground, the rest -had broken and fled, and the Earl of Leven, their leader, was already -making the best of his way towards Leeds. - -The battle at this moment presented one of the strangest spectacles -in the history of warfare. On the one side Prince Rupert with his -broken brigades was flying towards the North, on the other Leven -and Manchester and Fairfax, believing the day hopelessly lost, were -making equal haste towards the South. Such was the juncture at -which the Man of Destiny arrived. He was in command of the only really -disciplined force on the field. - -[Illustration: HE SWOOPED WITH HIS CAVALRY ROUND THE REAR OF THE KING’S -ARMY.] - -Mr. Frederic Harrison, in his excellent monograph on Cromwell, thus -graphically describes what happened: “In an hour the genius of Cromwell -had changed disaster into victory. Launching the Scotch troopers of -his own wing against Newcastle’s Whitecoats, and the infantry of the -Eastern Association to succour the remnants of the Scots in the centre, -he swooped with the bulk of his own cavalry round the rear of the -King’s army, and fell upon Goring’s victorious troopers on the opposite -side of the field. Taking them in the rear, all disordered as they -were in the chase and the plunder, he utterly crushed and dispersed -them. Having thus with his own squadron annihilated the cavalry of the -enemy’s both wings, he closed round upon the Royalist centre, and there -the Whitecoats and the remnants of the King’s infantry were cut to -pieces almost to a man.” - -Such was Marston Moor, and how completely it was the work of the one -man of destiny may be seen in the fact that, complete and crushing as -the victory was, its advantages were almost entirely negatived by the -incapacity and imbecility of the Parliamentary leaders in the West and -South. Every one of any consequence wanted to be supreme leader; no -one had either definite plans or the capacity to carry them through; -and when at last there was a prospect of bringing matters to an issue -on the field of Newberry, the Royalist forces, though half-beaten, -were allowed to get away with all their guns, stores, and ammunition -in spite of the fact that Manchester was in command of a very superior -force. - -This was as good as a defeat for the forces of the Parliament, for it -was the cause of dividing their councils. Manchester and those who -sided with him had apparently begun to fear the terrible earnestness of -the Captain of the Ironsides, and were for making peace with the King -and patching matters up somehow. But Cromwell, with deeper insight, saw -that the quarrel had now gone too far and that it could not stop till -one side or the other had had a thorough and decisive beating, and that -side he was fully determined should be the King’s. - -The dispute ended in the fall of Manchester and the triumph of -Cromwell. Then came the reorganisation of the Parliamentary forces -under what was at this time the New Model, and this New Model, be it -noted, was the first standing army of professional soldiers that the -United Kingdom had ever seen. Its nominal Commander-in-Chief was Sir -Thomas Fairfax, but its master spirit and guiding genius was Oliver -Cromwell. - -But meanwhile the tide of Royalism had been on the rise again, sweeping -up from the West and South. The armies faced each other on the borders -of Leicestershire, but Cromwell was not there. Fairfax, no doubt -knowing his own weakness, entreated that he might come and command the -horse. He came, and then, as Clarendon pathetically remarks, “the evil -genius of the Kingdom in a moment shifted the whole scene,” and it is -related that when, after rumours had been for some days flying through -both armies as to his arrival, “Old Ironsides” at last came upon the -field of action, all the cavalry of the Parliament raised a great shout -of joy. - -The battle that he came to fight was Naseby, and, saving for the -superior discipline displayed on both sides, almost exactly the same -things happened as at Marston Moor. Cromwell this time commanded on -the right wing, but Rupert was placed at the Royalist’s right, and -was therefore opposed, not to Cromwell, but to Ireton, his son-in-law -and second self. Once more the left wing of the Parliament was broken -and scattered by the furious charge of the gallant Cavaliers, once -more the centre under Fairfax was “sore overpressed” and thrown into -confusion, and once more Cromwell and his Ironsides, having ridden -down everything that opposed them, swung round behind the rear of the -victorious Royalists, swooped in a hurricane of irresistible valour and -determination on their flanks and rear, turned defeat into victory, and -snatched triumph out of disaster. - -It is true that even then there seemed so great a chance of the -Royalists retrieving the day that Charles, who had put himself at the -head of the flower of his cavalry, had thought himself warranted in -crying: “One charge more, gentlemen, and the days is ours!” But while -he was thinking about this, Cromwell, Fairfax, and Ireton had, by the -exercise of almost superhuman energy, reformed the whole of their army, -horse, foot, and artillery, into complete battle-array on a new front, -and against this the fiery valour of the Cavaliers dashed itself in -vain. - -Once more valour with generalship had conquered valour without it. The -defeat was utter and crushing. For fourteen long miles the pursuit -went on and only stayed when the walls of Leicester were in sight. The -King’s army was utterly destroyed and he himself never again appeared -at the head of a force in the field. - -During the twelve months that followed we see the erstwhile Farmer of -Huntingdon in a new light as the besieger and reducer of strong places. -His methods were logical, effective and, we may fairly add, pitiless. -Those days were not these any more than William the Norman’s or Edward -Longlegs’ were Cromwell’s, and moreover we must remember that he had -set himself with all the strength of his mighty nature to stamping the -plague of civil war out of the Three Kingdoms with such dispatch as -was possible, and it had got to be done speedily, for outside were the -enemies of Britain waiting to take advantage of the weakness that this -plague might leave her with. - -First he summons the stronghold to surrender, threatening all with -the sword. If this is refused he selects his point of attack, batters -away at it till he makes a practicable breach, then he gives another -chance of surrender, this time with somewhat better terms, but this is -the last grace. Refusal now means wave after wave of his irresistible -iron and leather-clad soldiery pouring into the breach, till at last -all opposition is beaten down and then massacre--for which, it may be -added, he and those with him are never at a loss to find a biblical -precedent. - -The victories that he won by this method were simply amazing. In about -sixteen months he was engaged in some sixty battles and sieges, and -took fifty fortified towns and cities with over a thousand pieces -of artillery, forty thousand stand of arms, and between two and -three hundred colours. The end of this wonderful campaign was the -Storm of Bristol. This happened on the 10th and 11th of September, -1646. As a feat of warfare it is almost incredible. The second city -in the kingdom, defended by properly constructed earthworks and -fortifications, and garrisoned by four thousand troops with a hundred -and fifty pieces of cannon, was stormed and taken with a loss of under -two hundred men! - -It reads more like one of Drake’s insolently valiant attacks upon a -Spanish treasure-city than a desperate conflict between Englishmen -and Englishmen. There can only be one explanation of it, and that -explanation is summed up in the two words: Oliver Cromwell. We are -bound to grant that the valour was equal on both sides, but equally we -are forced to admit that all the genius and generalship were on one. - -Looked at from our point of view, there were terrible blemishes on -these triumphs. Every advantage was pursued with the unsparing ferocity -which was possible only to religious bigotry fired to a white heat. It -is only reasonable to suppose that these Puritan champions of the new -faith were fired with just the same furious and pitiless zeal as that -which inspired the Israelites in their attack on Canaan, or the first -armies of Islam in their assaults on the idolaters of the East. They -slew and spared not, they hewed their enemies in pieces as Samuel hewed -Agag “before the Lord,” and they honestly believed that the Lord looked -down with approval on them and their bloody work. - -Priceless treasures of art were destroyed, not only without remorse, -but with grim exultation. To them they were abominations of the -heathen, just as the Canaanite idols of silver and gold were to the -armies of Israel. But however ferociously it was done, the work was -done thoroughly, and by August, 1646, the fall of Ragland Castle -following on the surrender of Oxford, brought down the curtain on the -first act of the Civil War. Charles gave himself up to the Scots at -Newark, and Oliver turned to fight the enemies of his own household. - -The chief of these enemies, curiously enough, was that same Parliament -in whose name he had won all his brilliant triumphs, and a conflict, -very interesting to the student of humanity, now began between the Man -of Action and one of those Talking Machines which the good Earl Simon -some four centuries before had found so singularly ineffective. - -There is no need to tell in detail how the struggle went. Every -one knows how Cromwell preached and prayed and stormed at the -self-sufficient busybodies who thought themselves a power in the land -because they called themselves a parliament. Then, seeing that no other -method would stop their gabble, he brought in his soldiers and turned -them out to talk in the streets or wherever else they could get any one -to listen to them, while he went on with his work. - -It is not very many years since Thomas Carlyle, who perhaps understood -Cromwell better than any other man not living in his own age, was -walking over Westminster Bridge with a very distinguished British -officer one night when the Mother of Parliaments was busy tearing her -hair and rending her garments over some wordy futility or other, and, -jerking his thumb towards the lighted windows, he said: “Ah, my lord, -I should like to see the good day when you would go in there with a -file of Grenadiers as old Noll did with his dragoons and clear that -nest of cacklers out. Maybe the nation would get some of its business -_done_ then instead of only getting it talked about.” - -From this there is a certain moral to be drawn by the wise. For my own -part I should dearly love to know with what words old Noll himself -would have answered the Sage of Chelsea. - -The payment of the Scots’ arrears by the Parliament, their surrender -of the king--who, by the way, was a great deal stronger in helpless -captivity than he had ever been at the head of an army--and his seizure -by Cromwell through the instrumentality of Cornet Joyce and his troop -of horse, now led up to a very singular situation. Cromwell, the -conqueror, went over to the side of Charles Stuart the captive, and -if it had not been for that fatal twist in the king’s moral nature, -there is no telling but that he might have been re-seated on a throne -supported and surrounded by the pikes and sabres of the Ironsides. - -But unhappily for him, it was not in Charles Stuart’s nature to “go -straight,” and, in the end, after Cromwell had faced and quelled a -mutiny among his own men on his account, he discovered that the king -was playing him false, that he did not honestly wish to follow his -policy of “healing and settling,” but only to regain his freedom and -try the hazard of battle again. - -From that moment Cromwell was his unsparing enemy. Now he saw in -Charles “The Man of Blood” who, for the sake of a personal aspiration -and for personal profit, was eager to once more set his subjects by the -ears and light the flame of war from end to end of the country. - -West and South and North the Loyalists were arming and rising again -and the Scots were marching across the Border, so the Man of Destiny -stopped talking and preaching, buckled on his sword and strode out to -battle once more. - -The first rising was in Wales, and that he crushed as promptly as he -did pitilessly. Then he turned with a weary and war-worn army of some -seven thousand men, so wasted with marching and privation and sickness -that, as a record of the time tells us, “they seemed rather fit for a -hospital than a battle,” to face the invading Scots in the North. - -He met them at Preston. They were three to one--or rather, to be more -exact, twenty-four thousand to seven thousand--well armed and found and -confident of victory. Yet never did the military genius of the great -Oliver shine out more brilliantly than now. What followed was not a -battle; it was an onset, a chase, and a massacre which lasted three -days and extended over some thirty miles of country. When it was over -Cromwell wrote in one of those marvellous dispatches of his: “We have -quite tired our horses in pursuit of the enemy. We have killed and -disabled all their foot and left them only some horse. If my horse -could but trot after them I would take them all.” - -The next act in the swiftly-moving drama was the trial and execution of -him who to this day is considered by some to have been a royal martyr, -who only exchanged an earthly for a heavenly crown, and by others is -looked upon as the man who deliberately made himself guilty of the -worst of all blood-guiltiness, the guilt of civil war. That is a matter -for each one to decide according to his own convictions, which, be it -noted, some two and a half centuries of argument have not yet altered. -Here we are only concerned with Cromwell’s share in it. - -There can be no doubt to an unbiassed mind that at one period he -honestly tried for a monarchical settlement of the difficulty. It -is equally undeniable that he considered Charles’s double-dealing -responsible for what he held to be the unpardonable crime of the Second -Civil War and therefore as having incurred for a second time the guilt -of blood. That the execution, or murder, of the king met with his -entire approval cannot be doubted, since before it happened he said to -Algernon Sidney: “I tell you we will cut off his head with the crown -upon it.” - -So, whether crime or act of justice, it was done, and Cromwell, perhaps -more than any one else, was responsible for it. - -The next act is the Dictatorship, and the first scene in it the -re-conquest of Ireland, with its massacres and bitter, pitiless -persecutions in revenge or punishment, as you will, for other massacres -which had gone before. It is a piteous story, and one of no great -credit to any one, but, to borrow the maxim of Strafford, the former -tyrant of Ireland, it was “thorough.” In nine months, with about -fifteen thousand men, the Dictator had stamped the Irish rebellion out -and made “the curse of Cromwell” a phrase that will dwell on Hibernian -lips for many a generation. - -But no sooner was the Irish revolt drowned in blood and flame than -Prince Charles, afterwards Charles II. of infamous memory, took the -Oath to the Covenant, and the Scots rose to support him. Cromwell -crossed the Border on July 22, 1650. - -As it happened, the Scottish general was Leslie, the old comrade who -had fought at his side at Marston Moor. For some weeks the Scots played -a waiting game, and Cromwell, with his men wearied and falling sick, -and with no other base than his ships on the coast, hurled texts and -biblical harangues at the enemy. In fact, as Mr. Harrison cleverly puts -it, “it was not so much a battle between two armies as between two -rival congregations in arms.” - -Leslie and his preachers fired other texts back at him and kept out of -his way until the fatal 3rd of September came. By this time Cromwell -had only eleven thousand men capable of bearing arms, and they were in -no great state for fighting. Leslie had twenty-two or three thousand -Scots and all the advantage of the position, but the Fates had already -taken the matter into their own hands. On the afternoon of the 2nd, -Cromwell saw that the wary Scot, as some say, driven by the frantic -exhortation of the preachers, had forsaken his post of vantage. “The -Lord hath delivered them into our hands!” he cried, and straightway -began to set his battle in order. - -The next morning, while it was yet moonlight, they came to blows. -In an hour or so it was all over. The Scots fled in utter panic and -confusion, “being made by the Lord of Hosts as stubble to our swords,” -to use Oliver’s own words. When the rout was at its height the sun -rose, scattering the morning mists. “Let God arise and His enemies be -scattered!” he shouted exultantly through the roar of the battle, and -then--how characteristic it was of the man!--he halted his army in the -very moment of triumph and sang the one hundred and seventeenth psalm, -beginning: “O praise the Lord all ye people, for His merciful kindness -is great towards us!” Then he unleashed his bloodhounds again, and the -rest was massacre. - -[Illustration: HE HALTED HIS ARMY ... AND SANG THE HUNDRED AND -SEVENTEENTH PSALM.] - -Another year passed in miscellaneous fighting and arguing, slaughter -and psalm-singing, and once more the sun of the 3rd of September, -Cromwell’s Day of Fate, or, as Byron puts it: - - “His day of double victory and death,” - -dawned, this time over Worcester, the scene of “the Crowning Mercy.” -The same miracles of generalship were accomplished, the same tremendous -victory was won at a ridiculously small expense--under two hundred men -to conquer an entrenched army of fifteen thousand--and this was the end -of the fighting at home. - -But meanwhile there was fighting abroad, and, more than that, the fame -of the great Oliver and his marvellous doings had been ringing from -end to end of Europe. As Clarendon, the historian of the Royalists, -candidly admits: “His greatness at home was but a shadow of the glory -he had abroad.” The mastery of the seas was wrenched out of the hands -of the Dutch by Blake, the sea-power of England was organised as its -land-power was, and Britain rose at a bound from the degradation to -which she had sunk under the first Stuart to the proud position of the -first naval and military Power of the world, and the greatest ministers -and monarchs in Europe, even the Pope himself, were forced to respect -the prowess and cringe for the friendship of the Farmer of Huntingdon. - -If, as has been aptly suggested, the great Oliver could have lived to -an age which is now a normal one for statesmen, the disgraceful and -ruinous interval occupied by the reigns of the second Charles and the -second James might have been spared with all their infamy and national -loss, and William of Orange might worthily have continued the work -which Cromwell so well began. But the time was not yet, and so it was -not to be. The great ideal of his life, a Protestant Alliance, was -never realised. His last days were days of darkness and suffering, -social, mental, and physical. - -Once more the Day of Fate came round, and between three and four in -the afternoon the watchers by his bedside heard him sigh deeply and -heavily. Some say that he whispered: “My work is done!”--and then he -died. This may be fact or fancy, but, be that as it may, no man had a -better right to pass out of the mystery of the things that are into the -mystery of the things that are to be with such words on his lips than -Oliver Cromwell, General, Statesman, and King in everything but the -empty name. - - - - -V - -_WILLIAM OF ORANGE_, - -_OVERCOMER OF DIFFICULTIES_ - - - - -V - -WILLIAM OF ORANGE - - -It is perhaps one of the most curious facts of our history that the -Empire-Maker who, as it were, finally completed the work begun by his -namesake William the Norman, should, like him, have been a foreigner, -should have sprung from similar ancestry, and should have been his -exact reverse in every mental and physical quality save one--an -inflexible determination to do the work which he was appointed to do in -spite of every conceivable kind of obstacle. - -It is noteworthy also that this man should have come from those same -Low Countries from whose shores our Saxon ancestors had first come -on their plundering forays to do their share of the work of making -the English people. The ancestry of the great-grandson of William -the Silent stretched far back, probably even into those remote and -turbulent times, and it is within the limits of possibility that some -stalwart ancestor of the ancient House of Nassau may himself have had -something to do in the early making of that Realm, over which, a -thousand years later, his descendant was to rule during one of the most -critical and perilous periods of its existence. - -Be that, however, as it may, the central fact which stands out in the -story of William III. is this: Whatever his country or ancestry, he -was, so far as we have any means of judging, the one man in the world -just then who could have accomplished the difficult and, as it must -often have seemed even to him, almost impossible task which had to be -performed if the work of the other Empire-Makers who had gone before -him was not to be sadly marred, if not altogether undone. - -William of Orange may perhaps be most truthfully described as an -overcomer of difficulties. Probably no other man ever had so many -difficulties to conquer as he had, and his triumph over them is one of -the finest examples of irresistible will-power and purely intellectual -force that all history has to show. Mentally he was a giant, and as -such he acquitted himself in what was undoubtedly a battle of giants -fighting for the spoils of Europe. Physically he was a miserable -weakling, shattered by disease, seldom free from bodily pain, and -foredoomed from his youth by an exhausting and incurable malady. - -Yet even his sports and pastimes were those, not only of a healthy, -but even of a robust constitution. His pale, sickly, small-pox-pitted -face never flushed save under the stimulus of battle or the chase. He -fought his fight with Fate and won it by sheer intellectual strength, -yet none of the pleasures of intellect were his. He knew nothing of -science, little of literature, and less of art. - -Apparently fitted by Nature only for the pursuits of the study, he -found his rare moments of real happiness when riding down a stag or a -boar in the forests of Windsor or the woods of Flanders, or, sword in -hand, leading his men wherever the battle was hottest or the danger the -greatest. A creature of contradictions, in short, determined to make -himself that which Nature had seemingly _not_ made him, and to do that -which he appeared least fitted to do. - -No one possessing an intelligent grasp of the deplorable state of -affairs which obtained in England, and the threatening aspect of -matters on the Continent during the last decade but one of the -seventeenth century, would have guessed for a moment that this -“asthmatic skeleton,” as Macaulay somewhat roughly describes his -hero, was the man to turn England’s weakness into strength, and even -in defeat to grapple successfully with the colossal Power which was -threatening the liberties of Europe. - -In England the weakness and baseness of the two last Stuart kings had -more than undone the work of the great Oliver. He had, as has been -shown, made England one of the first Powers in the world, strong at -home and respected and even courted abroad. Charles II. had sold his -country, or at any rate his own independence and what should have been -his royal honour, to France. He had, in fact, exhibited to the world -the disgraceful spectacle of an English king who was the pensioner of a -foreign monarch. - -The for-ever infamous Treaty of Dover had brought the prestige of -England to its lowest ebb. For the first time in nearly seven hundred -years the Isle Inviolate had been seriously threatened with invasion, -and London, for the first time since it had been a city, had heard the -sound of hostile guns. Now this of itself, taking the whole history of -these islands into consideration, is a fact of absolutely unparalleled -infamy, and yet if such infamy could have been equalled, the brother -and successor of Charles II. would have done so. Indeed, from one point -of view it may be said that he excelled it. - -The guns of William’s countrymen were heard in the Thames because -Charles II., having his brother James for Lord High Admiral, had so -scandalously wasted the funds which should have been devoted to the -maintenance of the Navy that no adequate defence was really possible; -but it was left for James II., the last and most contemptible, if not -in all respects the worst king of the royal and miserable House of -Stuart, to be the only British monarch who ever brought a foreign army -on to British soil for the purpose of coercing by force the will of -the British people. More than this, too, it must be remembered that -these foreign troops were Frenchmen supported by renegade English, -Irish, or Scotsmen who had deliberately deserted their own country to -serve under the standard of a man who was to the seventeenth century -what Phillip II. of Spain had been to the sixteenth. - -So low, then, had Britain sunk in the scale of nations when William of -Orange made his entry upon the stage of British history. The fact which -made his entry possible is hardly of the sort that would commend itself -to people of a romantic turn of mind, although few romances have been -really more romantic than his own life-story. - -He could never have become King of England, nor is it likely that he -could even have been asked to constitute himself the protector of -English liberties, had it not been for the fact that he was married -to the daughter of James II., and of this marriage Lord Macaulay -truly says: “His choice had been determined chiefly by political -considerations, nor did it seem likely that any strong affection would -grow up between a handsome girl of sixteen, well-disposed, indeed, and -naturally intelligent, but ignorant and simple, and a bridegroom who, -though he had not completed his twenty-eighth year, was in constitution -older than her father; whose manner was chilling, and whose head was -constantly occupied by public business or by field sports.” - -His marriage was, in short, “a marriage of convenience,” and yet, in -defiance of all the rules that are supposed to govern the most intimate -of all human relationships, it was one of the best and, in the end, -most devoted unions that history has to record. It is hardly possible -to doubt that William of Orange married Mary Stuart because he saw -with that keenly penetrating foresight of his that such a union would -strengthen him in his life-long combat with the arch-enemy of his -faith, his family, and his nation; and this enemy was that same Louis -of France who had made Charles II. his pensioner, and was soon to make -James II. his dependent. - -To quote Lord Macaulay again: “He saved England, it is true, but he -never loved her, and he never obtained her love.... Whatever patriotic -feeling he had was for Holland ... yet even his affection for the -land of his birth was subordinate to another feeling which early -became supreme in his soul, which mixed itself with all his passions -and compelled him to marvellous enterprises, which supported him -when sinking under mortification, pain, sickness, and sorrow ... and -continued to animate him even while the prayer for the departing was -read at his bedside.” - -It was this hatred of France and her king which nerved him to do for -the liberties of Europe and Great Britain what Francis Drake had done -for England against Philip of Spain, and in the doing of this he won -the conspicuous glory of forcing the paymaster of the two English -sovereigns whom he succeeded, to make peace with him on equal terms; -and this, too, although he lost more battles than he won, and had to -surrender more strong cities than he took. - -It is comparatively easy for a conqueror to take triumph out of -victory, but it is a higher quality which patiently endures defeat and -confronts disaster, and by sheer genius wins triumph in the end. This -is what William of Orange did, and it is from this fact that he derives -his title to be ranked among the Makers of that Empire to whose throne -he came as an alien, and whose honour he restored and upheld, as one -might say, in spite of herself. - -So far as England is concerned, the male line of Stuart came in with -a fool and went out with a coward. One does not even care to imagine -what would have happened if James II. had remained on the throne; or if -William of Orange, with his hereditary and deep-rooted hatred of Louis -XIV. and his policy, had not come to take his most miserably-vacated -place in the nick of time. - -The sentimentality which makes such a fuss about loyalty to persons as -distinguished from loyalty to country, and the lawyer-quibbles which -occupied men’s minds in the dispute as to whether James II. was King -_de facto_ or _de jure_, or both, of the country from which he had run -away like an absconding debtor, may be dismissed, just as Harold the -Saxon’s claims had been some six hundred years before. It is merely a -question of the Fit and the Unfit, and James was Unfit. - -James Stuart deserted his post as ruler of these realms because he -found himself assailed by difficulties which the most ordinary ability -ought to have overcome. William assumed the same position in the face -of difficulties which only the highest qualities of kingcraft and -statesmanship could have enabled him to successfully grapple with. In -a word, James possessed no ideal that qualified him to be a king, much -less an Empire-Maker. William _did_ possess such an ideal, and that is -the only reason why he became King of England, _vice_ James Stuart, -absconded. - -Next, perhaps, to Henry VII., William was the most business-like -sovereign who has occupied the British throne. With him all men -and things, all beliefs and sentiments, were subordinated to the -achievement of the one great end--the curbing of the power of France, -and consequently the furtherance of political and theological liberty -in Europe. He was, in fact, only incidentally an Empire-Maker, although -without him and without the broad and firm basis of popular liberty and -national strength which he laid down, as it were, in the doing of his -greater work, the building up of the Imperial fabric would undoubtedly -have been long delayed and seriously impeded. - -He got himself made King of Great Britain and Ireland, not because he -wanted to occupy the throne, but because from that eminence he would be -able to look the Grand Monarch more equally in the face. - -We get a luminous insight into the character of the man in his reply to -the Convention or conference of the two Houses of Parliament which had -proposed that his wife as actual and lawful heir to the throne which -her father had forsaken, should occupy it as queen, and that he should -reign by her authority as a sort of Royal Executive. - -“My lords and gentlemen,” he said, “no man can esteem a woman more than -I do the Princess, but I am so made that I cannot think of holding -anything by apron-strings, nor can I think it reasonable to have any -share in the government unless it be put in my own person, and that for -the term of my life. If you think fit to settle it otherwise I will -not oppose you, but will go back to Holland and meddle no more in your -affairs.” - -That was the kind of man William of Orange was. He had come to be a -king, and a king he would be or nothing. And so king he was, and it -was not very long before he was to show how well his self-confidence -was justified. He had scarcely seated himself on the throne before the -Parliament, recognising the fact that his work was something other than -merely filling James’s place, deliberately suggested that he should -resume as King of England the hostilities which he had begun against -Louis as Stadtholder of the Netherlands, and he on his part showed how -ready he was to take up the task by exclaiming, in one of his rare -bursts of exultation, after reading the address: - -“This is the first day of my reign!” - -This address, however, welcome as it was, was somewhat belated. For -more than a month before it was presented, Louis, under the pretence of -helping the runaway, whom for his own purposes he affected to believe -still lawful King of England, had committed the gravest of all acts of -war, and James had crowned the disgrace of his flight by the infamy of -heading an invasion of British territory by foreign mercenaries. On the -12th of March, 1689, he landed at Kinsale as enemy and invader of his -own country, convoyed by fifteen French men-of-war, and supported by -2,500 French troops. - -The story of this Irish war needs no re-telling here, save in so far -as it brings out the contrast between William and James as the Fit and -the Unfit for the doing of that work which had just then got to be done -if England was not to sink back to the degrading position of a French -dependency, and if the way of future progress and Imperial expansion -was to be left open. William no sooner saw that the scene of the fight -for constitutional liberty and religious freedom had shifted for the -time being from the Low Countries to Ireland than he sent Marshal -Schomberg, who was then one of the most skilful soldiers in Europe, -with an army of sixteen thousand men to the scene of action. - -Meanwhile the heroically stubborn resistance which has won immortal -fame for the men of Londonderry had proved, not only to James and his -foreign mercenaries, but to Louis himself and all Europe, that the -struggle which was just then renewed was no mere war of dynasties, -and that something very much greater than the mere question as to who -should be king of England had got to be decided before the trouble was -over. - -James in Ireland and Louis in France stood for the already discredited -and exploded doctrine of the divine right of kings to rule as they -pleased because they were the sons of their fathers; for the dark -tyranny of Rome, now almost equally discredited; and for the domination -of Europe by the French autocracy. In Holland and England and Germany -William and his allies stood for the very reverse of all this, so that -it was not only the destinies of the United Kingdom, but those of the -greater part of the civilised world that had to be decided, and it was -by procuring through mingled victory and defeat, confronted by powerful -enemies abroad and by conspiracy and threatened assassination at home, -that the worthy descendant of William the Silent proved his real right -divine as king of these realms and champion of those principles of -which the British Empire of to-day is the concrete expression. - -It was really on the shores of an insignificant Irish stream that -William fought and won the battle of European liberty. But before he -did this he had another battle to fight, as it were, in front of his -newly-given throne. - -His reign, unhappily, saw the commencement of that system of government -which an intelligent Chinese Minister to the Court of St. James’ once -described as “the election of one party to do the business of the -nation, and of another to stop them doing it.” In other words, it was -William’s fate, among all his other difficulties, to have to contend -with the bitter and usually dishonest strife of Parliamentary parties, -and so keen did this strife become after the foreign enemy had actually -landed on British soil, that he was even then on the point of throwing -up the whole business in disgust, and going back to Holland to fight -his battles out there. - -What would have happened if he had done so is anything but a pleasant -subject for speculation. Happily, at the eleventh hour he refused to -acknowledge himself beaten. Sick of the strife of words and longing for -the reality of deeds, he announced his intention to place himself at -the head of the English forces in Ireland, “and with the blessing of -God Almighty endeavour to reduce that kingdom that it may no longer be -a charge to this.” - -In this we may see more than the expression of a pious hope. As -statesman and soldier William had seen that Ireland was the back-door -of Great Britain, and that so long as it remained open so long would -the whole kingdom be vulnerable to foreign invasion, and so he went to -close it. - -It was a strange position for any man to be placed in. He was going -to fight for everything that he held dear. He knew that if he lost in -Ireland he must lose also in England and the Netherlands, but he was -also going to fight against the father of the woman whom he had now -come to love so dearly that her death, when it happened, came nearer to -wrecking his imperial intellect than all the other trials and troubles -of his laborious and almost joyless life. He had no feeling of personal -enmity against James as he had against Louis, and it was duty, and duty -alone, which took him to the Irish war. Almost the last words that he -said to his wife concerning the enemy whom he was about to meet on the -battlefield were: - -“God send that no harm may come to him!” - -Mr. Traill has thus tersely summed up the condition of affairs at this -moment: “Ireland in the hands of a hostile army, the shores of England -threatened by a hostile fleet, a dangerous conspiracy only detected on -the eve of success, a formidable insurrection imminent in the country -he was leaving behind him....” - -And yet, gloomy as the outlook seemed, his spirits rose as they ever -did when he saw the moment for doing instead of talking draw near, -and Bishop Burnett tells us that he said to him on the eve of his -departure: “As for me, but for one thing I should enjoy the prospect -of being on horseback and under canvas again, for I am sure that I am -fitter to direct a campaign than to manage your Houses of Lords and -Commons.” - -These words were well worthy of the man who, not many days later, -quietly sat down to breakfast in the open air beside Boyne Water, -within full sight of the enemy and within easy range of their guns. -Breakfast over, he mounted his horse and was promptly fired at. The -first shot from two field-pieces which had been trained on him and his -staff killed a man and two horses. The second grazed his shoulder and -made him reel in his saddle. - -“There was no need for any bullet to come nearer than that!” was his -remark on the occurrence. Certainly not many bullets have ever come -nearer to changing the history of Britain, and therefore of the British -Empire, than that one. - -[Illustration: MADE HIM REEL IN HIS SADDLE.] - -After the wound had been dressed, instead of taking the rest which -a good many strong men would have taken, this consumptive and -asthmatic invalid re-mounted his horse and remained until nightfall -in the saddle, making his dispositions for the battle of the morrow, -and attending to every detail himself. His prudent uncle and -father-in-law, apparently bent on fulfilling William’s pious wish, was -meanwhile taking very good care to keep himself out of harm’s way. - -[Illustration: “MEN OF ENNISKILLEN, WHAT WILL YOU DO FOR ME?” HE CRIED.] - -The battle itself, which, as every one knows, was fought on the 1st of -July, brought out with startling clearness the contrast between the -man who was king in his own right and the man who called himself king -because his name was James Stuart. - -“Men of Enniskillen, what will you do for me?” he cried at the critical -moment of the fight, when Caillemot and Schomberg, his two best -captains, had been killed, and he, drawing his sword and swinging it -aloft with his wounded arm, led his trusty Dutch guards and Ulstermen -against the Irish centre. James, meanwhile, having watched the first -part of the fight on which all his fortunes depended from the safe -eminence of the Hill of Donore, had already given up for lost the -day which he had done nothing to win, and was making the best of -his way to Dublin, whence, in due course, leaving the beaten and -demoralised rabble that had once been his army to its fate, he fled -to the congenial ignominy of his safe retreat at St. Germain, and the -fostering care of his country’s worst enemy. - -The Battle of the Boyne not only settled the fate of the Stuart -dynasty for good; it decided the question whether this country was to -be ruled by a feeble despotism under the patronage of France, or by -that constitutional monarchy under which Great Britain has so worthily -proved her title to be called the Mother of Free Nations, and in -winning this battle and deciding this all-important question, William -of Orange won the right to be counted among the wisest and strongest -of our Empire-Makers. The disgusted Irishmen, too, had some reason on -their side when they said to the victors after the battle: “Change -leaders, and we’ll fight you again!” - -The story of his wars in those countries which have been aptly termed -the cockpit of Europe is the story of the continuation of that work -which he came to England to do; not, as has already been pointed out, -for England as a country, but for the establishment of those principles -for which the British Constitution, of which he was one of the makers, -stands. Ignorant or prejudiced critics have accused him of sacrificing -English blood and treasure to the furtherance of his own ambition. The -fact is that he employed them upon the best and most necessary work -that there was for them to do just then. - -“Look at my brave English!” he said to the Elector of Bavaria one -day during the siege of Namur, while a British regiment was carrying -the outworks on one side of the city. But they were doing more than -carrying earthworks. They were fighting for the principles which their -descendants crowned with everlasting glory at Trafalgar and Waterloo. -They were showing the soldiers and generals of France, then held to -be the best in the world, the sort of stuff that they were made of, -and giving promise of future prowess that was soon to be splendidly -redeemed at Blenheim and Ramillies, Oudenarde and Malplaquet. - -It was a singular war, and by all the rules of warfare the issue should -have been the reverse of what it was. But again and again William’s -wonderful genius and indomitable persistence snatched victory out of -defeat, and turned disaster into advantage, until at last the Grand -Monarch himself had to confess the power of the enemy whom he had once -thought so insignificant, and the signing of the Treaty of Ryswick left -William triumphant if somewhat dissatisfied. - -The results would no doubt have been much greater if William could have -had his own way, and if the strife of parties in the British Parliament -had not so sorely crippled him. But at least he had the satisfaction -of knowing before he died that, whereas a few months before the French -men-of-war had with impunity insulted and threatened the English -coasts, and landed a small army on Irish soil, a few months afterwards -every invader had been driven from British ground, and the French fleet -almost destroyed, while the Mediterranean, on which British ships -had sailed only by sufferance, was now well on the way to becoming a -British lake. - -And yet, in spite of all the triumphs that he had won over so many -difficulties and so many dangers, and in spite of the consciousness of -work well and nobly, if quietly and unostentatiously, done, William’s -last days, like those of many another man who has deserved well of the -world, were full of sorrow and suffering. - -The death of his now adored queen had so shaken his mighty nature that -for some days his reason was despaired of, and there can be no doubt -but that it hastened his own end. And yet, weak and far advanced in -disease as he was when he went out for that fatal ride from Kensington -to Hampton Court, he was even then going a-hunting. The brutal Jacobite -toast: “To the little gentleman in black velvet who works underground!” -still serves to remind us of the mole-hill over which his horse -stumbled and fell, breaking his rider’s collar-bone, and inflicting the -death-wound which he had escaped on a score of battle-fields. - -His death was worthy of his life, for it was the death of a brave, -patient man and a Christian gentleman. No doubt he himself would have -preferred to have died at the head of a charge, or in the thick of an -assault on a French fortress, but his destiny ordered it otherwise, -and the man who had a hundred times faced death in the most reckless -fashion for the purpose of inspiring his followers with his own courage -and enthusiasm, died quietly in his bed, leaving behind him the -greatest work ever done by an individual British sovereign, and a fame -which, but for the one dark and inexplicable blot of Glencoe, is as -fairly entitled to be called spotless as that of any man who ever sat -upon a throne and accomplished great things with such means as came to -his hand. - - - - -VI - -_JAMES COOK_, - -_CIRCUMNAVIGATOR_ - - - - -VI - -JAMES COOK - - -Once more I am going to ask you to take your seat with me on the ideal -equivalent of the Magic Carpet and skim across another time-gulf some -half-century wide. This time we alight on the morning of Monday, July -5, 1742, before the door of a double-fronted shop, one side of which is -devoted to the sale of groceries and the other to the drapery business. -This shop is situated in a little village on the Yorkshire coast a few -miles from Whitby, Staithes, or more exactly The Staithes, so called -from the local name for a pier or sea-wall of wood jutting out a few -feet into the German Ocean, and built partly to protect the little bay -from the North Sea rollers and partly to afford accommodation for the -fishing-boats and colliers. - -The shop belongs to a substantial citizen of Staithes named Saunderson, -and this morning Mr. Saunderson is a very angry man. In fact, if we go -into the shop, which is not yet open, we shall find him with a cane -or some similar weapon in his hand, leaning behind the counter and -hitting blindly at a bed there is beneath it, shouting the while sundry -excellent maxims on the virtue of early rising, especially modified for -the benefit of apprentices. - -But no response comes from the bed, and Mr. Saunderson stoops down to -make closer investigation. The bed is empty, and the fact dawns on him -that his last apprentice has followed the example of all the others -and run away to sea. It was a very common event on the Yorkshire coast -in those days, but this particular running away was destined to be a -very memorable one for the world, for the lad who, instead of being -in the bed under the counter, was just then striding rapidly away -over the fields to Whitby with one extra shirt and a jack-knife for -his sole possessions, was James Cook, a name as dear to the lovers of -the romance of travel and adventure as Robinson Crusoe, and one of -infinitely more importance in the annals of mankind. - -In following his fortunes, so far as the brief limits of such a -sketch as this will permit, we shall bid a perhaps welcome adieu for -a while to the roar of guns and the shock of battle, to the blaze of -burning towns and the fierce cries ringing along the decks of captured -treasure-ships, to watch the contest of a clear head and a strong will -against those foes which may be overcome without bloodshed, although -not always without loss of life--the hidden dangers of unknown oceans -strewn with uncharted reefs and shoals lying in wait for unwary keels, -the sudden hurricanes of the Tropics, and the storms and fogs and the -floating ice-navies of the far North and South. It was these that -Captain Cook went out to fight and overcome, and in doing so to prove -eloquently that: - - “Peace hath her victories no less renowned than war.” - -Nevertheless there are certain points of likeness between James Cook, -Geographer and Circumnavigator, and that other Circumnavigator, Francis -Drake, Pirate and Scourge of Spain. Both began life as ship-boys, -and both rose, by sheer ability and strength of purpose, far above -their original station in life to positions of command in the service -of their country. Both were men of iron will, far-reaching design, -unshakeable self-reliance, and passionate temper, and, lastly, both -were possessed by that irresistible spirit of roving and adventure -which, when it once seizes a man, but seldom lets him rest in peace. In -short, though the vocation of one was piracy and war, and that of the -other the peaceful, but none the less adventurous service of science, -both were stamped with the supreme and essential characteristics of the -Empire-Maker. - -Naturally, the world had changed a good deal by the time James Cook -started out to add so enormously to men’s knowledge of it. Spain had -fallen from her high estate and was living in slothful ease on the -dregs and lees of that strong wine which she had drunk to intoxication -in the golden days of Cortez and Pizarro. But Britain, no longer only -England, had become Great Britain, and was fast expanding into Greater -Britain. Cowley, Dampier, Clapperton and Anson had circumnavigated the -globe more than once, and people were beginning to have something like -a definite notion of how very big a place was this world which now -seems so small to us. The Imperial Idea was beginning to take hold of -men’s minds. They wanted to know, not so much how big the world was, -but what other unknown lands might be lying waiting for the discoverer, -hidden away among the vast expanses which were still an utter blank -upon the map. - -The maritime nations of the world, too, and Britain, now foremost among -them, had unconsciously taken a very great stride along the pathway of -real progress, and they were beginning to grasp the higher ideal of -colonisation as distinguished from mere conquest, and to James Cook -belongs the high honour, if not of discovering, at least of first -definitely locating and in part mapping out the greatest of all the -British colonies. - -Indeed, it may be said that, in sober fact, he added a whole continent -to the British Empire, and that without the striking of a single blow -or the loss of a single life in battle. - -The first few years of James Cook’s seafaring life were eventless, -just as Francis Drake’s were, but for all that he, like Gloriana’s -Little Pirate, was doing that minor but no less essential part of his -life-work which was the necessary preparation for the greater. He was -doing his work first as ship’s boy, then as sailor before the mast, -then as second mate, first mate, and so on up the laborious ladder -which was to lead him in the end to an unequalled eminence among -mariners. - -Thus for thirteen years he served what may be called his apprenticeship -to his life’s work; learning in the most practical of all schools, -a North Sea collier of the eighteenth century, not only the science -of seamanship in all its details, but also what was hardly less -important--that science of taking things as they came, of looking upon -hardship, privation and danger as the commonplaces of a seaman’s life, -incidents in his day’s work, as it were, and as such scarcely worth -even the mention, and hence much less worth troubling about. - -A curiously instructive fact strikes one in contrasting Captain Cook’s -own account of his voyages with those of others, such as Anderson and -Gilbert, who sailed with him. They expatiate largely on the miseries -of heat and cold, ice and mist, the almost uneatable character of the -sea-fare of those days, disease among the crew, and so on; but Captain -Cook hardly ever mentions them, saving only the scurvy, of which more -hereafter. - -But there was something else that James Cook had already learnt long -ago while he was yet a boy. When he was a lad of six or seven he had -been set to work on a farm belonging to a man named William Walker, -and this William had a wife named Mary who, taking a fancy to the lad, -taught him his letters and encouraged him to read, and so, without -knowing it, put into his hands the talisman which was to win his way to -future greatness. She not only aroused in him that passion for reading -which distinguished him among the sailors of his time, but she gave him -what might have been the only means of gratifying it, for not every -farm-lad and ship’s-boy of the middle of the eighteenth century had -learnt, or ever did learn, to read and write. - -It may have been that James Cook’s latent ambition had never looked -beyond the possibility of becoming master of one of the vessels of -which he had been mate, and it is also possible that he might never in -reality have been anything more, but it so happened that his ship, the -_Friendship_, was lying in London river in May, 1756, and that at the -same time the war with France, which had been brewing for a year, broke -out. - -As usual the Press Gang set instantly to work, and now came Cook’s -chance. He was mate of a ship, albeit only a collier brig; still he -was a thorough seaman, an excellent navigator, and, more than that, he -seems to have known something of the theory as well as the practice of -his science. These accomplishments, however, did not put him beyond the -reach of the Press Gang. - -Now, in those days there were two ranks of seamen before the mast in -the King’s navy--the pressed man, who might be anything from a raw -land-lubber to an escaped convict, and the volunteer, who was probably -and usually a good sailor, if not something better, as Cook was, and -he, guided either by inspiration or deliberate resolve, eluded the -Press Gang by offering himself as a volunteer, and so in due course -took his rating as able-seaman before the mast on board his Majesty’s -frigate _Eagle_, of sixty guns, of which shortly afterwards the good -genius of his life, Sir Hugh Palliser, was appointed captain. - -During the next four years there was fighting, but we have no record -of any share that Cook took in it. What we do know is that by the time -he was thirty he had risen to the rank of master of the _Mercury_, a -King’s ship which went with the fleet to the St. Lawrence at a very -critical juncture in British colonial history. - -So far it would appear that he had worked himself up by sheer ability -and industry, but now his chance was to come. The river St. Lawrence at -that time had never been surveyed, and it was absolutely necessary that -soundings should be taken and the river correctly charted before the -fleet could go in and with its guns cover Wolfe’s attack on Quebec. -The all-important work was entrusted to the master of the _Mercury_, -and although the river was swarming with the canoes of hostile Indians -in the service of the French, and though he had to do his work at -night, he did it so thoroughly that not only did the fleet go in and -out again with perfect safety, but the work has needed but little -re-doing from that day to this. - -Thus did James Cook, not as sailor or fighting-man, but as good mariner -and skilful workman play his first part as Empire-Maker, and in an -unostentatious fashion contribute his share towards the capture of -Quebec and the acquisition of one of the widest and fairest portions of -Greater Britain. - -He was at this time, as has been said, only thirty. As regards the -outer aspect of the man he stood something over six feet, spare, hard, -and active. His face was a good one and suited to the man, broad -forehead, bright, brown, well-set eyes, yet rather small, a long, -well-shaped nose with good nostrils, a firm mouth, and full, strong -chin. - -In short, his best portraits show you just the kind of man you would -expect Captain Cook to be. For the rest he was a man of iron frame, -tireless at work, resting only when it was a physical necessity, with -few friends and fewer confidants, cool of judgment save during his rare -and deplorable fits of passion, self-contained and self-reliant--just -such a sea-king, in short, as we may imagine Heaven to have -commissioned to carry the British flag three times round the world and -to the uttermost parts of the known earth, and to plant it on lands -which until then no white man’s eye had seen or foot had trodden. - -In the same year Cook was promoted from the _Mercury_ to the -_Northumberland_, the Admiral’s flag-ship, and in her he came back -to England, and at St. Margaret’s Church, Barking, married Elizabeth -Batts, a young lady of great beauty and of social standing far above -that of the grocer’s apprentice and collier’s knockabout boy, but not -above that of the Master of a King’s ship. His married life lasted -some seventeen years, and of these he spent a little over four in the -enjoyment of the delights of home. - -For the next four years or so he was regularly employed in surveying -and exploring work off the Atlantic coast of America, and this -of itself shows that he had already made his mark in his chosen -profession. But much greater things were now to be in store for him. It -will be remembered how Drake, when he first saw the smooth waters of -the Pacific, prayed God that He would give him life and leave to sail -an English ship on its waters. That prayer had been granted, and his -and many another English ship had crossed the great Sea of the South. - -Meanwhile the realised dream of El Dorado had been replaced in men’s -minds by another, even more vast, shadowy, and splendid. This was the -dream of the Great Southern Continent, and in this imagination revelled -and ran riot. Grave scientists, too, demonstrated beyond all doubt that -there must be such a land far away to the south since how, without it -as a counterpoise to the continents of the north, was the rolling world -to be kept in equilibrium? - -So they took it for granted, laid it down upon the maps, and wrote -glowing descriptions of the varieties of climate, the splendour of -scenery, the wealth of treasures and the strange peoples and animals -that it must of necessity contain. Above all, it would be a new El -Dorado which would not be under the control of Spain. - -What more could men want, unless indeed it was the actual discovery of -the Terra Incognita Australis? This was the new world of which Cook was -to be the Columbus. Others had seen parts of it just as others had seen -parts of America before the great Genoese reached the West Indies, but -he was the man who was to do the work of putting its existence beyond -all doubt. - -The Royal Society found that there would be a transit of Venus in the -year 1769, and that it would be best observed from some point in the -great Southern Ocean, say Amsterdam Island or the Marquesas Group, -lately discovered by the Dutch and Portuguese, and as the result of -representations made to the King, an expedition was set on foot to -carry out suitable persons to observe it. Of this expedition James -Cook, raised from the rank of master to that of lieutenant, was placed -in command. On his own recommendation the ship chosen for the purpose -was the _Endeavour_, a Whitby-built craft of 370 tons, broad of bow and -stern and fairly light of draft, and built for strength and endurance -rather than speed. - -She sailed, carrying a complement all told of eighty-five men, from -Plymouth on August 26, 1768, which as Cook’s latest biographer happily -remarks, was a Friday, and the starting-day of what was, all things -considered, the most successful voyage of discovery ever made. Just -before she sailed Captain Wallace had come back bringing the news of -the discovery of Otaheite, otherwise known as Tahiti, and as this -island was considered a more favourable position, Captain Cook, as we -may now fairly call him, was ordered to proceed there first. - -It is of course utterly out of the question to attempt any connected -account even of one voyage round the world, let alone three, within -such limits as these, therefore I cannot do better than let the great -navigator describe his achievements, as he actually did, in three -modest paragraphs: - -“I endeavoured to make a direct course to Otaheite” (this was after -he had crossed the Atlantic and doubled the Horn, which doubling, by -the way, took thirty-three days), “and in part succeeded, but I made -no discovery till I got within the Tropic, where I fell in with Lagoon -Island, The Groups, Verde Island, Chain Island, and on the 13th of -April arrived at Otaheite, where I remained three months, during which -time the observations on the transit were taken. - -“I then left it, discovered and visited the Society Islands and -Ohetoroa; thence proceeded to the south till I arrived in latitude -40°22 south, longitude 147°29 east, then on the 6th of October, fell in -with the east side of New Zealand. - -“I continued exploring the coast of this country till the 31st of -March, 1770, when I quitted it and proceeded to New Holland; and -having surveyed the eastern coast of that vast country, which part had -never before been visited, I passed between its northern extremity and -New Guinea, and landed on the latter, touched at the island of Savu, -Batavia, Cape of Good Hope, and St. Helena, and arrived in England on -the 2nd of July, 1771.” - -I have seldom come across such a masterpiece of eloquent simplicity as -this, but then, of course, Cook’s voyages were made before the days -of the lecture-exploiter and the Age of Booms. There is, however, one -remark that may be made on it. What Cook calls New Holland we call -Australia, and Botany Bay, the first point he touched at, is hard by -Port Jackson, on the flowery shores of which now stands the lovely -capital of New South Wales. Terra Incognita Australis was unknown no -longer, but the days when it was to prove itself even more golden than -El Dorado were yet distant nearly a hundred years. - -If you would read the marvellous tale of frozen lands and seas, of the -sunlit coral-islands gemming the sparkling waters as thickly as the -stars stud the Heavens, of the delights of Paradise and the terrors -of Nifflheim told and written by sundry members of this expedition -after their return, you must go to your library and find them in the -originals, for there is no space to give them here. Suffice it to say -that, though somewhat prolix and diffuse, you will, if you are blessed -with an intelligent taste for that kind of thing, find them more -delightful reading than any of the countless romances whose writers -have taken their materials out of them. - -But there is one circumstance which for the honour of James Cook ought -to be mentioned. The curse of sea-voyaging in those days was scurvy. -Out of forty sick, nearly half of the little company, no fewer than -twenty-three died, and this terrible fact set the captain thinking, -with the result that he, first of all mariners, grappled with and -conquered this worst of the dangers of the ocean. If he had never done -anything else he would have deserved a niche in the Temple of Fame. In -his second voyage round the world, which lasted three years and sixteen -days, he only lost four men, three of whom died by accident and the -fourth not of scurvy. - -The Circumnavigator was now promoted to the rank of Commander, a -modest enough reward for the achievement of the greatest work of his -generation. He remained ashore just a year, probably the longest period -he had ever spent on land since he first went to sea. - -During this time the publication of a collection of travels started -people talking about the Southern Continent again. Captain Cook had -found it, but that didn’t matter. His discovery was not splendid enough -by any means, so it was decided to send another expedition, this time -of two ships, “to complete the discovery of the southern hemisphere” -(!) and Cook sailed again in command aboard the _Resolution_ of 462 -tons having for consort the _Adventure_ of 336 tons. - -They sailed on July 13, 1772, and on October 30th reached Table Bay--a -hundred and nine days, think of that, you who take a run out to the -Cape and back again for a winter holiday! Truly the world was somewhat -larger in those days. - -From Cape Town they steered straight away for the South, and on -December 10th they sighted for the first time the ice-fringe of what we -know now to be the _true_ Terra Incognita Australis. - -The landsmen on board seem to have had a dreadful time during this part -of the voyage and Foster, one of the naturalists of the expedition, -bewails “the gloomy uniformity with which they had slowly passed dull -hours, days and months in this desolate part of the world.” What a -change it must have been from the rigours and horrors of Antarctica to -the paradisaical delights of Tahiti, which, after surveying the coast -of New Zealand and deciding that it consisted of two islands and not -one, the expedition reached on the 16th of the following August. - -There is perhaps no other spot on earth which so completely fulfils -one’s ideas of what Paradise ought to be as this same island of -Tahiti even now, but what must it have been in those days, when white -men first saw it in all the beauty and simplicity of its primeval -innocence. Now, alas, it is very different, cursed by the diseases and -vices of civilisation and afflicted by a cast-iron _régime_ which the -people seem to think a little worse than death, since they are dying as -fast as they can to get away from it. - -After this again New Zealand was visited, and once more the two ships -plunged into the icy solitudes of Antarctica, only to return again, -baffled by the impenetrable ice-wall. From here the ships steered -northwards for Easter Island and Crusoe’s Island. It is noteworthy -that on the way Captain Cook, the great Medicine Man of the sailors, -himself fell sick, and that, for want of anything better, “a dog was -killed to make soup for him”--from which it will be seen that voyages -of discovery were not exactly picnics in his time. - -From Juan Fernandez he steered for the Marquesas again, once more -visited New Zealand, and once more his sea-worn crews revelled in the -unrestrained delights of Tahiti. Then again to the south, this time -not to rest until the whole circle of the Southern hemisphere had been -made without the finding of any other southern continent than the -unapproachable Antarctica, and so in due course and without mishap -came the Sunday morning, July 30, 1775, when the _Resolution_ and the -_Adventure_, having well vindicated their names, dropped their willing -anchors into the waters of Spithead. - -More honours, though not of the nineteenth-century-boom order, were -now most justly bestowed on the Circumnavigator. He was promoted to -the rank of Post-Captain in the Navy, and made a Captain of Greenwich -Hospital, a post which carried with it a home and honourable retirement -for the rest of his life--of which he was the very last man in the -world to avail himself. He was also elected Fellow of the Royal -Society, and presented with the gold medal for his treatment of scurvy. - -Captain Cook as sailor, as scientific navigator, and as explorer was -now at the height of his fame. He was forty-eight years old, and had -spent thirty-four years at sea, and it is no exaggeration to say -that during this time he had added more geographical knowledge to -the history of the world than any one had ever done before, and had -probably covered a larger portion of its surface. He had at once proved -and disproved the dream of the Southern Continent, and, potentially -speaking, he had added enormous areas to the ever-growing realms of -Greater Britain. - -He might well have rested on such laurels as these, but there was more -work for him to do, and he went to do it. One of the greatest questions -of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries, was the -possibility of the North-West Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific. -So far every attempt had ended in failure, and generally in disaster, -but now, when men’s minds were full of the wonders Captain Cook had -achieved, there arose another question: Might not a _North-East_ -passage from the Pacific to the Atlantic be possible, and, if so, who -better to try it than the great Circumnavigator? An expedition was -promptly decided on. Captain Cook was not offered the command, as the -Government probably and rightly thought he had won his laurels. But -one fatal evening he dined with Lord Sandwich, the promoter of the -expedition, and at table he met his old patron, Sir Hugh Palliser, and -his friend, Mr. Stephens, Secretary to the Admiralty. Ostensibly the -object of the dinner was to consult him as to the best leader for the -new venture, but the moment the subject was broached the unquenchable -passion for travel blazed up again, and the great Navigator rose to his -feet and said gravely: - -“My lord and gentlemen, if you will have me I will go myself.” - -So was decided the fatal voyage which was destined to end a glorious -and almost blameless career by an ignoble and unworthy death. - -The expedition consisted of the old _Resolution_ and the _Discovery_, -a vessel of three hundred tons. The voyage lasted four years and nine -months, but the loss of life by sickness was only five men, of whom -three were ill when they started. A good deal of the old ground was -gone over, more islands were discovered, more unknown coasts surveyed. -Fair Tahiti was visited once more, and the expedition, so far as its -principal object was concerned, came to an end, as the search for the -Southern Continent had done, in a way blocked by impenetrable barriers -of ice--this time the ice of the North. - -Thus turned back, they steered southward, and on December 1, 1778, -they discovered Hawai, which discovery the great Navigator in his last -written words somewhat strangely says, “seemed in many respects to be -the most important that had hitherto been made by Europeans throughout -the extent of the Pacific Ocean.” - -It was here, as all the world knows, that he met his death, and the -story of it is, unhappily, at sad variance with that of his life. - -The one blemish on Captain Cook’s otherwise noble character was a -liability to outbursts of ungovernable temper, and during these he -seems to have behaved on more occasions than one in a manner almost -befitting one of the old buccaneers. For instance, he would punish -paltry thefts by cutting off the ears of the islanders, firing small -shot at them as they swam to the shore, chasing them in boats, and -ordering his men to strike and stab them with boat-hooks as they -struggled out of the way. On one occasion he punished a Kanaka who had -pilfered some trifle by “making two cuts upon his arm to the bone, one -across and the other close below his shoulder.” - -Again, at the island of Eimeo, because a goat was stolen, he landed -thirty-five armed men, blockaded the island with armed boats, and burnt -every house and canoe that he came across, and, as an eye-witness -says, “several women and old men still remained by the houses, whose -lamentations were very great, but all their tears and entreaties could -not move Captain Cook to desist in the smallest degree from those cruel -ravages.” - -Now it was undoubtedly this anger-madness of his, combined with an -equally incomprehensible act of duplicity, which cost him his life. -When he returned from his attempt to find the North-East passage and -landed at Hawai, he was hailed by the natives as Lono, a god who had -disappeared ages before, saying that he would return in huge canoes -with cocoa-nut trees for masts. Now unhappily there is no doubt that -Captain Cook, for some reason or other, took advantage of this belief. -Not only did he not undeceive the natives, but he permitted divine -honours to be paid to him. - -From personal knowledge of the Pacific Islanders I am able to say that -in their pristine state they look upon deception and lying as the -gravest of crimes, and usually punish them with death, and Captain -Cook, with his vast experience of them, must have known this also, -and therefore he must have been fully aware that the moment anything -happened to show the natives that he was _not_ a god, his life would -not be worth a moment’s purchase. - -Shortly after this the ships sailed, and it would have been well for -Cook, who had been guilty of some very high-handed acts, if he had -never returned. But they came back a week afterwards to find the -island under the mysterious _tabu_--which is the Kanaka equivalent -for an interdict, and by far the most sacred institution known to the -Polynesians. Some of his marines broke this _tabu_ in the most flagrant -fashion. In revenge one of the _Discovery’s_ cutters was stolen. When -anything of this sort happened Captain Cook was accustomed to inveigle -a chief or two on board his ship and keep them there till the thing -stolen was restored. He tried to do this with the King of Hawai, but -the people suspected his design, and at the critical moment news came -that a canoe had been burnt and a chief killed. The King refused to go -another step, and then Captain Cook, who was armed with a hanger and a -double-barrelled gun, did a terribly foolish thing for such a man to -do. - -[Illustration: MISSED HIM AND KILLED ANOTHER MAN BEHIND HIM.] - -He began to walk away to his boat, turning his back on the armed and -angry natives. To do so was to invite certain death, and one of the -warriors attacked him with his spear. He turned and shot at the man, -missed him, and killed another man behind him. A shower of stones -followed, and the marines fired on the natives. - -Cook appears now to have seen the seriousness of the situation, and -signalled to those in the boat to stop firing. While he was doing this -a chief ran up and drove his spear through his body. Some accounts -say that it was an iron dagger, others that he was clubbed on the -head simultaneously. At any rate he staggered forward and fell face -downwards in the water, on which the natives “immediately leapt in -after and kept him under for a few minutes, then hauled him out upon -the rocks and beat his head against them several times, so that there -is no doubt but that he quickly expired.” - -Such was the end of the great Circumnavigator, the greatest seaman of -his time, and a man honoured wherever the science of navigation was -known. It was a miserable end to such a brilliant career, miserable as -was that of the great Magellan, who lost his life and the deathless -honour of being the first sea-captain to sail round the world in just -such a petty and ignoble squabble on the beach of a lonely islet in the -Phillipines. - -But though his death was ignoble, it can detract nothing from the -splendour of his life’s work. He was not perfect--no great man -is--and it is only the mournful truth to say that the meanest and most -unlovable trait in his character was the direct and culpable cause -of his death. Among sailors this is already forgotten, and they only -remember him, as they are well warranted in doing, as the greatest of -English mariners, and the man who conquered their most terrible enemy -and their deadliest destroyer. - - - - -VII - -_LORD CLIVE_, - -_QUILL-DRIVER AND CONQUEROR_ - - - - -VII - -LORD CLIVE - - -It is one of the distinctions of Robert Clive to be at once the model -of all bad boys and the forlorn hope of their despairing fathers. He -was probably the very worst boy that ever became a really great man. -Of his early youth there is absolutely nothing good to be said, saving -only the fact that he was possessed of that brute, bulldog courage -which thousands of English boys, whose names have never been heard -beyond their native towns, have possessed in common with him. - -He was idle, passionate, aggressive, not over truthful, and of a -distinctly turbulent, not to say piratical disposition. For instance, -he had not reached his teens before he established a sort of juvenile -reign of terror in the sleepy old town of Market Drayton, which had at -once the misfortune and the honour of being his birthplace. - -Even the school-books have not omitted to tell us how the boy became -the father of the future pirate and Empire-Maker, by organising the -kindred spirits of the town into a buccaneering band, as captain of -which he levied blackmail in the shape of nuts, apples, sweetmeats, and -even coin of the realm on the shopkeepers. - -If the tribute were punctually paid, well and good; but if one rebelled -or defaulted, the odds were that he very soon had a heavy bill to pay -for window-repairing, or else there would be sudden deaths in his -fowl-house, or, peradventure, his errand-boy, if not an accomplice -of the gang, would return prematurely from his rounds with his goods -missing and undelivered, and his person in a somewhat battered and -dishevelled condition. - -The most respectable feat that he appears to have accomplished in -these days would, after all, appear to be the climbing of the lofty -church steeple, and his enjoyment on that dizzy eminence of the horror -and consternation of the townsfolk. This feat was, in its way, as -characteristic of the man that was to be as was his first essay in -world-piracy, for later on we shall see how he reached a far more dizzy -eminence than this and kept his head as few others would have done. - -His school life appears to have been as unsatisfactory as his home -life. He was sent to academy after academy, and at each, ushers and -pedagogues struggled with him in vain--although of itself this fact was -not greatly to his discredit, since the methods of alleged education in -the first half of the eighteenth century were even more unnatural than -they are now. Still, the fact remains that he was a hopeless dunce, -self-willed and idle, and of an unlovable disposition, redeemed only by -the one good quality of intrepid pluck. - -One of his uncles, in a family letter, says, semi-prophetically of him: -“Fighting, to which he is out of measure addicted, gives his temper -such a fierceness and imperiousness that it flies out on every trifling -occasion.” - -It is also said that one of his schoolmasters saw signs of future -greatness in the dullard of whom neither he nor any of his brethren -could make even a presentable schoolboy, but this is probably a story -of the “I told you so” order, possibly invented by the worthy pedagogue -some time after the event. Be this, however, as it may, the fact is -that in the end the last of the pedagogues seems to have thrown the -job up in despair and returned him back on his father’s hands as a -hopelessly hard case. - -Now it so happened that in those days there was a refuge for -the destitute, or perhaps it would be more correct to say the -ne’er-do-well, which in these days is hardly represented by any portion -of our Colonial Empire. - -If there appeared to be no chance of a lad doing anything decent at -home; if his parents were too poor to buy him a commission in the Army, -and hadn’t interest enough to get him into the Navy, and if he were, -as Clive undoubtedly was, too much of a dunce to have a chance in -any other respectable profession, the last thing that could be done -for him was to get him a writership in the service of the East India -Company. - -If this could be done, two prospects were open to him. He would die -of fever in a year or two, after a hard struggle to live upon his -miserable pay, or he would “shake the Pagoda Tree,” and come home a -wealthy nabob, with a brick-dust complexion, a sun-dried and somewhat -shrivelled conscience, and a liver perpetually on strike. As it -happened, however, Robert Clive availed himself of neither of these -prospects, since the mysterious Fates had a third one in store for him. - -Certainly they were _very_ mysterious Fates which presided over the -early fortunes of the future Conqueror of India, and upon none of their -darlings have they frowned so blackly and then suddenly turned round -and smiled so brightly as upon the scapegrace of Market Drayton. - -To begin with, the voyage to India in those days, even for people with -large means, was a weary and miserable business. Ocean greyhounds, the -Suez Canal, and the Peninsular Railway, were undreamt of; and the heavy -Indiamen lumbered toilfully round the Cape, across the Indian Ocean, -and up the Bay of Bengal, taking their time about it--sometimes six -months, sometimes a year, or more. In Clive’s case it was more, for -his ship first crossed the Atlantic to the Brazils, and stopped there -for some months. Here he spent all his money, and got in return a -smattering of Portuguese, which he afterwards found useful. - -When he eventually landed on the surf-beaten beach of Madras, he was -not only penniless but in debt. The only person of influence to whom -he had an introduction had left for England. His duties were both -laborious and distasteful. He had no friends and was too shy and -awkwardly proud to make any, and for months he was veritably a stranger -in a strange land, and, to crown all, he became wretchedly ill. - -How mournful he really felt his position to be, and how far the stern -discipline of misery had already softened his intractable disposition, -may be seen from one of his letters home, in which he says: - -“I have not enjoyed one happy day since I left my native country. If -I should be so far blest as to revisit it again, but more especially -Manchester” (this, by the way, was his mother’s native place) “the -centre of all my wishes, all that I could hope or desire for would be -presented before me in one view.” - -How little did the despairing lad dream as he wrote thus in some -interval of his weary drudgery that when he did revisit his native land -it would be as a conqueror, laurel-crowned, and hailed as one worthy to -rank with the first soldiers of his age! - -But, bright as his fortune was to be, he appears just now to have been -doing very little to deserve it. Macaulay tells us, in that brilliant -essay of his, that he behaved just as badly to his official superiors -as he had done to his schoolmasters, and came several times very near -to being dismissed, and at length, so heavily did sickness of body -and weariness of soul lie upon him, that twice in quick succession he -attempted to blow his brains out, and twice the pistol missed fire. - -If those had been the days of central-fire, self-cocking revolvers, -instead of flint-lock pistols, the history of Asia would have been -changed, and what is now our Indian Empire would probably have been a -French possession. - -It will be necessary just here to quote a little history with a view -to seeing how matters stood in India at the time when Clive, as it is -said, flung away the second useless pistol, and, like Wallenstein, -exclaimed that after all he must have been born for something great. - -The map of India then was very different to what it is now. There was -no red about it at all. In the East, France was practically mistress of -the seas, whatever she might be elsewhere. The British flag only flew -over one spot, and that only by sufferance. This was the little trading -settlement of Madras, which was rented from the Nabob of the Carnatic, -who was only the deputy of the deputy of the once mighty prince whom -Europe knew vaguely as the Great Mogul. - -Fort St. George and Fort St. David were mere parodies of military -stations, and the nucleus of the army which was to conquer the whole -Peninsula consisted chiefly of half-trained natives, miscellaneously -armed with bows and arrows, swords and bucklers, and here and there a -firelock. On the other hand, France possessed the Island of Mauritius -and the town and district of Pondicherry, the former governed by -Labourdonnais and the latter by Dupleix, both men of great capacity and -still greater ambition. - -France and England were just then at war in Europe, and Labourdonnais -thought it a good time to crush English trade in India while it was yet -in its infancy, so, in spite of all the British East Indian fleet could -do to stop him, he appeared with his ships off Madras, landed a large -body of troops, forced Fort St. George to surrender, and hoisted the -French flag on its battlements. - -Happily, this roused the jealousy of Dupleix. Labourdonnais had pledged -his honour that Madras should be restored on the payment of a moderate -ransom. Dupleix, who had already dreamt of being sole master of India, -was determined that it should be wiped off the map altogether, so he -accused his fellow Governor of trespassing on his preserves, and in the -end succeeded in annulling his conditions and marching the Governor of -Fort St. George, with the principal servants of the Company, in triumph -off to Pondicherry. - -Unfortunately for him, there was one whom he did not take, not a -principal servant by any means, only an insignificant, underpaid -quill-driver, who had slipped out of the town disguised as a Mussulman, -and yet Dupleix would have made a very good bargain if he could have -exchanged all his other prisoners of war for him. - -Clive reached Fort St. David, a dependency of Fort St. George, in -safety, and there, taking advantage of the anger roused by this gross -breach of faith, he exchanged the pen for the sword, and the writer -became an ensign in the East India Company’s army, such as it was. - -Scarcely, however, had he done so than peace was made in Europe, and -therefore in India. Clive, no doubt in great disgust, was sent back to -his desk, but, happily for him and the British Empire, not for long. -Fortunately, too, submarine telegraphs had not been invented then, and -India was almost always a year behind Europe, so Governor Dupleix made -up his mind to have a war on his own account, and the prize of this -war was to be, as Macaulay puts it, “nothing less than the magnificent -inheritance of the House of Tamerlane.” - -To this end he took such skilful advantage of the disputes of the -pretenders to the throne of Nizam al Mulk, the last of the great -Viceroys of the Deccan, that within a very short time he secured the -triumph of Mirzapha Jung, his _protégé_, and rose himself to such a -position that, in the name of this puppet, he was the virtual ruler -of thirty millions of people, and master of the whole Carnatic, -saving only the city of Trichinopoly, which was all that was left to -Mohammed Ali, the candidate with whom the English Company had sided in -a half-hearted and wholly futile fashion. - -At this juncture, Clive, who was now twenty-five years old, and who -occupied a sort of hybrid post with the title of Commissary of the -forces, took upon himself to represent to his superiors that unless -something very decided was done, the French must invariably become -Lords Paramount of the whole Peninsula. They hadn’t a notion what was -to be done, but Clive had, and the brazen effrontery of his plan seems -to have paralysed the authorities into giving him a free hand. - -The situation was this: The triumphant Frenchman, believing his -quickly-acquired dominion a permanent one, had raised a tall pillar to -his own glory on the site of his greatest victory, and round this was -growing up a city, the name of which in English meant the City of the -Victory of Dupleix. Chunda Sahib, successor of Mirzapha, was besieging -Trichinopoly, supported by several hundred trained French soldiers. -Major Lawrence, commander of the English garrison at Madras, had gone -to England, and the English Company possessed no officer of proved -ability. The natives, dazzled by the rapid and brilliant triumphs of -Dupleix, and remembering the times when they had seen his colours -flying over Fort St. George, looked with contemptuous pity on the -English as a remnant of feeble shopkeepers who were soon to be cast -into the sea. And so, in all probability, they would have been if that -historic pistol had gone off a few years before. - -Clive, viewing the situation with true military genius, saw two facts: -first, that it would be ridiculous with the force at his disposal to -attack the besiegers of Trichinopoly; and second, that, if a dash were -made at Arcot, the capital and favourite residence of the Nabobs of the -Carnatic, which is rather less than a hundred miles inland from Madras, -the siege of Trichinopoly would probably be raised, and so this he -determined to do. - -His army consisted of two hundred English soldiers and three hundred -Sepoys, with eight English officers, of whom only two had ever seen an -action. He made the journey by forced marches through the thunder and -lightning and rain of the wet season, and so astounded the garrison of -Arcot by his utterly unexpected appearance before the gates that they -ran without striking a blow. - -Clive now found himself master of a half-ruined fort, which he at -once proceeded to strengthen and victual as best he might, well -knowing that he would have to fight for what he had got. Presently the -panic-stricken garrison came back, and brought with it reinforcements -which gave it the respectable strength of three thousand men. In the -middle of the night on which they arrived and sat down before the -town to think matters over, Clive, without waiting to be besieged as -he should have done by all the rules of Eastern warfare, marched out, -caught them napping, cut them to pieces, and marched back again without -losing a man. - -Naturally the news of such doings as this flew fast to Trichinopoly -and Pondicherry, and clearly something had to be done to crush this -insolent upstart before he gave any further trouble. To this end four -thousand men were sent by Chunda Sahib, under his son Rajah, and by the -time these reached the walls of the old fort they had been increased -by reinforcements to ten thousand, and had, moreover, been joined by -a detachment of a hundred and fifty French soldiers whom Dupleix had -dispatched in hot haste from Pondicherry. - -As has been said, the place they had come to attack was a half-ruined -old fort, with dry ditches and hardly any defences worth serious -mention, and its garrison by this time consisted only of a hundred and -twenty Englishmen and two hundred Sepoys. Four of the eight officers -were dead, and the commander of what looked very like a forlorn hope -was an ex-quill-driver twenty-five years old. - -And yet for fifty days and nights the besiegers hurled themselves in -vain against the rotten and crumbling battlements behind which that -dauntless handful of half-starved men had made up their minds either -to stand till help came, or to fall like the heroes that they were. - -The confidence and affection which the gallant young commander inspired -in his men--European and native alike--during this terrible time is one -of the most splendid tributes to his fame. When there was nothing left -but rice to live and fight on, the very Sepoys came to him of their -own will to ask that all the grain should be given to the Europeans, -who wanted more nourishment than they did. As for them, they would -gladly be content with the water that it was boiled in! Men like this -are bad to beat, and so Rajah Sahib found in spite of all his enormous -advantages. - -But the splendid defence of Arcot had by this time done something more -than hold the French and their allies in check. One Morari Row, the -chief of a body of six thousand Mahrattas--the bandit ancestors of some -of the finest soldiery that now fights under the flag of Britain--had -been hired to defend Mohammed Ali against his enemies, but so far, -instead of helping, he had been waiting to see which way the cat would -jump. His personal experience of the British had taught him that, if -they were not dogs or old women, they were seemingly only fit for the -bazaar and the counting-house, and certainly no worthy allies for -a race of warriors. But now the gallantry of Clive and his men was -ringing all through the Carnatic, and Morari swore by all his gods -that, since the English really could fight after all, and were able to -help themselves to such purpose, he hadn’t the slightest objection to -helping them. - -Having decided this in his own prudent mind, he gave his warriors -orders to march, and no sooner did it transpire that their objective -was the sorely beleaguered fortress of Arcot than Rajah Sahib came -to the conclusion that he had got a harder nut between his teeth -than his jaws could crack, and so he made overtures of peace in the -true Oriental style--that is to say, he offered a huge bribe for an -unconditional surrender, and accompanied the offer with a threat of -general assault and subsequent extermination if the offer were refused. -The young quill-driver’s reply was characteristic. - -“Tell Rajah Sahib,” he said to the envoy, “that I refuse his bribe with -as much scorn as I receive his threat. Tell him also that his master -and father is a usurper and his army a rabble, and bid him beware how -he brings them into a breach defended by English soldiers.” - -Rajah Sahib declined the warning, and prepared for attack by making his -fanatic followers gloriously drunk with bhang and ether assorted drugs. -He also selected the day of a great Moslem festival for the assault, -and enlisted the services of some elephants, whose heads he covered -with spiked plates of iron, and these, when the attack was delivered, -were driven against the gates to act as living battering-rams. - -But Clive had already foreseen that living battering-rams had the -disadvantage of working both ways, and so the elephants were received -with such a galling fire that, instead of charging the gates, they -turned round and made lanes through the army behind them with -distinctly demoralising effect. - -This was a bad beginning, but the end was worse. Clive acted not only -as general-in-command, but also as an ordinary gunner, and he seems, -moreover, to have pretty well filled all the posts between. He worked -as hard as any soldier or Sepoy of them all. There were more weapons -than men to use them, so the rear ranks loaded and primed the muskets, -and passed them up to the front as fast as they could be fired, and -Rajah Sahib speedily learnt what Clive had meant by a breach defended -by English soldiers, for the fire was so fast and fierce that the more -men that he sent into the breach the more stopped there--and that was -about all there was in it from his point of view. - -Three times the onset was repeated, and three times the attacking -swarms were mown down by the leaden hail-storm that swept the breach, -and after the third time the Rajah and his merry men had had enough of -it and retreated to their lines. - -[Illustration: INSTEAD OF CHARGING THEY TURNED ROUND AND MADE LANES -THROUGH THE ARMY BEHIND THEM.] - -The night passed in anxious watching, every man in his place and every -gun loaded, but their last shot had been fired and the morning light -showed that Rajah Sahib and what was left of his army had found the -work too much highly seasoned for their taste; that they had just run -away, leaving all their guns, ammunition, and stores to be picked up by -the victors at their leisure. - -Such was the forever memorable defence of Arcot, and such too was the -practical foundation of the British Empire in India. It was the work -of a hundred and twenty-five English soldiers and two hundred Sepoys, -inspired to heroism by a young man whom Fortune had suddenly plucked -out of the wrong place and set down in the right one. - -Clive was by no means the man to look upon work as done because it -was well begun. The authorities at Fort St. George promptly sent him -two hundred more English soldiers and seven hundred Sepoys, and with -this force--which was quite a large army for him--he marched out to -join hands with Morari Row, attacked Rajah Sahib at the head of five -thousand men with a stiffening of three hundred French regulars, hit -him very hard, and generally convinced people that an Englishman worthy -of his name and race had at length taken matters in hand. - -Unhappily, however, the English were not as strong in the -council-chamber as they were in the field, and while the authorities -were hesitating, Rajah Sahib and Dupleix retrieved their loss to such -purpose that a native army supported by four hundred French troops -marched almost up to the walls of Fort St. George and proceeded to -amuse themselves by laying the settlement waste, with the result that -Captain Clive had to come to the rescue, and the end was another -overwhelming defeat, during which about half of the French regulars -were either killed or taken prisoners. - -This physical victory was followed by a moral one no less effective. -The vaingloriously-named City of the Victory of Dupleix, surmounted by -its magniloquently inscribed pillar, lay at Clive’s mercy and directly -in his path, and he promptly pulled the pillar down and wiped the city -off the face of the earth. He didn’t do this because he personally -disliked either Dupleix or his nation, but in doing it he showed -that he was statesman as well as soldier, for, as he well knew, the -destruction of the City of Victory was to the waiting and watching -millions of India the symbol of the destruction and discredit of the -French power, and the establishment and vindication of the British. -From that day to this Britain’s star in the East has been in the -ascendant and that of France on the decline. - -How completely all this and what followed was the work of one man, and -one only is eloquently shown by the pronouncement of old Morari Row -to the effect that the English who followed Clive must be of quite -a different tribe or breed to those who followed anybody else, and -further by the fact that he inflicted two decisive defeats upon the -French at Covelong and Chingleput, with a force consisting of five -hundred raw Sepoy levies, and two hundred newly-imported scourings of -the London slums, who had so little of the soldier in them that when a -shot killed one in the first skirmish all the rest turned round and ran -away; while on another occasion the report of a cannon so frightened -the sentries that they all left their posts, and one of them was -discovered occupying a strategic position at the bottom of a well! - -And yet Clive, somehow, made steady, disciplined soldiers out of this -miserable rabble, and, though at last he was so ill that he could -hardly stand, led them to victory and turned the French out of their -forts--which was perhaps a miracle even greater than the making of -Cromwell’s Ironsides. - -After this the young man, having well earned a holiday, got married and -came home for his honeymoon. He was at once hailed as the saviour of -India--or at any rate of the East India Company, the directors of which -drained many a good bottle of port to the toast of “General” Clive; and -even his father half incredulously admitted that “after all it seemed -that the booby had something in him.” - -But “the booby,” who had come back moderately rich, bore no malice, -and at once began to repair the evil of his youth by paying off all -the debts of his family. He then proceeded to waste his substance and -his time by getting into Parliament and getting turned out again on -petition, after which he very properly went back to India to do work -that parliamentary orators couldn’t do. - -His first exploit was the reduction of the pirate stronghold of -Gheriah, which had long dominated the whole Arabian Gulf, the next -was the Avenging of one of the blackest crimes in history. There is -no need to tell of it here, for is not the story of the Black Hole of -Calcutta deep-graven in the memory of every man and woman, boy and -girl, of Anglo-Saxon blood? Forty-eight hours after the news reached -Madras Clive was given the command of nine hundred British infantry and -fifteen hundred Sepoys, and with this army, supported by a fleet under -Admiral Watson, he marched to the conquest of an empire half as large -as Europe. - -Curiously enough, however, he began by treating with Surajah -Dowlah--the arch-criminal of the Black Hole--instead of crushing him, -and, more amazing still, during the course of the negotiations, he -deliberately forged Admiral Watson’s name to a treaty intended to -deceive an adherent whom he knew to have made terms with the other -side. It is the most inexplicable act in his career, and, being so, it -is only a waste of words to try and explain it away. He did it, and -there’s an end of it. - -The next act in the now swiftly passing drama was the first and only -council of war that Clive ever held. It was the eve of Plassey, an -occasion ever memorable in the annals, not only of Britain but of the -whole Orient. He was on one bank of the river, Surajah Dowlah was on -the other with an army outnumbering his by twenty to one, splendidly -equipped, very strong in artillery, and, as usual, supported and -officered by the inevitable Frenchmen. The river was the Rubicon which -lay between Clive and the Empire of India--and for once in his life he -hesitated. - -He called a council of war. It decided against crossing the river with -three thousand men in face of sixty thousand, and Clive endorsed the -verdict. Then he went apart under some palm trees and held another and -a wiser council with himself, and this council promptly and utterly -revoked the decision of the other. - -The next morning the river was crossed and the next night the little -army encamped within a mile of the Nabob’s host. At sunrise the next -day Surajah Dowlah, who in the midst of his myriads had passed a night -haunted, as has been suggested, by the ghosts of the men and women who -perished in the Black Hole, sent forth his forty thousand infantry, -his fifteen thousand cavalry, his batteries of fifty guns, and his -iron-plated war-elephants to crush the invader once and for all, and on -they went like some huge tidal wave, roaring and rushing, to overwhelm -some little tree-clad island--and then, just as the human avalanche was -in mid-career, the despot weakling’s will wavered, or, more probably, -his mind broke down, and he gave the order to halt and retreat, almost -before a blow was struck. - -It was the moment of grace for Clive and he seized it. The three -thousand charged the sixty thousand, and all of a sudden the impending -tragedy on which the fate of all India from the Himalayas to Cape -Comorin depended, was turned into a farce. Of the sixty thousand only -five hundred were slain; of the three thousand twenty-two were killed -and fifty wounded. The whole thing was over in an hour, and India was -won. - -To Clive himself the result was an appointment as Governor-General over -the whole of the Company’s territory in Bengal, and this virtually -raised him to an authority higher than that of a throne, and, to his -everlasting honour be it said, that in an age and country of almost -universal corruption, he never abused it. Victory after victory in the -field, and triumph after triumph in policy now followed fast upon each -other, till French, Dutch, and native princes alike were crushed to -impotence or reduced to grovelling submission, and the crowning victory -of Chinsurah set the seal of absolute supremacy upon British rule in -India. - -Three months after this Clive again came home, the possessor of fairly -won wealth which was only exceeded by the magnitude of his fame, to -be hailed as the greatest of British living Commanders, and to be -rewarded, first with a place in the Irish, and then with one in the -British Peerage. - -The story of his five years’ stay in England is not an edifying one. -It is a story of wild extravagance, fierce and unworthy jealousies in -the very councils of that Company to which he had given more lands -and subjects than any European monarch possessed, and of general -dissatisfaction and disillusion. - -But meanwhile the way to his last and perhaps his greatest triumph was -being prepared for him. As year after year passed it became more and -more plain that the empire he had created could not get on without him. -The men put in authority after him by the Company had but one object -in life and that was to “shake the Pagoda Tree.” In other words, to -set prince against prince and state against state for the sole purpose -of making money out of their differences, and generally to squeeze the -utmost amount of gold out of the country in the shortest possible time. - -Corruption which scandalised even that corrupt age revelled in hitherto -unheard-of excesses. Everything was neglected but money-making, and the -lately-terrible English name was fast becoming a scoff and a by-word -even to the plundered and the oppressed. So in the end Clive went out -again, it being seen that he only could end a situation fast becoming -impossible. - -But this time it was not to fight French, or Indian, or Dutchman, but -his own countrymen, and to win in the Council Chamber a victory that -was perhaps greater than any he had won on the battlefield. In eighteen -months he did what he had said he would do, and replaced chaos with -cosmos. It was a fitting climax to his life’s work, and yet such is the -irony of Fate and the baseness of human nature that it also came near -to proving his personal ruin. - -He had fought and conquered the evil spirits of greed, corruption, -and private extortion, but he had not killed them. The hatred of -the evil-doer pursued him across the seas and roused up all the old -jealousies at home. On his first and second returns he had been hailed, -first as a man of the most brilliant promise and then as a man who had -splendidly fulfilled that promise. But now, in the country which he had -enriched by the addition of a whole empire no charge was so base that -it was not believed against him. He had put down the oppressor, the -extortioner, and the money-grubber, and he came back to his native land -to be arraigned before a committee of the House of Commons as all these -and something of a criminal to boot! - -But with this third home-coming of his, his story as an Empire-Maker -ends. It is well to know that he came triumphantly out of all the -toils that his jealous and unworthy enemies had laid for him, and in -this he was happier than his great rival Dupleix, who sank through all -the gradations of poverty and misery into a nameless grave. But still -the work of his foes and that of the terrible Indian climate had -not been without effect. Crippled both in mind and body, he at last -sought refuge in opium from the tortures of the diseases which he had -contracted in the service of his country. - -Time after time his genius blazed out again through the glooms that -were settling over his later days, and so great was the faith of the -Government in him that he was actually asked to go and do for North -America what he had done for India. - -If the broken invalid of those days had been the same man as the -defender of Arcot and the victor of Plassey, the history of the -Anglo-Saxon race might well have been changed, for Robert Clive would -not only have been strong to crush the rebels, but also just and -generous to procure them afterwards those equal rights of citizenship -the denial of which split Anglo-Saxondom in two. - -Of this, at least, we may be fairly certain: there would have been no -Bunker’s Hill and no Brandywine River save as geographical expressions, -and there would have been neither a Saratoga nor a Yorktown save as -towns and nothing more. - -But this was not to be. Clive’s genius had given forth its last flash -and the eclipse had come. On November 22, 1774, some ten weeks after -the assembly of the Revolutionary Congress at Philadelphia, Robert, -Lord Clive, Baron of Plassey, and Conqueror of the domains of the great -Tamerlane, for the third time put a pistol to his head--and this time -it went off. - -It was, as Macaulay says, an awful close to such a career, and yet, -after all, granted even everything that his worst enemies said against -him, Robert Clive had well and worthily earned a place in the front -rank of Britain’s Empire-Makers. - -On Sir Thomas Wren’s tomb in St. Paul’s stands the Latin legend which -translated reads: “If you seek his monument look around you!” If a man -could be endowed with an infinite range of vision he might be placed on -the highest pinnacle of the Himalayas, and as he looked east and west -and south the same might be said to him as the epitaph of Robert Clive; -for all that he could see from the Arabian Gulf to the Bay of Bengal, -and from the Himalayan slopes to the coral reefs of Cape Comorin, would -be the monument of his eternal fame--and is there man born of woman who -could desire a worthier? - - - - -VIII - -_WARREN HASTINGS_, - -_THE FIRST UNCROWNED KING OF INDIA_ - - - - -VIII - -WARREN HASTINGS - - -Both in point of time and personal capacity, Warren Hastings, first -Governor-General of the British Empire in India, was the successor -of Robert, Lord Clive. At the same time it may be as well to point -out in this connection that there might be more literal correctness -in describing Warren Hastings as an Empire-Preserver rather than an -Empire-Maker. - -It was the victor of Plassey who rough-hewed the stones upon which the -now gorgeous fabric of our Indian Empire stands. It was Hastings who, -in spite of stupendous difficulties, took those stones and laid them -down according to that plan which he had formed, and which has been -followed in the main by all who have added to the structure. - -As was said in other words of William of Orange, one of the greatest -claims that the great Governor has to the interest and admiration of -those who have a share in the splendid inheritance that he built -up, lies in the fact that he did his work in the face of everlasting -hindrances and in the midst of perpetual embarrassments, which must -infallibly have discouraged and bewildered any but a man upon whom the -gods had set the stamp of greatness, and, in their own way, crowned -him one of the kings of men. In short, like the grandson of William -the Silent, Warren Hastings was first and foremost an overcomer of -difficulties. - -Great and splendid and enduring as his work undoubtedly was, it would -not, after all, have been very difficult to do if he had just been left -to do it--not helped, because he wasn’t the kind of man who wanted -help, but just left alone. Instead of this, however, as though it were -not enough that his work of organising and consolidating what the -sword of Clive had won, and combating the infinity of complications -arising out of the rivalry of a dozen warring native potentates, he -was purposely surrounded in his own council-chamber by unscrupulous -enemies of his own blood and country, whose only title to historical -recognition is now the infamy that they have earned by failing to -prevent the doing of that work which Warren Hastings saw had got to be -done, and which he, with an inflexible heroism, decided to do in spite -of everything that his enemies, white or brown, Mohammedan, Hindoo or -British, could do to cripple him. - -Sir Alfred Lyall, his most recent biographer, has very happily said of -him that “perhaps no man of undisputed genius ever inherited less in -mind or money from his parents or owed them fewer obligations of any -kind.” His father, Pynaston Hastings, was the vagrant ne’er-do-well son -of a fine old family. He married when only fifteen without any means or -prospect of supporting a family. Warren was the second son. His father -was only seventeen at his birth, and his mother died a few days later. -As soon as he was old enough Pynaston took holy orders, married again, -obtained a living in the West Indies, and there died, leaving his son -to be put into a charity school by his grandfather. - -This is not much for a father to do for a son, but there was something -else that Pynaston Hastings did which was of very great consequence, -though in the nature of the case no credit is due to him for it. -He transmitted to him the blood of a long line of ancestors, which -stretched away back through one of the followers of William the Norman -to the days of those old pirate kings of the Northland who, as I have -pointed out before, were none the worse fathers of Empire-Makers -because they were pirates as well. - -One of his ancestors, John Hastings, Lord of the Manors of -Yelford-Hastings in Oxfordshire, and of Dalesford in Worcestershire, -lost about half of his worldly goods, including the plate that he -sent to be coined at the Oxford Mint, in helping Charles Stuart to -fight the great Oliver, and afterwards spent most of the remainder in -buying his peace from the Parliament. It was on the ancient estate of -Dalesford, long before sold to the stranger and the alien, that Warren -Hastings was born, some two hundred years later, practically a pauper -and almost an outcast, under the shadow of his ancestral home. - -When he came to reasoning years he made a boyish resolve, challenging -fate with all the splendid insolence of a seven-year-old dreamer, that -some day he would make his fortune and buy the old place back--which -in due course he did, although in those days his prospect of doing so -was about as small as it was of reigning over the millions of subjects -whose descendants to-day revere his memory almost as that of one of -their own demigods. - -When he was twelve years old Warren was taken away from the charity -school by one of his uncles and sent to Westminster, where he -distinguished himself by winning a King’s scholarship in the year 1747. -Even when his poor old grandfather, the last Hastings of Dalesford, and -the miserably paid rector of the parish which his ancestors had owned, -sent Warren to sit beside the little rustics of the village school, he -immediately singled himself out from them by the willing intelligence -with which he took to his work and afterwards the headmaster of -Westminster had high hopes of university distinctions for him. It was -indeed a somewhat curious coincidence that Robert Clive should have -been such an exceedingly bad boy and the completer of his work such a -good one. - -But the Fates had already decided that Warren Hastings was to graduate -with honours in a very much bigger university than that on the banks -of the Isis or the Cam. His uncle died suddenly, and the orphan lad -was passed on to the care of a distant connection who happened to be a -director of the East India Company. - -His headmaster remonstrated strongly, but happily without effect, -against his immediate removal to Christ’s Hospital to learn -account-keeping before going out to Bengal as a writer in the service -of “John Company.” - -It seems as though the worthy Dr. Nichols had a very high opinion of -his intellectual abilities, for, when all his protests failed, he -actually offered to send his brilliant young pupil to Oxford at his own -expense. - -Happily for the British Empire Mr. Director Chiswick, the relative -aforesaid, stuck to his selfish project of getting him off his hands as -quickly and permanently as possible by sending him out to Calcutta to -take jungle fever or make a fortune, just in the same way that Clive’s -despairing parents had done. - -He sailed for Calcutta when he was seventeen, the same age as his -precious father was when he was born. He had been two years at the desk -in Calcutta when there came the news that Clive had taken Arcot and put -a very different complexion on the struggle between the English and -French Companies for the supremacy of India. - -About that time he was sent to a little town on the Hooghly about a -mile from Moorshedabad, and while he was here driving bargains with -native silk-weavers and tea merchants, Surajah Dowlah marched into -Calcutta and cast such English prisoners as he could lay hold of into -the Black Hole. - -Hastings was also taken prisoner, but most fortunately did not get -into the Black Hole, and he appears to have been set at large on the -intercession of the chief of the Dutch factory. During the period which -followed his partial release--for he was still under surveillance at -Moorshedabad--he made his first essay in diplomacy, or what would -perhaps be more correctly described as political intrigue, with the -result that the city got too hot for him, and he fled to Fulda, an -island below Calcutta, where, as has been pithily said, the English -fugitives from Fort William “were encamped like a shipwrecked crew -awaiting rescue.” - -The rescue came in the shape of the combined naval and military -expedition, commanded by Admiral Watson and Robert Clive, which was -destined to end in the triumph of Plassey, and Warren Hastings, as -Macaulay aptly suggests in his brilliant but singularly misinformed -essay, doubtless inspired by the example of Clive and the similarity of -their entrance on to the stage of Indian affairs, like him exchanged -the pen for the sword, and fought through the campaign. But Clive saw -“that there was more in his head than his arm,” and after the battle -of Plassey he sent him as resident Agent of the Company to the Court -of Meer Jaffier, the puppet-nabob who had been set up in the place of -Surajah Dowlah. - -He held this post until he was made a Member of Council in 1761, and -was obliged to remove to Calcutta. Clive was at home now, and the -interregnum of oppression, extortion, and general mismanagement was -in full swing; but the man who was afterwards so grossly wronged and -falsely impeached, and who passed through the most celebrated trial in -English history charged with just such crimes, had so little taste for -them that three years later he came back a comparatively poor man, and -the fortune he had he either gave away to his relations or lost through -the failure of a Dutch trading-house. - -After a stay of four years, during which he renewed his intimacy with -his old schoolfellow, the creator of the immortal John Gilpin, and made -the acquaintance of Johnson and Boswell, he found himself so reduced in -circumstances that he not only had to ask the Directors of the Company -to give him more employment in India, but when he got it he was forced -to borrow the money to pay his passage out again. - -It is quite impossible to form any just and reasonable judgment of the -work which Warren Hastings now went out to do unless one first gets an -adequate idea of the condition of things obtaining in India before the -English went there, and of the conditions that would have obtained, -if men like Clive, Hastings, Cornwallis, and Wellesley had not by one -means and another--some good, some bad, but all just what were possible -under the circumstances--succeeded in imposing the _Pax Britannica_ -upon the rival and constantly warring potentates who governed the -native populations. - -No doubt the war on the Rohillas, or the so-called spoliation of the -Begums of Oude, together with more or less magnified incidentals, -formed famous themes in after years for the inflated eloquence and -grandiloquent over-statements of Edmund Burke and Sheridan, and for the -far less comprehensible or excusable special pleading of Lord Macaulay. - -It was, no doubt, very affecting to see the patched and powdered fine -ladies who paid their fifty guineas a seat in Westminster Hall to -watch the men of words mangling the reputation of the man of deeds, -weeping and fainting at the harrowing pictures they drew--mostly on -their own imaginations--of the sufferings which he had _not_ caused; -but we of to-day are sufficiently far removed from the personal spite -and the passion and rivalry which inspired the enemies and accusers -of the great Governor to be able to look at things as they actually -were, and in doing so we shall see that, however heavy was the hand -that Warren Hastings laid upon the subject peoples, it was but as a -caress to a blow when compared with the oppression and extortion with -which conqueror after conqueror, Mohammedan and Hindoo, Sikh, Afghan, -and Mahratta, had ground down and despoiled the helpless races which -successively passed under their sway. - -Order, however dearly bought, is always less expensive than anarchy, -and the impassioned periods of Burke and Sheridan look somewhat silly -when we compare them with the sober facts. It never seems to have -struck them or their audience to make any comparison between the -English gentleman and loyal servant of his country whom they would have -handed down to history as a monster of iniquity, and those real tyrants -of the type of Surajah Dowlah, Hyder-Ali, and Nana-Sahib, whose brutal -rule and ruthless wars of conquest and extermination must have been, -under the circumstances, the only possible alternative to the strong -and steady control of the Englishman. - -The first thing that Warren Hastings did on his return was to -reorganise the trade of the Province, and in this he succeeded so -well that the Directors rewarded him in 1772 with the Governorship -of Bengal; and if they could have stopped there, leaving him to do -the rest, the immediately subsequent history of India might have been -very much more creditable to the rulers and more pleasant reading -for the descendants of the ruled than it was. But unhappily a body -of traders and shareholders became possessed with the idea that they -were the proper sort of people to rule a country divided by political -and religious factions, with a history of almost constant warfare -stretching back for centuries, and situated fifteen thousand miles away. - -This, on the face of it, was an impossibility. When they had found -their Governor they should have trusted him to govern, instead of -sending out his personal enemies to sit at his council-table to spy -upon his actions and hamper and oppose him in everything that he did. - -But there was something else in its way quite as serious as this. -Practically all the charges that were brought against Warren Hastings -on his impeachment are answered and disposed of by the fact that the -only condition upon which he could retain his position and do the work -that he had set his soul upon doing was, in three words, making India -_pay_. John Company looked upon his new possession as a trader on a -market. With the Directors, who, after all were Hastings’ masters, it -was business first, and policy and government a good distance after. - -Even Macaulay admits that every exhortation to govern leniently and -respect the rights of the native princes and their subjects was -accompanied by a demand for increased contributions. “The inconsistency -was at once manifest to their vice-regent at Calcutta, who, with an -empty treasury, with an unpaid army, with his own salary often in -arrear, with deficient crops, with Government tenants daily running -away, was called upon to remit home another half-million without fail.” - -There is another thing to be remembered before we can judge Warren -Hastings fairly in the matter of his forced contributions. The tea -that was flung overboard in Boston Harbour in the December of 1773 was -imported by the East India Company. The connection will appear more -obvious when we look at what followed. - -Great Britain was about to plunge into war, east and west, north and -south. Criminal misgovernment at home had produced revolt abroad. -Disaster after disaster and disgrace after disgrace were soon to befall -the British arms. The Anglo-Saxon race was about to be split in two, -and England herself was to fight, if not for her very existence, at -least for her honourable place among the nations. - -All this Warren Hastings foresaw with that marvellous prevision which -made some of his actions look almost prophetic, and determined that, -come what might elsewhere, the Star of the East should not be plucked -from the British Crown. He was not a soldier. He was an administrator. -His task was not to increase but to hold. He was by no means always -successful in war, and in all his long rule he never added a province -or a district to the area of British India; but what Clive won he held -and strengthened during those fateful years when the destiny of Britain -as an empire was trembling in the balances of Fate. - -Now, to keep India, money was absolutely necessary, and the getting -of it was not always work that could be done with kid gloves on, and -the greatness of Warren Hastings as Empire-Maker or Holder may be seen -in the fact that he deliberately, and with his eyes open, risked his -future fortune and reputation in the doing of this work by the only -means available. - -He knew that his methods would be censured by his masters and made -unscrupulous use of by his enemies, and he said so in so many words, -and, careless of criticism and undeterred by the most virulent and -treasonable opposition, he succeeded so far that he was able to say -with truth that he had rescued one province from infamy, and two from -total ruin. It is simply amazing to the dispassionate reader of the -present day to watch the needless struggles which were imposed upon -this man, already confronted by a titanic task, by the very men who -ought to have been the first, for their own sakes and their country’s, -to have made his way as smooth and his burdens as light as possible. - -The man who may be fairly described as the evil genius of Warren -Hastings’ career was that Sir Philip Francis who is generally looked -upon as the author of the far-famed Letters of Junius. He and Sir John -Clavering, both personal enemies of the Governor-General--as he was -now--were sent out as members of the Council, and to the days of their -death they never ceased to thwart and embarrass him by every means in -their power. - -One reason for their enmity was undoubtedly the sordid motive of -getting him turned out of the Governor-Generalship in order that one -of them might succeed to his office, and that both might share in the -fruits of the extortions which, in him, they condemned. - -This was not only unjust to Hastings, but it was also a crime against -their country, committed at a moment when she had all too much need of -such men as he was. - -To my mind, at least, there is a very strong resemblance between -the savage invective of Junius and the consistent and unscrupulous -malevolence with which Sir Philip Francis tried to wreck the life-work -of a man at whose table he was not worthy to sit. - -Those were days in which political rivalry and personal enmity -entailed personal consequences if they were pushed too far. Hastings -seemed to have come at length to the conclusion that India was not -large enough to hold himself and Francis. He had submitted to insult -after insult, and he would have been something more than human if his -enemy’s unceasing efforts to make his life a misery and his work a -failure had not left some bitterness in his soul, and so one fine day -he sat down and embodied his opinion of him in a Minute to the Council, -and in this he purposely put words which meant inevitable bloodshed: - -“I do not trust to his promise of candour; convinced that he is -incapable of it, and that his sole purpose and wish are to embarrass -and defeat every measure which I may undertake or which may tend even -to promote the public interest if my credit is connected with them.... -Every disappointment and misfortune have been aggravated by him, -and every fabricated tale of armies devoted to famine and massacre -have found their first and most ready way to his office, where it is -known they would meet with most welcome reception.... I judge of his -public conduct by my experience of his private, which I have found -void of truth and honour. This is a severe charge but temperately and -deliberately made.” - -These were not words which a man in those days could write without -taking his chance of a bullet or the point of a small-sword, and -Hastings knew this perfectly well. Francis challenged him on -the spot, and the day but one after they confronted each other -with pistols at fourteen paces. Francis’s pistol missed fire, and -Hastings obligingly waited until he had reprimed. The second time the -pistol went off, but the ball flew wide. Hastings returned it very -deliberately and his enemy went down with a bullet in the right side. - -[Illustration: HIS ENEMY WENT DOWN WITH A BULLET IN THE RIGHT SIDE.] - -The difference between the two men may be seen from what followed. -After his adversary had been carried home, the Governor-General sent -him a friendly message offering to visit him and bury the hatchet for -good, as was customary in such affairs between gentlemen. Francis, not -being a gentleman, refused, and as soon as he was well enough to travel -he came home to England to injure by backstairs-intrigue and the most -unscrupulous lying and misrepresentation the man who, in the midst of -his difficulties and dangers, had proved all too strong for him in the -open. - -To use his own words, “after a service of thirty-five years from -its commencement, and almost thirteen of them passed in the charge -and exercise of the first nominal office of the government,” Warren -Hastings at last laid down his thankless task and came home to render -an account of his stewardship before a tribunal which possessed neither -adequate knowledge to judge of his actions nor that judicial spirit of -calmness and impartiality which could alone have guaranteed him such a -trial as English justice accords to the vilest criminal. - -His impeachment is not only the most notable but altogether the -most amazing trial in the history of British Law. It would be alike -superfluous and presumptuous to reproduce here an account of that which -has been described in the incomparable sentences of Lord Macaulay. His -essay on Warren Hastings has been considered by many to be the finest -of that magnificent collection of Essays and Reviews, and the story of -the Impeachment is undoubtedly the finest portion of it. Hence those -who read these lines cannot do better than read it as well. If they -have read it before they will simply be repeating a pleasure; if they -have not, then a new pleasure awaits them. - -What we are concerned with here are the bare facts of the matter; but -we may first pause for a moment to look at the man as he was when he -came across the world to face his mostly incompetent and prejudiced -judges. This is how his picture is drawn by Wraxall, a contemporary and -a personal acquaintance. The portrait is certainly more faithful than -the ridiculous caricatures drawn by Burke and Sheridan. - -“When he landed in his native country he had attained his fifty-second -year. In his person he was thin, but not tall, of a spare habit, very -bald, with a countenance placidly thoughtful, but when animated full -of intelligence. Placed in a situation where he might have amassed -immense wealth without exciting censure, he revisited England with -only a modest competence. In private life he was playful and gay to -a degree hardly conceivable; never carrying his political vexations -into the bosom of his family. Of a temper so buoyant and elastic that -the instant he quitted the council-board where he had been assailed by -every species of opposition, often heightened by personal acrimony, he -mixed in society like a youth upon whom care had never intruded.” - -Such was the man who, in a period of national dejection which almost -amounted to disgrace, came back, the one man of his generation who -had upheld the honour of the British name abroad in a post of great -difficulty and danger, to receive, not reward, but impeachment. - -He first faced his judges on February 13, 1788, “looking very infirm -and much indisposed, and dressed in a plain, poppy-coloured suit of -clothes.” He was finally acquitted on March 1, 1794! The trial thus -languished through seven sessions of Parliament, the total hearing -occupied one hundred and eighteen sittings of the Court, and the -vindication of his personal and official character from the slanders -of enemies, who were at last refuted with complete discredit to his -slanderers cost him about £100,000, of which no less than £75,000 were -actually certified legal costs--and this was the reward that England -gave to the one man who was capable of preserving to her the fruit of -the victories of Clive and his gallant lieutenants! - -Modern opinion, endorsed by the high legal authority of the late Sir -James Stephen, has completely rejected alike the personal vilifications -of such self-interested traitors as Francis and Clavering, and the -emotional special-pleading of Burke and Sheridan. - -“The impeachment of Warren Hastings,” he says, “is, I think, a blot on -the judicial history of the country. It was monstrous that a man should -be tortured at irregular intervals for seven years, in order that a -singularly incompetent tribunal might be addressed before an excited -audience by Burke and Sheridan, in language far removed from the -calmness with which an advocate for the prosecution ought to address a -criminal court.” - -To some extent Hastings was recouped for the cost of his persecution, -even if he was not rewarded for his distinguished services. He was -granted a pension of £4,000 a year for twenty-eight and a half years, -part paid in advance, and a loan of £50,000 free of interest. But -meanwhile he had been fulfilling the dream of his boyhood by buying -back his ancestral estate for £60,000, and another £60,000 was still -owing to the lawyers. - -Henceforth, disgusted, as he may well have been, with the ingratitude -of the country he had served so well in so difficult a time, he retired -to his old home and spent the remaining years of his life in the calm -pursuits of a country gentleman, diversified by the cultivation of -letters and the writing of verses. - -It was in these days that he used to tell his friends how, as a little -lad of seven, he had lain in the long grass on the banks of a stream -that flowed through the old domain of Dalesford and dreamt the wild -dream whose fulfilment had, after all, been stranger than the dream -itself--for not even his boyish romance could be compared with the -fact that, during the winning of the means to buy back the home of his -fathers, he had risen to be the actual ruler of something like fifty -millions of people, and the dictator of terms of peace and war to -princes who governed territories half as large as Europe and even more -populous. - -But in the end he outlived both his enemies and the discredit they had -tried to cast upon him. Two years before the battle of Waterloo he was -summoned before the Houses of Parliament in the evening of his days to -give evidence on the work of his manhood, and when he retired, after -nearly four hours’ examination, the whole crowded House of Commons rose -and stood uncovered and in silence as the old Empire-Keeper walked out -of the Chamber. - -He lived to see that empire, for which he had striven so painfully and -so manfully, redeemed by the genius and valour of Rodney and Nelson -and Wellington from the disgrace and degradation which had threatened -it during the last decades of the eighteenth century, and three years -after Waterloo he died. - -His remains lie in the family church at Dalesford, and, to once more -quote the words of Sir Alfred Lyall, “in Westminster Abbey a bust -and an inscription commemorate the name and career of a man who, -rising early to high place and power, held an office of the greatest -importance to his country for thirteen years, by sheer force of -character and tenaciousness against adversity, and who spent the next -seven years in defending himself before a nation which accepted the -benefits but disliked the ways of his too masterly activity.” - -Lord Macaulay, who throughout his famous essay does him less than -justice, concludes it by making almost generous amends. “Not only had -the poor orphan retrieved the fallen fortunes of his line--not only -had he re-purchased the old lands and rebuilt the old dwelling--he -had preserved and extended an empire.[1] He had founded a policy. He -had administered government and war with more than the capacity of -Richelieu. He patronised learning with the judicious liberality of -Cosmo. He had been attacked by the most formidable combination of -enemies that ever sought the destruction of a single victim; and over -that combination, after a struggle of ten years, he had triumphed. He -had at length gone down to his grave in the fulness of age, in peace -after so many troubles, in honour after so much obloquy.” - - [1] In the territorial sense this is hardly correct. The - great essayist probably meant extension in the sense - of increase of prestige and influence over the still - independent states of the Peninsula. - - - - -IX - -_NELSON_ - -“_ENGLAND EXPECTS THAT EVERY MAN WILL DO HIS DUTY._” - - - - -IX - -NELSON - - -I am conscious of more difficulties ahead in beginning this sketch -than I have felt with regard to any other of the series, for, while on -the one hand it would be absurd to omit from the glorious ranks of our -Empire-Makers the most glorious of them all, it is at the same time -practically impossible to say anything fresh or even anything that is -not very generally known about the man who, however much he may once -have been slighted, and however inadequately his earlier services may -have been rewarded during his life, has now come to be the idol of the -country that he saved from invasion and the Empire that he preserved -from destruction. - -His life has been written and re-written, his character and his actions -have been discussed and rediscussed, the most private acts and thoughts -of his life have been dragged out into the full glare of publicity--a -fate which any great man would have to be a very great sinner to -deserve--but when all this has been said and done there remains a -single, sharply-defined individuality of this incomparable naval -captain whom the whole world now acknowledges and reveres, quite apart -from all national considerations, as the greatest sailor who ever trod -a deck and the greatest naval strategist who ever planned a battle or -took a fleet into action. - -It has been said that when a nation is on the brink of ruin the Fates -either hasten its end or send some great man to restore its fortunes. -It certainly was thus with the Britain of Nelson’s early youth. On the -17th of October, 1781, Lord Hawke, the victor of Quiberon Bay, and the -last of the great line of seamen of whom Admiral Blake was the first, -died, leaving, as Horace Walpole said the next day in the House of -Commons, his mantle to nobody. - -Apparently, there was no one worthy to wear it. The fortunes of England -were indeed at a low ebb. Both her naval and military prestige had very -seriously declined. The American colonies had been lost by the worst -of statesmanship at home and the worst of bungling incompetence and -cowardice abroad. We had been beaten by the raw colonists on land and -by the French and Dutch at sea. - -At home the very highest circles of the realm were polluted by such -corruption and crippled by such imbecility as would be absolutely -incredible to us now, Imagine, for instance, what would be thought -to-day of the post of Secretary of State for War being given to a man -who had been explicitly declared by a court martial to be absolutely -incapable of serving his country in any military capacity!--and yet -this is only one example out of many of the flagrant abuses of this -amazingly disgraceful period. - -Happily, however, for the honour of the race and the safety of the -Empire there had been born, twenty-three years before to a country -parson in Norfolk, a boy, the fifth in a family of eleven, who fourteen -years later was destined to die in the moment of victory, happy in the -knowledge that he had not left his country a single enemy to fight -throughout the length and breadth of the High Seas. When Horace Walpole -spoke his panegyric on Lord Hawke he would probably have been very much -surprised if he had been told that it was this then insignificant and -unknown cousin of his own who was not only to take up the mantle of the -hero of Quiberon, but to bequeath it in his turn, not to a rival or a -successor, but to the country which his last triumph left mistress of -the seas. - -Although there doesn’t seem to be any direct proof, it may be admitted -that there is sufficiently strong presumption to warrant us in -believing, if we choose to do so, that Horatio Nelson, son of the Rev. -Edmund Nelson, Rector of Burnham Thorpe in Norfolk, could one way or -another have traced a lineage back to the old Sea Kings of the North. - -Certainly he must have had some of the blood of those who fought -the Armada in his veins, and it is noteworthy that a Danish poet in -celebrating his valour, wisdom, and clemency during and after the great -battle of Copenhagen, attempted to soothe the wounded pride of his -countrymen by pointing out that Nelson was indubitably a Danish name -and that after all they had only been beaten by the descendant of one -of their old Sea Kings. - -But however this may be, the immediate facts all show that the man who -crowned and completed the work which Francis Drake and his brother -pirates began came of a stock that seemed to promise but little in the -way of hereditary battle-winning. - -Every one on his father’s side appears either to have been a parson or -to have married one. His mother’s father was a parson too, but happily -she had a brother Maurice who was a captain in the Navy, and had done -some very good work at a time when good work was badly wanted. - -This gallant sailor was a great grand-nephew of Sir John Suckling, -the poet, and it may be noticed, in passing, that on the 21st of -October, 1757, the day which we now know as the anniversary of -Trafalgar--Captain Maurice Suckling in the _Dreadnought_, in company -with two other sixty-gun ships, attacked seven large French men-of-war -off Cape François in the West Indies, and gave them such a hammering -that they were very thankful for the wind which enabled them to escape. - -But still more noteworthy is the opinion of Captain Maurice Suckling of -his nephew when he first received his father’s request to give him a -place on board his ship. - -“What,” he wrote in reply to the application, “has poor Horatio done, -who is so weak, that he above all the rest should be sent to rough it -out at sea? But let him come, and the first time we go into action a -cannon-ball may knock off his head and provide for him at once.” - -The weakness here somewhat grimly alluded to was the curse of Nelson’s -existence from the day that he first set foot on the deck of a ship to -the moment when the bullet from the mizen-top of the _Redoubtable_ made -his almost constant bodily suffering a matter of minutes. - -His physical infirmities, or at any rate the weakness of his body -as compared with the vast strength and tireless energy of his mind, -bring him into very close relationship with William of Orange. Putting -nationality aside, he was, in fact, on the sea what William was on -land, and the central point in his policy was also the same--tireless -and unsparing hostility to France. - -With Nelson, indeed, this appears to have gone very near to the borders -of fanaticism. Some of his sayings with regard to the Frenchmen of his -day are absolutely ferocious. Hatred and contempt are about equally -blended in them. “Hate a Frenchman as you would hate the devil!” was -with him an axiom and was his usual form of advice to midshipmen on -entering the service. - -On one occasion in the Mediterranean he said to one of his captains who -had got into a dispute about the property which the defeated French -garrison at Gaieta were to be allowed to take away with them: - -“I am sorry that you had any altercation with them. There is no way to -deal with a Frenchman but to knock him down. To be civil to him is only -to be laughed at when they are enemies.” - -The same spirit breathes through nearly all his letters. Thus, for -instance, he concluded a letter to the British Minister at Vienna with -these words: “_Down, down with the French_ ought to be written in the -council-room of every country in the world, and may Almighty God give -right thoughts to every sovereign is my constant prayer.” - -He seems to have had respect for every other enemy that he met; but for -the French he had nothing save contemptuous and unsparing hostility. -“Close with a Frenchman, but out-manœuvre a Russian” was another of his -favourite sayings. This, it is to be hoped, is all past and gone; but -it is instructive as giving us the key, not only to Nelson’s policy, -but also to that spirit which made the British man-of-warsmen of the -day absolutely prefer to fight the French at long odds than on even -terms. - -It was this spirit which was embodied in another of Nelson’s pet -phrases: “Any Englishman is worth three Frenchmen.” Of course that -would be all nonsense now; but in justice to our neighbours it ought to -be remembered that the Frenchmen whom Nelson and his sailors met and -conquered were the worst and not the best of their nation. - -The old navy of France, the navy which had commanded the Eastern -Seas in the days of Clive and which had with impunity insulted the -English shores and brought an invading force into Ireland in the time -of William the Third no longer existed. It had been essentially an -aristocratic service like our own, its officers were gentlemen and -thorough sailors, and its seamen were brave, disciplined, and obedient. - -But in her blood-drunkenness France had either murdered or banished -nearly every man who was fit to command a ship or who knew how to -point a gun. The fleets of revolutionary France were for the most part -commanded by ignoramuses or poltroons, or both, and manned by a rabble -who had neither stamina, training, or discipline. - -Without the slightest wish to detract from the splendour of the -victories of Nelson or his comrades, I still think it is only fair to -point out again, as has once or twice been done before, that when we -read of French Admirals declining battle even when they had superior -force, or of running away before the battle was over, or of a small -British squadron crumpling up a whole fleet with very trifling loss to -itself, we ought to remember that the French Admirals had little or no -confidence in their officers, while the officers had still less either -in their admirals or their men. - -On the other hand, such a man as Nelson, Collingwood, or Hardy had -simply to say that he was going to do a certain thing to convince every -one serving under him that it was about as good as already done. - -This brings me naturally to one of Nelson’s most striking -characteristics. No man who rose to distinction in the Navy was ever -guilty of so many barefaced acts of insubordination as he was. Happily -for him and for us his disobedience or neglect of orders was always -justified by victory. The genius for supreme command, which was far -and away the strongest point in his character, manifested itself very -early in his career. The event proved that he was the superior of every -naval officer then afloat, whether admiral or midshipman, and he seemed -instinctively to know it. - -When he was commanding the old _Agamemnon_ in the Mediterranean, at -the time when it was in dispute whether Corsica should fall under the -rule of France or Britain, he fought two French ships, the _Ça Ira_ -and the _Sans Culottes_, for a whole day and beat them. The next day a -sort of general action was fought, Admiral Hotham being in command of -the British fleet. Nelson naturally wanted a fight to a finish, but -the Admiral was content with the capture of two ships and the flight of -the rest, and in reply to Nelson’s remonstrances he said: “We must be -contented. We have done very well.” - -In a letter home on the subject of this action, Nelson penned -a sentence which was at once prophetic in itself and closely -characteristic of the writer. It was this: “I wish to be an Admiral and -in command of the English fleet. I should very soon either do much or -be ruined. My disposition cannot bear tame and slow measures. Sure I am -had I commanded on the 14th, that either the whole French fleet would -have graced my triumph or I should have been in a confounded scrape.” - -That is Nelson’s mental portrait drawn by himself. No half measures -would ever do for him, and in most of the letters that he sent home -from his various scenes of action, whether they were written to his -wife, his private friends, or the Lords of the Admiralty, we find -the constant complaint, made with an insistence amounting almost to -petulance, that when he saw complete triumph within his grasp his -superiors either would not help him to secure it or forced him to be -content with a mere temporary advantage. - -Under such circumstances it was only natural that such a man should now -and then break loose. He saw quite plainly that there were confused -councils at home, and timid tactics afloat. He saw also that under -Napoleon the power of France was growing every day. - -The Board of Admiralty was apparently both corrupt and incompetent. The -Mediterranean fleet had been so shamefully neglected that after Nelson -had fought an action off Toulon even he was afraid to risk another -without the certainty of victory because there was “not so much as -a mast to be had east of Gibraltar,” and he could not possibly have -re-fitted his ships. It was about this time that he said in one of his -letters home: - -“I am acting, not only without the orders of my commander-in-chief, but -in some measure contrary to him.” - -If the authorities at home had only had the same opinion of his -abilities as those had who were able to watch his operations on the -spot, and particularly in Italy, it is quite possible that the whole -history of Europe might have been changed and that Napoleon would never -have won that series of brilliant victories which cost such an infinity -of blood and treasure, and which bore no fruits but such as resembled -all too closely the fabled Dead Sea apples. - -Nelson’s patriotism may have been of a somewhat narrow-minded order, -and his hatred of the French may have partaken somewhat of the nature -of bigotry, but there can be no doubt that he was the one man in Europe -who saw what was coming and had the ability, if he had only had the -power, to save the world from the horrors of the Napoleonic wars. - -Thus, for instance, if his advice had been taken, the splendid victory -of Aboukir Bay might have been turned into the decisive battle of the -war which only ended with Waterloo. As it was, he to some extent took -the law into his own hands. He saw perfectly well that Napoleon’s -ultimate point of attack was not Egypt but India. He sent an officer -with dispatches to the Governor of Bombay, advising him of the defeat -of the French Fleet, and in this dispatch he said: - -“I know that Bombay was their first object if they could get there, but -I trust that now Almighty God will overthrow in Egypt these pests of -the human race. Buonaparte has never yet had to contend with an English -officer, and I shall endeavour to make him respect us.” - -In another dispatch to the Admiralty he taught a lesson which we have -only lately begun to learn. In those days of the old wooden-walls the -handy, light-heeled frigate was to the ships of the line what the swift -cruisers of to-day are to the big battleships. They were the eyes -and ears of the fleet, and they could be sent on errands which were -impossible to the huge three-deckers. After the battle of the Nile was -won he said in this dispatch: - -“Were I to die this moment _want of frigates_ would be found stamped -on my heart. No words of mine can express what I have suffered, and am -suffering, for want of them.” - -The inner meaning of these bitter words was one of vast importance, -not only to Britain, but to all Europe. They meant really that the -most splendid victory that had so far been won at sea had been robbed -of half its results. For want of the lighter craft, even of a few -bomb-vessels and fire-ships which he had implored the authorities to -send him, Napoleon’s store-ships and transports in the harbour of -Alexandria escaped attack and certain destruction. - -Their destruction would have enabled Nelson to carry out the policy -which his genius had told him was the only true one to pursue at this -momentous crisis. He would have cut off Napoleon’s communications and -deprived him of his supplies. Then he would have blockaded the Egyptian -Coast and left the future conqueror of Austerlitz to perish amidst the -sands of Egypt. As he said to himself: “To Egypt they went with their -own consent, and there they shall remain while Nelson commands this -squadron--for never, never will he consent to the return of one ship or -Frenchman. I wish them to perish in Egypt and give an awful lesson to -the world of the justice of the Almighty.” - -This was a pitiless pronouncement, but no one who has read the history -of the Napoleonic wars can doubt the accuracy of Nelson’s foresight or -the true humanity of his policy, for, if this had happened only a few -thousands out of the five million lives which these wars are computed -to have cost would have been lost. There would have been no Austerlitz, -or Wagram, or Jena for France to boast of; but, on the other hand, -there would have been no Leipsic, no Moscow, and no Waterloo. - -As usual, however, Nelson, although he had magnificently restored the -credit of the British arms at sea, was crippled by shortness of means -and baulked by the stupidity and incompetence of his masters at home. -Sir Sidney Smith’s policy was preferred to his, with the result that -Napoleon was permitted to desert his army and live to become the curse -of Europe for the next seventeen years. - -But, if he did not do all he wanted to do, when Nelson won the battle -of the Nile he completely established his claim to be considered one -of the Empire-makers of Britain, for if he had not followed the French -with that unerring judgment of his, and if he had not, in defiance of -all accepted naval tactics, attacked them in what was considered to be -an unassailable position--that is to say, moored off shore in two lines -with both ends protected by batteries--all the work that Clive and -Hastings had done in India might have been undone, and, considering the -miserable state of our national defences, we might either have lost -India or had to wage such an exhausting war for it that we could not -possibly have taken the decisive share that we afterwards did in the -overthrow of the French power. - -As he said in one of his most famous utterances while the British fleet -was streaming into the bay: “Where there is room for a Frenchman to -swing, there is room for an Englishman to get alongside him.” - -That was Nelson. His idea was always to get alongside, to get as close -as possible to the enemy and to hit him as hard as he could. Mere -defeat was not enough for him. He wanted a fight to a finish, the -finish being the absolute destruction or capture of the hostile force. - -This was not because there was anything particularly ferocious in his -nature. On the contrary, a more tender-hearted man never lived. - -Before that one defeat of his at Teneriffe when he lost his arm, he -wrote to his Commander-in-chief--this letter, by the way, was the last -he ever wrote with his right hand--expressing solicitude for everybody -but himself. None knew better than he the desperate nature of the -venture, for in this very letter he said that on the morrow his head -would probably be crowned either with laurel or cypress, and the last -thing he did before he left his ship was to call his stepson to help -him in burning his wife’s letters, and then ordered him to remain -behind, saying: “Should we both fall, what would become of your poor -mother?” - -Happily Lieutenant Nisbet disobeyed the order to his face and went. -When the bullet shattered Nelson’s arm at the elbow, it was his stepson -who had the presence of mind to whip off his silk handkerchief and bind -it round above the wound. But for this, Nelson would never have fought -another battle, for he must have bled to death before he reached his -ship. - -It so happened that he could have been put much sooner on board the -_Sea Horse_, but her commander, Captain Freemantle, was still on shore, -and, for all he knew, might be dead or alive. His wife was on board -the _Sea Horse_, and Nelson, wounded and bleeding as he was, insisted -on going on, saying: “I would rather suffer death than alarm Mrs. -Freemantle by letting her see me in this state when I can give her no -tidings of her husband.” Freemantle, as it turned out, had been wounded -in almost exactly the same place only a few minutes before. - -When Nelson got back to his own ship, he would not hear of being slung -or carried up on deck. - -“I’ve got one arm and two legs left,” he said, “and I’ll get up by -myself.” - -And so he did, and up a single rope at that. In a strong man this -would have been wonderful; in a mere weakling as Nelson physically was, -it was little short of a miracle. - -This was the man who, in the Battle of Cape St. Vincent, with an -utterly disabled ship, boarded and took two Spanish men-of-war both -bigger than his own. One of them had eighty and the other a hundred and -twelve guns; his own only mounted seventy-four. - -It is, of course, entirely out of the question that in such a mere -sketch as this I should attempt to follow Nelson through even a -moderate proportion of the hundred and five engagements in which he -personally fought, nor would it be fitting that I should attempt to -emulate the brilliant and detailed descriptions which have illustrated -the principal of them. - -With his doings at Naples and Palermo, and his much-debated and -inexplicable attachment to Lady Hamilton which unhappily began during -this period, we have here no concern. The hero of the Nile, like every -other great man, had his faults. Those who cavil at them are really -blaming their possessors for not being perfect, for if really great -men had no faults they would be perfect, and that is impossible, -and, so much being said, the scene may now shift forthwith from the -Mediterranean to the Baltic. - -The Armed Neutrality is now only a phrase in history, but in the year -1801 it was a very serious reality. It was a league between Russia, -Sweden, and Denmark. From the English point of view it meant this--that -France, with whom we had now practically embarked in a struggle to the -death, would be able, under the sanction of this league, to import from -the shores of the Baltic the very articles that we did not wish her to -have, and which she couldn’t get elsewhere. These were naval stores, -pine-trees for masts and spars, hemp for rigging, tar, and so on. - -It was very easy to see that this Armed Neutrality meant in plain -English that these three Powers were quite agreeable to the smashing-up -of Great Britain by France provided that they were not called upon to -pay any of the expenses or suffer any of the other losses of the war. -Denmark was therefore politely but firmly requested to detach herself -from this league, the reason being that Denmark in those days kept -the key of the Baltic. Denmark refused, and unhappily for her she did -so just at the time when the Victor of the Nile had come home for a -well-earned holiday. - -We are not accustomed now, in the pride of our unequalled naval -strength, to take very much account of the fleets of these three -countries, but just before the Battle of the Baltic was fought it was a -very different matter. - -The Danes had twenty-three line-of-battle ships and thirty-one -frigates, not counting bomb-vessels and guard-ships. Sweden had -eighteen ships of the line, fourteen frigates and sloops and -seventy-four galleys, as well as a small swarm of gun-boats, while -Russia could put to sea eighty-two line-of-battle ships and forty-two -frigates. - -Such a force within the narrow waters of the Baltic was a very -formidable one, but before we can arrive at a just appreciation of -the magnificence and importance of the service which Nelson did for -his country we must remember that of all European waters those of the -Baltic, and especially of the approaches to it, are the most difficult -and dangerous. Even with the aid of steam it would be no light matter -to take a fleet into the Baltic under the guns of Elsinore and Kronberg -were the lamps of the lighthouses extinguished and all the buoys -removed. - -What then must it have been to go in with a fleet of sailing ships -utterly at the mercy of wind and current, to say nothing of the ice? -Indeed, Southey tells us that when Nelson went to Yarmouth to join the -fleet under Admiral Sir Hyde-Parker he found him a little nervous about -dark nights and ice-floes. - -His own remarks on the subject are very well worthy of remembrance: -“These are not times for nervous systems,” he said. “I hope we shall -give our northern enemies that hailstorm of bullets which gives our -dear country the dominion of the sea. We have it and all the devils in -the North cannot take it from us if our wooden walls have fair play.” - -It was a most egregious mistake not to have made the Victor of the -Nile and the Conqueror of the Mediterranean commander-in-chief of the -Northern Squadron. His fame was already resounding through the world, -and every one except the Lords of the Admiralty seems to have already -recognised the fact that he was by far the finest sailor of the age. - -Here again, too, officialism at home sadly crippled the work of valour -and genius abroad. As usual Nelson had his own plans, and as usual -they were the very best possible. His idea was to attack the Russian -Squadron in Reval and the Danish in Copenhagen simultaneously, and by -preventing their coalition make it too risky for the Swedes to join in. - -Captain Mahan, who is certainly entitled to be considered one of the -foremost naval authorities of the day, describes Nelson’s plan of -attack as worthy of Napoleon himself, and says that if adopted it -“would have brought down the Baltic Confederacy with a crash that would -have resounded throughout Europe.” As it was, more timid counsels -prevailed, but thanks to Nelson the end was the same, or nearly so. - -We may gather some notion of the difficulty of getting on to the scene -of battle when we read that no less than three English line-of-battle -ships went aground before the battle began, and we also get an -interesting glimpse of that old hand-to-hand style of naval warfare -which has now passed away for ever, when we are told that the ships -opened fire at a range of two hundred yards! Nowadays firing would -begin at between three and four thousand. If two modern fleets were to -get to business at that range the said business would probably consist -of one broadside from each, one discharge of the big guns, and after -that general wreck and ruin. It is not likely that either side would -win, and it is certain that both sides would lose. - -From ten to one the battle raged fast and furious, and so much damage -had been done on the English side that Sir Hyde-Parker made a signal -to leave off action. It was at this moment that Nelson uttered those -immortal words, which were destined to be as famous even as his signal -at Trafalgar: - -“What? Leave off action? No, damn me if I do! You know, Foley, I have -a right to be blind sometimes. No, I really don’t see the signal. Fire -away!” - -Those were days of hard swearing as well as hard hitting, and, -considering all the circumstances, even the purest of modern purists -may forgive a little vehemence of expression to the man who that day -did such good work, not only for our grandfathers, but for us and our -children. - -[Illustration: NELSON AT COPENHAGEN.] - -An hour or so later Nelson performed one of the most memorable actions -even of his life. The Danish ships and floating batteries were moored -in-shore. The fire of the English guns was, as usual, terribly -accurate, but as fast as the Danes were shot down, fresh crews were put -on board the ships, and Nelson very soon saw that this simply meant -butchery as long as a Danish ship floated. - -Consequently he sat down and wrote a note to the Crown Prince of -Denmark which he sent on shore under a flag of truce. This was the -letter: - -“Lord Nelson has directions to spare Denmark when no longer resisting, -but if the firing is continued on the part of Denmark, Lord Nelson -will be obliged to set on fire all the floating batteries he has taken -without having the power of saving the brave Danes who have defended -them.” - -The result of this letter was a truce, and the truce led to an -armistice and the separation of Denmark from the Armed Neutrality. -This was very different treatment, we may well imagine, to anything -that the French might have expected. In their case he considered -extermination to be the only remedy for the disease which in his eyes -they represented on earth. - -It was curious that after such a day’s work this man, who had probably -saved Europe from one of the greatest menaces that ever threatened it, -should go back to his cabin and copy out love verses to send to Lady -Hamilton--and yet that is just what he did, and at the end of them he -wrote: “_St. George_, April 2nd, 1801, at 9 o’clock at night. Very -tired after a hard fought battle.” - -The Battle of Copenhagen and the death of the Tsar Paul put an end -to the Northern Confederacy and to all the hopes of France in that -direction. But Nelson was not satisfied, for the Russian fleet had -escaped. He was, however, in some measure consoled by the recall of -Sir Hyde-Parker and the realisation of his old ambition by his own -appointment as commander-in-chief. - -His next service was as commander of a sort of patrol fleet on the East -Coast. Those were the days of the great invasion scare. Nelson never -believed in it. In one of his letters to Lord Addington on the subject -he said: - -“What a forlorn undertaking! It is perfectly right to be prepared -against a mad government, but with the active force your lordship has -given me I may pronounce it impracticable.” - -Soon after this, preliminaries of peace were signed, and to Nelson’s -intense disgust the French Ambassador was enthusiastically received in -London. Writing to his physician soon after he said: - -“Can you cure madness? for I am mad that our damned scoundrels dragged -the Frenchman’s carriage. I am ashamed for my country.” - -The Peace was hollow and brief, for the mastery of the sea was not -yet decided, and by the middle of 1803 we find Nelson back in the -Mediterranean, not blockading Toulon, but rather trying to tempt the -French out to a battle. - -He even went so far as to appear to run away, and the French Admiral, -Latouche-Treville, promptly wrote a letter giving a most glowing -account of how he had chased the English away from Toulon. The idea of -a Frenchman daring to say such a thing naturally made Nelson furious. -Writing about it to his brother he said: - -“If this fleet gets fairly up with M. Latouche his letter with all his -ingenuity must be different from his last. We had fancied that we had -chased him into Toulon, but from the time of his meeting Captain Hawker -of the _Isis_ I never heard of his acting otherwise than as a poltroon -and a liar. I am keeping his letter, and if I take him by God he shall -eat it.” - -This amiable design, however, the French Admiral baulked by dying, and -when Nelson heard the news he remarked half-angrily: “He is gone, and -all his lies with him.” - -That is what he thought of the Admiral. This is what he thought of the -fleet: “The French fleet yesterday was to appearance in high feather -and as fine as paint could make them. Our weather-beaten ships, I have -no fear, will make their sides like a plum-pudding.” - -The interval between the ending of the Toulon blockade and the -Battle of Trafalgar was filled chiefly by what may be described as -a huge naval hunt. On the one hand, there were three French fleets -manœuvring to get out and come together in the Channel with the object -of overwhelming any English force that might try to prevent the -embarkation of the Grand Army at Boulogne. But they had another object, -and that was to get as far as possible out of Nelson’s way. - -The first idea was to make a feint at the West Indies, and so away went -Admiral Villeneuve with his fleet across the Atlantic, and away went -Nelson post-haste after him. He got to the West Indies only to find -that the Frenchmen had doubled on their tracks and gone back again, and -so he immediately turned the prows of his weather-beaten and almost -unseaworthy ships to the eastward, and for the second time chased the -French across the Atlantic. But he missed them again, and on July 20, -1805, Nelson made an entry in his diary to the effect that he had that -day gone ashore at Gibraltar--the first time that he had left the -_Victory_ for two years all but ten days! - -From Gibraltar he came home and spent a few weeks of rest at Merton, -the estate which he had bought in Surrey. During this time a momentous -naval duel was fought in the Channel. Admiral Villeneuve had sent some -very important dispatches containing the plans for the concentration -of the French and Spanish fleets to the commander of the Rochefort -squadron by the _Didon_, a forty-four-gun frigate; but on her way the -_Didon_ was met by the _Phœnix_, an English forty-gun frigate which, -after the fashion of the times, proceeded to pound her to helplessness, -then ran alongside and carried her by the board in the good old -style. The result of this was that Villeneuve gave up all hope of the -concentration and retreated to Cadiz, where he anchored on August 17th. - -Admiral Collingwood, in command of the Atlantic squadron, at once -sent off the frigate _Euryalus_ home with news. She dropped anchor at -Spithead on the 1st of September. At five o’clock the next morning her -captain presented himself at Merton and found Nelson already up and -dressed. The moment Captain Blackwood entered the room Nelson’s face -lit up and he said: - -“I’m sure you bring me news of the French and Spanish fleets and -I think I shall have to give them a beating yet. Depend upon it, -Blackwood, I shall yet give Mr. Villeneuve a drubbing.” - -He left for London the same day to consult with the Admiralty, and it -was on one of the visits that he then paid to the Secretary of State -that he met for a few minutes--and for the only time in his life--the -man whose name was destined to be linked with his in everlasting fame. -This was Arthur Wellesley, some day to be Duke of Wellington, who was -to do for the French on land what Nelson had been doing for them at sea. - -Sir Arthur came away with a curious opinion of the little, pale, -nervous, fidgety, one-armed man, who had won the two greatest battles -in the history of naval warfare, and was about to surpass himself by -winning yet a greater one. - -From one point of view he was a vain, boastful, and somewhat womanish -little man. From another, he was not only a great leader of men, but -a statesman to boot. On the whole, the future Iron Duke came to the -conclusion that the Hero of the Nile was “a very superior person.” - -Nelson’s opinion of Wellington is unhappily lost to posterity. One can -imagine the sort of language he would have used if any one had told him -that a soldier had ventured to call him “a superior person.” - -“For charity’s sake, send us Lord Nelson, ye men of power.” Such -was the prayer of Captain Codrington of the _Orion_, serving with -Collingwood’s fleet off Cadiz. But by the time this letter got home -Nelson was with the fleet, and it is worthy of note that he reached the -last and most glorious of his hundred battlefields on his birthday, the -twenty-ninth of September. - -The first thing that he did was to send home for more ships, not -because he wasn’t ready to fight the French with what he had, but -simply in pursuance of his constant policy with regard to them. In his -dispatch to the Admiralty he said: - -“Should they come out, I shall immediately bring them to battle, but -though I should not doubt of spoiling any voyage they may attempt, yet -I hope for the arrival of the ships from England that as an enemy’s -fleet they may be annihilated.” - -In a private letter which he wrote at the same time he said: - -“It is annihilation that the country wants and not merely a splendid -victory of twenty-three to thirty-six--honourable to the parties -concerned, but absolutely useless in the extended scale to bring -Buonaparte to his marrow-bones. Numbers can only annihilate. Therefore -I hope the Admiralty will send the fixed force as soon as possible.” - -He hoped for forty sail of the line, but when the ever memorable -morning of the 21st had dawned he was only able to muster twenty-seven -against thirty-three. At half-past eleven the famous signal: “England -expects that every man will do his duty!” flew from the main-royal of -the _Victory_. - -I have no intention of attempting to re-write the thousand-times told -tale of Trafalgar or of the disaster which plunged the nation into -mourning in the midst of the exultation of triumph, for to do so would -be alike superfluous and impertinent. Let it be enough to point out -that the firing of the first gun marked the moment that Nelson had -lived and fought for. - -He was Commander-in-chief, as he had so often prayed to be, of the -British Fleet, and there in front of him was the last fleet of any -strength that his hated enemy France could muster. The battle, like the -triumph, was his and his alone. Every man who that day did his duty -fought by Nelson’s directions and, as it were, under Nelson’s eye, and -never was victory more complete or defeat more crushing. - -When it was over eighteen out of the thirty-three French and Spanish -ships had been captured, and finally only eleven got back to Cadiz so -shattered that they never again took the sea as men-of-war. - -The crowning triumph of Nelson’s life left Britain without a rival so -far as the mastery of the sea was concerned and threw the way open for -conquest and colonisation in all parts of the world. Well might the -great Admiral say when he lay dying in Captain Hardy’s arms: “Thank -God, I’ve done my duty!” - -No man ever died with nobler or more truly spoken words on his lips -than these, for he had not only given his country the empire of the -sea, but he had saved her from invasion by one who was perhaps the -greatest military genius the world has known. - -On the heights above Boulogne there stands a tall column surmounted -by a figure of Napoleon. It was raised to commemorate the assembly of -the Grand Army--that army which during the next ten years swept in an -irresistible torrent of conquest from one end of Europe to the other. -Napoleon’s back is turned on the white cliffs of England. If Nelson had -never lived, he might have been facing the other way. - - - - -X - -_WELLINGTON_ - -“_THE PRIDE AND THE GENIUS OF HIS COUNTRY._” - - --QUEEN VICTORIA. - - - - -X - -WELLINGTON - - -There is a very considerable amount of uncertainty, and there are -also a few somewhat remarkable coincidences associated with the early -youth of Arthur Wesley, better known to fame under the expanded form -Wellesley, son of Garret, Earl of Mornington, and his wife Ann Hill, -one of the daughters of Lord Dungannon. - -It is somewhat singular, for instance, that the birthday of a child -born in such a position should not be known within a day or two. His -mother, who ought to have spoken with authority, said that the future -conqueror of the great Napoleon entered the world on May-Day, 1769. - -The date on his baptismal certificate is the 30th of May, and -twenty-one years later a committee of the Irish House of Commons, to -which he had just been elected, investigated the question on a petition -which sought to show that he was not of full age, and this committee -decided that he was born on or before the 29th of April. With regard -to this latter date, however, it has been suggested that with the -money and influence that he had behind him there would have been no -difficulty in getting the Irish Parliament of those days to make him -any age that he pleased. - -But these things are only trifles. The fact of moment to the world is -that Arthur Wellesley managed to get born into the world some three -months before a certain other boy-baby was born at Ajaccio in Corsica. -No one, of course, dreamt then that these two babies were going to grow -up into Titans whose final struggle for the mastery of Europe was to -shake the world forty-six years later. - -There is perhaps no more noteworthy coincidence in modern history -than the fact that Nelson, Wellington, and Napoleon should all have -been born about the same time--for without Nelson’s victories at sea, -Napoleon would in all probability have been irresistible on land, -while, without Wellington’s splendid conduct of the Peninsular War, the -crowning victory of Waterloo would perhaps never have been won, and so -at least half the effects of Nelson’s hundred and five fights would -have been destroyed. - -This is all the more singular from the fact that nothing within the -limits of human probability save the supreme genius and individual -capacity of this Englishman and this Anglo-Irishman could possibly have -stemmed the tide of Napoleonic conquest. - -As I have pointed out in another of these sketches, the last decade but -one of the eighteenth century was one of disaster and degradation for -this country both at home and abroad. The national strength was sapped -by corruption, and the national spirit was daunted by defeat. - -The history of the next thirty or forty years distinctly shows that we -had but one Nelson at sea, and but one Wellington on land. If they had -been born a quarter of a century later, or even if they had not both -come into the world about the same time as their mighty antagonist, the -map of Europe would certainly be very different to what it is to-day, -and it is also fairly safe to say that the map of the world would not -now show nearly as much red as it does. - -Arthur Wellesley, like certain others of our Empire-Makers who will -be remembered, was a delicate, weakly boy and also, curiously enough, -a dunce at school. As far as we know he was first sent to a school at -Chelsea, whence in due course he went to Eton. Now there came a time -when Eton was very proud indeed of being his Alma-Mater; but when she -came to look back to see if she could remember anything about him she -found that his career was absolutely undistinguished. - -There was only one incident in it all that any one remembered, and that -was a fight that he had had with one Bob or “Bobus” Smith, of whom also -nothing is known save the fact that he had a brother who was afterwards -known to the world as Sydney Smith--not the defender of Acre, but the -clerical humourist who divided the human race into three sexes: Men, -women, and curates. - -It would seem that he was all along intended for the army, for when his -undistinguished career at Eton had closed he went to a French military -school at Angers, somewhere about the same time that a certain young -cadet of Artillery was beginning to learn his business in Toulon. Here, -again, we get very dim glimpses of the future conqueror, Empire-Maker, -and preserver. One of them, however, is fairly distinct. He had a -little terrier called Vick to which he was a great deal more attentive -than he was to his studies and which repaid his attention by constant -and unswerving devotion. - -When he left Angers is not known to a year or so, but in 1787 we come -across something definite, for in this year Arthur Wesley, as he still -spelt himself, was gazetted as ensign to His Majesty’s 73rd Regiment of -Foot. - -He now stood on the lowest of the gentlemanly rungs of the military -ladder and his upward progress was for a time somewhat bewildering. -Those were the days when money and social and political influence, -which came to about the same thing, did everything in the Army, the -Navy, the Church, and everywhere else, and, curiously enough, this -apparently absurd system produced the finest array of soldiers and -sailors that has ever adorned the annals of our empire. There are, -indeed, certain blasphemers who venture to suggest that it worked -quite as well as our much-boasted compound of mechanical cramming and -competitive examination does now. - -But, be this as it may, Arthur Wesley’s first steps up the ladder were -distinctly erratic. First he became a lieutenant of the 76th and 41st, -then a sub. in the 12th Light Dragoons, then a captain in the 58th -Foot, then captain of the 18th Light Dragoons, and so on till by the -autumn of 1793, when he had reached the mature age of twenty-four, he -was gazetted lieutenant-colonel of the 33rd Foot. - -There were two reasons for this rapid promotion. The first undoubtedly -is the fact that his elder brother Richard was now Earl of Mornington -and a wealthy man and a social power to boot. The second, as Mr. George -Hooper in his excellent biography suggests, is probably the perception -by his brother of qualities which so far nobody else had discovered. - -How far his Lordship was justified was speedily shown when in -1793--which the historical reader will note was the date of the driving -out of the English and Royalists from Toulon by the well-directed guns -of Citizen Buonaparte--he was given the command of the 33rd Foot. A few -months later the 33rd was officially recognised as the most effective -regiment on the Irish establishment. - -The next year Lieutenant-Colonel Wesley saw his first active service. -It was not an encouraging experience, but it was sufficient to show the -sort of stuff that the future Iron Duke was made of. The allied armies -in the Netherlands, with the English under the Duke of York among them, -were retreating after a series of disasters before the triumphant -onrush of the French legions. - -Near the town of Boxtell the retreat began to get uncomfortably like -a rout. Horse and foot were getting mixed up in a narrow lane and the -French, seeing this, were getting ready to charge into them; whereupon -Colonel Wesley planted his men skilfully across the mouth of the lane -and, when the French charged, the well-drilled 33rd stood so steadily -and used their muskets with such deadly precision that the French -thought better of it and the pursuit stopped there and then. - -That was the young Colonel’s first experience of actual war. It was -also the first check the French had so far received in the Netherlands, -which is also significant in the light of after events. - -After that he commanded the rear-guard in the retreat to the British -transports at Bremen. He did his duty as well as the hopeless -carelessness and incompetency of those over and above him permitted. -“It was a perfect marvel,” he said afterwards, “how a single man of us -escaped,” from which it will be gathered that British military genius -and discipline were somewhat at a discount during the campaign which -we may regard as the prelude to the stupendous struggle which was to -culminate on the field of Waterloo. - -When Colonel Wesley got home he did a very curious thing. He asked to -be allowed to resign his commission and to be given some post, however -humble, in the Civil Service. It is easy to see from his letter of -application to Lord Camden that he was utterly disgusted with the Army, -or rather with the way in which it was mismanaged. He also felt, as -he distinctly says, that he had in him the makings of a successful -financier, and certainly if great business capacity, instantaneous -knowledge of men, unequalled power of organisation, and absolutely -tireless energy are the principal requisites for commercial success, -Arthur Wesley might have died a millionaire. - -Happily, however, Lord Camden refused to grant his request. No doubt -the Earl of Mornington had something to say about it and good officers -were quite rare enough just then to make the abilities of the Colonel -of the 33rd fairly conspicuous. Soon after this he had an attack of -yellow fever in Ireland, probably by infection, which very nearly -killed him. Just at this time too, that is to say the end of 1795, an -expedition was organised to the West Indies and the 33rd were to form -part of it. - -It is interesting to us with our wind-defying monsters of steel and -steam to learn that the squadron tried for six weeks to get out of -the Channel and then had to come back. By this time the destination -of the expedition had been changed from the West to the East Indies. -The Colonel of the 33rd was too ill to sail with his regiment. A swift -frigate enabled him to overtake it at the Cape; but for all that he was -nearly thirteen months before he got to Calcutta. - -Arthur Wellesley, as he now began to sign himself, although nothing -more in the eyes of his comrades and commanders than a Colonel of Foot -who was a good disciplinarian and a promising soldier, had now entered -that theatre on the stage of which he was to play a brilliant part to a -world-wide audience. - -Nearly thirteen years before Warren Hastings had finished his work and -gone home to take his reward in impeachment and ruin. The brilliant -administration of Lord Cornwallis and the less conspicuous rule of Sir -John Shore were now to be followed by a double command which was to -extend, complete, and crown the great work of empire-making in the East -which had begun when Robert Clive left his desk to go and capture Arcot. - -A few weeks after Colonel Wellesley landed in Calcutta, his brilliant -brother, the Earl of Mornington took his seat on the Viceregal throne. -No happier combination could well have been possible. The elder brother -was a scholar, a statesman, and a broad-minded man of affairs. The -younger was, even then, the same man who won Vittoria, Talavera, and -Waterloo. - -The two acted in perfect unison. There was none of that bungling -timidity and incompetency in high places which confused the counsels -and crippled the activity of Robert Clive and Warren Hastings, and the -result was, as might have been expected, a succession of triumphs won, -be it noted, not only by consummate generalship, but also by incessant -vigilance and hard work resulting in perfect organisation. - -These triumphs culminated, as every one knows, in the crushing of -the Mahratta power--the last serious obstacle to the universality of -British rule in India--on the memorial field of Assaye. - -It was a magnificent combination of courage, calculation, and -generalship. With a force of five thousand men and eighteen guns and -with only two thousand European troops in his army, Wellesley defeated -and utterly cut up an army of over forty thousand men and an artillery -force of a hundred guns, and these, too, were the finest native -fighting troops in the Peninsula. In less than three hours after the -first assault the five thousand had conquered the forty thousand and -captured a hundred and two guns and all the stores and ammunition, -and it should always be remembered that Assaye was a very different -business to Plassey. It was a battle, not a rout, a tragedy rather -than a farce. Of the two thousand Europeans over four hundred were -killed and wounded, and of the three thousand natives, who fought -magnificently as they have ever since done in company with British -troops, there were no less than sixteen hundred killed and wounded. - -As for Wellesley himself, he was wherever he was wanted, and that was -usually in the thick of the fight. But there is another fact which -gives us a glimpse of the great general who was the master spirit of -the Peninsular Campaign. His men fought the battle of Assaye at the -end of a twenty-four mile march, and no military force that is not -commanded by a military genius could do that. - -There were other actions after Assaye, but it was there that the final -blow was really struck. Holkar, it is true, had seemed to turn the tide -for the time, but in the December of 1804 General Lake finally crumpled -him up. In March, 1805, the Colonel of the 33rd, now Sir Arthur -Wellesley, sailed from Madras in the frigate _Tridant_. We may pause to -note that in the following July he wrote from the Island of St. Helena -to tell his brother that his health, which had been very bad, was now -restored. - -He said: “I was wasting away daily, and latterly when at Madras, I -found my strength failed which had before held out.” If his strength -really had failed, it is quite probable that St. Helena would never -have known its most distinguished resident. - -A short time after, Wellington returned to England--he was known just -then as the “Sepoy General”--William Pitt remarked that he was at a -loss which most to admire--his modesty or his talents, and he added -that “he had never met with any military officer with whom it was so -satisfactory to converse.” This was a saying both accurate and just, -and it must be admitted that there is a very considerable difference -between the dispatches which Nelson wrote and those which Wellington -sent home after his greatest victories. - -It was during this brief stay at home that the one little romance of -Wellington’s life had a happy “finis” written to it. In the days before -he had given any public sign of the great genius that was in him, he -had wooed Lady Catherine Pakenham, a daughter of Lord Longford. Not -possibly without apparent reason, Lord and Lady Longford came to the -conclusion that he was an altogether ineligible person, and refused -their consent, and Arthur Wesley sailed away to the East, disconsolate -but not despairing. - -It is pleasant to be able to look over his shoulder just before he -returned, and read a letter in which Lady Catherine tells him that -such beauty as she had has been ravaged by small-pox. It is pleasanter -still to know that this information by no means cooled his ardour to -get home, and that when he did come back a Major-General, the victor in -many fights, and Sir Arthur Wellesley, my Lord and my Lady had reversed -their decision, and the course of true love was allowed to run with -perfectly satisfactory smoothness. - -Just before this he entered Parliament as member for Rye, on the -invitation of Lord Grenville. One didn’t need much more than the -invitation of a powerful minister to get into Parliament in those days. -At Westminster he distinguished himself chiefly as the vindicator of -his brother’s policy in India, and, more than this, he used his pen, -which was not much addicted to flourishes, but nevertheless wrote -good, strong, nervous English, to the same good purpose. There is one -sentence in an open letter to his brother which exactly sums up the -situation. - -“By your firmness and decision you have not only saved, but enlarged -and secured the invaluable Empire entrusted to your government at a -time when everything else was a wreck, and the existence even of Great -Britain was problematic.” - -Those are weighty words indeed, coming as they do from the man who won -the battle of Assaye and established, let us hope for ever, the British -Empire in India. - -All the same he doesn’t seem to have liked this talking business in -Parliament at all, for in a letter written in July, 1806, he says: -“You will have seen that I am in Parliament, and a difficult and most -unpleasant game I have had to play in the present extraordinary state -of parties.” From this it will be seen that Arthur Wellesley, like any -other good man of action and capable Empire-Maker, had a wholesome -contempt for the miserable and sordid game which is called party -politics. - -All the same we find him a few months afterwards as Chief Secretary -for Ireland, buying, that is to say bribing and corrupting with open -candour and unconcealed disgust, a sufficiency of votes and influence -to keep the Ministry in power. He said plainly: “Almost every man of -mark in the state has his price.” And when he was taxed with bribery -and corruption, he remarked with that marvellous insight of his, that -an inquiry into such practices would open up the whole theory of -constitutional government. - -We are supposed to have improved ourselves out of the venality of -buying and selling votes and seats, at any rate for cash down, but -we still bribe and we still corrupt. There are still titles for rich -men who will spend lavishly to support their party, there are still -innumerable advantages for the tradesman, and the contractor who -are loyal to their party and their ticket, and so it will be while -constitutional government and human nature remain what they are; but -for all that we may learn a good deal from a remark like this made -by a man who was so absolutely incorruptible that when he was made -Captain-General of the Spanish Army, he refused to draw his salary, and -who later on when his justly grateful country presented him with an -estate, paid the rent of it into the Treasury as long as the war lasted. - -It is not often, even among the great ones of the earth, that you meet -with an absolutely honest man, but there is no doubt about Wellington. - -After a little subordinate foreign service in Denmark, in which he -distinguished himself as usual, he went back to the Irish office for -about eight months. This particular eight months was a very critical -period indeed, and looking back at the facts across a gulf of eighty -years, one is inclined to wonder how it was that no better work could -be found for the already well-proved genius of Arthur Wellesley than -the ordinary routine work which a very much smaller man could have -done, if not as well, at least sufficiently well. It will have been -noticed more than once by those who have managed to get through the -foregoing pages, that one of the greatest and most dangerous faults of -British officialism, has been the employment of giants to do the work -of pigmies. But officialism would not be official if it were not dull, -so I suppose there is no help for it. One of the elements of greatness -is the faculty of recognising greatness in others, and officialism is -very seldom great. - -This was the year 1807, and that is the same thing as saying that it -was the period which marked the zenith of Napoleon’s power. The little -cadet of Artillery who had been teaching the raw republicans of France -how to construct fortifications, and how to knock them down, while -Arthur Wellesley was training the 33rd Foot, was now Emperor of the -French. - -More than that, he was practically master of Europe. From the Atlantic -Ocean to the Ural mountains he had not a single foe left in arms. -Some he had crushed, others he had over-awed or conciliated, but all -the nations of Europe were either his subjects or his forced allies. -Nelson, it is true, had made Britain the mistress of the seas, but, -saving only these little islands of ours, it must be confessed that -Napoleon was master of the land. - -There was, however, just one weak point, one loose joint, as it were, -in the armour of the conquering Colossus who now bestrode the Continent -from one end to the other. - -If you take the map of Europe you will see that Portugal is a very -small patch on it, and yet if it had not been for Portugal being -just where it is, and if there had not been such a man as Sir Arthur -Wellesley ready to turn its geographical advantages to the best -possible use, Napoleon would very probably have ended his career on a -throne, instead of on that lonely island in the Atlantic. - -This is not the place for me to attempt to redescribe the long glories -of the Peninsular War. In the first place, to do so would necessitate -more pages than I have paragraphs at my disposal; and, in the second -place, are they not already painted with a worthy splendour on the -glowing pages of Napier and Allison? - -But what does fall within the scope of such a sketch as this is the -business of pointing out a fact which the school books say nothing -about. The work that Wellington did in the Peninsula was of two sorts. -He not only saw the weak joint in Napoleon’s armour and struck hard and -straight at it. He did a great deal more than that. - -The genius of his combinations, the tenacity of his purpose, and that -inspired confidence which practically doubled the effectiveness of his -fighting force, compelled Napoleon to employ his greatest generals, and -some of his finest troops in the work of “flinging the English into the -sea,” as he himself phrased it. - -“There is nothing,” he told his marshals over and over again, “there is -nothing to be reckoned with except the English.” And it may be added -that if the English had not been led by such a man as he who was now -Viscount Wellington and Baron Douro the reckoning might have been a -somewhat short one. - -The actual effect of the Peninsular War and of Wellington’s genius -is not to be seen so much in the splendid triumphs of Vittoria and -Salamanca, or the awful slaughters of Albuera and Busaco. It is to be -found rather in the fact that Soult, Ney, and Masséna, the three finest -marshals of the Grand Army, were kept there, campaign after campaign, -fighting battle after battle, and suffering defeat after defeat, in the -hopeless effort to do what it was absolutely necessary to be done if -the conquests of Napoleon were to be anything more than a passing dream -of empire. - -Thus, for instance, when at the end of the campaign of 1810, Masséna -finally retired upon Salamanca he had lost every fight in which he had -engaged, and the Grand Army was the poorer by no fewer than thirty -thousand men. We have simply to ask ourselves what Napoleon would have -been able to do if he had only had all these men free to work his will -upon Continental troops and win more triumphs like Austerlitz and Jena, -instead of being forced to send them battalion after battalion, and -army after army, to dash themselves to pieces against that unbreakable -phalanx of British valour and determination which the genius of -Wellington had drawn up across the Portuguese frontier. - -Magnificent as were the efforts he made, and tremendous as were the -sacrifices which France submitted to for his sake, all the genius even -of Napoleon was of no avail as long as the life-blood of the Napoleonic -system was draining away through that open wound in the Peninsula. But -for this there would have been no Leipsic, and probably no Moscow, no -Waterloo, and no St. Helena. - -The most splendid military triumph in the history of the world is the -uninterrupted march of victory made by Wellington and the soldiers -whom his genius had made unconquerable for more than a thousand miles -from the lines of Torres Vedras to the banks of the Seine. But behind -the brilliance of this incomparable triumph there is something better -still, something which Napoleon himself was first to see, and this was -the supreme genius which planned, and the untirable pertinacity which -carried out, without one hitch or fault from start to finish, that -marvellous series of operations which began with the first move of the -pawns at Rolica, and ended with the triumphant checkmate at Waterloo. - -Although, as I say, it would be quite out of the question to attempt -to draw even the briefest outline of these magnificent campaigns, -yet there are one or two incidents in them which may be looked at in -passing for the sake of the glimpses they afford of the man in the -midst of his work, and, few though they may be, there is yet more real -knowledge to be got from them than from many pages of descriptions of -battles and sieges. - -Thus, for instance, shortly after he landed for the second time in -Portugal there was a conspiracy among the French officers to depose -Marshal Soult, and one of these men came to Wellington across the -Douro to tell him of this so that he might make their work easier by -a crushing defeat. This might have been of enormous advantage to him, -but he refused point blank to avail himself of such base assistance, -and sent the traitor back to the master whom he had betrayed. He was -not the man to work by methods like this. He had his own methods, and -so effectual were they that ten days after he had landed at Lisbon -there was not a single French soldier on Portuguese soil who was not a -prisoner of war. - -A month afterwards Napoleon writing to Soult and Ney said: “You are -to advance on the English, pursue them without cessation, beat them -and fling them into the sea. The English alone are redoubtable--they -alone. If the army is not differently managed, before the lapse of a -few months they will bring upon it a catastrophe.” How prophetic these -words were a glance at the splendidly inscribed colours of the British -Peninsular Regiments will amply suffice to show. - -As usual, Wellington in the Peninsula, like Nelson in the -Mediterranean, was forced by the incompetence or imbecility of the -authorities at home to do his tremendous work with most inadequate -means. In Spain the people whom he had come to save refused his -soldiers food, and those at home, whom he was no less fighting to save, -refused him money enough to buy it. In a letter written in January, -1811, he put the position very plainly. - -“If we cannot persevere in carrying on the contest in the Peninsula -or elsewhere on the Continent we must prepare to make one of our own -islands the seat of war. I am equally certain that if Buonaparte cannot -root us out of this country he must alter his system in Europe and give -us such a peace as we ought to accept.” - -This was the work that he had to do and did, and here is a glimpse -of the means he had to do it with. “I have not,” he says in the same -letter, “authority to give a shilling or a stand of arms or a round of -ammunition to anybody. I do give all, it is true, but it is contrary to -my instructions and at my peril. Not another officer in the army would -even look at the risks that I have to incur every day.” There are not -many more eloquent pictures than this of a man serving his country and -saving it in spite of itself. - -Like all good generals, Wellington insisted upon absolute obedience, -and nothing could excuse in his eyes even the most splendid breach of -discipline. After the taking of Ciudad Rodrigo, General Crawford, the -leader of the famous Light Division, had been ordered not to push his -operations beyond the river Coa, but he forgot his instructions in the -temptation to make a splendid dash at an overwhelming force under Ney. - -Nothing but the magnificent valour and discipline of the Division saved -it from utter destruction. Still it was saved, and when its gallant -leader reported himself to Wellington he said: “I am glad to see you -safe, Crawford.” - -“Oh, we were in no danger I can assure you!” was the answer. - -“No, but I was through your conduct!” came the dry retort, and Crawford -walked away crestfallen, remarking to himself that the General was -“damned crusty to-day.” - -Wellington’s best known title is the Iron Duke, and yet no man ever -had less iron in him than he. It is true that he armed himself from -head to foot with a mail which his enemies found impenetrable, but the -gallant heart whose high courage carried him through so many dangers -and difficulties was withal as tender as a woman’s. - -When his last great fight had been fought and won, when the long -tragedy of the Napoleonic wars was over, and the curtain had just -fallen upon the tremendous climax of Waterloo, Dr. Hume, his physician, -went to see him early on the morning of the 19th of June to tell him -of the death during the night of his friend Gordon, and this is how he -described the conqueror on the morrow of his greatest victory. - -“He had, as usual, taken off his clothes, but had not washed himself. -As I entered he sat up in bed, his face covered with the dust and -sweat of the previous day, and extended his hand to me which I took -and held in mine while I told him of Gordon’s death and of such of the -casualties as had come to my knowledge. He was much affected. I felt -the tears dropping fast upon my hand, and, looking towards him, saw -them chasing one another in furrows over his dusty cheeks.” - -This is a touching little picture of the one man in the world who has -proved himself capable of grappling with and overthrowing the Corsican -Colossus, and with it we may here bid him farewell. Waterloo was the -last as well as the greatest of his fights. He had given the world -peace. He had overthrown the most grievous tyranny that had threatened -it for many a long century. - -He had found Europe under the heel of France. He had conquered her -conqueror; and yet it was he who, when terms of peace were being -dictated in Paris, stopped his ferocious old ally Blücher from blowing -up the Bridge of Jena, and got such concessions for France in the hour -of her defeat and humiliation as none but the victor of the Peninsula -and the hero of Waterloo could have done. Like all really strong men, -he was merciful in his strength; and like all really great soldiers -he looked upon his enemies as his friends as soon as he had soundly -thrashed them. - -With his after career as a politician and a statesman I have here -nothing to do. His empire-making ended with the order that sent the -whole steadfast British line streaming down from the rising ground -which they had held so stubbornly all through that famous day. It is -better to take leave of him here, for Arthur Wellesley was too good -and too great a man for politics. He was the idol of the army he had -created, but he didn’t know how to lead a mob. - -[Illustration: THE ORDER THAT SENT THE BRITISH LINE STREAMING DOWN FROM -THE RISING GROUND.] - -Seventeen years after Waterloo, to the very day, he was beset in London -streets by a howling multitude of the very people he had served so -splendidly. - -If he had not found a refuge in the Temple and a bodyguard of Benchers, -it is probable that they would have pulled him from his horse and torn -him limb from limb. It is a sorry spectacle, although relieved by the -quaintness of the vision of this unconquered hero of a hundred fights -trusting for his life to a bodyguard of lawyers. - -He never forgot this, and probably never forgave it. Every one knows -how, when Apsley House was threatened by a mob, he made ready to defend -it in a businesslike and soldierly way. When the mob broke his windows -he coolly ordered iron shutters and put them up. Afterwards, when the -fickle tide of popular fancy had turned the other way, and the mob -was wont to cheer instead of cursing him, he used to point to these -shutters and laugh good-humouredly but seriously withal. - -In one sense, however, it is hardly true that Wellington’s last fight -was at Waterloo. The last time that he really made a display of his -military capacity was in London. It was he who on the 10th of April, -1848, saved London from the Chartists. He never allowed a soldier to be -seen, much less a weapon, and when it was all over, Sir John Campbell -came to him and said: - -“Well, Duke, it all turned out as you foretold.” - -And this was the answer: - -“Oh, yes; I was sure of it, and I never showed a soldier or a musket, -but I was ready. I could have stopped them whenever you liked, and if -they had been armed it would have been all the same.” - -That was Wellington’s last victory--bloodless, and, therefore, since -the enemy would have been his own countrymen, all the more glorious for -that. - -In the article on Nelson, I mentioned the well-known fact that the -greatest soldier and the greatest sailor of their age met but once, and -that Wellington so far gauged the character of the hero of Trafalgar -as to describe him as “a very superior person.” In the spirit they not -only met again, but they will live together in everlasting honour in -the memory of the British people. - -Their last resting-places are side by side, as they should be, in St. -Paul’s Cathedral, and side by side their glorious memories will remain -as long as the noble qualities which made them the greatest men, not -only of their nation, but of the age which their great deeds made -splendid, are held in honour--and that is the same thing as saying as -long as the human race endures. - - - - -XI - -“_CHINESE GORDON_” - -“_HONOUR--NOT HONOURS_” - - - - -XI - -“CHINESE GORDON” - - -We are living rather too near to the days of the man himself, to be -able to say what place History will ultimately assign to the greatest -and most famous of the old fighting stock of the Gordons. Probably the -discriminating historian of the day after to-morrow will look upon him -ethnologically as a queer survival or throwback--a man who lived and -did his work in the nineteenth century in the style of the fifteenth, -or even the fourteenth. - -In the military sense he would seem to be the last of our great -soldiers of fortune--for soldier of fortune he undoubtedly was far more -than soldier of Britain--and the work that he did as one of the makers -of the British Empire was done under foreign flags. - -It might, indeed, be asked by the superficial observer in what sense -he was an Empire-Maker at all, or what right he has to claim a place -in that long and splendid array of great men, only a few of whom can -be silhouetted within the limits of such a volume as this and whose -succession stretches through the centuries from William, Duke of -Normandy to Cecil John Rhodes of Rhodesia. - -The answer is plain enough, though not very obvious at first sight. The -British Empire is twofold. It is not only the greatest concrete Fact -that the world has ever seen; it is also a vast and very splendid Idea, -and in this sense it covers, not only just that portion of the earth’s -surface over which the Union Jack flies, but also every other land -known and half-known, old and new, civilised and savage, into which -the genius of the Anglo-Saxon has forced its way and over which it has -exercised that peculiar influence for which the word “English” stands -in the dictionaries of our foreign competitors. - -Charles George Gordon never added a square yard to the British Empire, -considered as a geographical expression. He very seldom fought at -the head of British troops, and when he did, it was not to any very -great purpose--in fact his witnessing of the murder of many hundreds -of gallant British soldiers by the officials who were guilty of the -criminal mismanagement of the Crimean War was about the sum total of -his experiences of warfare under the Flag. - -It is a not altogether curious fact that, although Gordon was one of -the very ablest leaders and organisers of men, and although he, shortly -after thirty, proved to demonstration that he possessed most of the -qualities of a great soldier, his native country didn’t appear to have -any use for him, or at least no adequate use. As I have said before, -the curse of both our Services, and therefore, in a very definite and -practical sense, of the whole Empire, is officialism, or officialdom. - -Two very different men grasped this fact in its relation to Gordon. One -was Nubar Pasha, Egyptian Minister at Constantinople, and the other was -John Ruskin. Nubar said: “England owes little to her officials; she -owes her greatness to men of different stamp.” Ruskin said practically -the same thing in one of his lectures at Woolwich, but in different -fashion and in many more words, while Gordon, within a mile or so of -the lecture-hall at Woolwich, was bending his great soul to the routine -duties which appear to have been about the best work that the British -Government could find for him to do. - -When the British Government did at last get him to take his share in -the doing of the most difficult and dangerous work which was just then -necessary to be done upon the very outskirts of civilisation, those -who were responsible for the exercise of the executive power deserted -him and left him to his death by what is probably the basest and most -criminal betrayal of a man of deeds by men of words that can be laid to -the charge of a British Government. - -History will probably say with truth that every member of that fatally -futile Cabinet who had any hand in sending Gordon to Khartoum and -neglecting to give him reasonable support incurred a direct and -personal responsibility for his death, from which the dispassionate -verdict of Posterity will be very slow to relieve their memories. - -It is a stain that can never pass away from their public reputations. -There are other faults of a similar sort for which these men will be -arraigned at the bar of History, but the fate of the lonely, betrayed -man, who day after day left his starving and ever-diminishing garrison -to look out across the desert from the battlements of Khartoum for -the help which, for him, never came, will certainly be considered the -blackest if not the greatest of them all. - -But there is another and very practical sense in which Gordon was -a British Empire-Maker. This realm of ours is what it is, not only -because we have fought for some parts of it and successfully stolen -others. It is ours because we knew how to make use of it after we got -it; because of all other men now existing on the face of the earth the -Anglo-Saxon is the best leader and governor of savage and semi-savage -men that has so far been evolved, and of such leaders and governors -Gordon plainly proved himself to be one of the very best. - -Under the British flag he never won a battle for Britain. The genius -which his Motherland might have made such splendid use of did its best -work under the dragon-flag of China and the crescent-flag of Egypt, but -nevertheless on the day when the last mile of the British high road -from Cairo to Cape Town is thrown open, and the _Pax Britannica_ is -proclaimed from north to south of Africa, men will remember Gordon and -confess that without him this might never have been done. - -It will have been noticed by those who have read between the lines -here printed that where Empire-Makers are concerned the old-fashioned -idea of ancestry seems to be not altogether the fiction that certain -latter-day theorists, men of words to a man, have sought to make it, -and Gordon was no exception to this rule. - -His lineage stretches away back into the dim mists which lie behind the -history of all these islands into the days when Englishmen, Scotsmen, -and Irishmen had yet to be thought of, and when the divisions of -mankind were racial rather than national. - -Of course the Gordons of last century were for the most part desperate -Jacobites, and as such were hinderers rather than doers of the work -of empire-making. But, curiously enough, this particular Gordon did -not come from these. On the contrary, there was a fight during that -miserable business of 1745 in which, on the field of Gladsmuir, -a couple of thousand Highland clansmen played havoc with some -English regiments fresh back from the Flemish wars, and after the -slaughter they took many prisoners, one of whom was David Gordon, -great-grandfather of the hero and martyr of Khartoum. - -From this it will be seen that, whether by design or accident, his -branch of the ancient and widespread stock had managed to get upon the -right side--that is to say, the side which was to fight for imperialism -as distinguished from mere nationalism, which in many cases is only -another way of spelling parochialism. - -It is noteworthy, by the way, that Gordon’s grandfather, William -Augustus, so named after “Butcher Cumberland,” fought at Louisburg and -on the Heights of Abraham, after Captain Cook had taken those soundings -on the St. Lawrence. His son, William Henry, fought as an officer of -artillery at Maida, and it was his grandson who won the yellow jacket -and mandarin’s button in suppressing the Taiping rebellion, who refused -a roomful of gold as a bribe, and who, after carefully scratching out -the inscription, gave the huge gold medal which he had received from -the Emperor of China anonymously to the Coventry Relief Fund. - -This “give away your medal,” to use his own words, is the keynote of -his whole life. Gordon worked “for honour, not honours,” and that one -letter makes a great deal of difference. We see here, too, the sign of -his kinship with other Empire-Makers, the faculty of seeing what work -had to be done and the power of doing it for its own sake, whatever -difficulties there might lie in the way. - -As a boy he seemed to combine in the most curious fashion a -constitutional sensitiveness amounting almost to timidity, with a -contempt for personal danger, and an equal contempt for authority which -individually he was unable to respect. - -Altogether, in fact, his was a nature which had very little to expect -in the way of promotion or favour from conventional officialdom, and -it was very little that he got. This view was no doubt amply justified -by his first experience in warfare in the trenches before Sebastopol, -for if ever heroism and devotion abroad were crucified by authority at -home, this was the case during the Crimean War. - -From the Crimea the scene shifts somewhat suddenly to China. And yet -here we may note that this is not the place to stop and worry about the -morality or otherwise of those so-called opium wars which led up to the -trouble of 1860. If the opium trade was bad, the opening of the Flowery -Land to European commerce was good, and one usually does find good and -bad mixed up in the most extraordinary manner in matters of this sort. -The point here is that the brief war which ended with the taking of the -Taku forts in the August of 1860, and the capture of Pekin, was the -beginning of the career of “Chinese Gordon.” - -He did not see the taking of the forts, but he did see the destruction -of the Summer Palace, “the Garden of Perpetual Brightness,” which was -destroyed as an act of revenge at the order of a British envoy who may -here be left nameless in the infamy that he earned by it. Gordon was -one of the involuntary Vandals, and this is what he said about the -business when writing home: - -“You can scarcely imagine the beauty and magnificence of the palaces -we burnt. It made one’s heart sore to destroy them. It was wretchedly -demoralising work.” - -After this for a year and a half he fulfilled the duties of a Captain -of Engineers in the camp at Tien-Tsin in the midst of a vast dreary -plain. During this time the Taiping rebels had been industriously -employing fire and sword to make one of the most fertile portions of -the Flowery Land the reverse of worthy of the name and, at length -Shanghai itself, the headquarters of the foreign traders, was -threatened by the ever-advancing wave of barbarism. - -A defensive force was hurriedly raised by an American named Ward, who -for nearly two years led it to constant victory and earned for it the -somewhat magniloquent title of the Ever-Victorious Army. - -Then a chance bullet killed Ward at the beginning of what might have -been a most brilliant career. Under his successor everything went -wrong. Victory was replaced by defeat and success by disaster. This -incompetent person being removed, the hitherto obscure officer of -Engineers stepped into his place. It was a time when a leader of men -was badly wanted. It was also the moment when Fate knocked at the door -of Charles George Gordon and found him in. - -Within a very short time disorganisation was replaced by discipline, -despair by confidence, and the Ever-Victorious Army was once more made -worthy of its name. It was here that Gordon really began his career -as a soldier of fortune. When he took command he told Li-Hung-Chang -that he would turn the rebels out of the score of walled cities which -they had captured and strengthened, and put the rebellion down within -eighteen months. As a matter of fact he did it in fifteen. - -The story of the doing of this so clearly shows the extraordinary -capacity that Gordon possessed for both the organisation and the -execution of a military campaign, as well as the faculty of inspiring -confidence in all sorts and conditions of men, that it is simply -amazing that the home authorities did not immediately recognise the -fact that he was something a good deal more than they had hitherto -taken him for. This, however, it was to take them some twenty years -more to find out. - -Still there was one incident at the close of the rebellion which -might have shown even the official mind very clearly what sort of -man this Major of Engineers was. The last incident of the war was -the surrender of the great lake-city of Soo-Chow, and the Wangs, or -chiefs of the rebels, laid down their arms on a guarantee of safety and -good treatment. The Chinese way of acting up to this was to chop the -heads off the whole lot. Now Gordon considered himself in a measure -responsible for this guarantee, and the way in which he marked his -sense of the breach of faith was characteristically unique. - -The brilliancy of his services was recognised by a money gift of 10,000 -taels (between three and four thousand pounds of English money). -Gordon acknowledged it by writing on the back of the Imperial letter: -“Major Gordon regrets that, owing to the circumstances which occurred -since the capture of Soo-Chow, he is unable to receive any mark of his -Majesty the Emperor’s recognition.” - -If ever a sceptred monarch got the snub direct the Son of Heaven must -have got it then, although the probability is that the 10,000 taels -never found their way back to the Imperial treasury. Gordon also wanted -to throw up the whole business, but the rebellion suddenly broke out -again in another place, and so he went on with his work until it was -finally crushed, for he was not the sort of man who liked to begin a -thing and not get through with it. - -His brilliant success in every single operation that he conducted -clearly proved, as I have said, that in Gordon Britain possessed a true -leader of men and master of affairs; in other words an Empire-Maker of -the first order. And yet she first ignored and undervalued him, and -then, as David did with Uriah, put him in the forefront of the battle -and left him there to die. - -For twenty years after we had wars in many places--in South and West -Africa, in Egypt, Abyssinia, and Afghanistan. In some we gained credit -and in some disgrace, but during all that twenty years the leaden eye -of officialdom never seems to have fallen upon Gordon. The Chinamen -were quicker sighted. He was the first and I believe the only “foreign -devil” who was endowed with the Yellow Jacket and made one of the -bodyguard of the Son of Heaven. - -If he had chosen he might have made an enormous fortune and risen to -any dignity short of the throne that the Flowery Land had to offer, -but as a matter of fact he left China poorer than he went into it, -bringing away with him only that big gold medal which he afterwards -gave anonymously to charity. - -And all this time he was, as one of his biographers and a fellow -soldier has truly said, “not only without honour in his own country, -but was regarded by many of the mandarins and ruling classes of his -fellow countymen as a madman.” The use of the word “mandarin” there -will be understood if we remember that his brother mandarins of China -held him in the highest honour. - -He came back to England in 1865, and was given the command of the Royal -Engineers at Gravesend, and there for six years he did the routine work -of a soldier, and in his spare time won a reputation for missionary -work of the unofficial and unassuming sort which will live as long as -his fame as a soldier and leader of men. - -Here in the interval between his two careers we may take a glance at -the physical man as he was just about now. This is how his comrade Sir -William Butler describes him: “In figure Gordon, at forty years of -age, stood somewhat under middle height, slight but strong, active, -and muscular. A profusion of thick, brown hair clustered above a -broad, open forehead. His features were regular, his mouth firm, and -his expression when silent had a certain undertone of sadness which -instantly vanished when he spoke. - -“But it was the clear, grey-blue eyes, and the low, soft, and very -distinct voice that left the most lasting impression on the memory of -the man who had seen and spoken with Charles Gordon, and an eye that -seemed to have looked at great distances and seen the load of life -carried on men’s shoulders, and a voice that, like the clear chime of -some Flemish belfry, had in it fresh music to welcome the newest hour, -even though it had rung out the note of many a vanished day.” - -Such was, then, the outer aspect of the man who at length went to Egypt -at the invitation of Nubar Pasha and the Khedive Ismael, to begin that -work which in the end cost one of the most valuable of British lives, -and made the delta and valley of the Nile what they are to-day in -everything but name--a British province. - -In this sense Gordon was _de facto_ an Empire-Maker. The mendacious -amenities of Diplomacy may lisp out meaningless phrases about the -evacuation of Egypt, but the fact is that we have re-created the land -of the Pharaohs, we have brought it from bankruptcy to prosperity, we -have released the fellah from the terror of the lash and the servitude -of forced labour. We have raised a downtrodden peasantry to the -position of self-respecting citizens, and we have turned slaves into -soldiers. This was the work that Gordon began for us, although we did -not employ him to do it, or recognise that he was doing it; but, having -taken it over and carried it so far, it is hardly likely that even -British officialdom will commit such a crime against civilisation as -the surrender of the almost completed task would now be. - -Gordon went south from Cairo by way of Suakin and Berber to Khartoum, -taking with him the somewhat curious title of Governor of the -Equator--which of course meant the Equatorial Provinces--and a very -distinct conception of a Central African Dominion which the soldiers -and statesmen of other generations will realise in due course, -provided always that the onward march of the Anglo-Saxon is not turned -aside or stopped by faint-heartedness within or disaster without. - -His headquarters or capital was a place called Gondokoro, situate in -the midst of a ghastly region of river, lake, and swamp, sunbaked by -day, and miasma-haunted by night. He went up by steamer from Khartoum -and, some two hundred miles above the city, he passed the island of -Abba in the White Nile, and in one of his letters home he wrote these -words which read somewhat weirdly in the lurid light of the camp-fires -which seven years later closed round Khartoum: - -“Last night, March 26th, we were going slowly along in the moonlight -and I was thinking of you all and of the expeditions and Nubar and Co., -when all of a sudden from a large bush came peals of laughter. I felt -put out, but it turned out to be birds, who laughed at us from the -bushes for some time in a very rude way. They are a species of stork, -and seemed in capital spirits and highly amused at anybody thinking of -going to Gondokoro with the hope of doing anything.” - -But the laughing storks were not the only inhabitants of the Island -of Abba, for, in a cave among its rocks, there was dwelling at that -very moment a certain Moslem monk, or dervish, named Mohammed Achmet, -who had already won some reputation for sanctity among his fellow -tribesmen. - -It would have been a most unwarrantable and, for Gordon, quite an -impossible thing to do, and yet, so far is fact stranger than fiction, -that the whole history of about a quarter of a continent would have -been changed for the better, and the march of civilisation and humanity -in Northern Africa would have been incalculably accelerated if the -Governor-General of the Equator had stopped his boat just at that -point, landed his men on the island, routed the holy man out of his -cave, and either put a bullet through his head or drowned him in the -Nile; for this recluse, then unknown beyond the confines of his native -desert, was destined seven years later to be hailed by the Soudan -tribesmen as the Mahdi--a word which to us means so much disgrace and -disaster as well as hard and tardily won triumph that there is no need -here to further elaborate the coincidence. - -It was not a pleasant land, this scene of Gordon’s first government. -As he himself says of the wilderness: “No one can conceive the utter -misery of these lands. Heat and mosquitoes day and night all the -year round.” These are few words, but I am able to say from personal -experience that to those who know what African heat and African -mosquitoes _are_ they speak very eloquently. - -Here, until October, 1876, Gordon lived and worked and suffered, making -maps, building forts, enticing traders to come to him, teaching his -soldiers to work and to till the ground and raise crops instead of -plundering the natives. One by one his staff died about him, but still -somehow the work went on. - -When he first arrived he wrote: “the only possessions Egypt has in my -province are two forts, one here at Gondokoro and the other at Fatiko. -There are three hundred men in one and two hundred in the other. You -can’t go out in safety half a mile.” - -But towards the end of ’76 the line of posts had been pushed to Duffli, -a place on the Nile only three degrees north of the Equator itself. -Lake Albert Nyanza had been circumnavigated for the first time by a -steamboat and mapped out--not by Gordon himself, who declined the -honour of first steaming on its waters, but by an Italian lieutenant -of his, named Gessi, and his reason for doing this was “to give a -practical proof of what I think regarding the inordinate praise which -is given to an explorer.” - -His idea was that those who did the hard work, the getting up of -stores and boats and other impedimenta over rapids and across deserts, -were the real men who deserved the honour. “But all this would go for -nothing in comparison with the fact of going on the lake, which you -may say is a small affair when you have the boats ready for you”--from -which certain much-boomed and belauded explorers known to latter-day -fame might well learn wisdom as well as a little becoming modesty. - -The farther south the bounds of Equatoria were pushed the more dismal -the country seems to have become. He calls it “a dead, mournful spot, -with a heavy, damp dew penetrating everywhere. It is as if the angel -Azrael had spread his wings over this land. You have little idea of the -silence and solitude. I am sure no one whom God did not support could -bear up. It is simply killing.” - -At length the three years of his miserable service came to an end. In -October he set his face northward from Khartoum and ate his Christmas -dinner in London. - -It was in those days that Britain woke up to some sense of her -opportunities and responsibilities. She had begun what was then called -the “forward” policy, and which to-day with wider vision and sounder -wisdom we call the Imperial policy. - -Unhappily the fickle breath of popular favour soon blew the other way -for a space; a halt was called, then a retreat was sounded, and of -course with the inevitable result. The arms of Britain were sullied -by defeat, and her ancient honour was stained by the breach of her -plighted word and the desertion of those who had trusted to her faith. - -This was the dark and disgraceful period which lasted from the end -of 1880 to the beginning of 1885. It began with the desertion of the -heroic British garrisons in the Transvaal and the everlasting shame -of Majuba Hill, and it ended with the political betrayal and the -constructive murder of Charles George Gordon. - -It was on January 31, 1877, that Gordon went back to Africa as -Governor-General of the Soudan. On May 5th he was installed at -Khartoum; on the 19th he left to strike his first blow against slavery; -by June 7th he had crossed four hundred miles of wilderness and passed -the frontier of Dafour. - -His movements during this time, amazing as they are now to us, were -absolutely paralysing to the chiefs and officials of the country. To -them a Pasha of Egypt was a portly gentleman, never in a hurry, never -inclined to leniency or mercy, a staunch upholder of the slave trade in -its worst as well as its best aspects, and possessing a very keen eye -indeed to the main chance. - -But the quite phenomenal Pasha who now flits across their astonished -vision is a lean, yellow-faced little man, clad in the gorgeous but -dusty and travel-stained uniform of a Marshal of Turkey, mounted on a -swift dromedary which out-distances every other animal of the desert -save the beast ridden by the Arab sheikh who accompanies him. The two -fly from point to point with incredible rapidity; the words of the -Pasha are sometimes stern and sometimes mild, but always just and -always dead against slavery. There is no talk of what he wants for -himself, but only of what he wants done or left undone, because this or -that is right or wrong--and what he wants he gets. - -The troops that came labouring after him were of such miserable -material that they deserved only to be made slaves themselves, and such -the Arabs would speedily have made them but for this yellow-faced, -bright-eyed man, who set them one against another, played off their -jealousies and hatreds, and generally out-manœuvred them with such -consummate and incomprehensible skill, striking at such vast distances -with such incredible rapidity, that in four months a seemingly -impossible feat had been accomplished, and the rebellion of the -slave-kings put down. - -And yet it was all hopeless. The slave trade was too much for him, as -it has so far been too much for every one else. “I declare I see no -human way to stop it!” he writes in one of his letters. “When you have -got the ink that has soaked into blotting-paper out of it, then slavery -will cease in these lands.” - -In the November of 1877 there occurred an incident which was destined -in after years to bear terrible fruit. He travelled from Kordofan -_viâ_ Khartoum to Merawy. He was on his way to Wadi Halfa to see about -pushing on the railway from there to Dongola. But before he got there -a dispatch reached him saying that the Abyssinians had invaded the -Eastern Soudan. Back he went, post-haste, only to find the news was -false. - -If it had not been for this the railway would have been completed, and -the cataracts of the Nile would not have delayed the tardily-sent -Relief Expedition until the Arab bullets had done their work and -gallant Gordon’s busy head had rolled to the foot of the Mahdi’s throne. - -A few weeks after this he is once more in Cairo in obedience to an -urgent summons from the Khedive. The work was this time financial. The -grip of the foreign bondholder was closing round the throat of the -fellaheen, and the bill for official extravagance and incompetence had -to be paid. It was characteristic of Gordon that his first financial -reform was the cutting down of his own salary from six thousand to -three thousand a year. - -This was all very well, but when he proposed to apply the same methods -to other people’s salaries he was very soon given to understand that -he was not the kind of man who was wanted in Cairo just then, so he -promptly threw up his presidency of the Committee of Inquiry and -went back to two years’ more work in the Soudan, to fight the slave -trade again in the old heroic, hopeless fashion, and to make maps and -plans; to fly hither and thither over the ghastly, waterless country, -sometimes riding for as much as two months at a time, till at last the -replacement of his old friend Ismael by Tewfik Pasha once more called -him back to Cairo. - -This time he went to Abyssinia also, and got arrested twice, a -circumstance which enabled him to give us the following word picture of -King Johannes. “He is of the strictest sect of the Pharisees. He talks -like the Old Testament. Drunk overnight, he is up at dawn reading the -psalms. If he were in England he would never miss a prayer-meeting, and -would have a Bible as big as a portmanteau.” - -After his release he came home again to rest, as he thought, but as a -fact to be called after a few weeks’ run on the Continent to take the -command of the Colonial Forces at the Cape of Good Hope. - -It was the eve of the Transvaal War, and now Gordon made the first and -the greatest mistake of his life. He refused the command. If he had -taken it there might have been no Transvaal War; certainly there would -have been no Ingogo or Majuba Hill. He started instead to India to be -Secretary to Lord Ripon, the new Liberal Viceroy. - -Three days after he landed he threw up his appointment, and two days -later he received an urgent invitation from China. He asked for leave, -and the War Office refused. He threw up his commission, making a -present of its value, about £6,000, to his stupid and graceless masters. - -He stopped the war with Russia, and sped back again to London, -receiving a telegram on the way telling him that his leave had been -cancelled and his resignation refused. - -He afterwards made a futile visit to Ireland and an equally futile -trip to South Africa. He offered to go and help in settling the Basuto -trouble. The Cape Government, to its loss and its shame, had not even -the politeness to reply to his offer, but when two millions of money -and a great number of valuable lives had been lost, they asked him a -year later if he would renew his offer, and, like the generous and -single-hearted hero that he was, he did so. - -Unhappily, however, when he got on the scene of action he spoilt -everything by allowing the enthusiast in him to get the better of -the soldier and the skilled man of affairs. The Cape Government was -certainly in the wrong as regards the Basuto question. Gordon’s advice -to them was to admit their wrong and begin to do right. Very good -indeed from the ethical point of view, but in practice hopelessly wrong -and bad where the South African native is concerned. With him, as with -the Boers, to admit yourself in the wrong is to own yourself defeated, -and to invite instant aggression. - -Of course the Cape Government could do nothing of the sort. To have -done so would have been to have kindled the flames of native war over -the whole southern half of the Continent. This was the fatal policy -which had already lost us the Transvaal when Sir Evelyn Wood had it in -the hollow of his hand. To have repeated it would probably have been -to lose all South Africa. Gordon, in his usual fashion, threw up his -appointment at once and came back to England. - -It was now November, 1882. Naturally he was coldly received at home, -but his reception was somewhat mollified by a letter which the King -of the Belgians sent him, for the second time asking him to enter his -service. - -“For the moment,” says his Majesty, “I have no mission to offer you, -but I wish to have you at my disposal, and I wish to take you from this -moment as my counsellor. You can name your own terms. You know the -consideration I have for your great qualities.” - -The post that he would probably have had was the Governorship of the -Congo. One can imagine how in such a position he would have dealt with -an unhung blackguard like Lothaire, the murderer of a man who had -confided himself to his hospitality. - -He spent most of the following year in travel, chiefly in Palestine. -The Delta of Egypt had been conquered, Mohammed Achmet, the carpenter’s -son, had become Mahdi, and the Soudan revolt was in full blast. Now at -last the British Government called upon the one man who, had his genius -and his work been recognised ten years sooner, could have saved so much -disgrace and disaster. - -How utterly he had been neglected and how completely he was unknown -in his own country even now, may be guessed from a remark made by a -gentleman to an officer of the Pembroke garrison. - -“I see,” said this person, “that the Government have just sent a -Chinaman to the Soudan. What can they mean by sending a native of that -country to such a place?” - -He thought, alas, that “Chinese Gordon” was a yellow-faced Asiatic who -wore a pigtail--and yet, after all, did British Officialdom know very -much more about the hero it was now sending to his death? - -In Egypt all was panic. The army of Hicks Pasha had been annihilated. -All Gordon’s work was undone, and the Mahdi was practically master of -the Soudan. But meanwhile Gordon had decided to accept the King of -the Belgians’ offer. On New Year’s Day, 1884, he reached Brussels to -tell him so, and the same day he learnt that the British Government -would not let him go. His thoroughly justified answer was a request to -be allowed to retire from Her Majesty’s service, “without any claim -whatever for pension”--King Leopold, with a juster estimate of the -man’s value, having promised to make up the loss to him. The refusal -was withdrawn, and he prepared to start for the Congo. - -Then on the 17th of January there came that memorable telegram from -Lord Wolseley asking him to come to London. He knew what he was wanted -for and he went. The work was the pacification and then the evacuation -of the Soudan. - -By the 18th of February he was in Khartoum again. His old influence -at once reasserted itself. What followed is too recent and too -well known for detailed repetition here: the vacillation between war -and peace, between diplomacy and force, argument when there should -have been hard-hitting, and hard-hitting when there should have been -argument. - -[Illustration: THE LONELY MAN WHO STOOD ON THE RAMPARTS OF KHARTOUM.] - -The net result was only fully known to the lonely man who month after -month stood on the ramparts of Khartoum, beleaguered by the Mahdi’s -innumerable hosts, looking out over the desert and down the Nile for -the army of relief which ought even then to have been there, and which -was waiting for politicians to finish their wrangles before it even -started. - -Then, week after week, the weary working and waiting went on, the ring -of spears drawing ever closer and closer round the doomed city, the -provisions within rapidly dwindling, and the lonely soldier, the last -of his blood now left in Khartoum, was still looking vainly northward. - -So Monday morning, the 26th of January, came, and in the dim light -that comes before the dawn the Arabs made their last and successful -assault. The moon had set at one o’clock. The famished garrison made -but little resistance. Gordon at the head of about a score of men faced -the incoming victors near the church of the Austrian mission. - -The eastern sky was just reddening with the coming dawn when a stream -of Arabs, shouting for Islam and victory, rushed into the open space -that had been made round the church. They stopped and put up their -rifles. An irregular volley crackled along their line, and when the -smoke had drifted away there was nothing for the belated expedition to -do but avenge the death of the betrayed and deserted hero. - -It was about midday on the 28th when a couple of steamers, with Sir -Charles Wilson and a detachment of the Sussex Regiment on board, -steamed out on to the broad stretch of river above which Khartoum -stands at the junction of the Blue and White Nile. Half-an-hour told -the miserable truth. There was no flag flying from the battlements, and -no English voice to bid the tardy comers welcome. - -But there is to be a welcome of a sort, for, as the boats come within -range, the guns of Khartoum open fire on them and a spattering hail of -rifle-balls drop about them, and the puffs of smoke leap up from every -point along the banks till the circle round the boats is completed. Of -this there could be only one meaning: Gordon the deserted was dead. -And this meaning was true, though we did not know the full truth of it -until long after all that was left of him on earth had been scattered, -graveless and uncared for, over the wind-swept sands of the Soudan. - -There is his grave; there, too, now is his monument--the memory of the -work he did and the deathless fame he earned. On those who sent him -to the forefront of the battle and left him there to die History has -not yet given her verdict. When she does it will, as usual, be a just -one, and, in all probability, it will not form very pleasant reading -for those of their descendants who may be animated with anything like a -proper pride of ancestry. - - - - -XII - -_CECIL RHODES_ - -“_ALL ENGLISH--THAT’S MY DREAM!_” - - - - -XII - -CECIL RHODES - - -Although there are obvious difficulties in the way of writing at once -without fear and without favour of a man who is unquestionably one of -the great ones of the earth while he is still alive, there are yet two -very cogent reasons why Cecil Rhodes should be the subject of this -concluding essay. - -In the first place, he is the last of our Empire-Makers in order of -time, and, in the second place, he has done his empire-making in the -last region of the earth in which this empire, or any other, can be -extended without coming into direct armed conflict with the great -Powers of the earth. - -If you get a map of Africa published thirty years ago, and lay it -beside a quite recent one, a very little intelligent observation -will enable you to see, at any rate, what I may be allowed to call -_prima facie_ evidence of the magnificent work which this last of our -Empire-Makers has done, not so much for this generation, perhaps, as -for the next, and the next. - -It is all very well for the goose that has never seen over its own -farmyard wall to assume a lofty, and possibly sincere, contempt for the -vast stretches of prairie and forest land that may lie outside. He is -quite justified in saying to his brother geese: “This is our home; all -our wants are supplied here. What do we want to go and lose ourselves -for in the long grass, or expose ourselves to the wild animals that -may be lurking about the dark depths of the forest? This farmyard -where we have lived all our lives, and where our long and honourable -ancestry has lived before us, is surely enough for us. There is a -nice pond yonder fringed with succulent mud. It has nice worms and -other things in it, and there doesn’t seem any prospect of our general -supply of goose-food coming to an end. What do we care about what there -is outside? Why should we trouble ourselves about the fortunes of -silly birds who go and fly over the wall, and lose themselves in the -wilderness? Let them go. What are they to us, even if they were born in -the same farmyard?” - -That is all very well as far as it goes, but there comes a time when -the farmyard fills up, and the duck-pond becomes over-crowded, and -worms and goose-food, &c., have to be scrambled for, and sometimes even -fought for, and it is just here that the larger wisdom of those who not -only look over, but fly over, the farmyard wall comes in. - -The fact is, that the known world is fast filling up. It may be that -Nature is preparing some colossal cataclysm for the destruction of this -civilisation, just as she has done for the subversion of others; but, -for the present, what those who have looked over the farmyard wall -have to consider is the fact that vastly improved conditions of life -in the older countries of the world have, with the sole and ominous -exception of France, had their inevitable result in a vast increase of -population, and that meanwhile, for the last three hundred years or so, -the available portions of the world have been getting discovered, and -filled up according to their capacity of sustenance. - -It is not, therefore, a merely predatory instinct, or a felonious -desire to go and steal away from the gentle savage those lands which he -is mostly accustomed to use as battlefields, that sends out the pioneer -to the uttermost ends of the earth. It is that ineradicable instinct -planted deep in all healthy human nature to get elbow-room, and behind -this instinct there is the necessity which Providence provided against -when it gave us this instinct, and that is the necessity of getting -out of a place that is overcrowded, into some other where muscles and -brains can get a better chance. - -It is probable, too, that that widespread passion which we are -accustomed to call “land-hunger” has been given to us in order to -compel us to carry out the vast scheme of human progress under the -impression that we are benefiting ourselves. - -Of course, as a rule, we do benefit ourselves, but it is reserved for -the few to see that greater Purpose which we are fulfilling at the -same time that we are serving ourselves, and of all the men who ever -lived no one has seen this more clearly than Cecil Rhodes. Accident and -weak lungs took him to Africa--that is to say to the only continent in -which it is yet possible for the British Empire to be increased without -violating the territory of some already established and recognised -Power, more or less civilised. - -Like Nelson and Warren Hastings, he came of a clerical stock. If it had -not been for those weak lungs of his it is possible that he might have -passed through a distinguished career at Oxford, and either entered the -church, or gone into business--probably the latter--but in either case -the map of South Africa would have looked very different to what it -does to-day. - -In one respect he presents a very strong and striking contrast to -our other Empire-Makers. Francis Drake went on his filibustering -expeditions, looted plate-ships, and sacked towns, no doubt with a -worthy intention of hurting the Queen’s enemies, but also with a very -definite idea of making money. John Hawkins started the Slave Trade for -the same reason; so too that East India Company which made it possible -for Clive and Warren Hastings to do their work, was in its beginnings -a money-making concern, and little else. It will be remembered, -for instance, how Warren Hastings was grievously hampered in his -empire-making by the incessant demands of his directors for money. - -Now the distinctive fact of Cecil Rhodes’s career is that he started -the other way. The first solid and salient fact that he appears to have -grasped in those old days in the early seventies, when he used to sit -under the burning African sun at a rough deal table picking diamonds -out from the yellow earth as it was brought by his kaffirs from the old -Kimberley mine, was the transcendent and almost irresistible power of -money. - -In Drake’s day valour and endurance were used to earn money in the -first case, or, if the reader prefers it, to steal money or its -equivalent. This was well enough in its way, and the British Empire -would have got on rather badly without it, but Cecil Rhodes appears to -have had an inspiration on this subject of the sort which only comes -to men of real genius. He seems to have said to himself: “How would it -be to earn the money first in thousands, in hundreds of thousands, in -millions if possible, and then use it to employ in more legitimate work -the same valour and enthusiasm which are just as conspicuous British -qualities now as they were in the days of Queen Elizabeth?” - -It is quite possible that, being an Oxford undergraduate, he remembered -the famous aphorism of Horace: “Honestly if possible--but still make -it.” There may have been some of his transactions which if submitted -to the legal scrutiny, say, of the Lord Chief Justice, would possibly -move him to another exhibition of that “unctuous rectitude” such as -that with which he, the sometime forensic defender of traitors and -sedition-mongers, outpoured on Dr. Jameson and his comrades. - -I have heard stories of the sort myself in Kimberley and elsewhere in -South Africa, but what of that? There are a good many things in our -history that it would be difficult to defend on moral grounds, and yet -without them we should have little or no history at all. - -There are several of Cecil Rhodes’s own sayings on record which show -clearly the light in which he looked upon large quantities of money not -merely as money, not as vulgar riches, but as an indispensable means to -an exalted end. - -He was with Gordon in that sadly futile expedition of his to -Basutoland, and during one of their conversations Gordon told him how -he had been offered a roomful of gold as a reward for his services in -China. - -“And you mean to say you didn’t take it?” said Rhodes, possibly with -some doubt of the great Crusader’s sanity in his mind. - -“No, I didn’t,” said Gordon. “I didn’t feel altogether justified in -doing so. I had been paid already for what I’d done.” - -“I should have taken it, and as many more roomfuls as they would have -given me,” said Rhodes, without hesitation. “Just think how much more -you could have done with it. It’s no use for us to have big ideas if we -have not got the money to carry them out.” - -That was Cecil Rhodes. He didn’t say: “Think how much it would have -come to,” or “How rich a man it would have made you,” or even “What you -would have been able to buy with it,” but “What you could _do_ with -it.” Those who call Cecil Rhodes a money-grabber, a financial schemer, -and all the rest of it, might learn something from that conversation -were they not as they are. - -There is no doubt but that he first of all devoted himself body and -soul to the making of money, and yet in the meanwhile he must have been -slowly shaping this Ideal of his. Early in the eighties he was talking -about South Africa generally with a friend, and during the course of -the conversation he pointed to the map and said: “There! All English! -That’s my dream.” And all English it would have been if it had not been -for the stupidity, the ignorance, and the cowardice of the vote-hunters -in Downing Street, who were afraid to be worried with the cares, though -they had no objection to avail themselves of the honours and profits of -empire-making. - -It is a favourite theory of my own that no man ought to be allowed to -sit either in the House of Lords or the House of Commons unless he has -been at least once round the world and visited the greater part of the -British Empire. - -If this had been the rule during the present reign, I am perfectly -certain that, whether by purchase, conquest, or colonisation, the whole -of Africa from the Zambesi to the Cape would now be coloured red, and -there would probably have been a red streak stretching from Cairo _viâ_ -Khartoum to the shores of Lake Tanganyka. - -In one of his speeches, Cecil Rhodes aptly described South Africa as -the Cinderella of the British Colonies, and this is perfectly true. -There is hardly a single instance in which Downing Street has not tried -to lose what every one now recognises as of almost priceless importance. - -Thus, for instance, in 1872 Lord Kimberley might have bought Delagoa -Bay, “the keyhole of Africa,” for the paltry amount of twelve or -fifteen thousand pounds and he refused the bargain. It would be cheap -now at ten millions. Unfortunately, as his biographer aptly puts it, -there was no Cecil Rhodes then to find the money out of his own pocket. -He was still sitting on a bucket and sorting diamonds in Kimberley. - -Again, in 1875, the Cape Colonial Government strongly urged the -annexation of Walfisch Bay and Damaraland on the south-west coast. The -reply of Downing Street was: “Her Majesty can give no encouragement -to schemes for the retention of British jurisdiction over Great -Namaqualand and Damaraland.” - -This, by the way, is a somewhat important point to those who wish to -get a clear view of Cecil Rhodes’s work as an Empire-Maker in South -Africa. Twenty-two years ago Ernst von Weber, who had been prospecting, -as it were, for a German South African Empire, said: “What would not -such a country full of such inexhaustible natural treasures become if -in course of time it is filled with German emigrants! Besides all its -own natural and subterraneous treasures, the Transvaal offers to the -European Power which possesses it an easy access to the immensely rich -tracts of country which lie between the Limpopo and the Central African -lakes and the Congo.” - -In 1884 Prince Bismarck said before a committee of the Reichstag: -“No opposition is apprehended from the British Government, and the -machinations of the Colonial authorities must be prevented.” - -Now look at any modern map of South Africa. Damaraland is now German -territory, the Transvaal has been given back to the corrupt and -tyrannical government which has of late made itself a libel on the -name of civilisation. A German railway runs from Pretoria to Delagoa -Bay, the only road from the sea to the Transvaal which does not pass -through British territory. There is a regular line of German steamers -to Delagoa Bay, and through this channel have come in the German -officers who have drilled the Transvaal army and built the forts which -command Johannesburg and Pretoria, as well as the field-pieces and -machine-guns, the thousands of rifles and the millions of cartridges, -which have no other purpose than the oppression of British subjects and -the slaughter of British soldiers as soon as the psychological moment -arrives. - -This much for the present has been lost, and unhappily no one has been -hung for the losing of it. Some day it will have to be taken back, -probably at a frightful loss of life and an enormous expenditure of -money. - -But there is one bright spot in the picture. Between the German -territory of Damaraland and the western frontier of the Transvaal and -the Free State there is a broad stretch of red. It was only painted red -just in the nick of time, and it was Cecil Rhodes who painted it. - -Another glance at the map will convince you in a moment what would have -happened if he had not made Bechuanaland British. To the east there is -the ignorantly hostile Transvaal. Behind that and stretching far away -to the northward is the Portuguese territory of Mozambique. Farther -north are the southern confines of the Soudan, and the enormous virgin -lands of Central Africa. To the west is German West Africa. Hence, -but for that red strip, there would be no way either by sea or land -through British territory--that is to say, through no territory that -would not be hostile--to the Central African Empire of the future, most -of which is, thanks to Cecil Rhodes, already called Rhodesia. - -People who only read the English papers, some of which would appear, -like the Pretoria _Press_ and the _Standard and Diggers News_, to be in -the pay of Mr. President Krüger and his corrupt legislature, have an -idea, and a very natural one too, that the great company known as the -De Beers Consolidated Mines is just a money-making concern and nothing -else. There never was a greater mistake. The De Beers Company is the -creation of Cecil Rhodes, and therefore it had to be an empire-making -concern one way or the other. - -One night there was a conversation between three men in Kimberley, -which deserves to become historical. The three men were Alfred Beit, -Barnie Isaacs Barnato, and Cecil John Rhodes. Each of these three men -had something that the others wanted. Beit and Barnato don’t seem to -have wanted much more than good business, but Alfred Beit already -knew Cecil Rhodes for something much greater and better than merely a -business man and piler-up of money-bags, so he supported them. - -What Rhodes wanted was nothing less than the levying of a subsidy -on the diamond mining industry of Kimberley, for the purpose of -empire-making in the north. Barnie Barnato kicked at this. In the end -he gave way, as he always did to Rhodes, and the result was that the De -Beers Corporation was virtually taxed to the extent of half a million -sterling for that northward expansion which Cecil Rhodes made possible -when he persuaded Sir Hercules Robinson to proclaim the Bechuanaland -Protectorate and checkmated the Germans on the west and the Boers on -the east just as they were going to join hands across it. - -What they really meant to do may be easily inferred from Van Niekerk’s -raid into the so-called Stella-Land which necessitated Sir Charles -Warren’s expedition--for which the Pretorian Government still owes -us about a million and a half--and Colonel Ferreira’s attempted raid -across the Limpopo into Matabeleland which was only stopped by Dr. -Jameson’s Maxims. - -If it had not been for Cecil Rhodes and the De Beers half million, the -British flag would not now be flying over a region as large as France -and Germany combined which, by all appearances, is destined to be the -nucleus of the South African Empire of the day after to-morrow. - -In such a vast country as South Africa--how big it is may be guessed -from the comparison between it and England on the map--the first -requisite for advancing civilisation is a road, the next a telegraph, -and the next is a railway, and the absolute necessity of these to -the new domain that he was making for Britain was of course plainly -apparent to such a man as Cecil Rhodes. - -His dream, which, if he lives long enough, he will certainly realise, -is the making of that British high road from Cairo to Cape Town -which Gordon, but for the baseness which betrayed him to his death, -would certainly now be helping to make from the other end. Therefore -when there was a shortness of money for the making of the railway -to Mafeking, and for carrying the telegraph up through Rhodesia and -northward across the Zambesi, the deficiency was supplied out of the -capacious pockets of the man who, if he had only had the chance, would -have been so glad to give that £12,000 for Delagoa Bay, and who knows -Africa well enough to see that with its rinderpest, its locusts, and -its horse-sickness, it stands in more need of mechanical transit and -communication than any other part of the world. - -When the extension of the Beira railway became necessary Cecil Rhodes, -by the sheer force of his own character, persuaded Lord Rothschild to -put down £25,000, every penny of which the great financier believed -was going to be “chucked into the sea.” His Lordship probably thinks -differently now. - -Perhaps the most salient feature in the contemporary history of South -Africa is the silent but ceaseless struggle for mastery which is going -on, and has been going on for years, between Cecil Rhodes and Paul -Krüger. - -There are some people who say that there are only two men in South -Africa. In the political sense this is probably true. So far, with the -single exception, perhaps, of the Jameson Raid and the consequences -which the weakness of our officials abroad and the cowardice of our -government at home made so deplorable, the enlightened Englishman has -scored at every move over the dishonest cunning of the ignorant Dopper. - -He prevented him joining hands with the Germans across Bechuanaland, -he stopped his raid into Matabeleland, he got his raiders stopped on -the confines of Amatongaland--and so destroyed his cherished dream of a -Transvaal seaboard--and, worse than all, he has made Rhodesia a so much -better place even for Dutchmen to live in than the Transvaal, that the -Boers are every day treking through the drifts of the Limpopo to live -on British soil and under British rule--that of Paul Krüger and his -German and Hollander hangers-on becoming impossible for self-respecting -men to submit to just as fast as their avarice and stupidity can make -it so. - -Both these men have their dreams. Paul Krüger is not the sort of person -whom any one would associate with an ideal. Still he has got one. It is -a United States of South Africa, under what he is pleased to consider -republican rule. - -He is probably too ignorant to know that, with the possible exceptions -of Russia and Turkey, there never was a civilised or half-civilised -Government less like a republic than the corrupt and tyrannical -oligarchy of Pretoria, but that’s what he means, and it is to fight for -that and not to fight for the independence of the Transvaal, which he -knows perfectly well is secured by the Imperial Government, that he has -built his forts and imported his German officers, German cannon, and -German rifles and ammunition. - -Cecil Rhodes also has an ideal. It is a federation of the South -African states, crown colony, republic and self-governing colony, -each possessing the management of its own affairs, and directing them -according to the will of the majority, and all united under the ægis of -the British flag, and enjoying that equal freedom and security which -cause nineteen out of every twenty emigrants from France and Germany to -go and settle in British colonies rather than in their own. - -Which of the two ideals will be realised is not very difficult to see. -The one is artificial, unnatural, and two hundred years behind the -times. The other is natural, logical, and if anything, a little bit -ahead of the times, and the difference between them is not altogether -unlike the difference between Paul Krüger and Cecil Rhodes. - -It would, of course, be quite outside the range of human possibility -for a man to have attained to the real greatness of Cecil Rhodes -without having made a good many enemies, public and private. - -Of his private enemies there is no need to say very much. In the first -place, until human nature has changed very considerably, it would -be quite impossible for any man to have been so uniformly and so -brilliantly successful as Cecil Rhodes has been without making plenty -of enemies both private and public. One of the very worst methods -of promoting brotherly love in the breasts of men whose standard of -manliness is not quite up to the average is to out-distance them in -the race for political distinction, or to out-wit them in the trickery -of finance--and I don’t suppose that any one would be readier to admit -that, in its ultimate analysis, finance is mainly trickery than Cecil -Rhodes himself. - -This category would include practically all the private and personal -enemies of Cecil Rhodes save one. The exception is, I regret to say, a -woman, and that is a fact which naturally blunts the pen of criticism -when it is held in the hands of a man. There would be no need to -mention Mrs. Cronwright-Schreiner--better known in literary circles as -Olive Schreiner--here but for the fact that she has made it impossible -to pass her over without notice by writing the most recent and, I fear -I must also say, the most virulent and untruthful attack that has been -made upon the personal character and public policy of our South African -Empire-Maker. - -And yet even this attack is in its way a sort of testimonial to the -greatness of the man whose reputation it was intended to demolish, -despite the fact that in it Cecil Rhodes is depicted as a monster of -iniquity and as the head of a soulless and tyrannical corporation -which has not only been guilty of all the crimes in the Decalogue, but -has invented a few new ones to go on with. Strange to say, however, -when Mrs. Cronwright-Schreiner was once interrupted in one of her -well-known denunciations of the greatest Englishman of his day with -the remark that after all he was a great man, she exclaimed: “A -great man! Of course he is, a very great man, and that’s the pity of -it!” The almost unanimous verdict of the English and South African -press on the deplorable literary and political blunder which Mrs. -Cronwright-Schreiner perpetrated in writing “Trooper Peter Halkett,” -goes far to show that her personal estimate of her enemy is a good deal -more correct than her literary and political estimate. - -Of the public enemies of Cecil Rhodes it will suffice to point out -briefly that, without one exception and whatever their nationality, -they are also the enemies of his country. It is noteworthy too that -Cecil Rhodes himself seems to have an instinctive perception of real -as distinguished from apparent or merely superficial hostility to the -British Empire. - -He recognised long ago, for instance, that our most dangerous enemies -both at home and abroad are the Germans, and throughout his whole -career he has lost no opportunity of checking and checkmating, so far -as the cowardice and apathy of the Colonial Office has permitted him, -their innumerable and dishonest attempts to undermine the British -supremacy in South Africa. - -If I were asked to name the three men who hate him most bitterly I -think I should say Paul Krüger, Dr. W. J. Leyds and the German Emperor. -It is something more than a coincidence that these three men should -also be the bitterest and most determined enemies of the British Empire. - -There can hardly be any doubt now in the minds of well-informed people -that the conditions which provoked the pitiful attempt at revolution in -Johannesburg and led up to the Jameson Raid were made in Germany, or -at any rate by German hands. The whole thing was what may be described -with more force than elegance as “a put up job.” - -The idea was to goad the Outlanders to revolt, put the rebellion down -by armed force, assert the absolute independence of the Transvaal as a -consequence, and get rid of that awkward clause in the Convention of -1884 which asserts the suzerainty of Great Britain over the Transvaal -by compelling the Pretorian government to submit all its foreign -treaties to the supervision of the Colonial Office. - -The next step would have been an offensive and defensive alliance with -Germany, and then, if there had been no Special Squadrons or obstacles -of that sort in the way, the Transvaal would have been gradually -Germanised. - -It was this that Cecil Rhodes foresaw when he ordered Dr. Jameson to -mass his men on the Transvaal frontier. This was, in fact, his answer -to the German application to the Portuguese Government for permission -to land sailors and marines from the _See-Adler_ in Delagoa Bay with a -view to sending them up to Pretoria in violation of the most explicit -treaty obligations. - -It is quite plain now that Cecil Rhodes intended this force as a -practical hint, and not as an invading army. I remember one night -shortly after the Raid, I was smoking the pipe of peace with some of -the Transvaal officials on the stoep of President Krüger’s house in -Pretoria. We were discussing Cecil Rhodes’s complicity in the Raid, -and in answer to a suggestion that he was at the bottom of it all, I -said: “No doubt Rhodes knew all about it. I needn’t tell you gentlemen -that nothing happens in South Africa that he doesn’t know, but he -never meant Jameson to cross the frontier when he did. If he had meant -invasion he would have had the country by now, but you won’t convince -me that Cecil Rhodes is such a fool as to try and jump the Transvaal -with five hundred men.” - -The only answer to this was a general laugh. President Krüger is not -supposed to understand English, but he laughed too. - -Of Cecil Rhodes’s enemies at home it is so difficult to speak with -anything like patience that they had better be passed over as briefly -as possible. The unceasing hostility of a certain section of the -British Press may, to some extent, be accounted for by the fact that he -has many powerful financial rivals, and that the Transvaal Government -has almost unique opportunities for bribery. - -Few newspapers are quite incorruptible. They are primarily run to -pay, and, therefore, it is hardly to be expected that they should be -entirely proof against the manifold seductions which an individual -millionaire, or a government with a vast secret service fund, is able -to practise upon them. - -It is almost impossible to believe that their hostility is really -sincere. They know perfectly well that empire-making cannot be done -with kid gloves on. They know, also, that the amount of actual -good that Cecil Rhodes has done in South Africa, even apart from -empire-making, is almost incalculable. None know this better than the -loyal Dutch burghers of the Cape and the Kaffirs. The former call him -“the Englishman with the Afrikander heart”; the latter call him their -father. But for him there would probably not be many loyal Dutch at -all at the Cape; and but for him also Matabeleland and Mashonaland -would still be the happy hunting-ground of King Lobengula’s murdering, -ravaging, and slave-making impis. - -[Illustration: THAT HISTORIC INDABA IN THE MATOPPOS.] - -He is, in fact, as was plainly shown in that historic Indaba in the -Matoppos, the one white man in South Africa whom the natives -love and trust. It is not many men who, with millions enough to buy -everything that the world has to sell in the way of comfort and luxury -and honours--as distinguished from honour--who would have gone as -he did, armed only with a walking-stick, into the stronghold of the -Matabele, and there won from them the title of “the bull that separates -the fighting bulls,”--in other words, the peacemaker--and stopped a war -which, if the Imperial authorities had had their way, would have gone -on into the next year, and would have cost four or five millions at -least. - -It is, by the way, characteristic of the strength of mind and fixity of -purpose of this man, that he solemnly warned Sir Richard Martin that, -if, after this, the war was continued, he would himself go and live -among the Matabele, and wash his hands of the whole affair. - -It is noteworthy, too, that this man, whom Olive Schreiner describes by -the mouth of her impossible trooper as “death on niggers,” is, in the -opinion of the niggers themselves, the greatest friend they ever had. - -If all the work of all the societies and associations of amiable old -ladies of both sexes for the Protection of the Aborigines and the -Elevation of the Savage were put together, it would not amount to a -tithe of what Cecil Rhodes has done for the natives of South Africa. -The Glen-Grey Act alone has almost emptied the prisons of kaffir -offenders, and as for his work at Kimberley, the effects of which I -have myself seen, it would be difficult to speak too highly of it. - -Thus, for instance, it is not generally known that Cecil Rhodes is the -greatest practical temperance worker in the world. Every one knows that -the curse of all savage races in contact with civilised peoples is -liquor. When he was moving the second reading of the Glen-Grey Act he -said: - -“I know the curse of liquor. Personally at the Diamond Fields I have -assisted in making ten thousand of these poor children hard-working -and sober. They are now in compounds, healthy and happy. In their -former condition the place was a hell upon earth, therefore my heart is -thoroughly with the idea of removing liquor from the natives.” - -I have myself seen “these poor children” happy, healthy, and sober, -in the compounds of Kimberley. In the Transvaal and the Portuguese -territory I have seen them drunken, degraded, and diseased, and I am in -a position to say that every word of the above quotation is solid fact. -I wonder how many of our professional temperance agitators could point -to such a splendid achievement as that. - -It seems, perhaps, a good deal to say of Cecil Rhodes that, not only -has he enormously increased our area of empire in South Africa, but -that he is the only man who can efficiently protect that empire from -the two greatest dangers which threaten it. - -These are, first, a war of Dutch against British, such as the Pretorian -Government and its German allies have been trying so hard to bring -about, and for the purposes of which they have been arming themselves -to the teeth; and, second, a general native uprising, which would very -probably follow hard on the heels of the racial war. - -Now the only English statesman who is thoroughly believed in by the -Dutch majority at the Cape is Cecil Rhodes, and the only white man who -is thoroughly trusted and respected by the natives of all tribes is -also Cecil Rhodes, and this is a fact which goes very far to account -for the desperate anxiety of the Hollander-German-Boer party in South -Africa and Europe to get him thoroughly disgraced and discredited over -the Jameson fiasco. - -The measure of their failure is not only the measure of his triumph. It -is also the measure of the future peace and prosperity of British South -Africa. We live too near the man to see him in his just proportions, -but, unless Downing Street excels, if that be possible, its own -blunders in the past, and unless this royal race of ours suddenly -belies all its best traditions, a day must come when the British flag -will fly over a federated and united South Africa, when the rule of the -Boer will have gone the way of all anachronisms--and in that day men -will look back and see, in juster perspective than we can do, the great -qualities of the man who has made it all possible. - -It is probable that in that day the very names of his enemies and -detractors will be forgotten, or remembered only as we remember the -name of Cataline in connection with that of Cicero. Then Cecil Rhodes -will take his place beside Robert Clive and Warren Hastings, and in -some great square of the future Metropolis of the British African -Empire, there will stand a statue of him, and on its base will probably -be inscribed those memorable words of his:-- - -“All English: That’s my dream!” - -And with such words I, too, may fittingly bring to a close this all too -imperfect series of word-portraits of some, at least, of the Men Who -Have Made the Empire. - - -UNWIN BROTHERS, THE GRESHAM PRESS, WOKING AND LONDON. - - - - - * * * * * * - - - - -Transcriber’s note: - -Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a -predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they -were not changed. - -Simple typographical errors, including occasional missing letters and -punctuation at the ends of some lines, were corrected; unpaired -quotation marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and -otherwise left unpaired. - -Illustrations in this eBook have been positioned between paragraphs -and outside quotations. - -Page 8: “Oune” probably is a misprint for “Orne”. - -Page 204: “Sir Thomas Wren” should be “Sir Christopher Wren”. - -Page 261: “countymen” may be a misprint for “countrymen”. - -Page 268: “Dafour” was printed that way. - - - -***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEN WHO HAVE MADE THE EMPIRE*** - - -******* This file should be named 63148-0.txt or 63148-0.zip ******* - - -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: -http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/6/3/1/4/63148 - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive -specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this -eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook -for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, -performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given -away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks -not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the -trademark license, especially commercial redistribution. - -START: FULL LICENSE - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full -Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at -www.gutenberg.org/license. - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or -destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your -possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a -Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound -by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the -person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph -1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this -agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the -Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection -of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual -works in the collection are in the public domain in the United -States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the -United States and you are located in the United States, we do not -claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, -displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as -all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope -that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting -free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm -works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the -Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily -comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the -same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when -you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are -in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, -check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this -agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, -distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any -other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no -representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any -country outside the United States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other -immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear -prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work -on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, -performed, viewed, copied or distributed: - - This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and - most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no - restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it - under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this - eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the - United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you - are located before using this ebook. - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is -derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not -contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the -copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in -the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are -redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply -either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or -obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any -additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms -will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works -posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the -beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including -any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access -to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format -other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official -version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site -(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense -to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means -of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain -Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the -full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -provided that - -* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed - to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has - agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid - within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are - legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty - payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in - Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg - Literary Archive Foundation." - -* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all - copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue - all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm - works. - -* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of - any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of - receipt of the work. - -* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than -are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing -from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The -Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project -Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may -contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate -or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other -intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or -other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or -cannot be read by your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium -with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you -with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in -lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person -or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second -opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If -the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing -without further opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO -OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT -LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of -damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement -violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the -agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or -limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or -unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the -remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in -accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the -production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, -including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of -the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this -or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or -additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any -Defect you cause. - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of -computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It -exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations -from people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future -generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see -Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at -www.gutenberg.org - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by -U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the -mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its -volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous -locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt -Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to -date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and -official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact - -For additional contact information: - - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND -DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular -state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To -donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project -Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be -freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and -distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of -volunteer support. - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in -the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - diff --git a/old/63148-0.zip b/old/63148-0.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 6d5d97a..0000000 --- a/old/63148-0.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h.zip b/old/63148-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index d6104ce..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/63148-h.htm b/old/63148-h/63148-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index 8512270..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/63148-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,10318 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> -<head> -<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /> -<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Men Who Have Made the Empire, by George Chetwynd Griffith</title> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - <style type="text/css"> - -body { - margin-left: 2.5em; - margin-right: 2.5em; -} - -h1, h2 { - text-align: center; - clear: both; - margin-top: 2.5em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - line-height: 2; - word-spacing: .3em; -} - -h1 {line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 4em; page-break-after: always;} - -h2+p {margin-top: 1.5em;} -h2 .subhead {display: block; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 1em;} -h2 .subheadx {display: block; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; padding-top: .5em; line-height: 1;} - -.transnote h2 { - margin-top: .5em; - margin-bottom: 1em; -} - -.subhead, .subheadx {text-indent: 0; text-align: center; font-size: 75%;} -h2 .subheadx .right {padding-left: 20em;} - -p.chaphead { - text-align: center; - text-indent: 0; - line-height: 2; - font-size: 125%; - margin-bottom: 1em; - page-break-before: always; -} -span.chapsubhead {font-size: 90%; word-spacing: .3em;} - -p { - text-indent: 1.75em; - margin-top: .51em; - margin-bottom: .24em; - text-align: justify; -} -.caption p, .center p, p.center {text-align: center; text-indent: 0;} - -.p1 {margin-top: 1em;} -.p2 {margin-top: 2em;} -.p4 {margin-top: 4em;} -.b1 {margin-bottom: 1em;} -.b2 {margin-bottom: 2em;} -.vspace {line-height: 1.5;} -.vspace2 {line-height: 2;} - -.in0 {text-indent: 0;} - -.small {font-size: 70%;} -.smaller {font-size: 85%;} -.larger {font-size: 125%;} -.large {font-size: 150%;} -.xxlarge {font-size: 300%;} - -p.drop-cap {text-indent: 0; margin-bottom: 1.1em;} -p.drop-cap:first-letter { - float: left; - margin: .05em .45em 0 0; - font-size: 300%; - line-height:0.7em; - text-indent: 0; - clear: both; -} -p.drop-cap.i .firstword {margin-left: -.7em;} -p.drop-cap.a .firstword {margin-left: -.75em;} -p.drop-cap .firstword {margin-left: -1.2em;} -p.drop-cap.b .firstword {margin-left: -1.3em;} -p.drop-cap.al .firstword {margin-left: -1.8em;} - -.center {text-align: center;} - -.right {text-align: right;} - -.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} -.firstword {text-transform: uppercase;} - -.bold {font-weight: bold;} - -hr { - width: 33%; - margin-top: 4em; - margin-bottom: 4em; - margin-left: 33%; - margin-right: auto; - clear: both; -} -hr.nospace, hr.nospacechap {margin: 1em auto 1em auto;} -hr.nospacechap {width: 20%;} - -table { - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; - max-width: 80%; - border-collapse: collapse; - word-spacing: .2em; -} - -table#toc {min-width: 25em;} -table#loi {max-width: 40em;} -table#loi td {padding-bottom: .75em; line-height: 1.7;} -table#loi .smaller td {padding-bottom: .2em;} - -tr.b1 td {padding-top: .5em; padding-bottom: 2em;} - -.tdl { - text-align: left; - vertical-align: top; - padding-right: 1em; - padding-left: 1.5em; - text-indent: -1.5em; -} - -.tdc {text-align: center;} - -.tdr { - text-align: right; - vertical-align: bottom; - padding-left: .3em; - white-space: nowrap; -} -.tdr.mw {min-width: 7em;} - -.pagenum { - position: absolute; - right: .25em; - text-indent: 0; - text-align: right; - font-size: 70%; - font-weight: normal; - font-variant: normal; - font-style: normal; - letter-spacing: normal; - line-height: normal; - color: #acacac; - border: .0625em solid #acacac; - background: #ffffff; - padding: .0625em .125em; -} - -.figcenter { - margin: 2em auto 2em auto; - text-align: center; - page-break-inside: avoid; - max-width: 25em; -} - -img { - padding: 1em 0 .5em 0; - max-width: 100%; - height: auto; -} - -a.ref {text-decoration: none;} - -.caption {text-align: center; margin-top: 0; font-size: .8em; word-spacing: .2em;} -.caption p.rightup {text-align: right; padding-right: 1em; margin-top: -1.4em;} - -.footnote { - border: thin dashed black; - margin: 1.5em 10%; - padding: .5em 1em .5em 1.5em; -} - -.footnote {font-size: .95em;} -.footnote p {text-indent: 1em;} -.footnote p.in0 {text-indent: 0;} - -.fnanchor { - vertical-align: 60%; - line-height: .7; - font-size: smaller; - text-decoration: none; -} -.footnote .fnanchor {font-size: .8em;} - -a.ref {text-decoration: none;} - -.blockquot { - margin: 1.5em 5% 1.5em 5%; - font-size: 95%; -} - -.blockquot.inhead p {padding-left: 1.5em; text-indent: -1.5em;} -.blockquot.inhead.center p {padding-left: 0; text-indent: 0; text-align: center;} - -.hang p { - text-align: justify; - padding-left: 1.5em; - text-indent: -1.5em; -} - -.poetry-container { - margin: 1.5em auto; - text-align: center; - font-size: 98%; -} - -.poetry { - display: inline-block; - text-align: left; - margin-left: 0; -} - -.poetry .stanza {padding: 0.5em 0;} -.poetry .verse {text-indent: -3em; padding-left: 3em;} - -.poetry .attrib {margin-right: -2em; text-align: right; margin-top: -.5em;} - -.poetry .indentq {text-indent: -3.45em;} -.poetry .indent0 {text-indent: -3em;} - -.transnote { - background-color: #999999; - border: thin dotted; - font-family: sans-serif, serif; - margin-left: 5%; - margin-right: 5%; - margin-top: 4em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - padding: 1em; -} - -.wspace {word-spacing: .3em;} - -span.locked {white-space:nowrap;} - -.bbox {border: thin solid black; padding: .75em; margin: 4em auto 4em auto; max-width: 20em; page-break-before: always; page-break-after: always;} - -@media print, handheld -{ - body {margin: 0;} - - h1, .chapter, .newpage {page-break-before: always;} - h1.nobreak, h2.nobreak, .nobreak {page-break-before: avoid; padding-top: 0;} - - p { - margin-top: .5em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .25em; - } - - table {width: auto; margin: 1em auto 1em auto;} - - .tdl { - padding-left: 1em; - text-indent: -1em; - padding-right: 0; - } - - p.drop-cap {text-indent: 1.75em; margin-bottom: .24em;} - p.drop-cap:first-letter { - float: none; - font-size: 100%; - margin-left: 0; - margin-right: 0; - text-indent: 1.75em; - } - - hr { - margin-top: .1em; - margin-bottom: .1em; - visibility: hidden; - color: white; - width: .01em; - display: none; - } - - ul {margin-left: 1em; padding-left: 0;} - li {list-style-type: none; padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1.5em;} - - .blockquot {margin: 1.5em 3% 1.5em 3%;} - - .poetry-container {text-align: center;} - .pw30 {width: 30em;} - .poetry {display: block; text-align: left; margin-left: 1.5em;} - .poetry .attrib {text-align: right; margin-right: 0;} - .poetry .stanza {page-break-inside: avoid;} - - .figcenter {margin: 0 auto 0 auto; max-width: 100%; - page-break-before: always; page-break-after: always;} - img {max-height: 90%;} - - .transnote { - page-break-inside: avoid; - margin-left: 2%; - margin-right: 2%; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - padding: .5em; - } - -} - -.poetry .indent0 {text-indent: -3em;} -.poetry .indent8 {text-indent: 1em;} - - - h1.pgx { text-align: center; - clear: both; - font-weight: bold; - font-size: 190%; - margin-top: 0em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - word-spacing: 0em; - letter-spacing: 0em; - line-height: 1; } - h2.pgx { text-align: center; - clear: both; - font-weight: bold; - font-size: 135%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - word-spacing: 0em; - letter-spacing: 0em; - page-break-before: avoid; - line-height: 1; } - h3.pgx { text-align: center; - clear: both; - font-weight: bold; - font-size: 110%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - word-spacing: 0em; - letter-spacing: 0em; - line-height: 1; } - h4.pgx { text-align: center; - clear: both; - font-weight: bold; - font-size: 100%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - word-spacing: 0em; - letter-spacing: 0em; - line-height: 1; } - hr.pgx { width: 100%; - margin-top: 3em; - margin-bottom: 0em; - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; - height: 4px; - border-width: 4px 0 0 0; /* remove all borders except the top one */ - border-style: solid; - border-color: #000000; - clear: both; } - </style> -</head> -<body> -<h1 class="pgx" title="">The Project Gutenberg eBook, Men Who Have Made the Empire, by George -Chetwynd Griffith, Illustrated by Stanley L. Wood</h1> -<p>This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States -and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no -restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it -under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this -eBook or online at <a -href="http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you are not -located in the United States, you'll have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this ebook.</p> -<p>Title: Men Who Have Made the Empire</p> -<p>Author: George Chetwynd Griffith</p> -<p>Release Date: September 8, 2020 [eBook #63148]</p> -<p>Language: English</p> -<p>Character set encoding: UTF-8</p> -<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEN WHO HAVE MADE THE EMPIRE***</p> -<p> </p> -<h4 class="pgx" title="">E-text prepared by Tim Lindell, Charlie Howard,<br /> - and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br /> - (<a href="http://www.pgdp.net">http://www.pgdp.net</a>)<br /> - from page images generously made available by<br /> - Internet Archive<br /> - (<a href="https://archive.org">https://archive.org</a>)</h4> -<p> </p> -<p> </p> -<table border="0" style="background-color: #ccccff;margin: 0 auto;" cellpadding="10"> - <tr> - <td valign="top"> - Note: - </td> - <td> - Images of the original pages are available through - Internet Archive. See - <a href="https://archive.org/details/menwhohavemadeem00grifiala"> - https://archive.org/details/menwhohavemadeem00grifiala</a> - </td> - </tr> -</table> -<div class="transnote"> -<p class="center"><span class="large bold">Transcriber’s -Note</span></p> <p>Larger versions of most illustrations -may be seen by right-clicking them and -selecting an option to view them separately, or by double-tapping -and/or stretching them.</p> -</div> -<p> </p> -<hr class="pgx" /> -<p> </p> -<p> </p> - -<h1>MEN WHO HAVE MADE THE EMPIRE</h1> - -<div class="chapter"> -<div class="center"><div class="bbox"> -<p class="center"><i>BY THE SAME AUTHOR.</i></p> - -<hr class="nospace" /> - -<div class="hang"> - -<p><b>VALDAR, THE OFT-BORN. A Saga of -Seven Ages.</b> Imp. 16mo, cloth gilt. Illustrated -by <span class="smcap">Harold Piffard</span>. Price 6s.</p> - -<p><b>THE VIRGIN OF THE SUN. A Tale of -the Conquest of Peru.</b> Crown 8vo, cloth. -With Frontispiece by <span class="smcap">Stanley L. Wood</span>. Price 6s.</p> - -<p><b>KNAVES OF DIAMONDS. Being Tales -of the Diamond Fields.</b> Crown 8vo, cloth. -Illustrated by <span class="smcap">E. F. Sherie</span>. Price 3s. 6d.</p></div> - -<hr class="nospace" /> - -<p class="center vspace wspace"><span class="smcap">London</span><br /> -C. ARTHUR PEARSON LIMITED</p> -</div></div></div> - -<div id="i_frontis" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_001.jpg" width="1200" height="2012" alt="" /><div class="caption"><p>“ALMIGHTY GOD, OF THY GOODNESS, GIVE ME LIFE AND LEAVE ONCE -TO SAIL AN ENGLISH SHIP ON YONDER SEA!”</p> - -<p>(<i>See <a href="#Page_54">page 54</a>.</i>)</p> -<p class="rightup"><i>Frontispiece.</i></p> -</div></div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="newpage p4 center wspace vspace"> -<p class="xxlarge"> -<span class="smcap">Men who have<br /> -Made the Empire</span></p> - -<p class="p2 larger"><span class="small">BY</span><br /> -GEORGE GRIFFITH</p> - -<p class="p2"><i>THIRD EDITION</i></p> - -<p class="p2"><span class="smcap">London</span><br /> -<span class="larger">C. ARTHUR PEARSON LIMITED</span><br /> -HENRIETTA STREET, W.C.<br /> -1899 -</p> - -<hr /> - -<p class="newpage p4 center smaller vspace2"> -<span class="bold">To</span><br /> -THE GLORIOUS MEMORY<br /> -OF<br /> -THE MIGHTY DEAD<br /> -AND TO<br /> -THE HONOUR OF THE LIVING<br /> -WHO ARE<br /> -CARRYING ON THEIR NOBLE WORK,<br /> -THE FOLLOWING PAGES<br /> -ARE INSCRIBED. -</p> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="newpage p4"> -<div class="poetry-container pw30"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indentq">“<i>Fair is our lot—O goodly is our heritage!</i></div> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>(Humble ye, my people, and be fearful in your mirth!)</i></div> - <div class="verse indent8"><i>For the Lord our God Most High</i></div> - <div class="verse indent8"><i>He hath made the deep as dry,</i></div> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>He hath smote for us a pathway to the ends of all the earth!</i>”</div> - </div> - <div class="attrib"><span class="smcap">A Song of the English</span></div> -</div> -</div> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_ix">ix</span></p> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CONTENTS">CONTENTS</h2> -</div> - -<table id="toc" summary="Contents"> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">I.</td> -</tr> -<tr class="small"> - <td> </td> - <td class="tdr">PAGE</td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">WILLIAM THE NORMAN</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#I">1</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">II.</td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">EDWARD OF THE LONG LEGS</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#II">21</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">III.</td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">THE QUEEN’S LITTLE PIRATE</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#III">39</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">IV.</td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">OLIVER CROMWELL</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#IV">71</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">V.</td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">WILLIAM OF ORANGE</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#V">97</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">VI.</td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">JAMES COOK</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#VI">119</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">VII.</td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">LORD CLIVE</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#VII">143</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">VIII.</td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">WARREN HASTINGS</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#VIII">169</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">IX.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_x">x</span></td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">NELSON</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#IX">193</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">X.</td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">WELLINGTON</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#X">223</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">XI.</td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">“CHINESE GORDON”</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#XI">249</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdc smaller" colspan="2">XII.</td> -</tr> -<tr class="b1"> - <td class="tdl">CECIL RHODES</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#XII">279</a></td> -</tr> -</table> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xi">xi</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="LIST_OF_ILLUSTRATIONS">LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</h2> -</div> - -<p class="p1 b2 center wspace larger"><span class="smcap">By</span> STANLEY L. WOOD</p> - -<table id="loi" summary="List of Illustrations"> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">“ALMIGHTY GOD, OF THY GOODNESS, GIVE ME LIFE AND LEAVE ONCE TO SAIL AN ENGLISH SHIP ON YONDER SEA!”</td> - <td class="tdr mw"><a href="#i_frontis"><i>Frontispiece</i></a></td> -</tr> -<tr class="smaller"> - <td> </td> - <td class="tdr"><i>Facing p.</i></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">HE DROVE THE GOOD STEEL THROUGH MAIL AND FLESH AND BONE</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_10">10</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">DUKE WILLIAM ROARED OUT THAT HE WAS ALIVE</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_17">17</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">EDWARD GRIPPED THE WOULD-BE MURDERER</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_30">30</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THEY CARRIED HIM DOWN TO THE BOATS</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_53">53</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">HE SWOOPED WITH HIS CAVALRY ROUND THE REAR OF THE KING’S ARMY</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_83">83</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">HE HALTED HIS ARMY ... AND SANG THE HUNDRED AND SEVENTEENTH PSALM</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_94">94</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">MADE HIM REEL IN HIS SADDLE</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_112">112</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">“MEN OF ENNISKILLEN, WHAT WILL YOU DO FOR ME?”<span class="pagenum" id="Page_xii">xii</span> HE CRIED</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_113">113</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">MISSED HIM AND KILLED ANOTHER MAN BEHIND HIM</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_141">141</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">INSTEAD OF CHARGING THEY TURNED ROUND AND MADE LANES THROUGH THE ARMY BEHIND THEM</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_158">158</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">HIS ENEMY WENT DOWN WITH A BULLET IN THE RIGHT SIDE</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_185">185</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">NELSON AT COPENHAGEN</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_214">214</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THE ORDER THAT SENT THE BRITISH LINE STREAMING DOWN FROM THE RISING GROUND</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_246">246</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THE LONELY MAN WHO STOOD ON THE RAMPARTS OF KHARTOUM</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_275">275</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> - <td class="tdl">THAT HISTORIC INDABA IN THE MATOPPOS</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_300">300</a></td> -</tr> -</table> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xiii">xiii</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="FOREWORD">FOREWORD</h2> -</div> - -<p>The Epic of England has yet to be written. -It may be that the fulness of time for writing -it has not come yet, or it may be that Britain is still -waiting for her Homer and her Virgil. Perhaps the -matured genius of a Rudyard Kipling, that strong, -sweet Singer of the Seven Seas, may some day -address itself to the accomplishment of this most -splendid of all possible tasks, and then, again, it -may be that it is his only to sound the prelude. -That is a matter for the gods to decide in their -own good time, but this much is certain—that when -this work has been worthily done the world will -hear echoing through the ages such a thunder-song -as has never stirred human hearts before.</p> - -<p>It will begin, doubtless, with the battle-cries of -the old Sea-Kings of the North, chanted to the -music of their churning oars and the rush and -roar of the foam swirling away under the bows of -their longships, and from them it will go on ringing -and thundering through the centuries, ever swelling -in depth and volume as more and more of the races -of men hear it rolling over the battle-fields of con<span class="pagenum" id="Page_xiv">xiv</span>quered -lands, until at last—as every loyal man of -English speech must truly hope—the roar of the -Last Battle has rolled away into eternal silence, and -north and south, east and west, the proclaiming of -the Pax Britannica heralds the epoch of</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p class="center">“The Parliament of Man, the Federation of the World.”</p></div> - -<p>But in the meantime, while we are waiting for the -coming of the singer whose master-hand shall blend -the song and story of Britain into an epic worthy of -his magnificent theme, materials may be gathered -together, old facts may be presented in new lights, -and the great characters who have played their parts -in the most tremendous drama that has ever occupied -the Stage of Time may be re-grouped in such fashion -as will make their subtler relationships more plain, -and all this will make the great work readier to the -hand of the Master when he comes.</p> - -<p>It is a portion of this minor work that I have set -myself here to do. The making of a nation and -the building of nations up into empires is, humanly -speaking, the greatest and noblest work that human -hands and brains can find to do, for the making of -an empire means, in its ultimate analysis, the substitution -of order for anarchy, of commerce for -plunder, of civilisation for savagery—in a word, -of peace for strife.</p> - -<p>Now, the British Empire as it stands to-day is -unquestionably the greatest moral and material Fact -in human history, and hence it is permissible to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_xv">xv</span> -assume that the makers of it must, each in his -own way, whether of peace or war, have been the -greatest empire-builders the world has yet seen, and -it is my purpose here to take the greatest of these -and tell with such force and vividness as I may, the -story of the man and his work. I am not going to -write a series of biographies arranged in prim chronological -ranks, nor am I going to confine myself to -the narration of collated facts so dear to the hearts -of educational inspectors and scholastic examiners. -Such you will find already cut and dried for you in -the school-books and in many ponderous tomes, -from the reading of which may your good taste -and good sense deliver you!</p> - -<p>I shall seek rather to show you the living man -doing the living work which his destiny called him -to do. The man will not always be found of the -best, nor the work, seemingly, of the noblest, but -what I shall seek to show you is that the work -<em>had</em> to be done in order that a certain end might be -accomplished, and that the man who did it was, all -things considered, the best and, it may be, the only -man to do it. In so far as I do not do this I shall -have failed in the doing of my own work.</p> - -<p>One more word seems necessary in order to anticipate -certain possible misconceptions. Our empire-making -is not yet complete, even at home. The -centuries of strife during which the hammering and -welding together of the nations which now make -up the United Kingdom has been progressing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_xvi">xvi</span> -have naturally and necessarily left certain national -jealousies and antipathies behind them, and the -last thing that I should desire would be to arouse -any of these.</p> - -<p>There are two kinds of patriotism, a smaller and -a greater, a National and an Imperial. Both are -equally good and noble, and it is necessary that the -first should precede the second. But it is equally -necessary that it should not supersede or obscure -it, and it is to this later and greater, this Imperial -patriotism that I shall appeal, and I would ask my -readers, whatever their nationality, to remember -that on the burning plains of India and the rolling -prairies of Canada, in the vast expanses of the -Australian Bush and the African Veld, there are -neither Englishmen nor Scotsmen, Welshmen nor -Irishmen; but only Citizens of the Empire, brothers -in blood and speech, and fellow-workers in the building -up of the noblest and stateliest fabric that human -hands have ever reared or God’s sun has ever shone -upon.</p> -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_1">1</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="I">I<br /> - -<i>WILLIAM THE NORMAN,</i><br /> - -<span class="subhead"><i>PIRATE AND NATION-MAKER</i></span></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_3">3</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">I<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">WILLIAM THE NORMAN</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="firstword">It</span> may strike those of my readers who have only -got their history from their school-books as -somewhat strange that I should begin my record -of British Empire-Makers with a man whom they -have been taught to look upon as a foreigner, an -invader, a conqueror, and a ruthless oppressor of -the English.</p> - -<p>The answer is simple, though manifold. The -school-books are only filled with potted facts, and -are therefore wrong and unreliable. It has been -well said that England was made on the shores -of the Baltic Sea and the German Ocean. The -so-called Englishmen who occupied it at the time -of the Conquest were not Englishmen at all, for -the simple reason that the true English race had -yet to be born, and, after it, the true British.</p> - -<p>The England and Scotland of the eleventh -century were peopled, not by nations, but by -tribes mostly at bitter and constant war with each -other. There were still Jutes and Angles, Picts<span class="pagenum" id="Page_4">4</span> -and Scots, Danes and Swedes and Norwegians, -each occupying their own little stretch of country, -and governed, more or less effectually, by their -chieftains, in proof of which it is enough to recall -the fact that Harold’s last fight but one was -against his own brother, who had come across -the Narrow Seas at the head of a miscellaneous -crowd of hungry pirates to steal as much as he -could of the ownerless heritage that Edward the -Confessor had left behind him.</p> - -<p>A good deal of sentiment, more or less born of -deftly-written romances, has glorified the memory -of this same Harold. Whether it was deserved -or not does not concern us now, any more than -does his right or unright to the throne of England. -It is enough here to grant him all honour as an -able leader of armies, and a man who knew how -to snatch victory from defeat, and glory from -disaster by dying like a hero surrounded by the -corpses of his foes.</p> - -<p>The idle question whether he or William had -the better right to the crown of England may be -left to those who care for such quibbling. Let -us, at the outset, in the words of the Sage of -Chelsea, “clear our minds of cant.” There is no -“right” or “wrong” in these things, saving only -the eternal right of the strongest and wisest—the -fittest or most suitable, in short, to wield power -and dominion whether the less fit like it or not. -The peoples are thrust headlong into the fiery<span class="pagenum" id="Page_5">5</span> -crucible of War, and, on the adamantine anvil of -Destiny, the Thor’s Hammer of Battle beats and -crushes them into the shape that God has designed -for them. It seems a rude method, but in many -thousands of years we have found no other, so -at least we may conclude that it is the best one -known.</p> - -<p>There is a very deep meaning in the seemingly -flippant and almost impious saying of Napoleon: -“God fights on the side of the biggest battalions.” -He does—but you must reckon the bigness of the -battalions, not only by their numbers, but by the -value of their units, remembering always that one -man with a stout heart and a cause he honestly -believes in is worth a score who have neither heart -nor faith.</p> - -<p>Just such a man was William the Norman, son -of Robert the Magnificent, otherwise styled the -Devil, and Arlette the Fair, daughter of Fulbert -the Tanner of Falaise. It is in this birth of his -that we find the first clue to his real greatness. -He was born of a union unhallowed by the -sanction of the Church, among a people proud -beyond all modern belief of their royal sea-king -ancestry.</p> - -<p>How did he come to achieve this almost miraculous -triumph over a prejudice and hostility of which we -can now form but a very dim idea?</p> - -<p>We have to look no farther than his cradle to -find the answer. Lying there, the little fellow used<span class="pagenum" id="Page_6">6</span> -to grasp the straw in his baby fists with such a grip -that it could not be pulled away from him. The -straw broke first, and ever in his after life what -William the Norman laid hold of he held on to; -and that is why he became the first of our Empire-Makers.</p> - -<p>No doubt it was the strain of the old pirate blood -which ran so strongly in his veins that made him -this. If we have successfully cleared our minds of -cant, we shall see plainly that, since all nations -begin in piracy of some sort, it is natural to expect -that the best pirates will prove the best Empire-Makers. -That old strain is, happily, not yet exhausted. -When it is, Great and Greater Britain -will be no more.</p> - -<p>Few men have passed unscathed through such -a stormy youth as his was. When he was seven -years old his father, Duke Robert, having exacted -an oath of unwilling fealty from his under-lords to -his bonny but base-born heir, went away on a -pilgrimage to Jerusalem from which he never -returned, leaving him to the wardship of his -friend, Alan of Brittany; and soon after Duke -Robert’s death became known Alan was poisoned. -After that for a dozen years the boy Duke was -in constant peril of his life.</p> - -<p>One night two lads were lying sleeping side by -side in the castle of Vaudreuil, and in the silence -and darkness of the night one of the Montgomeries, -bitter enemies of the Lords of Falaise, to whose<span class="pagenum" id="Page_7">7</span> -hate Alan of Brittany had already fallen a victim, -crept up to the bedside with a naked dagger, and -drove it blindly into the heart of one of the boys -and fled.</p> - -<p>Young Duke William—he was only a lad of -twelve then—woke up to find himself wet with his -playmate’s blood, but all unknowing then how -nearly the history of the world had come to -being changed by that foul and happily misdirected -dagger-stroke. Had it found his heart -instead there would have been no Norman Conquest, -no blending of the two strains of blood -from which has sprung the Imperial Race of earth, -no British Empire, no United States of America—without -all of which the world would surely -have been very different.</p> - -<p>Seven more years of plot and intrigue, of strife -and turmoil, young Duke William lived through -after this, growing ever keener in mind and -stronger in body, and, as we may well believe, -hardening into the incarnation of ruthless and yet -wisely-directed Force which was so soon to make -him a power among men. Before he was twenty -he shot his arrows from a bow which no other -man in his dukedom could bend, and he was -already a finished knight, a pattern of the gentleman -of his age, good horseman, good swordsman, -gentle towards women and stern towards men, -pure in his morals and moderate in his living; a -good Christian according to his lights and the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_8">8</span> -ideas of his day, and above all faithful to the ideals -that he had set before himself.</p> - -<p>Already at nineteen—that is to say in the year -1044—not only had he shaped his plans for reducing -the disorder of his turbulent dukedom to -discipline, but he had made his designs so manifest -that the lawless lords and robber barons could see -for themselves how stern a master he would make—as -in good truth he did—and the deadly work of -conspiracy started afresh. One night when he was -sleeping in his favourite castle of Valognes, Golet, -his court fool, came hammering at his bedroom -door with his bauble, crying out that some traitor -had let the assassins into the stronghold. He leapt -out of bed, huddled on a few clothes as he ran to -the stable, mounted his horse, and galloped away -all through the night toward Falaise along a road -which is called the Duke’s Road to this day. No -sooner was he safe across the estuary of the Oune -and Vire and in the Bayeux district than he -pulled his dripping, panting horse up in front of -the church of St. Clement, dismounted and knelt -down to say his prayers and thank God for his -merciful deliverance. Such was the youth who -was father to the man justly styled William the -Conqueror.</p> - -<p>It was not long after this that the years of -intrigue and plotting ended in armed revolt. Guy -of Burgundy, William’s kinsman and once his playmate, -looked with greedy eyes on the fair lands<span class="pagenum" id="Page_9">9</span> -of Normandy. He was master of many provinces -already, and among his hosts of friends there were -not a few of William’s own under-lords, in whose -breasts still rankled the shame of owning a bastard -for their master. To his side came the Viscount -of Coutance, Randolph of Bayeux, Hamon of -Thorigny and Creuilly, and that Grimbald of -Plessis whose hand was to have slain William -that night in Valognes, and in the end this long-gathering -storm burst on the grassy slopes of -Val-ès-Dunes.</p> - -<p>Master Wace the Chronicler, in his “Roman de -Rou,” gives us a brilliant little picture of that long-past -scene where the future Conqueror won his -spurs—of many a brave and gallant gentleman -clad <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">cap-à-pie</i> in shining mail, seated on mighty -chargers impatiently pawing the ground, of long -lances gay with fluttering ribbons tied on by dainty -hands that morning, of waving plumes and flaunting -pennons, and mild-eyed cattle grazing knee-deep in -the long wet grass in peaceful ignorance of the -bloody work that was about to be done.</p> - -<p>But with all this we have little to do, and one -episode must suffice. The starkest warrior among -the rebels was Hardrez, Lord of Bayeux, and he, -like many another, had sworn to slay William that -day with his own hands. The oath had proved -fatal to others before it did to him, but at length -his turn came. Young Duke William saw him -from afar, and with lance in rest made for him at<span class="pagenum" id="Page_10">10</span> -a gallop. One of the knights who had followed -Hardrez to battle charged at him in mid-course. -The next moment horse and man went rolling in -the grass, and William, dropping his splintered -lance, drew his sword, and, the Lord of Bayeux -coming up at the instant, he drove the good steel -with one shrewd, strong thrust through mail and -flesh and bone, and Hardrez never spoke again.</p> - -<p>That stroke won William his dukedom, and the -Chronicler, though a man of Bayeux himself, tells -in stirring lines how the young lord and his faithful -knights hunted the flying rebels off the field and -rode them down like sheep.</p> - -<p>This was not the last fight that William had for -the mastery of his own land, but it left his hands -free to begin the work that he had set himself to -do, and he did it. To him unity was strength, and -he was ready to go to any lengths to get it. His -methods then, as afterwards in England, were -severe—we should call them brutal nowadays, but -these days are not those.</p> - -<div id="ip_10" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_010.jpg" width="1200" height="1994" alt="" /><div class="caption">HE DROVE THE GOOD STEEL THROUGH MAIL AND FLESH AND BONE.</div></div> - -<p>When the citizens of Alençon defied him they -indulged in the pleasantry of hanging raw hides -over the walls and beating them, shouting out the -while that here there was plenty for the tanner’s -son to do. He set his teeth and swore his -favourite oath—by the Splendour of God—that -they should have work enough ere he had done -with them. When the city lay at his mercy he had -two-and-thirty of the humourists sent out to him,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_11">11</span> -and cut off their ears and noses and hands and feet, -and had them tossed over the walls as a sort of hint -that he was not quite the kind of person who could -appreciate jokes about his ancestors. It was an -inhuman deed, but history records no other public -aspersions of the good name of Duke William’s -mother.</p> - -<p>Yet one more battle the young Duke had to fight -before he crossed the Narrow Seas to the famous -field of Senlac. Henry of France, his titular overlord, -and Geoffrey of Anjou, jealous of the fast-growing -power of Normandy, united their forces in -an expedition which was half an invasion and half -a plundering raid. Duke William, with infinite -patience, and a quiet, marvellous self-restraint, held -his own fiery temper and the angry ardour of his -knights in check, watching the invaders burn town -after town and village after village, and turning -some of his fairest domains into a wilderness.</p> - -<p>He never struck a blow until, one fatal afternoon, -he swooped down from Falaise and caught the -French army severed in two by the rising flood of -the river Dive. Then he struck, and struck hard, -and when the bloody work was over, Henry was -glad to buy a truce and his liberty from his vassal -with the strong castle of Tillièries and all its lands, -and so heavy hearted was he at his defeat that, as -the Chronicler tells us, “he never bore shield or -spear again.”</p> - -<p>Normandy had now become the most orderly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_12">12</span> -and best governed country in Europe. Robbers, -noble and otherwise, were ruthlessly suppressed, -and the poorest possessed their goods in peace, -while William himself had time to turn his thoughts -to the gentler, and yet not less important, concerns -of policy and love-making.</p> - -<p>The old story of his courtship of the fair Matilda -of Flanders with a riding whip is evidently a myth -manufactured by some Saxon enemy, for Duke -William was in the first place a gentleman, and, -moreover, the lady and her parents were as anxious -as he was for the marriage, seeing that he was now -the most desirable of suitors. The truth is that the -Church opposed their union on some shadowy -grounds of consanguinity, and it did not take place -until after a courtship of four years.</p> - -<p>And now, having got our pirate Duke happily -married and seen him undisputed lord of his own -realm, we may go with him to St. Valery on the -coast of Ponthieu and watch him working and -praying and offering gifts at the old shrine, during -those fifteen long days that he watched the weather-cocks -and prayed for the south wind that was to -waft his fleet and army over to the English shore.</p> - -<p>It was on Wednesday, the 27th of September, -that the wind at last veered round. The eager -soldiery hailed the change as the granting of their -prayers and the consent of Heaven to the beginning -of their enterprise, and flung themselves into their -ships like a great host of schoolboys setting out on<span class="pagenum" id="Page_13">13</span> -a holiday. Soon the grey sea was covered with -a swarm of craft, and it must have seemed as -though the old Viking days had come back as the -great square sails went up to the mast-heads, and -the shining shields were hung along the bulwarks.</p> - -<p>William himself, in his golden ship <i>Mora</i>, the -present of his own dear Duchess, led the way with -the sacred banner of the Pope at his mast-head, -and the three Lions of Normandy floating astern. -The <i>Mora</i> was lighter heeled or lighter loaded than -the rest, for when morning dawned she was alone -on the sea with the Sussex shore in plain sight. -But presently a great forest of masts and clouds of -gaily-coloured sails rose up out of the grey waters -astern, and the whole vast fleet came on, urged by -oar and wind, and by nine o’clock that morning the -fore-foot of the <i>Mora</i>, close followed by her -consorts, struck the English ground in Pevensey -Bay.</p> - -<p>It has often been told how William, as he landed, -stumbled and fell on his hands and knees, and how -those near him cried out that it was a fatal omen. -The story may be myth or fact, but nothing could -be more characteristic of the true man than his -springing to his feet with both hands full of sand -and laughing out in that great voice of his:</p> - -<p>“Nay, by the Splendour of God, not so. See! -Have I not taken seizin of my new kingdom and -lawful heritage?”</p> - -<p>But the army of the so-called English, that they<span class="pagenum" id="Page_14">14</span> -had come to seek was nowhere to be found, and some -days were spent in uncertainty and debate as to -whether they should march on London or await -battle on the shore with their sea communications -open, and in the end they took the latter and the -wiser course.</p> - -<p>Meanwhile, as has been said, Harold was away -in the North fighting and beating his brother -Tostig and his fellow robbers, and the news of Duke -William’s landing was flying northward to him. It -must have been something of an anxious time for -both—the Norman waiting day after day in that -deadly inaction which is most fatal of all things to -the courage and discipline of an army, and Harold -hurrying southward at the head of his victorious -troops, knowing that he was about to try conclusions -with the best leader and the finest soldiery in -Europe.</p> - -<p>It is of little import here and to us now which of -them had the best right, as the lawyer-quibble has -it, to that which they were about to fight for. The -point is that such claims as either had they were -going to submit to the stern and final ordeal of -battle—and in good truth a stern ordeal it proved -to be.</p> - -<p>As he came to the South the standard of Harold—the -Fighting Man—was joined by troops of recruits -attracted by the fame of his northern victory, -and it was a great and really formidable army -which at length assembled between London and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_15">15</span> -the Sussex coast. Meanwhile the Normans, after -the fashion of the pitiless warfare of those days, -were dividing their time between the building of -entrenched camps and ravaging, plundering, and -burning throughout the pleasant Southern land.</p> - -<p>Of course messages and parleyings passed between -them. Harold from his royal house at -Westminster bade Duke William come and fight -him for his capital and his kingdom, to which Duke -William warily replied: “Come and drive us into -the sea if you can!” This at length King Harold -was forced to attempt. And so it came to pass -that, at length, on the 14th of October, the hosts -of the Saxon and the Norman confronted each -other on the field of Senlac by Hastings, on the -morrow to strike blows whose echoes were to ring -through many a long century, and to do deeds more -mighty in their effect than either Harold or William -dreamt of.</p> - -<p>The Norman host has been called a horde of -mailed robbers and cut-throats, eager only for -plunder, and the Saxon army has been almost -canonised as a band of heroes, gathered together -to die in defence of their native land and their -lawful king. Yet, strangely enough, the robbers -and cut-throats spent the best part of the night -confessing their sins and praying for victory, as -well as in making the best dispositions to attain -it. The patriots spent the same hours feasting -and drinking, and swaggering to each other about<span class="pagenum" id="Page_16">16</span> -the brave deeds they had done in the North and -the greater things they were going to do on the -morrow.</p> - -<p>So the night passes, and the morning dawns grey -and chill on the two now silent hosts. Then from -the Norman ranks rises the solemn cadence of the -Te Deum, and as this dies away the archers move -out—forerunners of those stout yeomen whose -clothyard shafts were one day to win Creçy and -Agincourt. Then come the footmen with their -long pikes, and after them the mailed and mounted -knights, in front of whom rides Taillefer—Iron-Cutter -and Minstrel—tossing his sword into the -air and catching it, and singing the while the Song -of Roland and Roncesvalles. As the archers and -pikemen spread out in skirmishing order he sets -spurs to his horse and charges at the Saxon line. -He kills two men, and then goes down under the -battle-axe of a third.</p> - -<p>Then the arrows flew fast and thick, and charge -after charge was made upon the palisades of stakes -that fenced the Saxon position, high above which -floated the Dragon Standard of Wessex and the -banner of the Fighting Man.</p> - -<p>But the double-bladed Saxon axes were no playthings, -and they were swung by strong and strenuous -arms, and every time the Norman front came up to -the breastwork it was hewn down in swathes by the -deep-biting blades. The arrows fell blunted and -broken on the big Saxon shields and stout Saxon<span class="pagenum" id="Page_17">17</span> -armour, and so Duke William, with that ever-ready -resource of his, bade his archers shoot up into the -air, and then down from the grey sky there fell a -rain of whirring, steel-pointed shafts, one of which, -winged by Fate, struck gallant Harold in the eye—doubtless -as he was looking up wondering at this -new manœuvre—and, piercing his brain, laid him -lifeless in the midst of his champions.</p> - -<div id="ip_17" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_017.jpg" width="1200" height="1998" alt="" /><div class="caption">DUKE WILLIAM ROARED OUT THAT HE WAS ALIVE.</div></div> - -<p>Soon after this a cry went up that Duke William -too was dead, and he, hearing this, tore off his -helmet—a somewhat unsafe thing to do in such a -fight—and roared out that he was alive, swearing—as -usual by the Splendour of God—that the land of -England should yet be his by nightfall.</p> - -<p>So they laid on again. William’s horse went -down under a pike-thrust. He clove the pike-man -to the chin and asked one of his knights to lend -him his horse. The knight refused, thinking more -of his skin than his loyalty, whereupon William -pitched him out of the saddle, swung himself up, -and led another charge against the ever-dwindling -ring of heroes who were still hammering away with -their battle-axes—and this time the stout line -wavers and breaks; the mail-clad warriors pour up -the slope, shouting that the day is won; axe and -sword ring loud and fast on helm and mail, the -Saxons reel back, closing round the body of their -king and the staff of his banner.</p> - -<p>“<i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">Dex aide! Dex aide! Ha-Rou! Ha-Rou!</i>” -Duke William’s men yell and roar again as they<span class="pagenum" id="Page_18">18</span> -scramble over heaps of mangled corpses filling the -trenches and blocking the breaches in the palisades. -Another moment or two of brief, bitter, and bloody -struggle and the last Saxon ring breaks and melts -away, and Hastings and England are won.</p> - -<p>What followed is history so familiar that few -words more from me will suffice. What Duke -William had done in his own land he did after -the same methods in the land that had been the -Saxons’. Cruel, bloody, and savage they were -beyond all doubt, but it is a question whether, -even in the doing, they were more disastrous than -the ferocious anarchy and the unceasing plunder -and outrage and murder that had disgraced the -weak and divided rule of the Saxon kings. In -their effect they were a thousandfold better. Duke -William believed that order was Heaven’s first law, -and, by whatever means he had at hand, he was -honestly determined to make it earth’s as well. -And he succeeded, which after all is not an unsatisfactory -test of honest merit. How well he did -so let us ask, not one of his own chroniclers or -troubadours, but the man who wrote the story of -his own conquered people, and this is what he will -tell us:</p> - -<p>“Truly he was so stark a man and wroth that -no man durst do anything against his will. Bishops -he set off their bishoprics, and abbots off their -abbacies, and thanes in prison. And at last he did -not spare his brother Odo. Him he set in prison.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_19">19</span> -Betwixt other things we must not forget the good -peace that he made in this land, so that a man that -was worth aught might travel over the kingdom -unhurt with his bosom full of gold. And no man -durst slay another though he had suffered never so -mickle evil from the other.”</p> - -<p>Such was this grim, stern, Thor’s-Hammer of a -man, who by his strength and cunning hewed into -shape that which in after days was to become the -corner-stone of the glorious, world-shadowing fabric -which we call the British Empire.</p> -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">21</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="II">II<br /> - -<i>EDWARD OF THE LONG LEGS</i><br /> - -<span class="subhead">“<i>BURY ME NOT TILL YOU HAVE CONQUERED SCOTLAND</i>”</span></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">23</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">II<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">EDWARD OF THE LONG LEGS</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="firstword">Two</span> centuries all but nine years have passed -away since William the Conqueror, unwept, -if not unhonoured, lost his life in avenging a paltry -joke, and left his work for others to carry on. -In the two centuries not much has been done, -although no little show has been made meanwhile, -and a great clash of arms has resounded through -the world.</p> - -<p>William the Red has died, as he lived, in a somewhat -ignoble and futile manner. Henry I. has -done one good thing, wedding, as it were, in his -own person and that of the Lady Matilda, the two -races which were afterwards to be one.</p> - -<p>Stephen and Matilda have settled their differences -and died, after the shedding of much wasted blood. -Henry II., by the hand of Strongbow and his -licensed pirates, has done a piece of good work -badly in beginning that conquest of Ireland which -is not to be completed until the Battle of the -Boyne is lost and won.</p> - -<p>Richard Lionheart has won much glory to very<span class="pagenum" id="Page_24">24</span> -small profit in the magnificent madness of the Third -Crusade. The barons, recognising, however dimly -and clumsily, that they are, in good truth, citizens -of the infant State whose lusty, turbulent youth -already gives promise of its future strength and -greatness, have become law-lords as well as landlords, -and with mailed hands have guided that unwilling -pen of John’s along the bottom of the parchment -on which the Great Charter is written.</p> - -<p>And, lastly, Simon of Montfort has taken a swift -stride through several centuries and, arriving at the -modern idea that the making of nations and the -ordering of the world can be achieved by Talk, has, -after not a little violence and the spilling of considerable -blood that might have been better spent, -got together that first Parliament or Talking-Machine, -whose successors have so sorely hindered -the progress of the world and balked the efforts of -those appointed by God, and not by the counting of -noses, to do its work.</p> - -<p>So the two noisy and somewhat foolish centuries -have rolled away into a blessed oblivion with a good -deal of shouting and swaggering, of strife and bloodshed, -but of little progress, saving that one Roger -Bacon has lived and written a certain book and -made himself a name for ever.</p> - -<p>But all this time the work with which we are -here most concerned, the making of an empire, has -been waiting for the next God-sent man to come -and do it, and this man was Edward Plantagenet,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">25</span> -surnamed Longlegs, next in lineal succession, not -as king, but as Empire-Maker, to him who won -the fight at Senlac and got himself so well obeyed -that “no man durst do anything against his will”—which -was a great deal to say of any one in such -days as those.</p> - -<p>Edward of the Long Legs came on to the stage of -History with long, swift, determined, and, in short, -wholly characteristic strides. The Talking-Machine -of the good Earl Simon had worked noisily, as is -usual with such machines, and had produced little -but sound and fury.</p> - -<p>There was war all round, and the usual anarchy -in Ireland and Wales. Llewelyn, Lord of Snowdon, -for instance, had pitted himself gallantly -against the logic of circumstances, and was seeking -to reconstruct the ancient and now impossibly obsolete -Celtic empire.</p> - -<p>“<i>Be of good courage in the slaughter, cling to thy -work, destroy England and plunder its multitudes!</i>” -his bards had sung to him, and so he had honestly -set himself to do, not recognising the fact that -empires are neither made nor re-made by mere -methods of miscellaneous blood-letting.</p> - -<p>To the north, Scotland was divided by schisms -and rent by the bitter jealousies of its nobles and -clan-chieftains, savage, rude and poor, but gallant, -strong, and very full of fight, as the English were -to learn later on.</p> - -<p>Over the Narrow Seas the wide domains which<span class="pagenum" id="Page_26">26</span> -William the Norman had kept with his sword and -which the second Henry had greatly increased by -inheritance and marriage, were slipping piecemeal -away from the throne to which they did not of right -divine belong, and with which it was therefore impossible -that they should remain.</p> - -<p>Such, in briefest outline, was the scene into which -Edward Longlegs strode, and of which he was to -be for thirty-five years the central and dominating -figure. His first look round, as it were, showed -him the nature of the task which it was his destiny -to forthwith set about.</p> - -<p>With that clearness of vision without which no -man has any chance of success in the business of -empire-making, he instantly pierced the dust-storms -of battle that were rising all about him, and the -mist-clouds of debate which Earl Simon’s Talking-Machine -had commenced to vomit forth, and behind -and beyond these he saw a certain Fact, a prime -necessity which had to be faced—in short a real -Something of an infinitely greater importance than -tribal warfare, the aspirations of bard-inspired -princelings, or even parliamentary debates.</p> - -<p>This was neither more nor less than the fact that, -when the Maker of all things mapped out this part -of the world, it pleased Him in His wisdom to put -England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland into one -little group of islands, and from this fact Edward -Longlegs drew the deduction that the King of -Kings had intended them to be under one lordship.</p> - -<p>It seems a simple thing to say now, a fact so -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_27">27</span> -patent that the mention of it seems superfluous. -So does the larger fact that the world is round; -but it was a very different matter in the times and -circumstances of Edward Longlegs, and, indeed, his -first and greatest claim to stand next in succession -to William the Norman in the royal line of empire-makers -consists in this: that he was capable of that -master-stroke of genius which clearly demonstrated -an imperial principle of which six hundred years of -history have been the continuous and emphatic -endorsement.</p> - -<p>No sooner was the bloody fight of Evesham over -and the good Earl Simon had breathed out his -generous, if somewhat premature soul in that last -cry of his: “It is God’s grace!” than Edward -Longlegs seems to have set himself to prepare for -the task that was to be his. He was not to be -king in name for some seven years more, but as the -historian of the English People with great pertinence -remarked: “With the victory of Evesham, -his character seemed to mould itself into nobler -form.” In other words he was, perchance unconsciously, -performing that indispensable preliminary -to all really great and true public reforms, the -reformation of himself.</p> - -<p>Hitherto his life had been none of the best. He -had been the leader of a retinue that had made -itself something like infamous in the land. He had -intrigued first with one party and then with another.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">28</span> -He is accused of a faithlessness which, it is said, -forced the good, though mistaken, Earl Simon into -armed revolt against his liege lord—though this -may, after all, only have been a stroke of wise and -necessary policy, since he possibly saw even then -that Chaos would not reform itself into Cosmos just -for being talked at.</p> - -<p>Then again, and with curious resemblance to -William of Normandy, and later of Hastings and -England, he had avenged an insult to his mother -by the slaughter of some three thousand men in the -rout of Lewes and a quite unjustifiable indulgence -in pillage and slaughter when the Barons’ War was -finally over.</p> - -<p>“It was from Earl Simon,” says John Richard -Green in one of those limpid sentences of his, “as -the Earl owned with a proud bitterness ere his -death, that Edward had learnt the skill in warfare -which distinguished him among the princes of his -time. But he had learnt from the Earl the far -nobler lesson of a self-government which lifted him -high above them as ruler among men.”</p> - -<p>It seemed, indeed, as though, by this reformation -of himself, he was to typify that reformation of -England which it was his life-work to begin. The -new Edward was to be the maker of the new -England.</p> - -<p>His first action after the war was characteristic of -the man and the work that he was to do. The -cessation of the fighting, as was usual in those days,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">29</span> -had left an undesirable number of truculent warriors -of various ranks wandering at large about the -kingdom with their legitimate occupation gone. -Edward, with that instinct of order characteristic -of all true empire-makers, saw in these the possibilities -of disorder, and with a happy combination -of wisdom and adventure turned their swords and -lances away from the bodies of their fellow-citizens -by taking them to fight the Paynim in the Holy Land.</p> - -<p>An incident of this excursion has been adorned -by one of those pleasant fictions which, if the -paradox may be pardoned, are none the less true -for the fact that they are false. Edward, having -sent certain hundreds of Moslems to Paradise with -a perhaps unnecessarily ruthless dispatch, was considered -by the sect of the Assassins to be a person -who would be better dead than alive in Palestine, -and so one of them, after several attempts, succeeded, -as one may put it, in interviewing him -privately with a poisoned dagger. The fiction has -it that his consort, Eleanor of Castille, sucked the -poison from the wound with her own sweet lips and -so saved his life.</p> - -<p>It is a pretty story, but, unfortunately for its -authenticity, no one seems to have heard of it or -thought it worth the telling until Ptolemy of Lucca -told it a good half-century afterwards. But the -truth underlying it remains, and this truth is that -Edward Longlegs was blessed with that greatest of -all earthly blessings, a loving and devoted wife.</p> - -<p>The facts of the matter are few but eloquent. -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">30</span> -Edward saw the dagger before it struck him, and -gripped the would-be murderer with a grip worthy -the muscles of Lionheart himself. There was a -struggle, during which the dagger-point scratched -his arm. A moment after it was buried in the -assassin’s own heart. Then some of Edward’s -retainers, hearing the scuffling, burst into the tent -and satisfied themselves that the wretch had -attempted his last murder by the somewhat superfluous -method of knocking out his brains with a -foot-stool.</p> - -<p>Soon after this symptoms of poisoning showed -themselves, and Edward, in his usual businesslike -way, made his will and his peace with God and -prepared to “salute the world” with becoming -dignity. In the end not Eleanor’s lips but the -surgeon’s knife removed the danger, and so once -again a dagger-thrust which had come near to -changing the history of Britain missed its mark.</p> - -<p>It was during his return from this Crusade, as he -was journeying through Calabria, that he met the -messengers who told him that his father was dead -and that he was King of England. Charles of -Anjou, who was riding with him at the moment, -wondered at the great grief he showed, and, being -himself a man almost incapable of feeling, asked him -why he should show more grief at his father’s death -than he had done for the loss of his baby son -who had died a short time before. The answer -was to the point and worthy of the man.</p> - -<div id="ip_30" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_030.jpg" width="1200" height="2032" alt="" /><div class="caption">EDWARD GRIPPED THE WOULD-BE MURDERER.</div></div> - -<p>“By the goodness of God,” he said, “the loss -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_31">31</span> -of my boy may be made good to me, but not -even God’s own mercy can give me a father -again.”</p> - -<p>It was on the same journey that there occurred -that curious incident which is called the “Little -Battle of Chalons,” and which is also instructive -in giving us another view of the man who could -use such wise and pious words as these. While he -was travelling through Guienne, the Count of -Chalons, one of the best and starkest knights of -his age, sent a friendly message to request the -favour of being allowed to break a lance with him. -Edward, though he had been repeatedly warned -of plots against his life by those who had designs -on his French dominions, and though as a king -he had a perfect right to decline the challenge -of a vassal, was, as we should say nowadays, too -good a sportsman to say no; but he took the -precaution of going to the knightly trysting-place -with an escort of a thousand men—in doing which -he was well justified by the fact that the Count -of Chalons was there waiting for him with about -two thousand.</p> - -<p>During the trouble which inevitably followed, the -Count of Chalons did break a lance with Edward, -but it was his own lance, and this failing, he gripped -him round the neck in the most unknightly fashion -and tried to drag him from the saddle. The Count -was a strong man, but Edward was a little stronger,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_32">32</span> -so he just sat still, and swinging his horse round, -pulled him out of the saddle instead, after which, -to put it into plain English, he gave him a sound -thrashing, and when he at length cried for quarter, -Edward, ever generous in the moment of victory, -gave him the life that he had forfeited by his -treachery, but, as a punishment, which the -coroneted scoundrel justly deserved, he compelled -him to take his sword back from the hands of a -common soldier, and so disgraced him for ever in -the eyes of his peers.</p> - -<p>It may be added that the Little Battle of Chalons, -in spite of the difference of numbers, ended in -something like a picnic for the English, after which -the king betook himself in leisurely fashion to the -throne, and the work that was waiting for him.</p> - -<p>No sooner was the crown upon his head, than -he got to his task. The Prince of Snowdon, now -calling himself Prince of Wales, had not only made -himself master of his own country, but had -pushed the war into England and reduced several -English towns, the chief of which was Shrewsbury. -Edward called upon him to restore the peace which -he had broken, and to come and do homage for his -lands. Llewelyn, in the plentitude of his pride, -told him to come and fetch him.</p> - -<p>Edward took a note of this, but waited two years -while he replenished the royal treasury by more -or less justifiable means. During this time, as -it happened, the Prince’s promised bride, Eleanor,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_33">33</span> -daughter of Earl Simon, fell into his hands. Again -and again he summoned the Prince to perform the -act of allegiance, holding his sweetheart meanwhile -as a hostage in honourable captivity.</p> - -<p>At length a fresh defiance from the Welshman -roused him to action, and Longlegs strode swiftly -across England and struck out hard and heavy. A -single blow dissipated the dream of Celtic empire -for ever. Llewelyn fled to his mountains and at -length sued for peace. By rights his life was forfeit -for rebellion, yet Edward not only forgave him but -remitted the fine of £50,000 which he had imposed -on the Welsh chieftains, and then invited Llewelyn -to his court and married him with all due pomp and -circumstance to the daughter of his old enemy—from -which it will be seen that Edward Longlegs, -like William the Norman, and indeed all good and -capable empire-makers, was a gentleman.</p> - -<p>Unhappily, Llewelyn repaid the kindness and -courtesy by new rebellion, which ended, as it -deserved, in disaster. Merlin had prophesied that, -when money was made round, a Welsh prince -should be crowned in London. During this last -revolt Edward had caused round halfpence and -farthings to be coined. When it was over the -head of Llewelyn was sent to London and crowned -with a garland of ivy on Tower Hill.</p> - -<p>What Longlegs had thus done with Wales he -sought by more devious and less effective means -to do with Scotland. The dispute between Balliol<span class="pagenum" id="Page_34">34</span> -and Bruce gave him the opportunity of intervention, -and of this the dismal results are too well known to -need detailed description at this time of day.</p> - -<p>Here, again, we have nothing to do with personal -right or wrong, or with the ethics of national independence. -The business of empire-making is too -urgent to wait for matters of this kind. It would -perhaps have been better if Edward, after the sack -and slaughter of Berwick, had hurled the whole -weight of the English power against the object of -his attack, as William the Norman would have -done, and once and for all crushed the opposition -into impotence.</p> - -<p>It would have been bitter and bloody work, as -the work of empire-making is apt to be, but the -end might have justified the means. Certainly -some centuries of bloodshed and bitterness would -have been saved. The high ideal of a United -Kingdom would have been realised nearly five -hundred years earlier, and the progress of both -realms in civilisation, wealth, and power might -have been quickened immeasurably.</p> - -<p>And after all, neither side in the long struggle -would have lost anything worthy of being weighed -against the greatness of the gain to both. There -would have been no Stirling Bridge, but then -there would have been no Falkirk; no Bannockburn, -but also no Flodden Field. All this, as it -happens, however, was not written in the Book of -Destiny, and so it does not concern us here, since<span class="pagenum" id="Page_35">35</span> -we have to consider how much of the work of -empire-making Edward did, not what he failed to -do or left undone.</p> - -<p>The surrender of Stirling in 1305 apparently -completed the conquest of Scotland, and Edward -was for the time being the actual and undisputed -sovereign of the whole country from the Pentland -Firth to the English Channel, and it is probable -that the conquest would have been a permanent -one but for the entrance of another power into -the field, and this was nothing less than the -English Baronage itself. It was as though the -chiefs of his own army had turned against him, -and, in the fatal dispute which followed, Robert -the Bruce saw his opportunity, and in the end -re-won for Scotland that independence which has -cost her so much and which, however precious as -a matter of sentiment, was destined to prove of -so little value to her.</p> - -<p>All that is past and done with now, but still no -one who holds that an empire is greater than a -nation, even as the whole is greater than its part, -can help looking back with regretful thoughts upon -those pages of our history which would have been -so much brighter and more glorious if those gallant -Scots who fought through those long and bitter wars -could have stood, as they have done since, side by -side with their brothers of the South, and so made -possible centuries ago the beginning of that great -work in which they have borne so splendid a part.</p> - -<p>Had that been so Edward Longlegs might have -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">36</span> -been the founder instead of only one of the makers -of the British Empire, and that last piteous scene -by the sandy shores of the Solway Firth would -never have been enacted.</p> - -<p>But though in the end he neither conquered -Scotland nor founded the United Kingdom, he -did something else which, as the centuries went -by, proved but little less important, for he began -to make the British Constitution.</p> - -<p>Gallant soldier and great general as he was, he -was perhaps an even greater statesman. He saw -far ahead of his times, too far indeed, for in his -enlightened conviction that in the matter of taxation -“what touched all should be allowed of all” -we have the real reason for that revolt of the -Baronage, which made a United Kingdom of the -Fourteenth Century an impossibility.</p> - -<p>Yet as law-maker he did work which lasted -longer than that which he did on the battle-field. -Like William the Norman, he was a stark man -who knew how to get himself obeyed, and order, -no matter how dearly bought, was the first thing -to be got, and he got it. He could “make a -wilderness and call it peace,” as he did over and -over again with Wales and Scotland—and, indeed, -to him a wilderness was better than a place where -disorder dwelt—but he also made another peace -within his own realms which was the first forerunner -of that which we enjoy to-day. The laws<span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">37</span> -which he made were for rich and poor, great and -small, alike. The hand that was pitiless in -destruction was also ready and strong to protect.</p> - -<p>The manner of his death is as characteristic as -any of the acts, good or bad, of his life. Old -and weak and sick, he made the long journey from -Westminster to the Solway to fulfil the oath which -he had sworn at the knighting of his unworthy son -to avenge Bruce’s murder of Comyns and to punish -his rebellion.</p> - -<p>Too feeble to keep the saddle, he was carried -in a litter at the head of the hundred thousand -men who were to be the instruments of his -vengeance, but at length the news of victory after -victory won by the Bruce stung him to a fury which -for the time was stronger than his weakness, and at -Carlisle the old warrior left his litter and once more -mounted his charger. It is a pathetic sight even -when looked at through the mists of the intervening -centuries. We can picture the gallant struggle that -he must have made to sit his horse upright and to -bear without fainting the weight of the armour that -was oppressing his disease-worn and weary limbs. -The mailed hand which had struck the great -Count of Chalons down could not now even draw -the sword that hung useless at his side.</p> - -<p>Only one thing remained strong in the man who -had once been the very incarnation of strength. -His inflexible will was still unbroken and unswerving -in its devotion to the great ideal and master-project<span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">38</span> -of his life. Had that will had its way, the -flood of English strength and valour that was rolling -slowly behind him would have burst in a torrent of -death and desolation over the war-wasted fields of -southern Scotland, and there can be but little doubt -as to what the end would have been.</p> - -<p>But it was not to be. The Spectre Horseman -was already riding by his side, and, like the wine -from a cracked goblet, the dregs of his once splendid -strength ebbed away. At last the skeleton hand -was outstretched, and he who had never been unhorsed -by mortal foe was stricken from the saddle. -Yet even then the proud spirit refused to yield. -He took his place in the litter again. With almost -dying lips he ordered the army forward; and, though -the end was very near, he did not submit without a -struggle, pathetic in its hopeless heroism, to conquer -even Death itself and carry out his purpose in spite -of the King of Terrors. Die he must, and that -soon, but his spirit should live after him and he -would still lead his army.</p> - -<p>“Bury me not till you have conquered Scotland!” -were almost the last words he spoke. Though they -were disobeyed and Scotland was never conquered, -yet they were well worthy of the iron-hearted man -who said them.</p> -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">39</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="III">III<br /> - -<i>THE QUEEN’S LITTLE PIRATE</i><br /> - -<span class="subhead">“<i>THE MASTER-THIEF OF THE NEW WORLD</i>”</span></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_41">41</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">III<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">THE QUEEN’S LITTLE PIRATE</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="firstword">Another</span> couple of centuries with a few -added years have slipped away, and the -next scene of the slowly-unfolding drama opens on -the sea instead of the land. The Idea which -Edward of the Long Legs had so clearly conceived -and so very nearly realised, the idea that the -frontiers of the United Kingdom of which he -had dreamt should be its sea-coasts has all the -time been growing and deepening, for, like all -ideas which faithfully reflect some fact in the -universe, it could not die, and was bound some -day to become a fact itself.</p> - -<p>Politically, England and Scotland were still independent -kingdoms, but many old differences had -been forgotten and forgiven, and they had come a -great deal closer, as it was fitting that they should -do on the eve of their final union. Moreover, they -were one in their dread and hatred of that cruel -and implacable Colossus which, with one foot on -the East and the other on the West, bestrode<span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">42</span> -the world, drawing vast treasures from hidden El -Dorados with which it built countless ships, and -hired and armed innumerable men for the enslavement -of mankind. For now we have reached -those “spacious times of great Elizabeth,” when -that lusty young giant of Liberty, recently born -into the world, was girding on his armour, and -making him ready to grapple with the powers of -oppression and darkness which were just then most -fitly incarnated in the shape of Spain.</p> - -<p>It is almost impossible for us of the present day -to understand clearly what the Spain of those days -was. She was the first naval and military Power -in the world, her ships and armies were everywhere, -her wealth was honestly believed to be illimitable, -and moreover she was the recognised champion -of the Catholic Church, whose spiritual thunders -mingled with the roar of her guns, and which -supplemented the terror of her arms by all the -diabolical enginry of torture and the awful powers -of the Holy Office.</p> - -<p>The world, in short, was on the eve of great and -marvellous doings—on the one hand so terrible in -their deadly earnestness and tremendous consequences, -and on the other so fantastically splendid -in their almost superhuman daring and undreamt-of -rewards, that it looked as though the Fates were -preparing some gigantic miracle wherewith to -astound mankind. And so, in sober truth, they -were, and the miracle about to be wrought was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">43</span> -the making of what we now call the British -Empire.</p> - -<p>In the beginning of the latter half of the sixteenth -century there was a yellow-haired, blue-eyed, -round-faced and sturdily-built youngster sailing to -and fro as ship’s boy in a tiny cockle-shell of a -craft plying with the humbler kinds of merchandise -between the Thames and the coasts of France and -Flanders. Whether or not he had heard any of -those wondrous stories which the western gales -were wafting across the Atlantic from the golden -Spanish Main we do not know, but probably he -had, and, like many another sailor-lad of his day, -he had dreamt wild dreams of blue seas and bright -skies, of white-walled cities crammed with gold, and -of stately galleons staggering across that mysterious -sea stuffed to the deck with the treasures they were -bringing to pour into the coffers of the King of Spain.</p> - -<p>And yet, wild as these dreams may have been, -they would have been commonplace in comparison -with the bewildering exploits with which this same -blue-eyed sailor-lad was one day to realise and -excel them. For this was he whose name the -mariners of Spain were soon to hear shrieked out -by the voice of the tempest, booming in the roar -of guns, and echoing through the crash of battle. -This, in a word, was Francis Drake—El Draque, -the Dragon, child and servant of the Devil himself, -Scourge of the Church and Plunderer of the -Faithful.</p> - -<p>As I say, he may or may not have heard the -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">44</span> -story of the Golden West, but it is quite certain -that he did hear much of the black and terrible -tales which the refugees and exiles from France and -the Netherlands had to tell, for not a few of them -crossed over in the little barque in which he served, -and he could not fail to hear what they had to say -of the murders and massacres, the torturing and -outrage with which Spain was disgracing her -knightly fame and her ancient faith. They are -horrible enough for us to read even here in the -security which that gallant struggle won for us, -and now when we can only hear the shrieks of -the tortured and the groans of the dying echoing -faintly across the gulf of three centuries; but what -must they have been to Francis Drake when he -heard them told by those whose eyes had only just -before looked upon the hideous reality—perhaps -indeed by some of those racked and mutilated unfortunates -who had managed to escape with their -lives to seek the sheltering hospitality of Gloriana -the Queen? Was it any wonder that deep down -in his boyish heart there were planted those seeds -of hate and horror which later on were to bear such -terrible fruit?</p> - -<p>The lad Francis seems to have performed his -duties as ship’s boy as well as he did everything -else, whether it was leading the Queen’s ships to -harry the coast of Spain or raging and storming -through one of his piratical raids among the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_45">45</span> -Fortunate Isles of the West, for when his master -died he made him his heir, and so Francis became -a trader on his own account. For a few years he -was just a peaceful shipmaster, making an honest -and hard-won living; but all this time events were -arranging themselves in more and more martial -array, and the bursting of the storm was not very -far off.</p> - -<p>The actual fighting did not begin in the guise of -recognised warfare for a very considerable time. -Spain and England were at peace, each trying to -humbug the other, but between Protestant and -Catholic it was otherwise. Armed cruisers manned -by angry Protestants made their appearance in the -Narrow Seas, and whenever they got a chance fell -upon Catholic ships and avenged the sufferings of -their fellow-heretics in a fashion at once prompt -and pitiless, and this at length so exasperated -Philip that he closed his ports to English trade, and -Drake’s occupation was gone. Better, in truth, had -it been for Philip if he had left him undisturbed in -his business!</p> - -<p>He sold his little vessel, went to Plymouth, and -entered the service of two kinsmen of his, one of -whom was soon to prove somewhat of an empire-maker -in his own line and whose name, with -certain others soon to be mentioned, was destined -to go down to everlasting fame indissolubly linked -with that of Francis Drake. This was Captain -John Hawkins, and when the young trader reached<span class="pagenum" id="Page_46">46</span> -Plymouth he had just come back with a shipload -of gold and other precious things from his first -venture in slave-trading, and now at least Drake, -who was still a lad in his teens, must have heard -something of the wonders of El Dorado. Yet, -curiously enough, when Captain Hawkins went -back he did not go with him. He sailed instead, -as a sort of supercargo, in another of Hawkins’ -ships to Biscay, and there a momentous revelation -awaited him, as though to guide him on the path -of his destiny.</p> - -<p>At San Sebastian about a score of English -sailors, once strong and stalwart men of Devon, -crept out of the dungeons of the Inquisition and -took passage with him home. King Philip had -taken off his embargo now, and these men were -the remnant of the crew of a Plymouth ship which -he had seized in port when the embargo was laid -on. The others had rotted to death during the six -months that he had bestowed his hospitality upon -them. We can imagine what talks they had on -the way home, and no doubt El Draque bore the -stories of these forlorn mariners well in mind on -that most memorable day when he “singed the -King of Spain’s beard” at Cadiz.</p> - -<p>John Hawkins came back from his second voyage -richer than ever, and now all the mariners of the -South Coast were beginning to dream golden -dreams which were soon to become yet more -golden deeds, and King Philip, to whom all such<span class="pagenum" id="Page_47">47</span> -ventures were the flattest piracy, began to fear for -his monopoly and instructed his ambassador in -London to drop the hint that foreign trade with -the Indies was forbidden, upon which, foolishly -enough, or perhaps not knowing their own true -strength, Queen Bess’s councillors backed down -and forbade John Hawkins to start again.</p> - -<p>He, obediently enough, stayed at home, but a -certain George Lovell got together an expedition -and slipped out to sea, westward bound. With -him went Francis Drake, at length to see for the -first time the blue waters and green shores of El -Dorado. This time, however, it proved anything -but golden for him or his companions, for they came -back with shattered ships and still worse broken -fortunes. They had drawn a blank in the great -lottery which half Europe was wanting to gamble -in.</p> - -<p>Nothing daunted, he shipped again, this time -with George Fenner, bound for Guiana. Again, -financially speaking, the voyage ended in disaster, -but there was one incident in it destined to bear -good fruit. A big Portuguese galleasse, backed up -by six gunboats, tried to enforce the prohibition -against foreign trade. Fenner had one ship and a -pinnace, and with these he fought the “Portugals” -and thoroughly convinced them by the logic of shot -and steel that he was not the sort of man to be -prohibited from doing anything he wanted to do.</p> - -<p>This forgotten action is really one of great importance.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_48">48</span> -It was Francis Drake’s first taste of -fighting, which in itself means a good deal, but it -was also the beginning of that lordly and magnificent -contempt which the English mariners of that -day were soon to feel for all enemies, no matter -how strong they might seem. It was this spirit -which a few years later was to take Sir Richard -Grenville</p> - -<p class="p1 b1 center">“With his hundred men on deck and his ninety sick below,”</p> - -<p class="in0">into the midst of the fifty-three Spanish ships -which he fought for an afternoon and a night before -he surrendered so sorely against his will and fell -dead of his wounds on the deck of the Spanish -flagship. It was this, too, which, when that long -seven days’ fight against the Armada was raging -and roaring up the Channel, brought the flag of -the Spanish Rear-Admiral down with a run just -because the Little Pirate stamped his foot on the -deck of that same <i>Revenge</i> and said that he was -Francis Drake and had no time to parley.</p> - -<p>Meanwhile the rumblings of the war-storm in -Europe had been growing louder. The Netherlanders -were at last turning on their torturers, -Darnley had been murdered and Mary Queen of -Scots put in prison, so Gloriana, feeling herself -somewhat at leisure, took a hand in the next -buccaneering expedition. It may be noted here, -by the way, that there was no more ardent -buccaneer and slave-trader in her dominions than<span class="pagenum" id="Page_49">49</span> -Good Queen Bess herself. She lent ships though -she withheld her commission, and her pirates did -the rest. If disaster overtook them or if the -Spanish Minister raged against their doings she -promptly disowned them and felt sorry for her ships. -But if they came back happily filled to the hatches -with plundered treasure, she took her dividends and -lent more ships.</p> - -<p>It was thus with the expedition which sailed out -of Plymouth on October 2, 1567, under the command -of Admiral John Hawkins, whose second -officer was Francis Drake. The diplomacy of the -times called it the trading venture of Sir William -Garrard and Co., but for all that there were two -ships of the Royal Navy in it, the <i>Jesus</i> and the -<i>Minion</i>, and the merchandise it carried consisted -mainly of cannon and small arms, powder and shot, -and cold steel.</p> - -<p>The voyage began with a slave-raiding expedition -down the Portuguese coast of Africa, whence -with five hundred slaves they crossed to the -Spanish Main. Here, after varying fortunes, they -filled their ships with treasure, and Hawkins turned -his prows northward for home. But while crossing -the mouth of the Gulf of Mexico a furious hurricane -burst upon them and drove his gold-and-pearl-laden -vessels so far into it, that he came to the -bold decision to put into the Spanish port of Vera -Cruz to refit.</p> - -<p>In the harbour he found twelve great galleons<span class="pagenum" id="Page_50">50</span> -loaded with gold and silver, waiting for the convoy -to escort them to Spain. They were utterly at the -mercy of the English ships, but John Hawkins, -pirate and slave-dealer, was still an English gentleman, -so he made a solemn convention to leave the -treasure-ships alone on condition of being allowed -to refit in the harbour. Hawkins was already -known in Spain as the “Enemy of God,” and Don -Martin Enriquez, the new Governor of Mexico, -had come out with special orders to abolish him by -any means that might be found the readiest.</p> - -<p>Don Martin seems to have thought that in this -case treachery would suit best, so he signed the -convention and gave his word of honour as a -gentleman of Spain that the English ships should -be allowed to come and go unmolested. So for -three days the work of dismantling went on in -peace, and on the fourth, half-disabled as they were, -they were attacked. It was a fierce and bloody -fight, and it ended in the sinking of four galleons, -the wrecking of the Spanish flag-ship, and the -killing of five or six hundred Spaniards.</p> - -<p>But on the English side only the <i>Jesus</i>, the -<i>Minion</i>, and the <i>Judith</i> got away and, shot-shattered -and half-provisioned, began to stagger homeward -across the wide Atlantic. On the way the <i>Judith</i> -was lost, and took to the bottom with her all the -proceeds of many months of trading and fighting -and privation.</p> - -<p>So the expedition came back poorer than it went,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_51">51</span> -and Spain laughed aloud, but, as will be seen, somewhat -too soon. Drake got home first, and no -sooner did he land at Plymouth than he took horse -for London. It so happened that a little while -before Spanish ships carrying a huge amount of -money to pay Alva’s army in the Netherlands, had -been driven into the Thames by the Protestant -rovers lately mentioned, and Gloriana, who never -liked to let a good thing go, had held on to it on -one pretext or another until Drake came hot-footed -and angry-hearted to tell of the treachery of Vera -Cruz.</p> - -<p>Gloriana wanted nothing better. Her buccaneering -venture had been a failure and here was a way -of paying herself for the two ships she had risked, -so she turned upon the Spanish Ambassador and -told him point blank that until the injury done to -her “honest merchants” was redressed she would -hold the treasure in pledge. Naturally after that -not a groat of it ever got to Alva or his soldiers.</p> - -<p>That year, which was 1569, Drake went to -Rochelle with Sir Thomas Wynter. The next -summer he married Mary Newman, and a month -or two later he was again steering to the westward -in two little vessels, the <i>Dragon</i> and the <i>Swan</i>. -The next year he went again, with the <i>Swan</i> alone, -and this time he came back with a certain idea in -his head which was magnificent to the point of -absurdity. The adventures of the last two or three -years had deepened his contempt for Spanish<span class="pagenum" id="Page_52">52</span> -prowess, and now he laughingly proposed to go -back, not to kill the goose that laid the King of -Spain’s golden eggs, but to rifle the nest in which -they were deposited. This was Nombre de Dios, -the strongest city in the New World, and the -richest to boot.</p> - -<p>The means employed were, as was usual in this -age of wonders, ridiculously inadequate to the end -to which they were devoted. Of late years certain -bold mariners have sought to win an ephemeral -notoriety by crossing the Atlantic in open boats. -Francis Drake set out on a serious and momentous -expedition to the Spanish Main in the <i>Pasha</i> of 70 -tons followed by the <i>Swan</i> of 25—that is to say in -a couple of fishing-boats. These two cockle-shells -were manned by seventy-three men all told, only -one of whom had reached the age of thirty. It -must have looked more like a parcel of lads going -afloat on a holiday spree than an expedition with -which all the world was soon to ring.</p> - -<p>There is no space here to tell of all that befel -these absurd adventurers on their devious and -tedious way to Nombre de Dios, though no -romancer ever imagined such a story as their -adventures make. So it must suffice to say that -on July 29th he started out across the Isthmus of -Darien at the head of seventy-three men to attack -a strong city as big as Plymouth, and with these -he actually fought his way into the town, established -himself in the centre of it and held it for some hours.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_53">53</span></p> - -<div id="ip_53" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_053.jpg" width="1200" height="2002" alt="" /><div class="caption">THEY CARRIED HIM DOWN TO THE BOATS.</div></div> - -<p>If his men had been the seasoned buccaneers of -his later raids he would probably have taken it -altogether, but they unhappily found in the Governor’s -house a stack of silver bars twelve feet high, -ten feet broad, and seventy feet long. This was a -little too much for the nerves of the Devon boys, -but Drake would not let them touch it, since the -town was not yet theirs. Then a fearful rain-storm -came on just about dawn and put out their matches -and ruined their bow-strings, and then a terrible -misfortune happened. Drake had been severely -wounded in the leg, but he had concealed his hurt -until the supreme moment came, and then, as he -was leading his handful of heroes to the last attack, -he went down with his boot full of blood. Something -very like a panic now took his men, not for -their own sakes but for his. In vain he stormed at -them, and cried angrily:</p> - -<p>“I have brought you to the door of the Treasure-house -of the World! Will ye be fools enough to -go away empty?”</p> - -<p>“Your life is more precious to us and England -than all the gold of the Indies!” they replied, and -so by kindly force they carried him down to the -boats and rowed away, having accomplished perhaps -the most splendid failure in history.</p> - -<p>The fame of this exploit instantly echoed through -the whole Spanish Main and thence across the -Atlantic to Europe. A few days later he avenged -his failure at Nombre de Dios by cutting a big ship<span class="pagenum" id="Page_54">54</span> -out from under the guns of Cartagena. Then he -vanished, leaving no other trace behind him than -the poor little abandoned <i>Swan</i>. For the next few -months nothing was seen of him, though his hand -was felt far and wide along the coast. Spanish -store-ships disappeared, dispatch boats were intercepted, -and coast-towns were raided with bewildering -rapidity and effectiveness.</p> - -<p>But all this time the deadly tropical fever was -playing havoc with his little handful of men. His -brother John died of it, and man after man was -struck down till at last, out of the seventy-three -who had sailed with him from Plymouth, he could -only muster eighteen fighting men when he at -length started to plunder the mule-train from -Panama.</p> - -<p>On the fourth day of the journey a very memorable -thing happened, for that noon he reached the -top of the dividing ridge of the Isthmus, and lo! -there before him, only a few miles away, lay the -smooth, shining expanse of the Pacific Ocean, that -long-hidden, jealously-guarded sea on which his -were the first English eyes that had ever gazed. -He did just what such a man would have done in -such circumstances. He fell on his knees and, raising -his hands to heaven, cried aloud:</p> - -<p>“Almighty God, of Thy goodness, give me life -and leave once to sail an English ship on yonder -sea!”</p> - -<p>Years afterwards the prayer was granted, and not<span class="pagenum" id="Page_55">55</span> -only did he sail on the Golden Sea, but crossed it -while he was making the first voyage that an -Englishman ever made round the world.</p> - -<p>Were I writing a book instead of an essay I -could tell of the plundering of the mule-trains, of -the taking of Vera Cruz—where, to the astonishment -of the Spaniards, he would not allow a single -woman or an unarmed man to be hurt—and Nombre -de Dios, which did not resist him so well the second -time. It must, however, be enough to say that -this time everything ended happily for the remnant -that survived, and that on Sunday morning, August -9, 1573, while the good folks of Plymouth were -in church, they heard a roar of artillery from the -batteries followed by an answering salute from the -sea and, straightway quitting their devotions, they -ran out to learn the good news that Gloriana’s -Little Pirate had come back safe at last and well -loaded up with plunder.</p> - -<p>His next venture was nothing less than that -famous voyage of his round the world, with the -fairy-story of which we have here nothing to do -save to say that the fame of it, no less than the -enormous treasure, the plunder of a hundred ships -and a score of towns, with which the poor sea-worn, -worm-eaten, wind-weary <i>Golden Hind</i>, staggered -one Michaelmas morning into Plymouth -Sound, at last convinced Queen Bess that in her -dear Little Pirate—whom, by the way, she had -never yet openly recognised—she had a champion<span class="pagenum" id="Page_56">56</span> -who was worth a good many thousands of King -Philip’s soldiers and sailors.</p> - -<p>But now the first of Drake’s open rewards was -to be his. The <i>Golden Hind</i> was hauled on to the -slips at Deptford, and Gloriana and her court dined -on board. When the dinner was over she bade her -Little Pirate kneel before her, touched him on the -shoulder with his own sword and bade him rise -Sir Francis Drake. The Spaniards, by the way, -had another title for him, no less honourable in his -eyes, and this was “the Master-Thief of the New -World.”</p> - -<p>For some considerable time nothing happened -beyond the failure of one or two trifling expeditions—which -failure was Gloriana’s fault, and not -Drake’s—and the setting of a price of £40,000 by -favour of the King of Spain on the Little Pirate’s -head—an investment of which Drake was soon to -pay the dividend in the craft-crowded harbour of -Cadiz.</p> - -<p>Meanwhile, matters between England and Spain -were going from bad to worse. For a few months -unscrupulous intrigue, backed up by wholesale -lying, hampered Drake most sorely in the preparation -of that great work which was nothing less -than the establishment of the sea-power of England. -Everything that the fickleness of his mistress, the -weathercock support of so-called friends at court, -and the still more dangerous machinations of -English statesmen in the pay of Spain could do,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_57">57</span> -was done. The fleet, to his unutterable rage and -disgust, was even placed on a peace-footing, despite -the fact that the noise of the Armada’s -preparations was still sounding across the Narrow -Seas.</p> - -<p>But at last, by some means or other, a certain -Spanish spy had got himself suspected and -stretched on the rack. Now the rack, as an aid to -cross-examination, is not an ideal instrument, but it -certainly served its purpose this time, for the spy in -his torment gave away all the details of a vast -scheme which embraced an alliance between -France, Spain, and Scotland, together with a -general Catholic uprising in England, which was to -take place simultaneously with the Triple Invasion.</p> - -<p>Never had England, and with her the cause of -liberty, stood in such great and deadly peril. -Gloriana at last flung diplomatic dalliance to the -winds, stopped her lying and chicanery, kicked the -Spanish Ambassador out of the country, and let her -Little Pirate loose. Yet even now there was -another lull before the storm, and this lull Philip -took advantage of to invite a fleet of English corn-ships -to his ports, where he seized them to feed -that ever-growing sea-monster which he was going -to pit against El Draque.</p> - -<p>This settled the matter. Drake, only half ready -for sea, put out with every ship that could move for -fear more orders would come to stop him and, with -an insolent assurance which augured well for the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_58">58</span> -great things that he was about to do, actually ran -his ships into Vigo Bay and forced the Spanish -Governor to allow him to finish his preparations in -Spanish waters. Then he turned his eager prows -westward, stopping on the way at the Cape Verde -Islands to lay waste Vera Cruz and make Santiago -a heap of ashes.</p> - -<p>Five years before young William Hawkins had -been taken prisoner here and burnt alive with -several of his crew, and this was El Draque’s way -of wiping out the old score.</p> - -<p>Then he sped on again, spent Christmas at Santa -Dominica, refitted his ships and refreshed his men, -and then fell like a thunderbolt on the famous city -of Santo Domingo, the oldest in the Indies, -founded by Columbus himself and ruled over by -his brother. It was this that the Little Pirate had -been preparing for during those other mysterious -voyages of his. The blow was as crushing as it -was unexpected, and the prestige of Spain in the -West never recovered from it. The town was -utterly stripped and dismantled by the victors. -Fifty thousand pounds in cash, two hundred and -forty guns of all calibres, and an immense amount -of other spoil was brought away, and the whole -fleet, after living at free quarters for a month, sailed -southward, completely refitted and re-victualled, as -usual, at the Spaniards’ expense.</p> - -<p>When the news got to Europe, it was said that -Philip had had “such a cooling as he had never<span class="pagenum" id="Page_59">59</span> -had since he was King of Spain.” It is both -interesting and instructive to learn that not the -least part of the booty took the shape of a hundred -English sailors who were found toiling as slaves in -the Spanish galleys.</p> - -<p>Reinforced by these, Gloriana’s Little Pirate -crossed the Caribbean Sea and fell on Cartagena, -the capital of the Spanish Main, and now the -richest city in the Indies. Paralysed by the insolence -of the attack, it soon fell under its fury and -real strength. The booty was enormous, but the -moral effect was still greater. The new-born sea-power -of England had vindicated itself with triumphant -suddenness, and Drake, having picked up the -unfortunate remnants of Raleigh’s colony in -Virginia—the time for colonising not having come -yet—entered Plymouth Sound again in the <i>Elizabeth -Bonaventura</i> at the head of his loot-laden fleet, and -reported his arrival, piously regretting that on the -way home he had missed the Spanish plate-fleet by -twelve hours “for reasons best known to God.”</p> - -<p>“A great gap hath been opened which is very -little to the King of Spain’s liking,” was the Little -Pirate’s own comment on the brilliant achievement -which had ushered a new power into the -world. He might also have put it another way, -and said that with his well-directed shot he had -plugged the source whence flowed the golden -stream of Spanish wealth, for indeed it was -nothing less than this. The Spanish Colossus<span class="pagenum" id="Page_60">60</span> -suddenly found itself with empty pockets, Spanish -credit was ruined at a single blow, the Bank of -Seville closed its doors, and when King Philip tried -to raise a loan of half a million ducats, he was -flatly refused.</p> - -<p>How hard hit he was may be seen from the fact -that instead of hurling the whole strength of his -laboriously-prepared Armada on the English coasts, -he asked for explanations. Gloriana, with an -almost splendid mendacity, disowned her Little -Pirate once more and swore she had nothing whatever -to do with him. But this Drake expected, and -went on with his own plans, having no doubt -honestly paid up the Queen’s full share of the -plunder.</p> - -<p>A few months more of diplomatic dodgery followed, -and then came the final opening of Gloriana’s -eyes. A letter stolen from the Pope’s own cabinet -proved to her beyond all possibility of doubt that -the Great Armada was intended for the invasion of -England and nothing else. Then she called her -Little Pirate to her again and took counsel with -him, with the result that the next time he hoisted -his flag he did so on board the great <i>Merchant -Royal</i> at the head of twenty-three sail including -five battleships, two first-class cruisers, seven -second-class, and about a dozen gunboats. Nor -did he go this time as the Queen’s licensed pirate -but as her Admiral of the Fleet, duly commissioned -in her name to burn, sink, and destroy, and to use<span class="pagenum" id="Page_61">61</span> -all means whatever to prevent the various divisions -of the Armada coming together.</p> - -<p>Even now, at the last minute of the eleventh -hour, treachery almost did its work, for there was -an Opposition and Peace-at-any-price Party in those -days, as there has been in later ones. Drake seems -to have known what was coming, for, when the -Queen’s messenger dashed into Plymouth bearing -the fatal orders, he had gone.</p> - -<p>Happily there was no telegraph in those days. If -there had been it would probably have proved the -ruin of England and the triumph of Spain. As it was -the next news that came was from Drake himself, -telling, laconically as usual, how he had “singed the -King of Spain’s beard in Cadiz.” When the facts -came out, the said singeing was seen to amount to -the destruction by burning and sinking of 12,000 -tons of shipping, including some of the finest -ships of war that floated. The whole English -fleet had, as had now become the custom on such -occasions, been revictualled at Spanish expense, -and four large ships full of provisions were captured -intact.</p> - -<p>From Cadiz the triumphant Admiral raged up -and down the terror-stricken coast, storming strongholds, -and burning and scuttling the store-ships of -the Great Armada. He went to Lisbon, where -Santa Cruz, said to be the greatest sea-captain in -Europe, lay, and, after vainly challenging him to -come out and fight, politely offered to convoy him<span class="pagenum" id="Page_62">62</span> -and his fleet to England “if by chance his course -should lie that way.” The fact was that the Colossus -was paralysed. Drake had struck out straight at its -heart, and so doing had proved two principles of no -small moment to the making of the British Empire: -first, the true frontiers of a maritime nation are its -enemies’ coasts; second, the only effective method -of defence for such a nation is attack.</p> - -<p>It was on his way home from this expedition, -storm-shattered and disgusted at missing the Plate-Fleet, -which had once more slipped through his -fingers, that Gloriana’s Little Pirate took the richest -prize of his life. This was the <i>San Felipe</i>. She -was the King of Spain’s own treasure-ship, and -she came, not from the West, but from the East. -Though he knew it not, Drake had that day done a -very great thing for England and the making of -her Empire, for not only did the <i>San Felipe</i> carry -treasure and rich stuffs to the value of something -like a million and a quarter of our money, but she -had on board dispatches, letters, and account-books -which let the English merchants into all the secrets -of Spain’s East Indian trade, and led to the almost -instant formation of the Honourable East India -Company, itself an Empire-Maker of no small -account.</p> - -<p>The epic of the Elizabethan era was now beginning -to hurry towards its climax. But Gloriana was -still surrounded by traitors, and even now temporising -was the order of the day. She was cast<span class="pagenum" id="Page_63">63</span> -down by remorse for the execution of Mary Queen -of Scots, and she even reprimanded her Little -Pirate for doing her too good service, and told -Philip that he was in disgrace for exceeding instructions.</p> - -<p>It was in vain that Drake and the other friends -of England prayed and entreated and stormed and -swore. In vain they pointed across the Narrow -Seas to Parma in the Netherlands at the head of -30,000 of the finest troops in Europe, and to the -ports of Spain and Portugal, once more swarming -with shipping and echoing with the noise of warlike -preparations. For a time the liars and traitors had -things their own way again. Drake and Howard -implored her to let them get their ships fitted and -go and fight the Armada in its own ports. No, she -would do nothing. And she did nothing till at last -arrived that fatal evening on <span class="locked">which—</span></p> - -<p class="p1 b1 center">“There came a gallant merchant-ship full sail to Plymouth Bay.”</p> - -<p>Golden weeks and priceless opportunities had -been wasted by the fatal lethargy of the Court. -Drake and Howard, instead of falling, as they -longed to do, on the wind-bound Armada in Vigo -Bay, and doing with it as Drake had done at Cadiz, -were kept on the defensive, straining like bloodhounds -at the leash, knowing that every moment -that the good wind lasted was heavily fraught with -fate for England and perhaps the world.</p> - -<p>At length the wind went round, and Drake, marvelling<span class="pagenum" id="Page_64">64</span> -in angry wonder “how God could have sent -a south-west wind just then,” found himself baffled -and beaten back, while Medina-Sidonia with his -released Armada sailed triumphantly for the -Channel. There was only one thing now to do -if England was to be saved. Valour and heroism, -self-devotion and skill, must repair the damage -that treason, lying, and weakness of head or heart -had done. By this time the Armada should have -been a crushed and tangled mass of burning wreckage, -and so it would have been if Drake had had -his way, and now here it was stronger than ever, -its ships covering the hitherto Inviolate Sea; and -there was Parma, with his transports still undestroyed, -only waiting to join hands with Sidonia to -once for all strangle the Heretic in their pitiless -grip.</p> - -<p>In the mighty and memorable fight that followed, -our Little Pirate commanded on his own ship, the -immortal <i>Revenge</i>. With almost incredible labour -and skill the English fleet was somehow worked -and warped out to the westward until, when -that famous Sunday morning dawned, the sun -looked, as has been truly said, upon a sight -glorious for England. There was the great Armada, -crescent-shaped, rolling up the Channel, -and there, right in the wind’s eye and on its rear, -were two English squadrons, and a third was gallantly -advancing out of Plymouth.</p> - -<p>This one, with true Elizabethan insolence, steered<span class="pagenum" id="Page_65">65</span> -right across the front of the huge fleet, firing into -such of the Dons as came within range. Then it -went about, and joined the other English ships to -windward.</p> - -<p>Every one has read of the long, running, seven-day -fight that followed; every one knows how the little, -light-heeled English ships ran in and out among -the great unwieldy galleons, tempting them out of -their formation, and, having isolated one, fell on her -like a pack of dogs on a wolf; and how, in spite of -all that the English Admiral and his captains could -do, the ever-changing wind and the ever-succeeding -calms so helped the Spaniards, that in the end they -reached the Straits of Dover but little worse off than -they started.</p> - -<p>If Drake could have had his way, these tactics -would have been pushed farther, and every mile of -the way would have been disputed; but Lord -Howard, though a brave man, lacked the all-daring -assurance of the conqueror of Santo Domingo -and Cartagena. He would not fight until he -had joined with Seymour and Wynter in the -Straits. So it came about that on the seventh -day—that is to say, Saturday afternoon—the Great -Armada, the poorer only by some dozen craft that -had been captured or battered into wreck and ruin, -was sailing gloriously past Calais with the French -and English land well in sight, and Dunkirk, the -trysting-place with Parma, only eighteen miles -away.</p> - -<p>England has never passed through such anxious -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_66">66</span> -hours as she did that afternoon and night. It -seemed as though, after all, her new-found sea-strength -had failed her, and that, despite all the -brilliant exploits of Gloriana’s Little Pirate in the -West, he was powerless to protect her nearer home. -What would have happened in the ordinary course -of events no one now knows, for the Spaniards, -stricken by some inexplicable madness, suddenly -altered the whole course of events by what can only -be called a freak of idiocy.</p> - -<p>Medina-Sidonia, after having accomplished the -most brilliant feat of seamanship that his age had -seen, gave orders for the Armada to anchor! A few -hours more and its work would have been done, -with what results to England one scarcely cares to -picture. So unexpected was this piece of priceless -good fortune by the English captains that they had -to drop their own anchors within range of the -Spanish guns to save entangling themselves with -the big Spanish ships.</p> - -<p>All Sunday the two fleets lay within sight of each -other; anxious councils of war were held on both -sides, and so night fell without a shot being fired -or anything done. By midnight the tide was -swirling strong and swift from the English to the -Spanish ships, and Drake was busy preparing his -crowning piece of devilry for the edification of the -Dons.</p> - -<p>At about one o’clock on that calm, moonless<span class="pagenum" id="Page_67">67</span> -morning, patches of flickering, leaping flame began -to show among the twinkling English lights, and -these grew swiftly higher and broader, and a few -minutes later the terrified Dons saw eight fire-ships -crowned mast-high with leaping flames, come reeling -and roaring into their midst.</p> - -<p>Then there was cutting of cables and slipping of -moorings, and labouring with frantic haste to get the -ships under sail. Galleon crashed into galleasse, and -galleasse into cruiser in the wild haste and fatal confusion.</p> - -<p>Marvellous to say, not a single Spanish ship took -fire, but behind the fire-craft there was something -more terrible and deadly still—El Draque and his -guns. At the supreme moment Lord Howard -weakly and foolishly turned aside to capture or -sink a disabled galleasse. If the rest of the fleet -had followed him there might have been no Battle -of Gravelines, and the Trafalgar of the Sixteenth -Century might never have been fought. But, as has -been well said, it was the hour for which Francis -Drake had been born. He set the <i>Revenge</i> on the -wind, and, followed by the rest of the squadron, bore -down in grim and ominous silence on the huddled, -entangled Dons. Within pistol range of the great -<i>San Martin</i> the <i>Revenge</i> burst into sudden thunder -and flame, and drove on enwreathed in smoke. In -her wake ship after ship came on in perfect order, -each raining her iron storm into the rent and -splintering sides of the Dons as they passed.</p> - -<p>Then from Dover way came the roar of guns -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_68">68</span> -telling that Wynter and Seymour had got to work, -and so for three hours they went at it, the Little -Pirate ever first, and revelling in the work that he -loved to do for his dear England. He had forgotten -all his mistress’s slights and fickleness, all -the harm that Court traitors had done him, all his -suffering and privation on the windless seas and -burning lands of the West. It was the hour of -England’s fate and his own, and there he was in -the thick of it, and he was happy.</p> - -<p>After three hours Howard and his laggards came -up, and the fight roared on flank and front and rear. -Although the school-books say but little about it, -there had never been such a sea-fight in the world -before, nor one on whose end such great issues -hung. The Spaniards, caught between El Draque -and the sands of Dunkirk—which to them was -something worse than being between the devil and -the deep sea—fought with all their ancient valour, -but ship after ship, as the battle roared on through -the day, went down riddled with shot or took fire -and blew up, till at length out of the forty battleships -and cruisers which Sidonia had somehow got -together to protect his rear, only sixteen were left, -and they were little better than shot-shattered, fire-blackened -hulks.</p> - -<p>The powder on both sides was nearly done, but -so too was the work of Drake and his ships. -Fathom by fathom the north-west wind was driving<span class="pagenum" id="Page_69">69</span> -the Dons on to the mud-banks of the Netherland -shore, and the Little Pirate in his well-named -<i>Revenge</i> was hanging on their weather quarter -watching—and I doubt not praying—for the -moment of their final ruin.</p> - -<p>And yet he was not to see it, for when there was -but five fathoms of water between the Spanish -keels and the Dutch mud the north-wester dropped -to a calm, a fresh south-wester sprang up in its -place, and for the fourth time in seven days the -Armada was saved from utter destruction by those -fickle winds to which a pious sentiment has ascribed -its ruin.</p> - -<p>Down went the Spanish helms, and round came -the dripping, labouring, Spanish prows, and ere -long all that was left of King Philip’s fleet was -staggering away to the northward to begin that -awful voyage round the north of Scotland and past -the wild Irish coast from which so few were to -return. Meanwhile the Little Pirate hung on to -the heels of the flying Armada for two days and -nights, until at length a tempest came rolling up -over the Dogger Bank, and he ran in for safety -under the Scottish shore, cheerfully leaving the -Dons to the winds of heaven, and the rocks that -were waiting to finish what his own guns had -begun.</p> - -<p>With the victory of Gravelines, Drake’s work as -an Empire-maker comes to an end. The expedition -to Portugal, for all its booty, was a failure and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_70">70</span> -did nothing to enhance his fame. If his advice had -been taken Spain might have been crushed and -humbled for ever, but such was the hopeless weakness -and vacillation at Court that, even after the -Armada had shown her the true designs of Philip, -Gloriana got into negotiations with him again. -Over and over again her Little Pirate besought her -to give him the means of striking the blow that -should crush Spain and make England undisputed -mistress of the seas, but it was not to be, and so at -length, sick and sore at heart, he sailed away again -to his beloved West, never to return.</p> - -<p>There is nothing in this last expedition of his -that is noteworthy save its continued misfortunes. -It seemed as though when the little <i>Revenge</i> -went down, as she did in the midst of the fifty-three -Spanish ships which she had fought “for a -day and a night,” she had taken her old commander’s -good luck down with her. At last on -the deadly island of Escudo de Veragua the two -guardian demons of El Dorado, fever and dysentry, -struck him down with many another of his men. -He lived to get away, but not for long, and six -days afterwards, when his fleet came to anchor off -Puerto Bello, the heroic Little Pirate breathed his -last and his gallant soul went to its account, passing -away from earth on the very spot that had been the -scene of his first sea-fight and his first victory.</p> -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_71">71</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="IV">IV<br /> - -<i>OLIVER CROMWELL</i><br /> - -<span class="subhead">“<i>HEALER AND SETTLER</i>”</span></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_73">73</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">IV<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">OLIVER CROMWELL</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="firstword">“He</span> is perhaps the only example which history -affords of one man having governed the -most opposite events and proved sufficient for the -most various destinies.”</p> - -<p>No man’s character was ever so completely and -so tersely summed up as the great Oliver’s is here -in these few words of a critic belonging to another -race and nation, and, as regards his varied destinies, -it may be added that no man ever was raised up -and set to work by the Controller of human destinies -as opportunely as he was.</p> - -<p>History shows no parallel to it, not even in the -oft-quoted story of Cincinnatus, and certainly in all -the long array of our rulers there is none other -whose story is so crammed with wonders or who -crowded so many notable and pregnant acts into -the busy days of a few years as this gentleman-farmer -of Huntingdonshire, who at forty-three left -his farming and vestry-meetings and the like and -girded on his sword to go and fight the good fight -of freedom, and who at fifty-two laid it aside to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_74">74</span> -prove himself as good a statesman and ruler as he -had been soldier and general.</p> - -<p>His claim to a foremost place among the Makers -of Britain is a twofold one, for he was a restorer, -a reinvigorator, as it were, of this realm, as well as -a very considerable widener of it. When the futile -and inglorious reign of “the most learned fool in -Christendom” came to an end, all the brilliant -promise of the Elizabethan age had been wofully -obscured, and the glories of the great Queen and -her pirates looked like those of a summer sun -setting behind a bank of fog.</p> - -<p>As Macaulay justly put the case: “On the day -of the accession of James I. England descended -from the rank which she had hitherto held and -began to be regarded as a Power hardly of the -second order.... He began his administration by -putting an end to the war which had raged many -years between England and Spain, and from that -time he shunned hostilities with a caution which -was proof against the insults of his neighbours and -the clamour of his subjects.”</p> - -<p>How different this from the gallant days of -Gloriana and her knights! And yet this poor -crowned and sceptred ninny aspired to be a despot -even as his son after him did. It is true that these -realms were beginning to need a despot and that -badly, but not such a one as could ever have been -born of that hopeless House of Stuart. A despot -who is a strong man may be good or evil as he uses<span class="pagenum" id="Page_75">75</span> -his opportunities and his powers, but the whole -stage of history has not yet held a despot who was -also a weak man who did not prove himself at once -a curse to his country and the world.</p> - -<p>The story of the feeble violence and silly cunning -with which Charles the First sought to enforce that -ridiculous theory of his about the Divine Right of -Kings has been too often and too variously told for -us to need to trouble with it here. There <em>is</em> a -Divine Right of Kings, as the great Oliver was -very soon to show with most unmistakable and -most unanswerable logic, but the kind of king who -really has Divine rights does not usually have them -because he is the son of his father, and especially of -such a father as James the First of England and -Sixth of Scotland.</p> - -<p>Our present concern is with the fact that this -Empire of ours, in a most critical state of its process -of making which came very near to one of unmaking, -was saved and transformed from weakness -to strength by the substitution of the real despotism -of the Lord Protector from the sham or histrionic -despotism of Charles the First.</p> - -<p>The fact was that the body-corporate of this -infant empire was assailed by the worst of all -national disorders, internal disintegration. England, -the very heart and centre of it, was about to be rent -in twain by the frenzied and pitiless talons of civil -war, and that is a war in which the right side—which, -of course, is always the best side—must<span class="pagenum" id="Page_76">76</span> -not only win, but utterly crush and pulverise the -other unless wreck and chaos irretrievable are to -follow.</p> - -<p>This was the central idea that the Great Oliver -grasped just as Edward of the Long Legs had -grasped his brilliantly premature idea of the United -Kingdom. He was the latest of that series of iron-handed -men that had begun with William the -Norman. The watchword of his whole public life -was “healing and settling.” The wounds of his -country had to be healed and its disorders settled, -no matter by what means, so long as it was done, -and in this deep-rooted conviction we see at a -glance his kinship with the other Empire-makers -who had gone before him.</p> - -<p>Of his early life there is little to be said, though -it is noteworthy that he was once fined £10 for -neglecting a summons to appear at the King’s -coronation and receive the honour of knighthood. -He little thought then that he would one day find -it his duty to refuse the crown and sceptre of -England.</p> - -<p>Every one who has read even the school-books -knows that when the war actually began all the -apparent advantages were on the side of the -Royalists. Though the first battles afforded the -extraordinary spectacle of mere conflicts of amateur -soldiers, few of whom had ever seen a real fight -before, the Cavaliers, trained to horsemanship and -the use of arms, and versed in all manly sports,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_77">77</span> -made far finer fighting material than the raw levies -of the Parliament. Had this difference continued -victory must have remained, as it began, with the -Royalists, with results to the nation that could -hardly have failed to be of the very worst sort. -This is what Cromwell himself says on this all-important -subject:</p> - -<p>“At my first going out into this engagement I -saw our men were beaten at every hand. Your -troops, said I, are most of them old, decayed serving-men, -and tapsters and such kind of fellows, -and, said I, their troops are gentlemen’s sons, -younger sons and persons of quality. Do you -think that the spirits of such base, mean fellows -will ever be able to encounter gentlemen that have -honour and courage and resolution in them? You -must get men of spirit and, take it not ill what I -say—I know you will not—of a spirit that is likely -to go on as far as gentlemen will go, or else you will -be beaten still.”</p> - -<p>These wise words, which, by the way, were said -to no less a man than John Hampden himself, form -a key to all the battles of the Civil War. No sooner -did Oliver come on to the field as a plain captain of -yeomanry horse than his keen, if untaught, eye instantly -recognised the one great virtue and strength -of the Royalist party. They had an Idea, a devotion, -a principle for the sake of which men were -ready to sell their lands, melt their plate, beggar -their families, and lose their own lives, and men so<span class="pagenum" id="Page_78">78</span> -equipped could only be successfully met and withstood -by men who, as he himself put it in that -quaintly eloquent phraseology of his, “made some -conscience of what they did,” and thereupon he set -himself to find such men and make soldiers of -them.</p> - -<p>How well he succeeded the following extract -from a contemporary news-letter written some ten -months after the outbreak of war will sufficiently -tell:</p> - -<p>“As for Colonel Cromwell”—promotion, it will -be seen, was somewhat rapid in those stormy days—“he -hath two thousand brave men, well disciplined. -No man swears but he pays his twelve -pence. If he be drunk he is set in the stocks, or -worse. If one calls the other Roundhead he is -cashiered; insomuch that the countries where they -come leap for joy of them and come in and join -with them. How happy it were if all the forces -were thus disciplined!”</p> - -<p>On the field of Marston Moor, Prince Rupert -nicknamed Cromwell “Old Ironsides,” and from -that day to this the most invincible troops that ever -marched to battle have been named after him. -Years afterwards, when his work and theirs was -done, their leader was able to say of them: “From -that day forward they were never beaten and -wherever they were engaged against the enemy -they beat continually.”</p> - -<p>This is literally true. Whether in skirmish or<span class="pagenum" id="Page_79">79</span> -battle, at home or abroad, whether pitted against -the disorderly chivalry of the Loyalists or the rigid -discipline of the finest Continental troops; whether -storming a breach or bearing the brunt of a half-lost -battle, these psalm-singing, hard-hitting -Crusaders of the new Church Militant not only -were never beaten, but never once failed to hurl -the enemy back in confusion and disaster.</p> - -<p>In them, in short, that stubborn English valour -which has since pushed its way all over the world -was first <em>disciplined</em>. They formed the first model -ever seen of an English regiment, a combination of -many units of strength and valour moving and -fighting as one, and the fact that “Old Ironsides” -was the first man thus to add discipline to valour is -in itself no small portion of his title to fame as an -Empire-Maker.</p> - -<p>The first occasion on which these Ironsides made -their mark in battle is one of even greater importance -than the battle itself, for it marks the entrance -on to the stage of history of the first regularly disciplined -English regiment, the parent of those who, -on a thousand fields since then, have proved themselves -worthy of their grim but splendid ancestors. -It was the first time, too, that they had a chance -to try conclusions with Rupert and his Cavaliers, -hitherto unconquered and irresistible.</p> - -<p>It was July 2, 1644, on a dull and storm-threatening -afternoon, that Cavalier and Roundhead -first met in a really serious fashion. Compared<span class="pagenum" id="Page_80">80</span> -with what was now to be done Edgehill and -all that had come after it had been trifles, for so far -the conflicts had been those of amateurs at the art -of war, each engaged, as it were, in licking the -other into shape, and the conclusion that they now -had to try was which of them had got into the best -shape. There were about four-and-twenty thousand -each of them as they stood through the anxious -hours of that summer afternoon on either side of a -ditch running across Marston Moor, each watching -for a chance to attack, but feeling, no doubt, that -the doings of the next few hours would decide an -issue which needed a certain amount of thinking -over.</p> - -<p>The two armies were drawn up upon what is -now the regulation pattern, right and left wings and -centre. Cromwell with his Ironsides on the left of -the Parliamentary army faced Rupert on the right -of the Royalists, and he was supported by the infantry -of what was then known as the Eastern -Association. The King’s centre was held by Newcastle, -and against it was the Parliamentary centre -reinforced by nine thousand Scots infantry. The -Royal left wing was composed of Goring’s cavalry -regiments and was faced by the Parliamentary right -wing under the two Fairfaxes.</p> - -<p>During the afternoon there was an exchange of -cannon shots which doesn’t seem to have done -very much harm on either side. Prince Rupert, -with his usual impetuosity, had been for some hours<span class="pagenum" id="Page_81">81</span> -wanting to get over the ditch and try conclusions -with the Ironsides, who were posted on a little -eminence amidst standing corn, and who had wiled -away the anxious hours of waiting with mutual exhortations -and psalm singing, not a little to the -amusement of Rupert and his gallant scapegraces, -who were yet to learn that these close-cropped, -grim-visaged Puritans could ride and fight a great -deal better than they could sing.</p> - -<p>The King’s older generals, no doubt contemplating -Continental etiquette, had decided that it -was too late to fight that evening and had withdrawn -to their quarters. Cromwell, laughing at -etiquette as he did at everything else that was not -of practical utility, saw his chance, jumped the ditch, -and went hot-footed and hot-handed into Rupert’s -ranks. A bullet scored his neck, and hearing some -one cry out that he was wounded he shouted: -“All’s well. A miss is as good as a mile!” and -charged on. Whether or not he was the first to -use this now favourite expression I am not able to -say, but at least it was characteristic.</p> - -<p>The charge was met in a fashion worthy of -Rupert and the gallant gentlemen who followed him, -and we learn that after the first onset the Ironsides -reeled back, but it was only for a moment. Some -Scots cavalry came up behind them, they surged -forward again, discipline and valour did their work, -and a few minutes afterwards Prince Rupert and -his merry men had met more than their match, and,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_82">82</span> -ere long, to use his own words, Colonel Cromwell -“had scattered them before him like a little dust.” -The remnants of them were chased and cut down -with a ruthless severity which was then part of the -Puritan character, almost to the gates of York, -eight miles away.</p> - -<p>But Cromwell, profiting by the mistakes which -Rupert himself had made in his headlong charges, -kept his men well in hand, and when once the -Royalist right wing was broken, led them round -to see how the battle had gone on the Parliamentary -right and centre.</p> - -<p>If he had not done so Marston Moor might have -replaced Charles Stuart on the throne of England. -Goring had broken up Fairfax’s cavalry as completely -as Oliver had broken up Rupert’s. He had -flung them back upon their infantry supports, breaking -these in turn, after which he flung himself with -the seemingly triumphant Royalists of the centre on -the Scots Infantry, taking them in flank and almost -routing them, too. Only three regiments of them -out of nine held their ground, the rest had broken -and fled, and the Earl of Leven, their leader, was -already making the best of his way towards Leeds.</p> - -<p>The battle at this moment presented one of the -strangest spectacles in the history of warfare. On -the one side Prince Rupert with his broken brigades -was flying towards the North, on the other Leven -and Manchester and Fairfax, believing the day -hopelessly lost, were making equal haste towards<span class="pagenum" id="Page_83">83</span> -the South. Such was the juncture at which the -Man of Destiny arrived. He was in command of -the only really disciplined force on the field.</p> - -<div id="ip_83" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_083.jpg" width="1200" height="1972" alt="" /><div class="caption">HE SWOOPED WITH HIS CAVALRY ROUND THE REAR OF THE -KING’S ARMY.</div></div> - -<p>Mr. Frederic Harrison, in his excellent monograph -on Cromwell, thus graphically describes what -happened: “In an hour the genius of Cromwell -had changed disaster into victory. Launching the -Scotch troopers of his own wing against Newcastle’s -Whitecoats, and the infantry of the Eastern -Association to succour the remnants of the Scots -in the centre, he swooped with the bulk of his own -cavalry round the rear of the King’s army, and fell -upon Goring’s victorious troopers on the opposite -side of the field. Taking them in the rear, all disordered -as they were in the chase and the plunder, -he utterly crushed and dispersed them. Having -thus with his own squadron annihilated the cavalry -of the enemy’s both wings, he closed round upon -the Royalist centre, and there the Whitecoats and -the remnants of the King’s infantry were cut to -pieces almost to a man.”</p> - -<p>Such was Marston Moor, and how completely it -was the work of the one man of destiny may be -seen in the fact that, complete and crushing as the -victory was, its advantages were almost entirely -negatived by the incapacity and imbecility of the -Parliamentary leaders in the West and South. -Every one of any consequence wanted to be -supreme leader; no one had either definite plans -or the capacity to carry them through; and when<span class="pagenum" id="Page_84">84</span> -at last there was a prospect of bringing matters to -an issue on the field of Newberry, the Royalist -forces, though half-beaten, were allowed to get -away with all their guns, stores, and ammunition -in spite of the fact that Manchester was in command -of a very superior force.</p> - -<p>This was as good as a defeat for the forces of -the Parliament, for it was the cause of dividing -their councils. Manchester and those who sided -with him had apparently begun to fear the terrible -earnestness of the Captain of the Ironsides, and -were for making peace with the King and patching -matters up somehow. But Cromwell, with -deeper insight, saw that the quarrel had now gone -too far and that it could not stop till one side or the -other had had a thorough and decisive beating, and -that side he was fully determined should be the -King’s.</p> - -<p>The dispute ended in the fall of Manchester and -the triumph of Cromwell. Then came the reorganisation -of the Parliamentary forces under -what was at this time the New Model, and this -New Model, be it noted, was the first standing -army of professional soldiers that the United -Kingdom had ever seen. Its nominal Commander-in-Chief -was Sir Thomas Fairfax, but its master -spirit and guiding genius was Oliver Cromwell.</p> - -<p>But meanwhile the tide of Royalism had been on -the rise again, sweeping up from the West and -South. The armies faced each other on the borders<span class="pagenum" id="Page_85">85</span> -of Leicestershire, but Cromwell was not there. -Fairfax, no doubt knowing his own weakness, -entreated that he might come and command the -horse. He came, and then, as Clarendon pathetically -remarks, “the evil genius of the Kingdom in a -moment shifted the whole scene,” and it is related -that when, after rumours had been for some days -flying through both armies as to his arrival, “Old -Ironsides” at last came upon the field of action, all -the cavalry of the Parliament raised a great shout -of joy.</p> - -<p>The battle that he came to fight was Naseby, -and, saving for the superior discipline displayed on -both sides, almost exactly the same things happened -as at Marston Moor. Cromwell this time commanded -on the right wing, but Rupert was placed -at the Royalist’s right, and was therefore opposed, -not to Cromwell, but to Ireton, his son-in-law and -second self. Once more the left wing of the Parliament -was broken and scattered by the furious charge -of the gallant Cavaliers, once more the centre under -Fairfax was “sore overpressed” and thrown into -confusion, and once more Cromwell and his Ironsides, -having ridden down everything that opposed -them, swung round behind the rear of the victorious -Royalists, swooped in a hurricane of irresistible -valour and determination on their flanks and rear, -turned defeat into victory, and snatched triumph out -of disaster.</p> - -<p>It is true that even then there seemed so great<span class="pagenum" id="Page_86">86</span> -a chance of the Royalists retrieving the day that -Charles, who had put himself at the head of the -flower of his cavalry, had thought himself warranted -in crying: “One charge more, gentlemen, and the -days is ours!” But while he was thinking about -this, Cromwell, Fairfax, and Ireton had, by the -exercise of almost superhuman energy, reformed -the whole of their army, horse, foot, and artillery, -into complete battle-array on a new front, and -against this the fiery valour of the Cavaliers -dashed itself in vain.</p> - -<p>Once more valour with generalship had conquered -valour without it. The defeat was utter and crushing. -For fourteen long miles the pursuit went on -and only stayed when the walls of Leicester were -in sight. The King’s army was utterly destroyed -and he himself never again appeared at the head of -a force in the field.</p> - -<p>During the twelve months that followed we see -the erstwhile Farmer of Huntingdon in a new light -as the besieger and reducer of strong places. His -methods were logical, effective and, we may fairly -add, pitiless. Those days were not these any more -than William the Norman’s or Edward Longlegs’ -were Cromwell’s, and moreover we must remember -that he had set himself with all the strength of his -mighty nature to stamping the plague of civil war -out of the Three Kingdoms with such dispatch -as was possible, and it had got to be done speedily, -for outside were the enemies of Britain waiting to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_87">87</span> -take advantage of the weakness that this plague -might leave her with.</p> - -<p>First he summons the stronghold to surrender, -threatening all with the sword. If this is refused -he selects his point of attack, batters away at it -till he makes a practicable breach, then he gives -another chance of surrender, this time with somewhat -better terms, but this is the last grace. -Refusal now means wave after wave of his -irresistible iron and leather-clad soldiery pouring -into the breach, till at last all opposition is beaten -down and then massacre—for which, it may be -added, he and those with him are never at a loss -to find a biblical precedent.</p> - -<p>The victories that he won by this method were -simply amazing. In about sixteen months he was -engaged in some sixty battles and sieges, and took -fifty fortified towns and cities with over a thousand -pieces of artillery, forty thousand stand of arms, and -between two and three hundred colours. The end -of this wonderful campaign was the Storm of Bristol. -This happened on the 10th and 11th of September, -1646. As a feat of warfare it is almost -incredible. The second city in the kingdom, defended -by properly constructed earthworks and -fortifications, and garrisoned by four thousand -troops with a hundred and fifty pieces of cannon, -was stormed and taken with a loss of under two -hundred men!</p> - -<p>It reads more like one of Drake’s insolently<span class="pagenum" id="Page_88">88</span> -valiant attacks upon a Spanish treasure-city than a -desperate conflict between Englishmen and Englishmen. -There can only be one explanation of it, and -that explanation is summed up in the two words: -Oliver Cromwell. We are bound to grant that the -valour was equal on both sides, but equally we are -forced to admit that all the genius and generalship -were on one.</p> - -<p>Looked at from our point of view, there were -terrible blemishes on these triumphs. Every advantage -was pursued with the unsparing ferocity -which was possible only to religious bigotry fired to -a white heat. It is only reasonable to suppose that -these Puritan champions of the new faith were fired -with just the same furious and pitiless zeal as that -which inspired the Israelites in their attack on -Canaan, or the first armies of Islam in their assaults -on the idolaters of the East. They slew and spared -not, they hewed their enemies in pieces as Samuel -hewed Agag “before the Lord,” and they honestly -believed that the Lord looked down with approval -on them and their bloody work.</p> - -<p>Priceless treasures of art were destroyed, not only -without remorse, but with grim exultation. To them -they were abominations of the heathen, just as the -Canaanite idols of silver and gold were to the -armies of Israel. But however ferociously it was -done, the work was done thoroughly, and by -August, 1646, the fall of Ragland Castle following -on the surrender of Oxford, brought down the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_89">89</span> -curtain on the first act of the Civil War. Charles -gave himself up to the Scots at Newark, and -Oliver turned to fight the enemies of his own household.</p> - -<p>The chief of these enemies, curiously enough, -was that same Parliament in whose name he had -won all his brilliant triumphs, and a conflict, very -interesting to the student of humanity, now began -between the Man of Action and one of those Talking -Machines which the good Earl Simon some -four centuries before had found so singularly -ineffective.</p> - -<p>There is no need to tell in detail how the struggle -went. Every one knows how Cromwell preached -and prayed and stormed at the self-sufficient busybodies -who thought themselves a power in the land -because they called themselves a parliament. Then, -seeing that no other method would stop their -gabble, he brought in his soldiers and turned them -out to talk in the streets or wherever else they -could get any one to listen to them, while he went -on with his work.</p> - -<p>It is not very many years since Thomas Carlyle, -who perhaps understood Cromwell better than any -other man not living in his own age, was walking -over Westminster Bridge with a very distinguished -British officer one night when the Mother of -Parliaments was busy tearing her hair and rending -her garments over some wordy futility or other, -and, jerking his thumb towards the lighted windows,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_90">90</span> -he said: “Ah, my lord, I should like to see the -good day when you would go in there with a file of -Grenadiers as old Noll did with his dragoons and -clear that nest of cacklers out. Maybe the nation -would get some of its business <em>done</em> then instead of -only getting it talked about.”</p> - -<p>From this there is a certain moral to be drawn by -the wise. For my own part I should dearly love to -know with what words old Noll himself would -have answered the Sage of Chelsea.</p> - -<p>The payment of the Scots’ arrears by the Parliament, -their surrender of the king—who, by the way, -was a great deal stronger in helpless captivity than -he had ever been at the head of an army—and his -seizure by Cromwell through the instrumentality of -Cornet Joyce and his troop of horse, now led up -to a very singular situation. Cromwell, the conqueror, -went over to the side of Charles Stuart the -captive, and if it had not been for that fatal twist in -the king’s moral nature, there is no telling but that he -might have been re-seated on a throne supported and -surrounded by the pikes and sabres of the Ironsides.</p> - -<p>But unhappily for him, it was not in Charles -Stuart’s nature to “go straight,” and, in the end, -after Cromwell had faced and quelled a mutiny -among his own men on his account, he discovered -that the king was playing him false, that he did not -honestly wish to follow his policy of “healing and -settling,” but only to regain his freedom and try -the hazard of battle again.</p> - -<p>From that moment Cromwell was his unsparing -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_91">91</span> -enemy. Now he saw in Charles “The Man of -Blood” who, for the sake of a personal aspiration -and for personal profit, was eager to once more set -his subjects by the ears and light the flame of war -from end to end of the country.</p> - -<p>West and South and North the Loyalists were -arming and rising again and the Scots were marching -across the Border, so the Man of Destiny -stopped talking and preaching, buckled on his -sword and strode out to battle once more.</p> - -<p>The first rising was in Wales, and that he crushed -as promptly as he did pitilessly. Then he turned -with a weary and war-worn army of some seven -thousand men, so wasted with marching and privation -and sickness that, as a record of the time tells -us, “they seemed rather fit for a hospital than a -battle,” to face the invading Scots in the North.</p> - -<p>He met them at Preston. They were three to -one—or rather, to be more exact, twenty-four thousand -to seven thousand—well armed and found and -confident of victory. Yet never did the military -genius of the great Oliver shine out more brilliantly -than now. What followed was not a battle; it was -an onset, a chase, and a massacre which lasted -three days and extended over some thirty miles of -country. When it was over Cromwell wrote in one -of those marvellous dispatches of his: “We have -quite tired our horses in pursuit of the enemy. We -have killed and disabled all their foot and left them<span class="pagenum" id="Page_92">92</span> -only some horse. If my horse could but trot after -them I would take them all.”</p> - -<p>The next act in the swiftly-moving drama was -the trial and execution of him who to this day is -considered by some to have been a royal martyr, -who only exchanged an earthly for a heavenly -crown, and by others is looked upon as the man -who deliberately made himself guilty of the worst -of all blood-guiltiness, the guilt of civil war. That -is a matter for each one to decide according to his -own convictions, which, be it noted, some two and -a half centuries of argument have not yet altered. -Here we are only concerned with Cromwell’s share -in it.</p> - -<p>There can be no doubt to an unbiassed mind -that at one period he honestly tried for a monarchical -settlement of the difficulty. It is equally undeniable -that he considered Charles’s double-dealing responsible -for what he held to be the unpardonable crime -of the Second Civil War and therefore as having -incurred for a second time the guilt of blood. -That the execution, or murder, of the king met -with his entire approval cannot be doubted, since -before it happened he said to Algernon Sidney: -“I tell you we will cut off his head with the crown -upon it.”</p> - -<p>So, whether crime or act of justice, it was done, -and Cromwell, perhaps more than any one else, was -responsible for it.</p> - -<p>The next act is the Dictatorship, and the first<span class="pagenum" id="Page_93">93</span> -scene in it the re-conquest of Ireland, with its -massacres and bitter, pitiless persecutions in -revenge or punishment, as you will, for other -massacres which had gone before. It is a piteous -story, and one of no great credit to any one, but, -to borrow the maxim of Strafford, the former -tyrant of Ireland, it was “thorough.” In nine -months, with about fifteen thousand men, the -Dictator had stamped the Irish rebellion out and -made “the curse of Cromwell” a phrase that will -dwell on Hibernian lips for many a generation.</p> - -<p>But no sooner was the Irish revolt drowned in -blood and flame than Prince Charles, afterwards -Charles II. of infamous memory, took the Oath -to the Covenant, and the Scots rose to support -him. Cromwell crossed the Border on July 22, -1650.</p> - -<p>As it happened, the Scottish general was Leslie, -the old comrade who had fought at his side at -Marston Moor. For some weeks the Scots played -a waiting game, and Cromwell, with his men wearied -and falling sick, and with no other base than his -ships on the coast, hurled texts and biblical harangues -at the enemy. In fact, as Mr. Harrison cleverly -puts it, “it was not so much a battle between two -armies as between two rival congregations in arms.”</p> - -<p>Leslie and his preachers fired other texts back at -him and kept out of his way until the fatal 3rd of -September came. By this time Cromwell had only -eleven thousand men capable of bearing arms, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_94">94</span> -they were in no great state for fighting. Leslie -had twenty-two or three thousand Scots and all the -advantage of the position, but the Fates had already -taken the matter into their own hands. On the -afternoon of the 2nd, Cromwell saw that the wary -Scot, as some say, driven by the frantic exhortation -of the preachers, had forsaken his post of vantage. -“The Lord hath delivered them into our hands!” he -cried, and straightway began to set his battle in order.</p> - -<p>The next morning, while it was yet moonlight, -they came to blows. In an hour or so it was all -over. The Scots fled in utter panic and confusion, -“being made by the Lord of Hosts as stubble to -our swords,” to use Oliver’s own words. When the -rout was at its height the sun rose, scattering the -morning mists. “Let God arise and His enemies -be scattered!” he shouted exultantly through the -roar of the battle, and then—how characteristic it -was of the man!—he halted his army in the very -moment of triumph and sang the one hundred and -seventeenth psalm, beginning: “O praise the Lord -all ye people, for His merciful kindness is great -towards us!” Then he unleashed his bloodhounds -again, and the rest was massacre.</p> - -<div id="ip_94" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_094.jpg" width="1200" height="1984" alt="" /><div class="caption">HE HALTED HIS ARMY ... AND SANG THE HUNDRED AND -SEVENTEENTH PSALM.</div></div> - -<p>Another year passed in miscellaneous fighting -and arguing, slaughter and psalm-singing, and -once more the sun of the 3rd of September, -Cromwell’s Day of Fate, or, as Byron puts it:</p> - -<p class="p1 b1 center">“His day of double victory and death,”</p> - -<p class="in0"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_95">95</span> -dawned, this time over Worcester, the scene of -“the Crowning Mercy.” The same miracles of -generalship were accomplished, the same tremendous -victory was won at a ridiculously small -expense—under two hundred men to conquer an -entrenched army of fifteen thousand—and this -was the end of the fighting at home.</p> - -<p>But meanwhile there was fighting abroad, and, -more than that, the fame of the great Oliver and -his marvellous doings had been ringing from end -to end of Europe. As Clarendon, the historian -of the Royalists, candidly admits: “His greatness -at home was but a shadow of the glory he had -abroad.” The mastery of the seas was wrenched -out of the hands of the Dutch by Blake, the sea-power -of England was organised as its land-power -was, and Britain rose at a bound from the degradation -to which she had sunk under the first Stuart to -the proud position of the first naval and military -Power of the world, and the greatest ministers and -monarchs in Europe, even the Pope himself, were -forced to respect the prowess and cringe for the -friendship of the Farmer of Huntingdon.</p> - -<p>If, as has been aptly suggested, the great Oliver -could have lived to an age which is now a normal -one for statesmen, the disgraceful and ruinous interval -occupied by the reigns of the second Charles -and the second James might have been spared with -all their infamy and national loss, and William of -Orange might worthily have continued the work<span class="pagenum" id="Page_96">96</span> -which Cromwell so well began. But the time was -not yet, and so it was not to be. The great ideal -of his life, a Protestant Alliance, was never realised. -His last days were days of darkness and suffering, -social, mental, and physical.</p> - -<p>Once more the Day of Fate came round, and -between three and four in the afternoon the -watchers by his bedside heard him sigh deeply -and heavily. Some say that he whispered: “My -work is done!”—and then he died. This may be -fact or fancy, but, be that as it may, no man had -a better right to pass out of the mystery of the -things that are into the mystery of the things that -are to be with such words on his lips than Oliver -Cromwell, General, Statesman, and King in everything -but the empty name.</p> -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_97">97</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="V">V<br /> - -<i>WILLIAM OF ORANGE</i>,<br /> - -<span class="subhead"><i>OVERCOMER OF DIFFICULTIES</i></span></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_99">99</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">V<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">WILLIAM OF ORANGE</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="firstword">It</span> is perhaps one of the most curious facts of our -history that the Empire-Maker who, as it were, -finally completed the work begun by his namesake -William the Norman, should, like him, have been a -foreigner, should have sprung from similar ancestry, -and should have been his exact reverse in every -mental and physical quality save one—an inflexible -determination to do the work which he was appointed -to do in spite of every conceivable kind of -obstacle.</p> - -<p>It is noteworthy also that this man should have -come from those same Low Countries from whose -shores our Saxon ancestors had first come on their -plundering forays to do their share of the work of -making the English people. The ancestry of the -great-grandson of William the Silent stretched far -back, probably even into those remote and turbulent -times, and it is within the limits of possibility that -some stalwart ancestor of the ancient House of -Nassau may himself have had something to do in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_100">100</span> -the early making of that Realm, over which, a -thousand years later, his descendant was to rule -during one of the most critical and perilous periods -of its existence.</p> - -<p>Be that, however, as it may, the central fact which -stands out in the story of William III. is this: -Whatever his country or ancestry, he was, so far as -we have any means of judging, the one man in -the world just then who could have accomplished -the difficult and, as it must often have seemed even -to him, almost impossible task which had to be -performed if the work of the other Empire-Makers -who had gone before him was not to be sadly -marred, if not altogether undone.</p> - -<p>William of Orange may perhaps be most truthfully -described as an overcomer of difficulties. Probably -no other man ever had so many difficulties to -conquer as he had, and his triumph over them is -one of the finest examples of irresistible will-power -and purely intellectual force that all history has to -show. Mentally he was a giant, and as such he -acquitted himself in what was undoubtedly a battle -of giants fighting for the spoils of Europe. Physically -he was a miserable weakling, shattered by -disease, seldom free from bodily pain, and foredoomed -from his youth by an exhausting and -incurable malady.</p> - -<p>Yet even his sports and pastimes were those, not -only of a healthy, but even of a robust constitution. -His pale, sickly, small-pox-pitted face never flushed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_101">101</span> -save under the stimulus of battle or the chase. He -fought his fight with Fate and won it by sheer -intellectual strength, yet none of the pleasures of -intellect were his. He knew nothing of science, -little of literature, and less of art.</p> - -<p>Apparently fitted by Nature only for the pursuits -of the study, he found his rare moments of real -happiness when riding down a stag or a boar in the -forests of Windsor or the woods of Flanders, or, -sword in hand, leading his men wherever the battle -was hottest or the danger the greatest. A creature -of contradictions, in short, determined to make himself -that which Nature had seemingly <em>not</em> made him, -and to do that which he appeared least fitted to -do.</p> - -<p>No one possessing an intelligent grasp of the -deplorable state of affairs which obtained in England, -and the threatening aspect of matters on the -Continent during the last decade but one of the -seventeenth century, would have guessed for a -moment that this “asthmatic skeleton,” as Macaulay -somewhat roughly describes his hero, was the -man to turn England’s weakness into strength, -and even in defeat to grapple successfully with -the colossal Power which was threatening the -liberties of Europe.</p> - -<p>In England the weakness and baseness of the -two last Stuart kings had more than undone the -work of the great Oliver. He had, as has been -shown, made England one of the first Powers in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_102">102</span> -world, strong at home and respected and even -courted abroad. Charles II. had sold his country, or -at any rate his own independence and what should -have been his royal honour, to France. He had, in -fact, exhibited to the world the disgraceful spectacle -of an English king who was the pensioner of a -foreign monarch.</p> - -<p>The for-ever infamous Treaty of Dover had -brought the prestige of England to its lowest ebb. -For the first time in nearly seven hundred years -the Isle Inviolate had been seriously threatened -with invasion, and London, for the first time -since it had been a city, had heard the sound of -hostile guns. Now this of itself, taking the whole -history of these islands into consideration, is a fact -of absolutely unparalleled infamy, and yet if such -infamy could have been equalled, the brother and -successor of Charles II. would have done so. Indeed, -from one point of view it may be said that he -excelled it.</p> - -<p>The guns of William’s countrymen were heard in -the Thames because Charles II., having his brother -James for Lord High Admiral, had so scandalously -wasted the funds which should have been devoted -to the maintenance of the Navy that no adequate -defence was really possible; but it was left for -James II., the last and most contemptible, if not in -all respects the worst king of the royal and miserable -House of Stuart, to be the only British -monarch who ever brought a foreign army on to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_103">103</span> -British soil for the purpose of coercing by force the -will of the British people. More than this, too, it -must be remembered that these foreign troops were -Frenchmen supported by renegade English, Irish, -or Scotsmen who had deliberately deserted their -own country to serve under the standard of a man -who was to the seventeenth century what Phillip -II. of Spain had been to the sixteenth.</p> - -<p>So low, then, had Britain sunk in the scale of -nations when William of Orange made his entry -upon the stage of British history. The fact which -made his entry possible is hardly of the sort that -would commend itself to people of a romantic turn -of mind, although few romances have been really -more romantic than his own life-story.</p> - -<p>He could never have become King of England, -nor is it likely that he could even have been asked -to constitute himself the protector of English liberties, -had it not been for the fact that he was married -to the daughter of James II., and of this marriage -Lord Macaulay truly says: “His choice had been -determined chiefly by political considerations, nor -did it seem likely that any strong affection would -grow up between a handsome girl of sixteen, well-disposed, -indeed, and naturally intelligent, but -ignorant and simple, and a bridegroom who, though -he had not completed his twenty-eighth year, was in -constitution older than her father; whose manner -was chilling, and whose head was constantly -occupied by public business or by field sports.”</p> - -<p>His marriage was, in short, “a marriage of convenience,” -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_104">104</span> -and yet, in defiance of all the rules that -are supposed to govern the most intimate of all -human relationships, it was one of the best and, in -the end, most devoted unions that history has to -record. It is hardly possible to doubt that William -of Orange married Mary Stuart because he saw -with that keenly penetrating foresight of his that -such a union would strengthen him in his life-long -combat with the arch-enemy of his faith, his family, -and his nation; and this enemy was that same -Louis of France who had made Charles II. his -pensioner, and was soon to make James II. his -dependent.</p> - -<p>To quote Lord Macaulay again: “He saved -England, it is true, but he never loved her, and he -never obtained her love.... Whatever patriotic -feeling he had was for Holland ... yet even his -affection for the land of his birth was subordinate to -another feeling which early became supreme in his -soul, which mixed itself with all his passions and -compelled him to marvellous enterprises, which -supported him when sinking under mortification, -pain, sickness, and sorrow ... and continued to -animate him even while the prayer for the departing -was read at his bedside.”</p> - -<p>It was this hatred of France and her king which -nerved him to do for the liberties of Europe and -Great Britain what Francis Drake had done for -England against Philip of Spain, and in the doing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_105">105</span> -of this he won the conspicuous glory of forcing the -paymaster of the two English sovereigns whom he -succeeded, to make peace with him on equal terms; -and this, too, although he lost more battles than he -won, and had to surrender more strong cities than -he took.</p> - -<p>It is comparatively easy for a conqueror to -take triumph out of victory, but it is a higher -quality which patiently endures defeat and confronts -disaster, and by sheer genius wins triumph in the -end. This is what William of Orange did, and it -is from this fact that he derives his title to be -ranked among the Makers of that Empire to whose -throne he came as an alien, and whose honour he -restored and upheld, as one might say, in spite of -herself.</p> - -<p>So far as England is concerned, the male line of -Stuart came in with a fool and went out with a -coward. One does not even care to imagine what -would have happened if James II. had remained on -the throne; or if William of Orange, with his hereditary -and deep-rooted hatred of Louis XIV. and -his policy, had not come to take his most miserably-vacated -place in the nick of time.</p> - -<p>The sentimentality which makes such a fuss about -loyalty to persons as distinguished from loyalty to -country, and the lawyer-quibbles which occupied -men’s minds in the dispute as to whether James II. -was King <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">de facto</i> or <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">de jure</i>, or both, of the country -from which he had run away like an absconding<span class="pagenum" id="Page_106">106</span> -debtor, may be dismissed, just as Harold the -Saxon’s claims had been some six hundred years -before. It is merely a question of the Fit and the -Unfit, and James was Unfit.</p> - -<p>James Stuart deserted his post as ruler of these -realms because he found himself assailed by difficulties -which the most ordinary ability ought to have -overcome. William assumed the same position in -the face of difficulties which only the highest qualities -of kingcraft and statesmanship could have -enabled him to successfully grapple with. In a -word, James possessed no ideal that qualified him -to be a king, much less an Empire-Maker. William -<em>did</em> possess such an ideal, and that is the only reason -why he became King of England, <em>vice</em> James Stuart, -absconded.</p> - -<p>Next, perhaps, to Henry VII., William was the -most business-like sovereign who has occupied the -British throne. With him all men and things, all -beliefs and sentiments, were subordinated to the -achievement of the one great end—the curbing of -the power of France, and consequently the furtherance -of political and theological liberty in Europe. -He was, in fact, only incidentally an Empire-Maker, -although without him and without the broad and -firm basis of popular liberty and national strength -which he laid down, as it were, in the doing of his -greater work, the building up of the Imperial fabric -would undoubtedly have been long delayed and -seriously impeded.</p> - -<p>He got himself made King of Great Britain -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_107">107</span> -and Ireland, not because he wanted to occupy the -throne, but because from that eminence he would be -able to look the Grand Monarch more equally in the -face.</p> - -<p>We get a luminous insight into the character of -the man in his reply to the Convention or conference -of the two Houses of Parliament which had proposed -that his wife as actual and lawful heir to -the throne which her father had forsaken, should -occupy it as queen, and that he should reign by -her authority as a sort of Royal Executive.</p> - -<p>“My lords and gentlemen,” he said, “no man -can esteem a woman more than I do the Princess, -but I am so made that I cannot think of holding -anything by apron-strings, nor can I think it reasonable -to have any share in the government unless it -be put in my own person, and that for the term of -my life. If you think fit to settle it otherwise I -will not oppose you, but will go back to Holland -and meddle no more in your affairs.”</p> - -<p>That was the kind of man William of Orange -was. He had come to be a king, and a king he -would be or nothing. And so king he was, and it -was not very long before he was to show how well -his self-confidence was justified. He had scarcely -seated himself on the throne before the Parliament, -recognising the fact that his work was something -other than merely filling James’s place, deliberately -suggested that he should resume as King of England<span class="pagenum" id="Page_108">108</span> -the hostilities which he had begun against -Louis as Stadtholder of the Netherlands, and he -on his part showed how ready he was to take up -the task by exclaiming, in one of his rare bursts of -exultation, after reading the address:</p> - -<p>“This is the first day of my reign!”</p> - -<p>This address, however, welcome as it was, was -somewhat belated. For more than a month before -it was presented, Louis, under the pretence of helping -the runaway, whom for his own purposes he -affected to believe still lawful King of England, -had committed the gravest of all acts of war, and -James had crowned the disgrace of his flight by the -infamy of heading an invasion of British territory -by foreign mercenaries. On the 12th of March, -1689, he landed at Kinsale as enemy and invader -of his own country, convoyed by fifteen French -men-of-war, and supported by 2,500 French -troops.</p> - -<p>The story of this Irish war needs no re-telling -here, save in so far as it brings out the contrast -between William and James as the Fit and the -Unfit for the doing of that work which had just -then got to be done if England was not to sink -back to the degrading position of a French dependency, -and if the way of future progress and Imperial -expansion was to be left open. William no -sooner saw that the scene of the fight for constitutional -liberty and religious freedom had shifted for -the time being from the Low Countries to Ireland<span class="pagenum" id="Page_109">109</span> -than he sent Marshal Schomberg, who was then -one of the most skilful soldiers in Europe, with -an army of sixteen thousand men to the scene of -action.</p> - -<p>Meanwhile the heroically stubborn resistance -which has won immortal fame for the men of -Londonderry had proved, not only to James and -his foreign mercenaries, but to Louis himself and all -Europe, that the struggle which was just then -renewed was no mere war of dynasties, and that -something very much greater than the mere question -as to who should be king of England had -got to be decided before the trouble was over.</p> - -<p>James in Ireland and Louis in France stood for -the already discredited and exploded doctrine of the -divine right of kings to rule as they pleased because -they were the sons of their fathers; for the dark -tyranny of Rome, now almost equally discredited; -and for the domination of Europe by the French -autocracy. In Holland and England and Germany -William and his allies stood for the very reverse of -all this, so that it was not only the destinies of the -United Kingdom, but those of the greater part of -the civilised world that had to be decided, and it was -by procuring through mingled victory and defeat, -confronted by powerful enemies abroad and by -conspiracy and threatened assassination at home, -that the worthy descendant of William the Silent -proved his real right divine as king of these realms -and champion of those principles of which the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_110">110</span> -British Empire of to-day is the concrete expression.</p> - -<p>It was really on the shores of an insignificant -Irish stream that William fought and won the -battle of European liberty. But before he did this -he had another battle to fight, as it were, in front of -his newly-given throne.</p> - -<p>His reign, unhappily, saw the commencement of -that system of government which an intelligent -Chinese Minister to the Court of St. James’ once -described as “the election of one party to do the -business of the nation, and of another to stop them -doing it.” In other words, it was William’s fate, -among all his other difficulties, to have to contend -with the bitter and usually dishonest strife of -Parliamentary parties, and so keen did this strife -become after the foreign enemy had actually landed -on British soil, that he was even then on the point -of throwing up the whole business in disgust, and -going back to Holland to fight his battles out -there.</p> - -<p>What would have happened if he had done so is -anything but a pleasant subject for speculation. -Happily, at the eleventh hour he refused to -acknowledge himself beaten. Sick of the strife -of words and longing for the reality of deeds, he -announced his intention to place himself at the head -of the English forces in Ireland, “and with the -blessing of God Almighty endeavour to reduce that -kingdom that it may no longer be a charge to this.”</p> - -<p>In this we may see more than the expression of -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_111">111</span> -a pious hope. As statesman and soldier William -had seen that Ireland was the back-door of -Great Britain, and that so long as it remained -open so long would the whole kingdom be -vulnerable to foreign invasion, and so he went -to close it.</p> - -<p>It was a strange position for any man to be -placed in. He was going to fight for everything -that he held dear. He knew that if he lost in -Ireland he must lose also in England and the -Netherlands, but he was also going to fight against -the father of the woman whom he had now come -to love so dearly that her death, when it happened, -came nearer to wrecking his imperial intellect than -all the other trials and troubles of his laborious and -almost joyless life. He had no feeling of personal -enmity against James as he had against Louis, and -it was duty, and duty alone, which took him to the -Irish war. Almost the last words that he said to -his wife concerning the enemy whom he was about -to meet on the battlefield were:</p> - -<p>“God send that no harm may come to him!”</p> - -<p>Mr. Traill has thus tersely summed up the condition -of affairs at this moment: “Ireland in the -hands of a hostile army, the shores of England -threatened by a hostile fleet, a dangerous conspiracy -only detected on the eve of success, a formidable -insurrection imminent in the country he was leaving -behind him....”</p> - -<p>And yet, gloomy as the outlook seemed, his spirits -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_112">112</span> -rose as they ever did when he saw the moment for -doing instead of talking draw near, and Bishop -Burnett tells us that he said to him on the eve of -his departure: “As for me, but for one thing I -should enjoy the prospect of being on horseback -and under canvas again, for I am sure that I am -fitter to direct a campaign than to manage your -Houses of Lords and Commons.”</p> - -<p>These words were well worthy of the man who, -not many days later, quietly sat down to breakfast -in the open air beside Boyne Water, within full -sight of the enemy and within easy range of their -guns. Breakfast over, he mounted his horse and -was promptly fired at. The first shot from two -field-pieces which had been trained on him and his -staff killed a man and two horses. The second -grazed his shoulder and made him reel in his -saddle.</p> - -<p>“There was no need for any bullet to come nearer -than that!” was his remark on the occurrence. -Certainly not many bullets have ever come nearer -to changing the history of Britain, and therefore -of the British Empire, than that one.</p> - -<div id="ip_112" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_112.jpg" width="1200" height="1994" alt="" /><div class="caption">MADE HIM REEL IN HIS SADDLE.</div></div> - -<p>After the wound had been dressed, instead of -taking the rest which a good many strong men -would have taken, this consumptive and asthmatic -invalid re-mounted his horse and remained until -nightfall in the saddle, making his dispositions for -the battle of the morrow, and attending to every<span class="pagenum" id="Page_113">113</span> -detail himself. His prudent uncle and father-in-law, -apparently bent on fulfilling William’s pious wish, -was meanwhile taking very good care to keep -himself out of harm’s way.</p> - -<div id="ip_113" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_113.jpg" width="1200" height="2011" alt="" /><div class="caption">“MEN OF ENNISKILLEN, WHAT WILL YOU DO FOR ME?” HE CRIED.</div></div> - -<p>The battle itself, which, as every one knows, was -fought on the 1st of July, brought out with startling -clearness the contrast between the man who was -king in his own right and the man who called -himself king because his name was James -Stuart.</p> - -<p>“Men of Enniskillen, what will you do for me?” -he cried at the critical moment of the fight, when -Caillemot and Schomberg, his two best captains, -had been killed, and he, drawing his sword and -swinging it aloft with his wounded arm, led his -trusty Dutch guards and Ulstermen against the -Irish centre. James, meanwhile, having watched -the first part of the fight on which all his fortunes -depended from the safe eminence of the Hill of -Donore, had already given up for lost the day -which he had done nothing to win, and was making -the best of his way to Dublin, whence, in due course, -leaving the beaten and demoralised rabble that had -once been his army to its fate, he fled to the congenial -ignominy of his safe retreat at St. Germain, -and the fostering care of his country’s -worst enemy.</p> - -<p>The Battle of the Boyne not only settled the fate -of the Stuart dynasty for good; it decided the -question whether this country was to be ruled by<span class="pagenum" id="Page_114">114</span> -a feeble despotism under the patronage of France, -or by that constitutional monarchy under which -Great Britain has so worthily proved her title to be -called the Mother of Free Nations, and in winning -this battle and deciding this all-important question, -William of Orange won the right to be counted -among the wisest and strongest of our Empire-Makers. -The disgusted Irishmen, too, had some -reason on their side when they said to the victors -after the battle: “Change leaders, and we’ll fight -you again!”</p> - -<p>The story of his wars in those countries which -have been aptly termed the cockpit of Europe is -the story of the continuation of that work which he -came to England to do; not, as has already been -pointed out, for England as a country, but for the -establishment of those principles for which the -British Constitution, of which he was one of the -makers, stands. Ignorant or prejudiced critics -have accused him of sacrificing English blood and -treasure to the furtherance of his own ambition. -The fact is that he employed them upon the best -and most necessary work that there was for them -to do just then.</p> - -<p>“Look at my brave English!” he said to the -Elector of Bavaria one day during the siege of -Namur, while a British regiment was carrying the -outworks on one side of the city. But they were -doing more than carrying earthworks. They were -fighting for the principles which their descendants<span class="pagenum" id="Page_115">115</span> -crowned with everlasting glory at Trafalgar and -Waterloo. They were showing the soldiers and -generals of France, then held to be the best in the -world, the sort of stuff that they were made of, and -giving promise of future prowess that was soon to -be splendidly redeemed at Blenheim and Ramillies, -Oudenarde and Malplaquet.</p> - -<p>It was a singular war, and by all the rules of warfare -the issue should have been the reverse of what -it was. But again and again William’s wonderful -genius and indomitable persistence snatched victory -out of defeat, and turned disaster into advantage, -until at last the Grand Monarch himself had to -confess the power of the enemy whom he had once -thought so insignificant, and the signing of the -Treaty of Ryswick left William triumphant if -somewhat dissatisfied.</p> - -<p>The results would no doubt have been much -greater if William could have had his own way, -and if the strife of parties in the British Parliament -had not so sorely crippled him. But at least -he had the satisfaction of knowing before he died -that, whereas a few months before the French men-of-war -had with impunity insulted and threatened the -English coasts, and landed a small army on Irish -soil, a few months afterwards every invader had -been driven from British ground, and the French -fleet almost destroyed, while the Mediterranean, on -which British ships had sailed only by sufferance, -was now well on the way to becoming a British lake.</p> - -<p>And yet, in spite of all the triumphs that he had -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_116">116</span> -won over so many difficulties and so many dangers, -and in spite of the consciousness of work well -and nobly, if quietly and unostentatiously, done, -William’s last days, like those of many another -man who has deserved well of the world, were -full of sorrow and suffering.</p> - -<p>The death of his now adored queen had so shaken -his mighty nature that for some days his reason -was despaired of, and there can be no doubt but -that it hastened his own end. And yet, weak and -far advanced in disease as he was when he went -out for that fatal ride from Kensington to Hampton -Court, he was even then going a-hunting. The -brutal Jacobite toast: “To the little gentleman in -black velvet who works underground!” still serves -to remind us of the mole-hill over which his horse -stumbled and fell, breaking his rider’s collar-bone, -and inflicting the death-wound which he had -escaped on a score of battle-fields.</p> - -<p>His death was worthy of his life, for it was the -death of a brave, patient man and a Christian -gentleman. No doubt he himself would have -preferred to have died at the head of a charge, -or in the thick of an assault on a French fortress, -but his destiny ordered it otherwise, and the man -who had a hundred times faced death in the most -reckless fashion for the purpose of inspiring his -followers with his own courage and enthusiasm, -died quietly in his bed, leaving behind him the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_117">117</span> -greatest work ever done by an individual British -sovereign, and a fame which, but for the one -dark and inexplicable blot of Glencoe, is as fairly -entitled to be called spotless as that of any man -who ever sat upon a throne and accomplished -great things with such means as came to his hand.</p> -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_119">119</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="VI">VI<br /> - -<i>JAMES COOK</i>,<br /> - -<span class="subhead"><i>CIRCUMNAVIGATOR</i></span></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_121">121</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">VI<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">JAMES COOK</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap b"><span class="firstword">Once</span> more I am going to ask you to take -your seat with me on the ideal equivalent -of the Magic Carpet and skim across another time-gulf -some half-century wide. This time we alight -on the morning of Monday, July 5, 1742, before -the door of a double-fronted shop, one side of which -is devoted to the sale of groceries and the other to -the drapery business. This shop is situated in a -little village on the Yorkshire coast a few miles -from Whitby, Staithes, or more exactly The -Staithes, so called from the local name for a pier -or sea-wall of wood jutting out a few feet into the -German Ocean, and built partly to protect the -little bay from the North Sea rollers and partly -to afford accommodation for the fishing-boats and -colliers.</p> - -<p>The shop belongs to a substantial citizen of -Staithes named Saunderson, and this morning Mr. -Saunderson is a very angry man. In fact, if we -go into the shop, which is not yet open, we shall -find him with a cane or some similar weapon in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_122">122</span> -his hand, leaning behind the counter and hitting -blindly at a bed there is beneath it, shouting the -while sundry excellent maxims on the virtue of -early rising, especially modified for the benefit of -apprentices.</p> - -<p>But no response comes from the bed, and Mr. -Saunderson stoops down to make closer investigation. -The bed is empty, and the fact dawns -on him that his last apprentice has followed the -example of all the others and run away to sea. It -was a very common event on the Yorkshire coast -in those days, but this particular running away was -destined to be a very memorable one for the world, -for the lad who, instead of being in the bed under -the counter, was just then striding rapidly away -over the fields to Whitby with one extra shirt and -a jack-knife for his sole possessions, was James -Cook, a name as dear to the lovers of the romance -of travel and adventure as Robinson Crusoe, and -one of infinitely more importance in the annals of -mankind.</p> - -<p>In following his fortunes, so far as the brief limits -of such a sketch as this will permit, we shall bid a -perhaps welcome adieu for a while to the roar of -guns and the shock of battle, to the blaze of burning -towns and the fierce cries ringing along the -decks of captured treasure-ships, to watch the contest -of a clear head and a strong will against those -foes which may be overcome without bloodshed, -although not always without loss of life—the hidden<span class="pagenum" id="Page_123">123</span> -dangers of unknown oceans strewn with uncharted -reefs and shoals lying in wait for unwary keels, the -sudden hurricanes of the Tropics, and the storms -and fogs and the floating ice-navies of the far North -and South. It was these that Captain Cook went -out to fight and overcome, and in doing so to prove -eloquently that:</p> - -<p class="p1 b1 center">“Peace hath her victories no less renowned than war.”</p> - -<p>Nevertheless there are certain points of likeness -between James Cook, Geographer and Circumnavigator, -and that other Circumnavigator, Francis -Drake, Pirate and Scourge of Spain. Both -began life as ship-boys, and both rose, by sheer -ability and strength of purpose, far above their -original station in life to positions of command -in the service of their country. Both were men -of iron will, far-reaching design, unshakeable -self-reliance, and passionate temper, and, lastly, -both were possessed by that irresistible spirit of -roving and adventure which, when it once seizes a -man, but seldom lets him rest in peace. In short, -though the vocation of one was piracy and war, and -that of the other the peaceful, but none the less -adventurous service of science, both were stamped -with the supreme and essential characteristics of the -Empire-Maker.</p> - -<p>Naturally, the world had changed a good deal by -the time James Cook started out to add so enormously -to men’s knowledge of it. Spain had fallen<span class="pagenum" id="Page_124">124</span> -from her high estate and was living in slothful ease -on the dregs and lees of that strong wine which -she had drunk to intoxication in the golden days -of Cortez and Pizarro. But Britain, no longer only -England, had become Great Britain, and was fast -expanding into Greater Britain. Cowley, Dampier, -Clapperton and Anson had circumnavigated the -globe more than once, and people were beginning -to have something like a definite notion of how -very big a place was this world which now seems -so small to us. The Imperial Idea was beginning -to take hold of men’s minds. They wanted to -know, not so much how big the world was, but -what other unknown lands might be lying waiting -for the discoverer, hidden away among the vast -expanses which were still an utter blank upon the -map.</p> - -<p>The maritime nations of the world, too, and -Britain, now foremost among them, had unconsciously -taken a very great stride along the pathway -of real progress, and they were beginning to -grasp the higher ideal of colonisation as distinguished -from mere conquest, and to James Cook -belongs the high honour, if not of discovering, at -least of first definitely locating and in part mapping -out the greatest of all the British colonies.</p> - -<p>Indeed, it may be said that, in sober fact, he -added a whole continent to the British Empire, -and that without the striking of a single blow or -the loss of a single life in battle.</p> - -<p>The first few years of James Cook’s seafaring life -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_125">125</span> -were eventless, just as Francis Drake’s were, but -for all that he, like Gloriana’s Little Pirate, was -doing that minor but no less essential part of his -life-work which was the necessary preparation for -the greater. He was doing his work first as ship’s -boy, then as sailor before the mast, then as second -mate, first mate, and so on up the laborious ladder -which was to lead him in the end to an unequalled -eminence among mariners.</p> - -<p>Thus for thirteen years he served what may be -called his apprenticeship to his life’s work; learning -in the most practical of all schools, a North Sea -collier of the eighteenth century, not only the science -of seamanship in all its details, but also what was -hardly less important—that science of taking things -as they came, of looking upon hardship, privation -and danger as the commonplaces of a seaman’s life, -incidents in his day’s work, as it were, and as such -scarcely worth even the mention, and hence much -less worth troubling about.</p> - -<p>A curiously instructive fact strikes one in contrasting -Captain Cook’s own account of his voyages -with those of others, such as Anderson and Gilbert, -who sailed with him. They expatiate largely on -the miseries of heat and cold, ice and mist, the -almost uneatable character of the sea-fare of those -days, disease among the crew, and so on; but -Captain Cook hardly ever mentions them, saving -only the scurvy, of which more hereafter.</p> - -<p>But there was something else that James Cook -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_126">126</span> -had already learnt long ago while he was yet a boy. -When he was a lad of six or seven he had been -set to work on a farm belonging to a man named -William Walker, and this William had a wife -named Mary who, taking a fancy to the lad, taught -him his letters and encouraged him to read, and -so, without knowing it, put into his hands the -talisman which was to win his way to future greatness. -She not only aroused in him that passion -for reading which distinguished him among the -sailors of his time, but she gave him what might -have been the only means of gratifying it, for not -every farm-lad and ship’s-boy of the middle of the -eighteenth century had learnt, or ever did learn, -to read and write.</p> - -<p>It may have been that James Cook’s latent -ambition had never looked beyond the possibility -of becoming master of one of the vessels of which -he had been mate, and it is also possible that he -might never in reality have been anything more, -but it so happened that his ship, the <i>Friendship</i>, -was lying in London river in May, 1756, and that -at the same time the war with France, which had -been brewing for a year, broke out.</p> - -<p>As usual the Press Gang set instantly to work, -and now came Cook’s chance. He was mate of -a ship, albeit only a collier brig; still he was a -thorough seaman, an excellent navigator, and, more -than that, he seems to have known something of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_127">127</span> -the theory as well as the practice of his science. -These accomplishments, however, did not put him -beyond the reach of the Press Gang.</p> - -<p>Now, in those days there were two ranks of -seamen before the mast in the King’s navy—the -pressed man, who might be anything from a raw -land-lubber to an escaped convict, and the volunteer, -who was probably and usually a good sailor, -if not something better, as Cook was, and he, -guided either by inspiration or deliberate resolve, -eluded the Press Gang by offering himself as a -volunteer, and so in due course took his rating as -able-seaman before the mast on board his Majesty’s -frigate <i>Eagle</i>, of sixty guns, of which shortly afterwards -the good genius of his life, Sir Hugh Palliser, -was appointed captain.</p> - -<p>During the next four years there was fighting, -but we have no record of any share that Cook took -in it. What we do know is that by the time he -was thirty he had risen to the rank of master of -the <i>Mercury</i>, a King’s ship which went with the -fleet to the St. Lawrence at a very critical juncture -in British colonial history.</p> - -<p>So far it would appear that he had worked himself -up by sheer ability and industry, but now his -chance was to come. The river St. Lawrence at -that time had never been surveyed, and it was -absolutely necessary that soundings should be taken -and the river correctly charted before the fleet could -go in and with its guns cover Wolfe’s attack on<span class="pagenum" id="Page_128">128</span> -Quebec. The all-important work was entrusted to -the master of the <i>Mercury</i>, and although the river -was swarming with the canoes of hostile Indians in -the service of the French, and though he had to -do his work at night, he did it so thoroughly that -not only did the fleet go in and out again with -perfect safety, but the work has needed but little -re-doing from that day to this.</p> - -<p>Thus did James Cook, not as sailor or fighting-man, -but as good mariner and skilful workman play -his first part as Empire-Maker, and in an unostentatious -fashion contribute his share towards the -capture of Quebec and the acquisition of one of -the widest and fairest portions of Greater Britain.</p> - -<p>He was at this time, as has been said, only thirty. -As regards the outer aspect of the man he stood -something over six feet, spare, hard, and active. -His face was a good one and suited to the man, -broad forehead, bright, brown, well-set eyes, yet -rather small, a long, well-shaped nose with good -nostrils, a firm mouth, and full, strong chin.</p> - -<p>In short, his best portraits show you just the -kind of man you would expect Captain Cook to be. -For the rest he was a man of iron frame, tireless -at work, resting only when it was a physical necessity, -with few friends and fewer confidants, cool of -judgment save during his rare and deplorable fits -of passion, self-contained and self-reliant—just such -a sea-king, in short, as we may imagine Heaven to -have commissioned to carry the British flag three<span class="pagenum" id="Page_129">129</span> -times round the world and to the uttermost parts -of the known earth, and to plant it on lands which -until then no white man’s eye had seen or foot had -trodden.</p> - -<p>In the same year Cook was promoted from the -<i>Mercury</i> to the <i>Northumberland</i>, the Admiral’s -flag-ship, and in her he came back to England, and -at St. Margaret’s Church, Barking, married Elizabeth -Batts, a young lady of great beauty and of social -standing far above that of the grocer’s apprentice -and collier’s knockabout boy, but not above that -of the Master of a King’s ship. His married life -lasted some seventeen years, and of these he spent -a little over four in the enjoyment of the delights of -home.</p> - -<p>For the next four years or so he was regularly -employed in surveying and exploring work off the -Atlantic coast of America, and this of itself shows -that he had already made his mark in his chosen -profession. But much greater things were now to -be in store for him. It will be remembered how -Drake, when he first saw the smooth waters of the -Pacific, prayed God that He would give him life -and leave to sail an English ship on its waters. -That prayer had been granted, and his and many -another English ship had crossed the great Sea of -the South.</p> - -<p>Meanwhile the realised dream of El Dorado had -been replaced in men’s minds by another, even -more vast, shadowy, and splendid. This was the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_130">130</span> -dream of the Great Southern Continent, and in -this imagination revelled and ran riot. Grave -scientists, too, demonstrated beyond all doubt that -there must be such a land far away to the south -since how, without it as a counterpoise to the continents -of the north, was the rolling world to be -kept in equilibrium?</p> - -<p>So they took it for granted, laid it down upon -the maps, and wrote glowing descriptions of the -varieties of climate, the splendour of scenery, the -wealth of treasures and the strange peoples and -animals that it must of necessity contain. Above -all, it would be a new El Dorado which would not -be under the control of Spain.</p> - -<p>What more could men want, unless indeed it was -the actual discovery of the Terra Incognita Australis? -This was the new world of which Cook was to be -the Columbus. Others had seen parts of it just as -others had seen parts of America before the great -Genoese reached the West Indies, but he was the -man who was to do the work of putting its existence -beyond all doubt.</p> - -<p>The Royal Society found that there would be a -transit of Venus in the year 1769, and that it would -be best observed from some point in the great -Southern Ocean, say Amsterdam Island or the -Marquesas Group, lately discovered by the Dutch -and Portuguese, and as the result of representations -made to the King, an expedition was set on foot to -carry out suitable persons to observe it. Of this<span class="pagenum" id="Page_131">131</span> -expedition James Cook, raised from the rank of -master to that of lieutenant, was placed in command. -On his own recommendation the ship chosen -for the purpose was the <i>Endeavour</i>, a Whitby-built -craft of 370 tons, broad of bow and stern and -fairly light of draft, and built for strength and endurance -rather than speed.</p> - -<p>She sailed, carrying a complement all told of -eighty-five men, from Plymouth on August 26, -1768, which as Cook’s latest biographer happily -remarks, was a Friday, and the starting-day of -what was, all things considered, the most successful -voyage of discovery ever made. Just before she -sailed Captain Wallace had come back bringing the -news of the discovery of Otaheite, otherwise known -as Tahiti, and as this island was considered a more -favourable position, Captain Cook, as we may now -fairly call him, was ordered to proceed there first.</p> - -<p>It is of course utterly out of the question to -attempt any connected account even of one voyage -round the world, let alone three, within such limits -as these, therefore I cannot do better than let the -great navigator describe his achievements, as he -actually did, in three modest paragraphs:</p> - -<p>“I endeavoured to make a direct course to -Otaheite” (this was after he had crossed the Atlantic -and doubled the Horn, which doubling, by the way, -took thirty-three days), “and in part succeeded, but -I made no discovery till I got within the Tropic, -where I fell in with Lagoon Island, The Groups,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_132">132</span> -Verde Island, Chain Island, and on the 13th of -April arrived at Otaheite, where I remained three -months, during which time the observations on the -transit were taken.</p> - -<p>“I then left it, discovered and visited the Society -Islands and Ohetoroa; thence proceeded to the -south till I arrived in latitude 40°22 south, longitude -147°29 east, then on the 6th of October, fell in with -the east side of New Zealand.</p> - -<p>“I continued exploring the coast of this country -till the 31st of March, 1770, when I quitted it and -proceeded to New Holland; and having surveyed -the eastern coast of that vast country, which part -had never before been visited, I passed between -its northern extremity and New Guinea, and landed -on the latter, touched at the island of Savu, -Batavia, Cape of Good Hope, and St. Helena, -and arrived in England on the 2nd of July, -1771.”</p> - -<p>I have seldom come across such a masterpiece of -eloquent simplicity as this, but then, of course, -Cook’s voyages were made before the days of the -lecture-exploiter and the Age of Booms. There is, -however, one remark that may be made on it. -What Cook calls New Holland we call Australia, -and Botany Bay, the first point he touched at, is -hard by Port Jackson, on the flowery shores of -which now stands the lovely capital of New South -Wales. Terra Incognita Australis was unknown -no longer, but the days when it was to prove itself<span class="pagenum" id="Page_133">133</span> -even more golden than El Dorado were yet distant -nearly a hundred years.</p> - -<p>If you would read the marvellous tale of frozen -lands and seas, of the sunlit coral-islands gemming -the sparkling waters as thickly as the stars stud the -Heavens, of the delights of Paradise and the -terrors of Nifflheim told and written by sundry -members of this expedition after their return, you -must go to your library and find them in the -originals, for there is no space to give them here. -Suffice it to say that, though somewhat prolix and -diffuse, you will, if you are blessed with an intelligent -taste for that kind of thing, find them more -delightful reading than any of the countless -romances whose writers have taken their materials -out of them.</p> - -<p>But there is one circumstance which for the -honour of James Cook ought to be mentioned. -The curse of sea-voyaging in those days was -scurvy. Out of forty sick, nearly half of the little -company, no fewer than twenty-three died, and this -terrible fact set the captain thinking, with the result -that he, first of all mariners, grappled with and -conquered this worst of the dangers of the ocean. -If he had never done anything else he would have -deserved a niche in the Temple of Fame. In his -second voyage round the world, which lasted three -years and sixteen days, he only lost four men, three -of whom died by accident and the fourth not of -scurvy.</p> - -<p>The Circumnavigator was now promoted to the -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_134">134</span> -rank of Commander, a modest enough reward for -the achievement of the greatest work of his generation. -He remained ashore just a year, probably -the longest period he had ever spent on land since -he first went to sea.</p> - -<p>During this time the publication of a collection -of travels started people talking about the Southern -Continent again. Captain Cook had found it, but -that didn’t matter. His discovery was not splendid -enough by any means, so it was decided to send -another expedition, this time of two ships, “to complete -the discovery of the southern hemisphere” (!) -and Cook sailed again in command aboard the -<i>Resolution</i> of 462 tons having for consort the -<i>Adventure</i> of 336 tons.</p> - -<p>They sailed on July 13, 1772, and on October -30th reached Table Bay—a hundred and nine days, -think of that, you who take a run out to the Cape -and back again for a winter holiday! Truly the -world was somewhat larger in those days.</p> - -<p>From Cape Town they steered straight away for -the South, and on December 10th they sighted for -the first time the ice-fringe of what we know now -to be the <em>true</em> Terra Incognita Australis.</p> - -<p>The landsmen on board seem to have had a -dreadful time during this part of the voyage and -Foster, one of the naturalists of the expedition, -bewails “the gloomy uniformity with which they -had slowly passed dull hours, days and months in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_135">135</span> -this desolate part of the world.” What a change -it must have been from the rigours and horrors of -Antarctica to the paradisaical delights of Tahiti, -which, after surveying the coast of New Zealand -and deciding that it consisted of two islands and -not one, the expedition reached on the 16th of the -following August.</p> - -<p>There is perhaps no other spot on earth which -so completely fulfils one’s ideas of what Paradise -ought to be as this same island of Tahiti even now, -but what must it have been in those days, when -white men first saw it in all the beauty and simplicity -of its primeval innocence. Now, alas, it is -very different, cursed by the diseases and vices of -civilisation and afflicted by a cast-iron <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">régime</i> which -the people seem to think a little worse than death, -since they are dying as fast as they can to get away -from it.</p> - -<p>After this again New Zealand was visited, and -once more the two ships plunged into the icy solitudes -of Antarctica, only to return again, baffled by -the impenetrable ice-wall. From here the ships -steered northwards for Easter Island and Crusoe’s -Island. It is noteworthy that on the way Captain -Cook, the great Medicine Man of the sailors, himself -fell sick, and that, for want of anything better, -“a dog was killed to make soup for him”—from -which it will be seen that voyages of discovery -were not exactly picnics in his time.</p> - -<p>From Juan Fernandez he steered for the Marquesas<span class="pagenum" id="Page_136">136</span> -again, once more visited New Zealand, and -once more his sea-worn crews revelled in the unrestrained -delights of Tahiti. Then again to the -south, this time not to rest until the whole circle of -the Southern hemisphere had been made without -the finding of any other southern continent than the -unapproachable Antarctica, and so in due course -and without mishap came the Sunday morning, -July 30, 1775, when the <i>Resolution</i> and the <i>Adventure</i>, -having well vindicated their names, dropped -their willing anchors into the waters of Spithead.</p> - -<p>More honours, though not of the nineteenth-century-boom -order, were now most justly bestowed -on the Circumnavigator. He was promoted -to the rank of Post-Captain in the Navy, and made -a Captain of Greenwich Hospital, a post which -carried with it a home and honourable retirement -for the rest of his life—of which he was the very -last man in the world to avail himself. He was -also elected Fellow of the Royal Society, and presented -with the gold medal for his treatment of scurvy.</p> - -<p>Captain Cook as sailor, as scientific navigator, -and as explorer was now at the height of his fame. -He was forty-eight years old, and had spent thirty-four -years at sea, and it is no exaggeration to -say that during this time he had added more -geographical knowledge to the history of the world -than any one had ever done before, and had -probably covered a larger portion of its surface. -He had at once proved and disproved the dream of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_137">137</span> -the Southern Continent, and, potentially speaking, -he had added enormous areas to the ever-growing -realms of Greater Britain.</p> - -<p>He might well have rested on such laurels as -these, but there was more work for him to do, and -he went to do it. One of the greatest questions of -the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries, -was the possibility of the North-West Passage from -the Atlantic to the Pacific. So far every attempt -had ended in failure, and generally in disaster, but -now, when men’s minds were full of the wonders -Captain Cook had achieved, there arose another -question: Might not a <i>North-East</i> passage from -the Pacific to the Atlantic be possible, and, if so, -who better to try it than the great Circumnavigator? -An expedition was promptly decided on. Captain -Cook was not offered the command, as the Government -probably and rightly thought he had won his -laurels. But one fatal evening he dined with Lord -Sandwich, the promoter of the expedition, and at -table he met his old patron, Sir Hugh Palliser, and -his friend, Mr. Stephens, Secretary to the Admiralty. -Ostensibly the object of the dinner was to -consult him as to the best leader for the new -venture, but the moment the subject was broached -the unquenchable passion for travel blazed up again, -and the great Navigator rose to his feet and said -gravely:</p> - -<p>“My lord and gentlemen, if you will have me I -will go myself.”</p> - -<p>So was decided the fatal voyage which was -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_138">138</span> -destined to end a glorious and almost blameless -career by an ignoble and unworthy death.</p> - -<p>The expedition consisted of the old <i>Resolution</i> -and the <i>Discovery</i>, a vessel of three hundred tons. -The voyage lasted four years and nine months, but -the loss of life by sickness was only five men, of -whom three were ill when they started. A good -deal of the old ground was gone over, more islands -were discovered, more unknown coasts surveyed. -Fair Tahiti was visited once more, and the expedition, -so far as its principal object was concerned, -came to an end, as the search for the Southern -Continent had done, in a way blocked by impenetrable -barriers of ice—this time the ice of the North.</p> - -<p>Thus turned back, they steered southward, and -on December 1, 1778, they discovered Hawai, -which discovery the great Navigator in his last -written words somewhat strangely says, “seemed in -many respects to be the most important that had -hitherto been made by Europeans throughout the -extent of the Pacific Ocean.”</p> - -<p>It was here, as all the world knows, that he met -his death, and the story of it is, unhappily, at sad -variance with that of his life.</p> - -<p>The one blemish on Captain Cook’s otherwise -noble character was a liability to outbursts of ungovernable -temper, and during these he seems to -have behaved on more occasions than one in a -manner almost befitting one of the old buccaneers.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_139">139</span> -For instance, he would punish paltry thefts by -cutting off the ears of the islanders, firing small -shot at them as they swam to the shore, chasing -them in boats, and ordering his men to strike and -stab them with boat-hooks as they struggled out of -the way. On one occasion he punished a Kanaka -who had pilfered some trifle by “making two cuts -upon his arm to the bone, one across and the other -close below his shoulder.”</p> - -<p>Again, at the island of Eimeo, because a goat -was stolen, he landed thirty-five armed men, -blockaded the island with armed boats, and burnt -every house and canoe that he came across, and, as -an eye-witness says, “several women and old men -still remained by the houses, whose lamentations -were very great, but all their tears and entreaties -could not move Captain Cook to desist in the -smallest degree from those cruel ravages.”</p> - -<p>Now it was undoubtedly this anger-madness of -his, combined with an equally incomprehensible act -of duplicity, which cost him his life. When he -returned from his attempt to find the North-East -passage and landed at Hawai, he was hailed by the -natives as Lono, a god who had disappeared ages -before, saying that he would return in huge canoes -with cocoa-nut trees for masts. Now unhappily -there is no doubt that Captain Cook, for some -reason or other, took advantage of this belief. Not -only did he not undeceive the natives, but he permitted -divine honours to be paid to him.</p> - -<p>From personal knowledge of the Pacific Islanders -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_140">140</span> -I am able to say that in their pristine state they -look upon deception and lying as the gravest of -crimes, and usually punish them with death, and -Captain Cook, with his vast experience of them, -must have known this also, and therefore he must -have been fully aware that the moment anything -happened to show the natives that he was <em>not</em> a -god, his life would not be worth a moment’s -purchase.</p> - -<p>Shortly after this the ships sailed, and it would -have been well for Cook, who had been guilty of -some very high-handed acts, if he had never -returned. But they came back a week afterwards -to find the island under the mysterious <em>tabu</em>—which -is the Kanaka equivalent for an interdict, and by far -the most sacred institution known to the Polynesians. -Some of his marines broke this <em>tabu</em> in -the most flagrant fashion. In revenge one of the -<i>Discovery’s</i> cutters was stolen. When anything of -this sort happened Captain Cook was accustomed -to inveigle a chief or two on board his ship and -keep them there till the thing stolen was restored. -He tried to do this with the King of Hawai, but -the people suspected his design, and at the critical -moment news came that a canoe had been burnt -and a chief killed. The King refused to go another -step, and then Captain Cook, who was armed with -a hanger and a double-barrelled gun, did a terribly -foolish thing for such a man to do.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_141">141</span></p> - -<div id="ip_141" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_141.jpg" width="1200" height="1988" alt="" /><div class="caption">MISSED HIM AND KILLED ANOTHER MAN BEHIND HIM.</div></div> - -<p>He began to walk away to his boat, turning his -back on the armed and angry natives. To do so -was to invite certain death, and one of the warriors -attacked him with his spear. He turned and shot -at the man, missed him, and killed another man -behind him. A shower of stones followed, and the -marines fired on the natives.</p> - -<p>Cook appears now to have seen the seriousness -of the situation, and signalled to those in the boat -to stop firing. While he was doing this a chief ran -up and drove his spear through his body. Some -accounts say that it was an iron dagger, others that -he was clubbed on the head simultaneously. At -any rate he staggered forward and fell face downwards -in the water, on which the natives “immediately -leapt in after and kept him under for a few -minutes, then hauled him out upon the rocks and -beat his head against them several times, so that -there is no doubt but that he quickly expired.”</p> - -<p>Such was the end of the great Circumnavigator, -the greatest seaman of his time, and a man honoured -wherever the science of navigation was known. It -was a miserable end to such a brilliant career, -miserable as was that of the great Magellan, who -lost his life and the deathless honour of being the -first sea-captain to sail round the world in just such -a petty and ignoble squabble on the beach of a -lonely islet in the Phillipines.</p> - -<p>But though his death was ignoble, it can detract -nothing from the splendour of his life’s work. He<span class="pagenum" id="Page_142">142</span> -was not perfect—no great man is—and it is only -the mournful truth to say that the meanest and -most unlovable trait in his character was the direct -and culpable cause of his death. Among sailors -this is already forgotten, and they only remember -him, as they are well warranted in doing, as the -greatest of English mariners, and the man who -conquered their most terrible enemy and their -deadliest destroyer.</p> -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_143">143</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="VII">VII<br /> - -<i>LORD CLIVE</i>,<br /> - -<span class="subhead"><i>QUILL-DRIVER AND CONQUEROR</i></span></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_145">145</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">VII<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">LORD CLIVE</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="firstword">It</span> is one of the distinctions of Robert Clive to -be at once the model of all bad boys and the -forlorn hope of their despairing fathers. He was -probably the very worst boy that ever became a -really great man. Of his early youth there is -absolutely nothing good to be said, saving only -the fact that he was possessed of that brute, bulldog -courage which thousands of English boys, -whose names have never been heard beyond -their native towns, have possessed in common -with him.</p> - -<p>He was idle, passionate, aggressive, not over -truthful, and of a distinctly turbulent, not to say -piratical disposition. For instance, he had not -reached his teens before he established a sort of -juvenile reign of terror in the sleepy old town of -Market Drayton, which had at once the misfortune -and the honour of being his birthplace.</p> - -<p>Even the school-books have not omitted to tell -us how the boy became the father of the future -pirate and Empire-Maker, by organising the kindred<span class="pagenum" id="Page_146">146</span> -spirits of the town into a buccaneering band, -as captain of which he levied blackmail in the -shape of nuts, apples, sweetmeats, and even coin -of the realm on the shopkeepers.</p> - -<p>If the tribute were punctually paid, well and good; -but if one rebelled or defaulted, the odds were that -he very soon had a heavy bill to pay for window-repairing, -or else there would be sudden deaths in -his fowl-house, or, peradventure, his errand-boy, if -not an accomplice of the gang, would return prematurely -from his rounds with his goods missing -and undelivered, and his person in a somewhat -battered and dishevelled condition.</p> - -<p>The most respectable feat that he appears to have -accomplished in these days would, after all, appear -to be the climbing of the lofty church steeple, and -his enjoyment on that dizzy eminence of the horror -and consternation of the townsfolk. This feat was, -in its way, as characteristic of the man that was to -be as was his first essay in world-piracy, for later on -we shall see how he reached a far more dizzy eminence -than this and kept his head as few others would -have done.</p> - -<p>His school life appears to have been as unsatisfactory -as his home life. He was sent to academy -after academy, and at each, ushers and pedagogues -struggled with him in vain—although of itself this -fact was not greatly to his discredit, since the -methods of alleged education in the first half of the -eighteenth century were even more unnatural than<span class="pagenum" id="Page_147">147</span> -they are now. Still, the fact remains that he was a -hopeless dunce, self-willed and idle, and of an unlovable -disposition, redeemed only by the one good -quality of intrepid pluck.</p> - -<p>One of his uncles, in a family letter, says, semi-prophetically -of him: “Fighting, to which he is out -of measure addicted, gives his temper such a fierceness -and imperiousness that it flies out on every -trifling occasion.”</p> - -<p>It is also said that one of his schoolmasters saw -signs of future greatness in the dullard of whom -neither he nor any of his brethren could make even -a presentable schoolboy, but this is probably a story -of the “I told you so” order, possibly invented by -the worthy pedagogue some time after the event. -Be this, however, as it may, the fact is that in the -end the last of the pedagogues seems to have thrown -the job up in despair and returned him back on his -father’s hands as a hopelessly hard case.</p> - -<p>Now it so happened that in those days there was -a refuge for the destitute, or perhaps it would be -more correct to say the ne’er-do-well, which in these -days is hardly represented by any portion of our -Colonial Empire.</p> - -<p>If there appeared to be no chance of a lad doing -anything decent at home; if his parents were too -poor to buy him a commission in the Army, and -hadn’t interest enough to get him into the Navy, -and if he were, as Clive undoubtedly was, too much -of a dunce to have a chance in any other respectable<span class="pagenum" id="Page_148">148</span> -profession, the last thing that could be done for -him was to get him a writership in the service of the -East India Company.</p> - -<p>If this could be done, two prospects were open to -him. He would die of fever in a year or two, after -a hard struggle to live upon his miserable pay, or he -would “shake the Pagoda Tree,” and come home a -wealthy nabob, with a brick-dust complexion, a sun-dried -and somewhat shrivelled conscience, and a -liver perpetually on strike. As it happened, however, -Robert Clive availed himself of neither of -these prospects, since the mysterious Fates had a -third one in store for him.</p> - -<p>Certainly they were <em>very</em> mysterious Fates which -presided over the early fortunes of the future Conqueror -of India, and upon none of their darlings -have they frowned so blackly and then suddenly -turned round and smiled so brightly as upon the -scapegrace of Market Drayton.</p> - -<p>To begin with, the voyage to India in those days, -even for people with large means, was a weary and -miserable business. Ocean greyhounds, the Suez -Canal, and the Peninsular Railway, were undreamt -of; and the heavy Indiamen lumbered toilfully -round the Cape, across the Indian Ocean, and up -the Bay of Bengal, taking their time about it—sometimes -six months, sometimes a year, or more. -In Clive’s case it was more, for his ship first crossed -the Atlantic to the Brazils, and stopped there for -some months. Here he spent all his money, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_149">149</span> -got in return a smattering of Portuguese, which he -afterwards found useful.</p> - -<p>When he eventually landed on the surf-beaten -beach of Madras, he was not only penniless but in -debt. The only person of influence to whom he -had an introduction had left for England. His -duties were both laborious and distasteful. He -had no friends and was too shy and awkwardly -proud to make any, and for months he was veritably -a stranger in a strange land, and, to crown -all, he became wretchedly ill.</p> - -<p>How mournful he really felt his position to be, -and how far the stern discipline of misery had -already softened his intractable disposition, may -be seen from one of his letters home, in which -he says:</p> - -<p>“I have not enjoyed one happy day since I left -my native country. If I should be so far blest as -to revisit it again, but more especially Manchester” -(this, by the way, was his mother’s native place) -“the centre of all my wishes, all that I could hope -or desire for would be presented before me in one -view.”</p> - -<p>How little did the despairing lad dream as he -wrote thus in some interval of his weary drudgery -that when he did revisit his native land it would be -as a conqueror, laurel-crowned, and hailed as one -worthy to rank with the first soldiers of his age!</p> - -<p>But, bright as his fortune was to be, he appears -just now to have been doing very little to deserve<span class="pagenum" id="Page_150">150</span> -it. Macaulay tells us, in that brilliant essay of his, -that he behaved just as badly to his official superiors -as he had done to his schoolmasters, and came several -times very near to being dismissed, and at length, so -heavily did sickness of body and weariness of soul -lie upon him, that twice in quick succession he -attempted to blow his brains out, and twice the -pistol missed fire.</p> - -<p>If those had been the days of central-fire, self-cocking -revolvers, instead of flint-lock pistols, the -history of Asia would have been changed, and what -is now our Indian Empire would probably have been -a French possession.</p> - -<p>It will be necessary just here to quote a little -history with a view to seeing how matters stood in -India at the time when Clive, as it is said, flung -away the second useless pistol, and, like Wallenstein, -exclaimed that after all he must have been -born for something great.</p> - -<p>The map of India then was very different to what -it is now. There was no red about it at all. In the -East, France was practically mistress of the seas, -whatever she might be elsewhere. The British flag -only flew over one spot, and that only by sufferance. -This was the little trading settlement of Madras, -which was rented from the Nabob of the Carnatic, -who was only the deputy of the deputy of the once -mighty prince whom Europe knew vaguely as the -Great Mogul.</p> - -<p>Fort St. George and Fort St. David were mere<span class="pagenum" id="Page_151">151</span> -parodies of military stations, and the nucleus of the -army which was to conquer the whole Peninsula -consisted chiefly of half-trained natives, miscellaneously -armed with bows and arrows, swords and -bucklers, and here and there a firelock. On the -other hand, France possessed the Island of Mauritius -and the town and district of Pondicherry, the -former governed by Labourdonnais and the latter -by Dupleix, both men of great capacity and still -greater ambition.</p> - -<p>France and England were just then at war in -Europe, and Labourdonnais thought it a good time -to crush English trade in India while it was yet in -its infancy, so, in spite of all the British East Indian -fleet could do to stop him, he appeared with his ships -off Madras, landed a large body of troops, forced -Fort St. George to surrender, and hoisted the -French flag on its battlements.</p> - -<p>Happily, this roused the jealousy of Dupleix. -Labourdonnais had pledged his honour that Madras -should be restored on the payment of a moderate -ransom. Dupleix, who had already dreamt of being -sole master of India, was determined that it should -be wiped off the map altogether, so he accused his -fellow Governor of trespassing on his preserves, -and in the end succeeded in annulling his conditions -and marching the Governor of Fort St. George, -with the principal servants of the Company, in -triumph off to Pondicherry.</p> - -<p>Unfortunately for him, there was one whom he<span class="pagenum" id="Page_152">152</span> -did not take, not a principal servant by any means, -only an insignificant, underpaid quill-driver, who -had slipped out of the town disguised as a Mussulman, -and yet Dupleix would have made a very -good bargain if he could have exchanged all his -other prisoners of war for him.</p> - -<p>Clive reached Fort St. David, a dependency of -Fort St. George, in safety, and there, taking advantage -of the anger roused by this gross breach of -faith, he exchanged the pen for the sword, and the -writer became an ensign in the East India Company’s -army, such as it was.</p> - -<p>Scarcely, however, had he done so than peace -was made in Europe, and therefore in India. Clive, -no doubt in great disgust, was sent back to his -desk, but, happily for him and the British Empire, -not for long. Fortunately, too, submarine telegraphs -had not been invented then, and India was almost -always a year behind Europe, so Governor Dupleix -made up his mind to have a war on his own -account, and the prize of this war was to be, as -Macaulay puts it, “nothing less than the magnificent -inheritance of the House of Tamerlane.”</p> - -<p>To this end he took such skilful advantage of the -disputes of the pretenders to the throne of Nizam al -Mulk, the last of the great Viceroys of the Deccan, -that within a very short time he secured the triumph -of Mirzapha Jung, his <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">protégé</i>, and rose himself to -such a position that, in the name of this puppet, he -was the virtual ruler of thirty millions of people,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_153">153</span> -and master of the whole Carnatic, saving only the -city of Trichinopoly, which was all that was left -to Mohammed Ali, the candidate with whom the -English Company had sided in a half-hearted and -wholly futile fashion.</p> - -<p>At this juncture, Clive, who was now twenty-five -years old, and who occupied a sort of hybrid post -with the title of Commissary of the forces, took -upon himself to represent to his superiors that -unless something very decided was done, the -French must invariably become Lords Paramount -of the whole Peninsula. They hadn’t a notion -what was to be done, but Clive had, and the brazen -effrontery of his plan seems to have paralysed the -authorities into giving him a free hand.</p> - -<p>The situation was this: The triumphant Frenchman, -believing his quickly-acquired dominion a permanent -one, had raised a tall pillar to his own glory -on the site of his greatest victory, and round this -was growing up a city, the name of which in -English meant the City of the Victory of Dupleix. -Chunda Sahib, successor of Mirzapha, was besieging -Trichinopoly, supported by several hundred trained -French soldiers. Major Lawrence, commander of -the English garrison at Madras, had gone to England, -and the English Company possessed no officer -of proved ability. The natives, dazzled by the -rapid and brilliant triumphs of Dupleix, and remembering -the times when they had seen his -colours flying over Fort St. George, looked with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_154">154</span> -contemptuous pity on the English as a remnant of -feeble shopkeepers who were soon to be cast into -the sea. And so, in all probability, they would -have been if that historic pistol had gone off a few -years before.</p> - -<p>Clive, viewing the situation with true military -genius, saw two facts: first, that it would be -ridiculous with the force at his disposal to attack -the besiegers of Trichinopoly; and second, that, -if a dash were made at Arcot, the capital and -favourite residence of the Nabobs of the Carnatic, -which is rather less than a hundred miles inland -from Madras, the siege of Trichinopoly would -probably be raised, and so this he determined -to do.</p> - -<p>His army consisted of two hundred English -soldiers and three hundred Sepoys, with eight -English officers, of whom only two had ever seen -an action. He made the journey by forced marches -through the thunder and lightning and rain of the -wet season, and so astounded the garrison of Arcot -by his utterly unexpected appearance before the -gates that they ran without striking a blow.</p> - -<p>Clive now found himself master of a half-ruined -fort, which he at once proceeded to strengthen and -victual as best he might, well knowing that he -would have to fight for what he had got. Presently -the panic-stricken garrison came back, and brought -with it reinforcements which gave it the respectable -strength of three thousand men. In the middle of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_155">155</span> -the night on which they arrived and sat down -before the town to think matters over, Clive, without -waiting to be besieged as he should have -done by all the rules of Eastern warfare, marched -out, caught them napping, cut them to pieces, -and marched back again without losing a -man.</p> - -<p>Naturally the news of such doings as this flew -fast to Trichinopoly and Pondicherry, and clearly -something had to be done to crush this insolent -upstart before he gave any further trouble. To this -end four thousand men were sent by Chunda Sahib, -under his son Rajah, and by the time these reached -the walls of the old fort they had been increased by -reinforcements to ten thousand, and had, moreover, -been joined by a detachment of a hundred and fifty -French soldiers whom Dupleix had dispatched in -hot haste from Pondicherry.</p> - -<p>As has been said, the place they had come to -attack was a half-ruined old fort, with dry ditches -and hardly any defences worth serious mention, and -its garrison by this time consisted only of a hundred -and twenty Englishmen and two hundred Sepoys. -Four of the eight officers were dead, and the commander -of what looked very like a forlorn hope was -an ex-quill-driver twenty-five years old.</p> - -<p>And yet for fifty days and nights the besiegers -hurled themselves in vain against the rotten and -crumbling battlements behind which that dauntless -handful of half-starved men had made up their<span class="pagenum" id="Page_156">156</span> -minds either to stand till help came, or to fall like -the heroes that they were.</p> - -<p>The confidence and affection which the gallant -young commander inspired in his men—European -and native alike—during this terrible time is one of -the most splendid tributes to his fame. When there -was nothing left but rice to live and fight on, the -very Sepoys came to him of their own will to ask -that all the grain should be given to the Europeans, -who wanted more nourishment than they did. As -for them, they would gladly be content with the -water that it was boiled in! Men like this are bad -to beat, and so Rajah Sahib found in spite of all -his enormous advantages.</p> - -<p>But the splendid defence of Arcot had by this -time done something more than hold the French -and their allies in check. One Morari Row, the -chief of a body of six thousand Mahrattas—the -bandit ancestors of some of the finest soldiery that -now fights under the flag of Britain—had been -hired to defend Mohammed Ali against his enemies, -but so far, instead of helping, he had been waiting -to see which way the cat would jump. His personal -experience of the British had taught him that, -if they were not dogs or old women, they were -seemingly only fit for the bazaar and the counting-house, -and certainly no worthy allies for a race of -warriors. But now the gallantry of Clive and his -men was ringing all through the Carnatic, and -Morari swore by all his gods that, since the English<span class="pagenum" id="Page_157">157</span> -really could fight after all, and were able to help -themselves to such purpose, he hadn’t the slightest -objection to helping them.</p> - -<p>Having decided this in his own prudent mind, he -gave his warriors orders to march, and no sooner -did it transpire that their objective was the sorely -beleaguered fortress of Arcot than Rajah Sahib -came to the conclusion that he had got a harder -nut between his teeth than his jaws could crack, -and so he made overtures of peace in the true -Oriental style—that is to say, he offered a huge -bribe for an unconditional surrender, and accompanied -the offer with a threat of general assault and -subsequent extermination if the offer were refused. -The young quill-driver’s reply was characteristic.</p> - -<p>“Tell Rajah Sahib,” he said to the envoy, “that -I refuse his bribe with as much scorn as I receive -his threat. Tell him also that his master and father -is a usurper and his army a rabble, and bid him -beware how he brings them into a breach defended -by English soldiers.”</p> - -<p>Rajah Sahib declined the warning, and prepared -for attack by making his fanatic followers gloriously -drunk with bhang and ether assorted drugs. He -also selected the day of a great Moslem festival for -the assault, and enlisted the services of some -elephants, whose heads he covered with spiked -plates of iron, and these, when the attack was -delivered, were driven against the gates to act as -living battering-rams.</p> - -<p>But Clive had already foreseen that living battering-rams -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_158">158</span> -had the disadvantage of working both -ways, and so the elephants were received with such -a galling fire that, instead of charging the gates, -they turned round and made lanes through the -army behind them with distinctly demoralising -effect.</p> - -<p>This was a bad beginning, but the end was -worse. Clive acted not only as general-in-command, -but also as an ordinary gunner, and he -seems, moreover, to have pretty well filled all -the posts between. He worked as hard as any -soldier or Sepoy of them all. There were more -weapons than men to use them, so the rear ranks -loaded and primed the muskets, and passed them -up to the front as fast as they could be fired, and -Rajah Sahib speedily learnt what Clive had meant -by a breach defended by English soldiers, for the -fire was so fast and fierce that the more men that -he sent into the breach the more stopped there—and -that was about all there was in it from his -point of view.</p> - -<p>Three times the onset was repeated, and three -times the attacking swarms were mown down by -the leaden hail-storm that swept the breach, and -after the third time the Rajah and his merry men -had had enough of it and retreated to their lines.</p> - -<div id="ip_158" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_158.jpg" width="1200" height="1982" alt="" /><div class="caption">INSTEAD OF CHARGING THEY TURNED ROUND AND MADE LANES -THROUGH THE ARMY BEHIND THEM.</div></div> - -<p>The night passed in anxious watching, every -man in his place and every gun loaded, but their -last shot had been fired and the morning light<span class="pagenum" id="Page_159">159</span> -showed that Rajah Sahib and what was left of his -army had found the work too much highly seasoned -for their taste; that they had just run away, leaving -all their guns, ammunition, and stores to be picked -up by the victors at their leisure.</p> - -<p>Such was the forever memorable defence of -Arcot, and such too was the practical foundation of -the British Empire in India. It was the work of -a hundred and twenty-five English soldiers and two -hundred Sepoys, inspired to heroism by a young -man whom Fortune had suddenly plucked out of -the wrong place and set down in the right one.</p> - -<p>Clive was by no means the man to look upon -work as done because it was well begun. The -authorities at Fort St. George promptly sent him -two hundred more English soldiers and seven -hundred Sepoys, and with this force—which was -quite a large army for him—he marched out to join -hands with Morari Row, attacked Rajah Sahib at -the head of five thousand men with a stiffening of -three hundred French regulars, hit him very hard, -and generally convinced people that an Englishman -worthy of his name and race had at length taken -matters in hand.</p> - -<p>Unhappily, however, the English were not as -strong in the council-chamber as they were in the -field, and while the authorities were hesitating, -Rajah Sahib and Dupleix retrieved their loss to -such purpose that a native army supported by four -hundred French troops marched almost up to the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_160">160</span> -walls of Fort St. George and proceeded to amuse -themselves by laying the settlement waste, with the -result that Captain Clive had to come to the rescue, -and the end was another overwhelming defeat, -during which about half of the French regulars -were either killed or taken prisoners.</p> - -<p>This physical victory was followed by a moral -one no less effective. The vaingloriously-named -City of the Victory of Dupleix, surmounted by its -magniloquently inscribed pillar, lay at Clive’s mercy -and directly in his path, and he promptly pulled the -pillar down and wiped the city off the face of the -earth. He didn’t do this because he personally -disliked either Dupleix or his nation, but in doing it -he showed that he was statesman as well as soldier, -for, as he well knew, the destruction of the City of -Victory was to the waiting and watching millions -of India the symbol of the destruction and discredit -of the French power, and the establishment and -vindication of the British. From that day to this -Britain’s star in the East has been in the ascendant -and that of France on the decline.</p> - -<p>How completely all this and what followed was -the work of one man, and one only is eloquently -shown by the pronouncement of old Morari Row -to the effect that the English who followed Clive -must be of quite a different tribe or breed to those -who followed anybody else, and further by the fact -that he inflicted two decisive defeats upon the -French at Covelong and Chingleput, with a force<span class="pagenum" id="Page_161">161</span> -consisting of five hundred raw Sepoy levies, and -two hundred newly-imported scourings of the -London slums, who had so little of the soldier in -them that when a shot killed one in the first skirmish -all the rest turned round and ran away; while -on another occasion the report of a cannon so -frightened the sentries that they all left their -posts, and one of them was discovered occupying -a strategic position at the bottom of a well!</p> - -<p>And yet Clive, somehow, made steady, disciplined -soldiers out of this miserable rabble, and, though -at last he was so ill that he could hardly stand, -led them to victory and turned the French out of -their forts—which was perhaps a miracle even -greater than the making of Cromwell’s Ironsides.</p> - -<p>After this the young man, having well earned -a holiday, got married and came home for his -honeymoon. He was at once hailed as the saviour -of India—or at any rate of the East India Company, -the directors of which drained many a good -bottle of port to the toast of “General” Clive; and -even his father half incredulously admitted that -“after all it seemed that the booby had something -in him.”</p> - -<p>But “the booby,” who had come back moderately -rich, bore no malice, and at once began to repair -the evil of his youth by paying off all the debts of -his family. He then proceeded to waste his -substance and his time by getting into Parliament -and getting turned out again on petition, after<span class="pagenum" id="Page_162">162</span> -which he very properly went back to India to do -work that parliamentary orators couldn’t do.</p> - -<p>His first exploit was the reduction of the pirate -stronghold of Gheriah, which had long dominated -the whole Arabian Gulf, the next was the Avenging -of one of the blackest crimes in history. There is -no need to tell of it here, for is not the story -of the Black Hole of Calcutta deep-graven in the -memory of every man and woman, boy and girl, -of Anglo-Saxon blood? Forty-eight hours after -the news reached Madras Clive was given the -command of nine hundred British infantry and -fifteen hundred Sepoys, and with this army, supported -by a fleet under Admiral Watson, he -marched to the conquest of an empire half as large -as Europe.</p> - -<p>Curiously enough, however, he began by treating -with Surajah Dowlah—the arch-criminal of the -Black Hole—instead of crushing him, and, more -amazing still, during the course of the negotiations, -he deliberately forged Admiral Watson’s name to -a treaty intended to deceive an adherent whom he -knew to have made terms with the other side. It -is the most inexplicable act in his career, and, being -so, it is only a waste of words to try and explain -it away. He did it, and there’s an end of it.</p> - -<p>The next act in the now swiftly passing drama -was the first and only council of war that Clive ever -held. It was the eve of Plassey, an occasion ever -memorable in the annals, not only of Britain but of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_163">163</span> -the whole Orient. He was on one bank of the -river, Surajah Dowlah was on the other with an -army outnumbering his by twenty to one, splendidly -equipped, very strong in artillery, and, as usual, -supported and officered by the inevitable Frenchmen. -The river was the Rubicon which lay -between Clive and the Empire of India—and for -once in his life he hesitated.</p> - -<p>He called a council of war. It decided against -crossing the river with three thousand men in face -of sixty thousand, and Clive endorsed the verdict. -Then he went apart under some palm trees and -held another and a wiser council with himself, and -this council promptly and utterly revoked the -decision of the other.</p> - -<p>The next morning the river was crossed and the -next night the little army encamped within a mile -of the Nabob’s host. At sunrise the next day -Surajah Dowlah, who in the midst of his myriads -had passed a night haunted, as has been suggested, -by the ghosts of the men and women who perished -in the Black Hole, sent forth his forty thousand -infantry, his fifteen thousand cavalry, his batteries -of fifty guns, and his iron-plated war-elephants to -crush the invader once and for all, and on they -went like some huge tidal wave, roaring and -rushing, to overwhelm some little tree-clad island—and -then, just as the human avalanche was in mid-career, -the despot weakling’s will wavered, or, more -probably, his mind broke down, and he gave the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_164">164</span> -order to halt and retreat, almost before a blow was -struck.</p> - -<p>It was the moment of grace for Clive and he -seized it. The three thousand charged the sixty -thousand, and all of a sudden the impending -tragedy on which the fate of all India from the -Himalayas to Cape Comorin depended, was turned -into a farce. Of the sixty thousand only five -hundred were slain; of the three thousand twenty-two -were killed and fifty wounded. The whole -thing was over in an hour, and India was -won.</p> - -<p>To Clive himself the result was an appointment -as Governor-General over the whole of the -Company’s territory in Bengal, and this virtually -raised him to an authority higher than that of -a throne, and, to his everlasting honour be it said, -that in an age and country of almost universal -corruption, he never abused it. Victory after -victory in the field, and triumph after triumph in -policy now followed fast upon each other, till -French, Dutch, and native princes alike were -crushed to impotence or reduced to grovelling -submission, and the crowning victory of Chinsurah -set the seal of absolute supremacy upon British rule -in India.</p> - -<p>Three months after this Clive again came home, -the possessor of fairly won wealth which was only -exceeded by the magnitude of his fame, to be hailed -as the greatest of British living Commanders, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_165">165</span> -to be rewarded, first with a place in the Irish, and -then with one in the British Peerage.</p> - -<p>The story of his five years’ stay in England is not -an edifying one. It is a story of wild extravagance, -fierce and unworthy jealousies in the very councils -of that Company to which he had given more lands -and subjects than any European monarch possessed, -and of general dissatisfaction and disillusion.</p> - -<p>But meanwhile the way to his last and perhaps -his greatest triumph was being prepared for him. -As year after year passed it became more and more -plain that the empire he had created could not get -on without him. The men put in authority after -him by the Company had but one object in life and -that was to “shake the Pagoda Tree.” In other -words, to set prince against prince and state against -state for the sole purpose of making money out of -their differences, and generally to squeeze the utmost -amount of gold out of the country in the shortest -possible time.</p> - -<p>Corruption which scandalised even that corrupt -age revelled in hitherto unheard-of excesses. -Everything was neglected but money-making, -and the lately-terrible English name was fast -becoming a scoff and a by-word even to the -plundered and the oppressed. So in the end -Clive went out again, it being seen that he only -could end a situation fast becoming impossible.</p> - -<p>But this time it was not to fight French, or -Indian, or Dutchman, but his own countrymen, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_166">166</span> -to win in the Council Chamber a victory that was -perhaps greater than any he had won on the battlefield. -In eighteen months he did what he had said -he would do, and replaced chaos with cosmos. It -was a fitting climax to his life’s work, and yet such -is the irony of Fate and the baseness of human -nature that it also came near to proving his personal -ruin.</p> - -<p>He had fought and conquered the evil spirits of -greed, corruption, and private extortion, but he had -not killed them. The hatred of the evil-doer pursued -him across the seas and roused up all the old -jealousies at home. On his first and second returns -he had been hailed, first as a man of the most -brilliant promise and then as a man who had -splendidly fulfilled that promise. But now, in the -country which he had enriched by the addition of a -whole empire no charge was so base that it was -not believed against him. He had put down the -oppressor, the extortioner, and the money-grubber, -and he came back to his native land to be arraigned -before a committee of the House of Commons as all -these and something of a criminal to boot!</p> - -<p>But with this third home-coming of his, his story -as an Empire-Maker ends. It is well to know that he -came triumphantly out of all the toils that his jealous -and unworthy enemies had laid for him, and in this -he was happier than his great rival Dupleix, who -sank through all the gradations of poverty and -misery into a nameless grave. But still the work<span class="pagenum" id="Page_167">167</span> -of his foes and that of the terrible Indian climate -had not been without effect. Crippled both in mind -and body, he at last sought refuge in opium from -the tortures of the diseases which he had contracted -in the service of his country.</p> - -<p>Time after time his genius blazed out again -through the glooms that were settling over his later -days, and so great was the faith of the Government -in him that he was actually asked to go -and do for North America what he had done for -India.</p> - -<p>If the broken invalid of those days had been the -same man as the defender of Arcot and the victor of -Plassey, the history of the Anglo-Saxon race might -well have been changed, for Robert Clive would -not only have been strong to crush the rebels, but -also just and generous to procure them afterwards -those equal rights of citizenship the denial of -which split Anglo-Saxondom in two.</p> - -<p>Of this, at least, we may be fairly certain: there -would have been no Bunker’s Hill and no Brandywine -River save as geographical expressions, and -there would have been neither a Saratoga nor a -Yorktown save as towns and nothing more.</p> - -<p>But this was not to be. Clive’s genius had given -forth its last flash and the eclipse had come. -On November 22, 1774, some ten weeks after the -assembly of the Revolutionary Congress at Philadelphia, -Robert, Lord Clive, Baron of Plassey, and -Conqueror of the domains of the great Tamerlane,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_168">168</span> -for the third time put a pistol to his head—and this -time it went off.</p> - -<p>It was, as Macaulay says, an awful close to such -a career, and yet, after all, granted even everything -that his worst enemies said against him, Robert -Clive had well and worthily earned a place in the -front rank of Britain’s Empire-Makers.</p> - -<p>On Sir Thomas Wren’s tomb in St. Paul’s stands -the Latin legend which translated reads: “If you -seek his monument look around you!” If a man -could be endowed with an infinite range of vision -he might be placed on the highest pinnacle of the -Himalayas, and as he looked east and west and -south the same might be said to him as the epitaph -of Robert Clive; for all that he could see from the -Arabian Gulf to the Bay of Bengal, and from the -Himalayan slopes to the coral reefs of Cape Comorin, -would be the monument of his eternal fame—and is -there man born of woman who could desire a -worthier?</p> -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_169">169</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="VIII">VIII<br /> - -<i>WARREN HASTINGS</i>,<br /> - -<span class="subhead"><i>THE FIRST UNCROWNED KING OF INDIA</i></span></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_171">171</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">VIII<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">WARREN HASTINGS</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap b"><span class="firstword">Both</span> in point of time and personal capacity, -Warren Hastings, first Governor-General -of the British Empire in India, was the successor -of Robert, Lord Clive. At the same time it may -be as well to point out in this connection that there -might be more literal correctness in describing -Warren Hastings as an Empire-Preserver rather -than an Empire-Maker.</p> - -<p>It was the victor of Plassey who rough-hewed -the stones upon which the now gorgeous fabric -of our Indian Empire stands. It was Hastings -who, in spite of stupendous difficulties, took -those stones and laid them down according to -that plan which he had formed, and which has -been followed in the main by all who have added -to the structure.</p> - -<p>As was said in other words of William of Orange, -one of the greatest claims that the great Governor -has to the interest and admiration of those who -have a share in the splendid inheritance that he<span class="pagenum" id="Page_172">172</span> -built up, lies in the fact that he did his work in the -face of everlasting hindrances and in the midst -of perpetual embarrassments, which must infallibly -have discouraged and bewildered any but a man -upon whom the gods had set the stamp of greatness, -and, in their own way, crowned him one of the -kings of men. In short, like the grandson of -William the Silent, Warren Hastings was first and -foremost an overcomer of difficulties.</p> - -<p>Great and splendid and enduring as his work -undoubtedly was, it would not, after all, have been -very difficult to do if he had just been left to do it—not -helped, because he wasn’t the kind of man -who wanted help, but just left alone. Instead of -this, however, as though it were not enough that -his work of organising and consolidating what the -sword of Clive had won, and combating the infinity -of complications arising out of the rivalry of a -dozen warring native potentates, he was purposely -surrounded in his own council-chamber by unscrupulous -enemies of his own blood and country, -whose only title to historical recognition is now the -infamy that they have earned by failing to prevent -the doing of that work which Warren Hastings -saw had got to be done, and which he, with an -inflexible heroism, decided to do in spite of everything -that his enemies, white or brown, Mohammedan, -Hindoo or British, could do to cripple -him.</p> - -<p>Sir Alfred Lyall, his most recent biographer, has<span class="pagenum" id="Page_173">173</span> -very happily said of him that “perhaps no man of -undisputed genius ever inherited less in mind or -money from his parents or owed them fewer -obligations of any kind.” His father, Pynaston -Hastings, was the vagrant ne’er-do-well son of -a fine old family. He married when only fifteen -without any means or prospect of supporting a -family. Warren was the second son. His father -was only seventeen at his birth, and his mother -died a few days later. As soon as he was old -enough Pynaston took holy orders, married again, -obtained a living in the West Indies, and there -died, leaving his son to be put into a charity school -by his grandfather.</p> - -<p>This is not much for a father to do for a son, but -there was something else that Pynaston Hastings -did which was of very great consequence, though -in the nature of the case no credit is due to him for -it. He transmitted to him the blood of a long line -of ancestors, which stretched away back through -one of the followers of William the Norman to the -days of those old pirate kings of the Northland -who, as I have pointed out before, were none the -worse fathers of Empire-Makers because they were -pirates as well.</p> - -<p>One of his ancestors, John Hastings, Lord of -the Manors of Yelford-Hastings in Oxfordshire, -and of Dalesford in Worcestershire, lost about half -of his worldly goods, including the plate that he -sent to be coined at the Oxford Mint, in helping<span class="pagenum" id="Page_174">174</span> -Charles Stuart to fight the great Oliver, and afterwards -spent most of the remainder in buying his -peace from the Parliament. It was on the ancient -estate of Dalesford, long before sold to the stranger -and the alien, that Warren Hastings was born, -some two hundred years later, practically a pauper -and almost an outcast, under the shadow of his -ancestral home.</p> - -<p>When he came to reasoning years he made a -boyish resolve, challenging fate with all the splendid -insolence of a seven-year-old dreamer, that some -day he would make his fortune and buy the old -place back—which in due course he did, although -in those days his prospect of doing so was about as -small as it was of reigning over the millions of -subjects whose descendants to-day revere his -memory almost as that of one of their own -demigods.</p> - -<p>When he was twelve years old Warren was -taken away from the charity school by one of his -uncles and sent to Westminster, where he distinguished -himself by winning a King’s scholarship in -the year 1747. Even when his poor old grandfather, -the last Hastings of Dalesford, and the -miserably paid rector of the parish which his -ancestors had owned, sent Warren to sit beside the -little rustics of the village school, he immediately -singled himself out from them by the willing intelligence -with which he took to his work and -afterwards the headmaster of Westminster had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_175">175</span> -high hopes of university distinctions for him. It -was indeed a somewhat curious coincidence that -Robert Clive should have been such an exceedingly -bad boy and the completer of his work such a -good one.</p> - -<p>But the Fates had already decided that Warren -Hastings was to graduate with honours in a very -much bigger university than that on the banks of -the Isis or the Cam. His uncle died suddenly, and -the orphan lad was passed on to the care of a -distant connection who happened to be a director of -the East India Company.</p> - -<p>His headmaster remonstrated strongly, but happily -without effect, against his immediate removal to -Christ’s Hospital to learn account-keeping before -going out to Bengal as a writer in the service of -“John Company.”</p> - -<p>It seems as though the worthy Dr. Nichols had -a very high opinion of his intellectual abilities, for, -when all his protests failed, he actually offered to -send his brilliant young pupil to Oxford at his own -expense.</p> - -<p>Happily for the British Empire Mr. Director -Chiswick, the relative aforesaid, stuck to his selfish -project of getting him off his hands as quickly and -permanently as possible by sending him out to -Calcutta to take jungle fever or make a fortune, just -in the same way that Clive’s despairing parents -had done.</p> - -<p>He sailed for Calcutta when he was seventeen,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_176">176</span> -the same age as his precious father was when he -was born. He had been two years at the desk in -Calcutta when there came the news that Clive had -taken Arcot and put a very different complexion on -the struggle between the English and French -Companies for the supremacy of India.</p> - -<p>About that time he was sent to a little town on -the Hooghly about a mile from Moorshedabad, and -while he was here driving bargains with native -silk-weavers and tea merchants, Surajah Dowlah -marched into Calcutta and cast such English -prisoners as he could lay hold of into the Black -Hole.</p> - -<p>Hastings was also taken prisoner, but most -fortunately did not get into the Black Hole, and -he appears to have been set at large on the intercession -of the chief of the Dutch factory. During -the period which followed his partial release—for he -was still under surveillance at Moorshedabad—he -made his first essay in diplomacy, or what would -perhaps be more correctly described as political -intrigue, with the result that the city got too hot for -him, and he fled to Fulda, an island below Calcutta, -where, as has been pithily said, the English fugitives -from Fort William “were encamped like a shipwrecked -crew awaiting rescue.”</p> - -<p>The rescue came in the shape of the combined -naval and military expedition, commanded by -Admiral Watson and Robert Clive, which was -destined to end in the triumph of Plassey, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_177">177</span> -Warren Hastings, as Macaulay aptly suggests in -his brilliant but singularly misinformed essay, -doubtless inspired by the example of Clive and -the similarity of their entrance on to the stage of -Indian affairs, like him exchanged the pen for the -sword, and fought through the campaign. But -Clive saw “that there was more in his head than -his arm,” and after the battle of Plassey he sent him -as resident Agent of the Company to the Court of -Meer Jaffier, the puppet-nabob who had been set -up in the place of Surajah Dowlah.</p> - -<p>He held this post until he was made a Member -of Council in 1761, and was obliged to remove to -Calcutta. Clive was at home now, and the interregnum -of oppression, extortion, and general mismanagement -was in full swing; but the man who -was afterwards so grossly wronged and falsely -impeached, and who passed through the most celebrated -trial in English history charged with just -such crimes, had so little taste for them that three -years later he came back a comparatively poor man, -and the fortune he had he either gave away to his -relations or lost through the failure of a Dutch -trading-house.</p> - -<p>After a stay of four years, during which he -renewed his intimacy with his old schoolfellow, -the creator of the immortal John Gilpin, and made -the acquaintance of Johnson and Boswell, he found -himself so reduced in circumstances that he not -only had to ask the Directors of the Company to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_178">178</span> -give him more employment in India, but when he -got it he was forced to borrow the money to pay his -passage out again.</p> - -<p>It is quite impossible to form any just and reasonable -judgment of the work which Warren Hastings -now went out to do unless one first gets an adequate -idea of the condition of things obtaining in India -before the English went there, and of the conditions -that would have obtained, if men like Clive, -Hastings, Cornwallis, and Wellesley had not by one -means and another—some good, some bad, but all -just what were possible under the circumstances—succeeded -in imposing the <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">Pax Britannica</i> upon -the rival and constantly warring potentates who -governed the native populations.</p> - -<p>No doubt the war on the Rohillas, or the so-called -spoliation of the Begums of Oude, together -with more or less magnified incidentals, formed -famous themes in after years for the inflated -eloquence and grandiloquent over-statements of -Edmund Burke and Sheridan, and for the far -less comprehensible or excusable special pleading -of Lord Macaulay.</p> - -<p>It was, no doubt, very affecting to see the -patched and powdered fine ladies who paid their -fifty guineas a seat in Westminster Hall to watch -the men of words mangling the reputation of the -man of deeds, weeping and fainting at the harrowing -pictures they drew—mostly on their own -imaginations—of the sufferings which he had <em>not</em><span class="pagenum" id="Page_179">179</span> -caused; but we of to-day are sufficiently far removed -from the personal spite and the passion and -rivalry which inspired the enemies and accusers of -the great Governor to be able to look at things as -they actually were, and in doing so we shall see -that, however heavy was the hand that Warren -Hastings laid upon the subject peoples, it was but -as a caress to a blow when compared with the -oppression and extortion with which conqueror -after conqueror, Mohammedan and Hindoo, Sikh, -Afghan, and Mahratta, had ground down and -despoiled the helpless races which successively -passed under their sway.</p> - -<p>Order, however dearly bought, is always less -expensive than anarchy, and the impassioned -periods of Burke and Sheridan look somewhat -silly when we compare them with the sober facts. -It never seems to have struck them or their -audience to make any comparison between the -English gentleman and loyal servant of his country -whom they would have handed down to history as -a monster of iniquity, and those real tyrants of the -type of Surajah Dowlah, Hyder-Ali, and Nana-Sahib, -whose brutal rule and ruthless wars of -conquest and extermination must have been, under -the circumstances, the only possible alternative to -the strong and steady control of the Englishman.</p> - -<p>The first thing that Warren Hastings did on his -return was to reorganise the trade of the Province,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_180">180</span> -and in this he succeeded so well that the Directors -rewarded him in 1772 with the Governorship of -Bengal; and if they could have stopped there, -leaving him to do the rest, the immediately subsequent -history of India might have been very -much more creditable to the rulers and more -pleasant reading for the descendants of the ruled -than it was. But unhappily a body of traders and -shareholders became possessed with the idea that -they were the proper sort of people to rule a -country divided by political and religious factions, -with a history of almost constant warfare stretching -back for centuries, and situated fifteen thousand -miles away.</p> - -<p>This, on the face of it, was an impossibility. -When they had found their Governor they should -have trusted him to govern, instead of sending out -his personal enemies to sit at his council-table to -spy upon his actions and hamper and oppose him in -everything that he did.</p> - -<p>But there was something else in its way quite as -serious as this. Practically all the charges that -were brought against Warren Hastings on his impeachment -are answered and disposed of by the fact -that the only condition upon which he could retain -his position and do the work that he had set his -soul upon doing was, in three words, making India -<em>pay</em>. John Company looked upon his new possession -as a trader on a market. With the Directors, -who, after all were Hastings’ masters, it was business<span class="pagenum" id="Page_181">181</span> -first, and policy and government a good distance -after.</p> - -<p>Even Macaulay admits that every exhortation to -govern leniently and respect the rights of the native -princes and their subjects was accompanied by a -demand for increased contributions. “The inconsistency -was at once manifest to their vice-regent at -Calcutta, who, with an empty treasury, with an unpaid -army, with his own salary often in arrear, with -deficient crops, with Government tenants daily -running away, was called upon to remit home -another half-million without fail.”</p> - -<p>There is another thing to be remembered before -we can judge Warren Hastings fairly in the matter -of his forced contributions. The tea that was flung -overboard in Boston Harbour in the December of -1773 was imported by the East India Company. -The connection will appear more obvious when we -look at what followed.</p> - -<p>Great Britain was about to plunge into war, east -and west, north and south. Criminal misgovernment -at home had produced revolt abroad. Disaster -after disaster and disgrace after disgrace were -soon to befall the British arms. The Anglo-Saxon -race was about to be split in two, and England herself -was to fight, if not for her very existence, -at least for her honourable place among the -nations.</p> - -<p>All this Warren Hastings foresaw with that -marvellous prevision which made some of his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_182">182</span> -actions look almost prophetic, and determined that, -come what might elsewhere, the Star of the East -should not be plucked from the British Crown. He -was not a soldier. He was an administrator. His -task was not to increase but to hold. He was by no -means always successful in war, and in all his long -rule he never added a province or a district to the -area of British India; but what Clive won he held -and strengthened during those fateful years when -the destiny of Britain as an empire was trembling -in the balances of Fate.</p> - -<p>Now, to keep India, money was absolutely -necessary, and the getting of it was not always -work that could be done with kid gloves on, and -the greatness of Warren Hastings as Empire-Maker -or Holder may be seen in the fact that he -deliberately, and with his eyes open, risked his -future fortune and reputation in the doing of this -work by the only means available.</p> - -<p>He knew that his methods would be censured by -his masters and made unscrupulous use of by his -enemies, and he said so in so many words, and, -careless of criticism and undeterred by the most -virulent and treasonable opposition, he succeeded -so far that he was able to say with truth that he -had rescued one province from infamy, and two -from total ruin. It is simply amazing to the dispassionate -reader of the present day to watch the -needless struggles which were imposed upon this -man, already confronted by a titanic task, by the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_183">183</span> -very men who ought to have been the first, for -their own sakes and their country’s, to have made -his way as smooth and his burdens as light as -possible.</p> - -<p>The man who may be fairly described as the evil -genius of Warren Hastings’ career was that Sir -Philip Francis who is generally looked upon as the -author of the far-famed Letters of Junius. He and -Sir John Clavering, both personal enemies of the -Governor-General—as he was now—were sent out -as members of the Council, and to the days of their -death they never ceased to thwart and embarrass -him by every means in their power.</p> - -<p>One reason for their enmity was undoubtedly the -sordid motive of getting him turned out of the -Governor-Generalship in order that one of them -might succeed to his office, and that both might -share in the fruits of the extortions which, in him, -they condemned.</p> - -<p>This was not only unjust to Hastings, but it was -also a crime against their country, committed at -a moment when she had all too much need of such -men as he was.</p> - -<p>To my mind, at least, there is a very strong -resemblance between the savage invective of Junius -and the consistent and unscrupulous malevolence -with which Sir Philip Francis tried to wreck the -life-work of a man at whose table he was not -worthy to sit.</p> - -<p>Those were days in which political rivalry and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_184">184</span> -personal enmity entailed personal consequences if -they were pushed too far. Hastings seemed to -have come at length to the conclusion that India -was not large enough to hold himself and Francis. -He had submitted to insult after insult, and he -would have been something more than human if his -enemy’s unceasing efforts to make his life a misery -and his work a failure had not left some bitterness -in his soul, and so one fine day he sat down and -embodied his opinion of him in a Minute to the -Council, and in this he purposely put words which -meant inevitable bloodshed:</p> - -<p>“I do not trust to his promise of candour; -convinced that he is incapable of it, and that his -sole purpose and wish are to embarrass and defeat -every measure which I may undertake or which -may tend even to promote the public interest if my -credit is connected with them.... Every disappointment -and misfortune have been aggravated -by him, and every fabricated tale of armies devoted -to famine and massacre have found their first and -most ready way to his office, where it is known they -would meet with most welcome reception.... I -judge of his public conduct by my experience of his -private, which I have found void of truth and -honour. This is a severe charge but temperately -and deliberately made.”</p> - -<p>These were not words which a man in those days -could write without taking his chance of a bullet -or the point of a small-sword, and Hastings knew<span class="pagenum" id="Page_185">185</span> -this perfectly well. Francis challenged him on the -spot, and the day but one after they confronted -each other with pistols at fourteen paces. Francis’s -pistol missed fire, and Hastings obligingly waited -until he had reprimed. The second time the pistol -went off, but the ball flew wide. Hastings returned -it very deliberately and his enemy went down with -a bullet in the right side.</p> - -<div id="ip_185" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_185.jpg" width="1200" height="1989" alt="" /><div class="caption">HIS ENEMY WENT DOWN WITH A BULLET IN THE RIGHT SIDE.</div></div> - -<p>The difference between the two men may be seen -from what followed. After his adversary had been -carried home, the Governor-General sent him a -friendly message offering to visit him and bury the -hatchet for good, as was customary in such affairs -between gentlemen. Francis, not being a gentleman, -refused, and as soon as he was well enough -to travel he came home to England to injure by -backstairs-intrigue and the most unscrupulous lying -and misrepresentation the man who, in the midst -of his difficulties and dangers, had proved all too -strong for him in the open.</p> - -<p>To use his own words, “after a service of thirty-five -years from its commencement, and almost -thirteen of them passed in the charge and exercise -of the first nominal office of the government,” -Warren Hastings at last laid down his thankless -task and came home to render an account of his -stewardship before a tribunal which possessed -neither adequate knowledge to judge of his actions -nor that judicial spirit of calmness and impartiality -which could alone have guaranteed him such a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_186">186</span> -trial as English justice accords to the vilest -criminal.</p> - -<p>His impeachment is not only the most notable -but altogether the most amazing trial in the history -of British Law. It would be alike superfluous and -presumptuous to reproduce here an account of that -which has been described in the incomparable -sentences of Lord Macaulay. His essay on Warren -Hastings has been considered by many to be the -finest of that magnificent collection of Essays and -Reviews, and the story of the Impeachment is -undoubtedly the finest portion of it. Hence those -who read these lines cannot do better than read -it as well. If they have read it before they will -simply be repeating a pleasure; if they have not, -then a new pleasure awaits them.</p> - -<p>What we are concerned with here are the bare -facts of the matter; but we may first pause for -a moment to look at the man as he was when -he came across the world to face his mostly -incompetent and prejudiced judges. This is how -his picture is drawn by Wraxall, a contemporary -and a personal acquaintance. The portrait is -certainly more faithful than the ridiculous caricatures -drawn by Burke and Sheridan.</p> - -<p>“When he landed in his native country he had -attained his fifty-second year. In his person he -was thin, but not tall, of a spare habit, very bald, -with a countenance placidly thoughtful, but when -animated full of intelligence. Placed in a situation<span class="pagenum" id="Page_187">187</span> -where he might have amassed immense wealth -without exciting censure, he revisited England with -only a modest competence. In private life he was -playful and gay to a degree hardly conceivable; -never carrying his political vexations into the -bosom of his family. Of a temper so buoyant and -elastic that the instant he quitted the council-board -where he had been assailed by every species of -opposition, often heightened by personal acrimony, -he mixed in society like a youth upon whom care -had never intruded.”</p> - -<p>Such was the man who, in a period of national -dejection which almost amounted to disgrace, came -back, the one man of his generation who had -upheld the honour of the British name abroad in -a post of great difficulty and danger, to receive, not -reward, but impeachment.</p> - -<p>He first faced his judges on February 13, 1788, -“looking very infirm and much indisposed, and -dressed in a plain, poppy-coloured suit of clothes.” -He was finally acquitted on March 1, 1794! The -trial thus languished through seven sessions of -Parliament, the total hearing occupied one hundred -and eighteen sittings of the Court, and the vindication -of his personal and official character from the -slanders of enemies, who were at last refuted with -complete discredit to his slanderers cost him about -£100,000, of which no less than £75,000 were -actually certified legal costs—and this was the -reward that England gave to the one man who was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_188">188</span> -capable of preserving to her the fruit of the victories -of Clive and his gallant lieutenants!</p> - -<p>Modern opinion, endorsed by the high legal -authority of the late Sir James Stephen, has completely -rejected alike the personal vilifications of -such self-interested traitors as Francis and Clavering, -and the emotional special-pleading of Burke and -Sheridan.</p> - -<p>“The impeachment of Warren Hastings,” he -says, “is, I think, a blot on the judicial history of -the country. It was monstrous that a man should -be tortured at irregular intervals for seven years, in -order that a singularly incompetent tribunal might -be addressed before an excited audience by Burke -and Sheridan, in language far removed from the -calmness with which an advocate for the prosecution -ought to address a criminal court.”</p> - -<p>To some extent Hastings was recouped for the -cost of his persecution, even if he was not rewarded -for his distinguished services. He was granted -a pension of £4,000 a year for twenty-eight and -a half years, part paid in advance, and a loan of -£50,000 free of interest. But meanwhile he had -been fulfilling the dream of his boyhood by buying -back his ancestral estate for £60,000, and another -£60,000 was still owing to the lawyers.</p> - -<p>Henceforth, disgusted, as he may well have been, -with the ingratitude of the country he had served so -well in so difficult a time, he retired to his old home -and spent the remaining years of his life in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_189">189</span> -calm pursuits of a country gentleman, diversified -by the cultivation of letters and the writing of -verses.</p> - -<p>It was in these days that he used to tell his friends -how, as a little lad of seven, he had lain in the long -grass on the banks of a stream that flowed through -the old domain of Dalesford and dreamt the wild -dream whose fulfilment had, after all, been stranger -than the dream itself—for not even his boyish -romance could be compared with the fact that, during -the winning of the means to buy back the home -of his fathers, he had risen to be the actual ruler of -something like fifty millions of people, and the -dictator of terms of peace and war to princes who -governed territories half as large as Europe and -even more populous.</p> - -<p>But in the end he outlived both his enemies and -the discredit they had tried to cast upon him. Two -years before the battle of Waterloo he was summoned -before the Houses of Parliament in the -evening of his days to give evidence on the work -of his manhood, and when he retired, after nearly -four hours’ examination, the whole crowded House -of Commons rose and stood uncovered and in -silence as the old Empire-Keeper walked out of the -Chamber.</p> - -<p>He lived to see that empire, for which he had -striven so painfully and so manfully, redeemed by -the genius and valour of Rodney and Nelson and -Wellington from the disgrace and degradation<span class="pagenum" id="Page_190">190</span> -which had threatened it during the last decades of -the eighteenth century, and three years after -Waterloo he died.</p> - -<p>His remains lie in the family church at Dalesford, -and, to once more quote the words of Sir Alfred -Lyall, “in Westminster Abbey a bust and an -inscription commemorate the name and career of a -man who, rising early to high place and power, held -an office of the greatest importance to his country -for thirteen years, by sheer force of character and -tenaciousness against adversity, and who spent the -next seven years in defending himself before a -nation which accepted the benefits but disliked the -ways of his too masterly activity.”</p> - -<p>Lord Macaulay, who throughout his famous essay -does him less than justice, concludes it by making -almost generous amends. “Not only had the poor -orphan retrieved the fallen fortunes of his line—not -only had he re-purchased the old lands and rebuilt -the old dwelling—he had preserved and extended -an empire.<a id="FNanchor_1" href="#Footnote_1" class="fnanchor">1</a> He had founded a policy. He had -administered government and war with more than -the capacity of Richelieu. He patronised learning -with the judicious liberality of Cosmo. He had -been attacked by the most formidable combination -of enemies that ever sought the destruction of a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_191">191</span> -single victim; and over that combination, after a -struggle of ten years, he had triumphed. He had -at length gone down to his grave in the fulness of -age, in peace after so many troubles, in honour after -so much obloquy.”</p> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_1" href="#FNanchor_1" class="fnanchor">1</a> In the territorial sense this is hardly correct. The great -essayist probably meant extension in the sense of increase of -prestige and influence over the still independent states of the -Peninsula.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_193">193</span></p></div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="IX">IX<br /> - -<i>NELSON</i><br /> - -<span class="subhead">“<i>ENGLAND EXPECTS THAT EVERY MAN WILL DO HIS DUTY.</i>”</span></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_195">195</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">IX<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">NELSON</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap i"><span class="firstword">I</span> am conscious of more difficulties ahead in -beginning this sketch than I have felt with -regard to any other of the series, for, while on the -one hand it would be absurd to omit from the -glorious ranks of our Empire-Makers the most -glorious of them all, it is at the same time -practically impossible to say anything fresh or even -anything that is not very generally known about -the man who, however much he may once have -been slighted, and however inadequately his earlier -services may have been rewarded during his life, -has now come to be the idol of the country that he -saved from invasion and the Empire that he preserved -from destruction.</p> - -<p>His life has been written and re-written, his -character and his actions have been discussed and -rediscussed, the most private acts and thoughts of -his life have been dragged out into the full glare of -publicity—a fate which any great man would have -to be a very great sinner to deserve—but when all -this has been said and done there remains a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_196">196</span> -single, sharply-defined individuality of this incomparable -naval captain whom the whole world -now acknowledges and reveres, quite apart from -all national considerations, as the greatest sailor -who ever trod a deck and the greatest naval -strategist who ever planned a battle or took a -fleet into action.</p> - -<p>It has been said that when a nation is on the -brink of ruin the Fates either hasten its end or send -some great man to restore its fortunes. It certainly -was thus with the Britain of Nelson’s early youth. -On the 17th of October, 1781, Lord Hawke, the -victor of Quiberon Bay, and the last of the great -line of seamen of whom Admiral Blake was the -first, died, leaving, as Horace Walpole said the -next day in the House of Commons, his mantle to -nobody.</p> - -<p>Apparently, there was no one worthy to wear it. -The fortunes of England were indeed at a low ebb. -Both her naval and military prestige had very -seriously declined. The American colonies had -been lost by the worst of statesmanship at home -and the worst of bungling incompetence and -cowardice abroad. We had been beaten by the -raw colonists on land and by the French and Dutch -at sea.</p> - -<p>At home the very highest circles of the realm -were polluted by such corruption and crippled by -such imbecility as would be absolutely incredible to -us now, Imagine, for instance, what would be<span class="pagenum" id="Page_197">197</span> -thought to-day of the post of Secretary of State -for War being given to a man who had been explicitly -declared by a court martial to be absolutely -incapable of serving his country in any military -capacity!—and yet this is only one example out of -many of the flagrant abuses of this amazingly disgraceful -period.</p> - -<p>Happily, however, for the honour of the race and -the safety of the Empire there had been born, -twenty-three years before to a country parson in -Norfolk, a boy, the fifth in a family of eleven, who -fourteen years later was destined to die in the -moment of victory, happy in the knowledge that he -had not left his country a single enemy to fight -throughout the length and breadth of the High -Seas. When Horace Walpole spoke his panegyric -on Lord Hawke he would probably have been very -much surprised if he had been told that it was this -then insignificant and unknown cousin of his own -who was not only to take up the mantle of the hero -of Quiberon, but to bequeath it in his turn, not to a -rival or a successor, but to the country which his -last triumph left mistress of the seas.</p> - -<p>Although there doesn’t seem to be any direct -proof, it may be admitted that there is sufficiently -strong presumption to warrant us in believing, if -we choose to do so, that Horatio Nelson, son of the -Rev. Edmund Nelson, Rector of Burnham Thorpe -in Norfolk, could one way or another have traced -a lineage back to the old Sea Kings of the North.</p> - -<p>Certainly he must have had some of the blood of -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_198">198</span> -those who fought the Armada in his veins, and it -is noteworthy that a Danish poet in celebrating his -valour, wisdom, and clemency during and after the -great battle of Copenhagen, attempted to soothe -the wounded pride of his countrymen by pointing -out that Nelson was indubitably a Danish name and -that after all they had only been beaten by the -descendant of one of their old Sea Kings.</p> - -<p>But however this may be, the immediate facts all -show that the man who crowned and completed the -work which Francis Drake and his brother pirates -began came of a stock that seemed to promise but -little in the way of hereditary battle-winning.</p> - -<p>Every one on his father’s side appears either to -have been a parson or to have married one. His -mother’s father was a parson too, but happily she -had a brother Maurice who was a captain in the -Navy, and had done some very good work at a time -when good work was badly wanted.</p> - -<p>This gallant sailor was a great grand-nephew of -Sir John Suckling, the poet, and it may be noticed, -in passing, that on the 21st of October, 1757, the -day which we now know as the anniversary of -Trafalgar—Captain Maurice Suckling in the <i>Dreadnought</i>, -in company with two other sixty-gun ships, -attacked seven large French men-of-war off Cape -François in the West Indies, and gave them such a -hammering that they were very thankful for the -wind which enabled them to escape.</p> - -<p>But still more noteworthy is the opinion of -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_199">199</span> -Captain Maurice Suckling of his nephew when he -first received his father’s request to give him a -place on board his ship.</p> - -<p>“What,” he wrote in reply to the application, -“has poor Horatio done, who is so weak, that he -above all the rest should be sent to rough it out at -sea? But let him come, and the first time we go -into action a cannon-ball may knock off his head -and provide for him at once.”</p> - -<p>The weakness here somewhat grimly alluded to -was the curse of Nelson’s existence from the day -that he first set foot on the deck of a ship to the -moment when the bullet from the mizen-top of the -<i>Redoubtable</i> made his almost constant bodily suffering -a matter of minutes.</p> - -<p>His physical infirmities, or at any rate the weakness -of his body as compared with the vast strength -and tireless energy of his mind, bring him into very -close relationship with William of Orange. Putting -nationality aside, he was, in fact, on the sea what -William was on land, and the central point in his -policy was also the same—tireless and unsparing -hostility to France.</p> - -<p>With Nelson, indeed, this appears to have gone -very near to the borders of fanaticism. Some of -his sayings with regard to the Frenchmen of his -day are absolutely ferocious. Hatred and contempt -are about equally blended in them. “Hate a -Frenchman as you would hate the devil!” was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_200">200</span> -with him an axiom and was his usual form of -advice to midshipmen on entering the service.</p> - -<p>On one occasion in the Mediterranean he said to -one of his captains who had got into a dispute -about the property which the defeated French -garrison at Gaieta were to be allowed to take -away with them:</p> - -<p>“I am sorry that you had any altercation with -them. There is no way to deal with a Frenchman -but to knock him down. To be civil to him is only -to be laughed at when they are enemies.”</p> - -<p>The same spirit breathes through nearly all his -letters. Thus, for instance, he concluded a letter to -the British Minister at Vienna with these words: -“<em>Down, down with the French</em> ought to be written in -the council-room of every country in the world, and -may Almighty God give right thoughts to every -sovereign is my constant prayer.”</p> - -<p>He seems to have had respect for every other -enemy that he met; but for the French he had -nothing save contemptuous and unsparing hostility. -“Close with a Frenchman, but out-manœuvre a -Russian” was another of his favourite sayings. -This, it is to be hoped, is all past and gone; but -it is instructive as giving us the key, not only to -Nelson’s policy, but also to that spirit which made -the British man-of-warsmen of the day absolutely -prefer to fight the French at long odds than on -even terms.</p> - -<p>It was this spirit which was embodied in another<span class="pagenum" id="Page_201">201</span> -of Nelson’s pet phrases: “Any Englishman is -worth three Frenchmen.” Of course that would -be all nonsense now; but in justice to our neighbours -it ought to be remembered that the Frenchmen -whom Nelson and his sailors met and conquered -were the worst and not the best of their -nation.</p> - -<p>The old navy of France, the navy which had -commanded the Eastern Seas in the days of Clive -and which had with impunity insulted the English -shores and brought an invading force into Ireland -in the time of William the Third no longer existed. -It had been essentially an aristocratic service like -our own, its officers were gentlemen and thorough -sailors, and its seamen were brave, disciplined, and -obedient.</p> - -<p>But in her blood-drunkenness France had either -murdered or banished nearly every man who was fit -to command a ship or who knew how to point a -gun. The fleets of revolutionary France were for -the most part commanded by ignoramuses or -poltroons, or both, and manned by a rabble who -had neither stamina, training, or discipline.</p> - -<p>Without the slightest wish to detract from the -splendour of the victories of Nelson or his comrades, -I still think it is only fair to point out again, as has -once or twice been done before, that when we read -of French Admirals declining battle even when -they had superior force, or of running away before -the battle was over, or of a small British squadron<span class="pagenum" id="Page_202">202</span> -crumpling up a whole fleet with very trifling loss -to itself, we ought to remember that the French -Admirals had little or no confidence in their officers, -while the officers had still less either in their -admirals or their men.</p> - -<p>On the other hand, such a man as Nelson, -Collingwood, or Hardy had simply to say that he -was going to do a certain thing to convince every -one serving under him that it was about as good as -already done.</p> - -<p>This brings me naturally to one of Nelson’s most -striking characteristics. No man who rose to distinction -in the Navy was ever guilty of so many -barefaced acts of insubordination as he was. -Happily for him and for us his disobedience or -neglect of orders was always justified by victory. -The genius for supreme command, which was far -and away the strongest point in his character, -manifested itself very early in his career. The -event proved that he was the superior of every -naval officer then afloat, whether admiral or midshipman, -and he seemed instinctively to know it.</p> - -<p>When he was commanding the old <i>Agamemnon</i> -in the Mediterranean, at the time when it was in -dispute whether Corsica should fall under the rule -of France or Britain, he fought two French ships, -the <i>Ça Ira</i> and the <i>Sans Culottes</i>, for a whole day -and beat them. The next day a sort of general -action was fought, Admiral Hotham being in command -of the British fleet. Nelson naturally wanted<span class="pagenum" id="Page_203">203</span> -a fight to a finish, but the Admiral was content -with the capture of two ships and the flight of the -rest, and in reply to Nelson’s remonstrances he -said: “We must be contented. We have done -very well.”</p> - -<p>In a letter home on the subject of this action, -Nelson penned a sentence which was at once prophetic -in itself and closely characteristic of the -writer. It was this: “I wish to be an Admiral -and in command of the English fleet. I should -very soon either do much or be ruined. My disposition -cannot bear tame and slow measures. -Sure I am had I commanded on the 14th, that -either the whole French fleet would have graced -my triumph or I should have been in a confounded -scrape.”</p> - -<p>That is Nelson’s mental portrait drawn by himself. -No half measures would ever do for him, -and in most of the letters that he sent home from -his various scenes of action, whether they were -written to his wife, his private friends, or the Lords -of the Admiralty, we find the constant complaint, -made with an insistence amounting almost to -petulance, that when he saw complete triumph -within his grasp his superiors either would not -help him to secure it or forced him to be content -with a mere temporary advantage.</p> - -<p>Under such circumstances it was only natural -that such a man should now and then break loose. -He saw quite plainly that there were confused<span class="pagenum" id="Page_204">204</span> -councils at home, and timid tactics afloat. He -saw also that under Napoleon the power of France -was growing every day.</p> - -<p>The Board of Admiralty was apparently both -corrupt and incompetent. The Mediterranean fleet -had been so shamefully neglected that after Nelson -had fought an action off Toulon even he was afraid -to risk another without the certainty of victory -because there was “not so much as a mast to be -had east of Gibraltar,” and he could not possibly -have re-fitted his ships. It was about this time -that he said in one of his letters home:</p> - -<p>“I am acting, not only without the orders of my -commander-in-chief, but in some measure contrary -to him.”</p> - -<p>If the authorities at home had only had the same -opinion of his abilities as those had who were able -to watch his operations on the spot, and particularly -in Italy, it is quite possible that the whole history -of Europe might have been changed and that -Napoleon would never have won that series of -brilliant victories which cost such an infinity of -blood and treasure, and which bore no fruits but -such as resembled all too closely the fabled Dead -Sea apples.</p> - -<p>Nelson’s patriotism may have been of a somewhat -narrow-minded order, and his hatred of the French -may have partaken somewhat of the nature of -bigotry, but there can be no doubt that he was -the one man in Europe who saw what was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_205">205</span> -coming and had the ability, if he had only had -the power, to save the world from the horrors of -the Napoleonic wars.</p> - -<p>Thus, for instance, if his advice had been taken, -the splendid victory of Aboukir Bay might have -been turned into the decisive battle of the war -which only ended with Waterloo. As it was, he -to some extent took the law into his own hands. -He saw perfectly well that Napoleon’s ultimate -point of attack was not Egypt but India. He -sent an officer with dispatches to the Governor of -Bombay, advising him of the defeat of the French -Fleet, and in this dispatch he said:</p> - -<p>“I know that Bombay was their first object if -they could get there, but I trust that now Almighty -God will overthrow in Egypt these pests of the -human race. Buonaparte has never yet had to -contend with an English officer, and I shall endeavour -to make him respect us.”</p> - -<p>In another dispatch to the Admiralty he taught -a lesson which we have only lately begun to learn. -In those days of the old wooden-walls the handy, -light-heeled frigate was to the ships of the line -what the swift cruisers of to-day are to the big -battleships. They were the eyes and ears of the -fleet, and they could be sent on errands which -were impossible to the huge three-deckers. After -the battle of the Nile was won he said in this -dispatch:</p> - -<p>“Were I to die this moment <em>want of frigates</em><span class="pagenum" id="Page_206">206</span> -would be found stamped on my heart. No words -of mine can express what I have suffered, and am -suffering, for want of them.”</p> - -<p>The inner meaning of these bitter words was -one of vast importance, not only to Britain, but -to all Europe. They meant really that the most -splendid victory that had so far been won at sea -had been robbed of half its results. For want of -the lighter craft, even of a few bomb-vessels and -fire-ships which he had implored the authorities to -send him, Napoleon’s store-ships and transports -in the harbour of Alexandria escaped attack and -certain destruction.</p> - -<p>Their destruction would have enabled Nelson -to carry out the policy which his genius had told -him was the only true one to pursue at this -momentous crisis. He would have cut off -Napoleon’s communications and deprived him of -his supplies. Then he would have blockaded the -Egyptian Coast and left the future conqueror of -Austerlitz to perish amidst the sands of Egypt. -As he said to himself: “To Egypt they went -with their own consent, and there they shall -remain while Nelson commands this squadron—for -never, never will he consent to the return of -one ship or Frenchman. I wish them to perish -in Egypt and give an awful lesson to the world -of the justice of the Almighty.”</p> - -<p>This was a pitiless pronouncement, but no one -who has read the history of the Napoleonic wars<span class="pagenum" id="Page_207">207</span> -can doubt the accuracy of Nelson’s foresight or -the true humanity of his policy, for, if this had -happened only a few thousands out of the five -million lives which these wars are computed to -have cost would have been lost. There would -have been no Austerlitz, or Wagram, or Jena for -France to boast of; but, on the other hand, there -would have been no Leipsic, no Moscow, and no -Waterloo.</p> - -<p>As usual, however, Nelson, although he had -magnificently restored the credit of the British -arms at sea, was crippled by shortness of means -and baulked by the stupidity and incompetence -of his masters at home. Sir Sidney Smith’s -policy was preferred to his, with the result that -Napoleon was permitted to desert his army and -live to become the curse of Europe for the next -seventeen years.</p> - -<p>But, if he did not do all he wanted to do, when -Nelson won the battle of the Nile he completely -established his claim to be considered one of the -Empire-makers of Britain, for if he had not -followed the French with that unerring judgment -of his, and if he had not, in defiance of all -accepted naval tactics, attacked them in what -was considered to be an unassailable position—that -is to say, moored off shore in two lines with -both ends protected by batteries—all the work -that Clive and Hastings had done in India might -have been undone, and, considering the miserable<span class="pagenum" id="Page_208">208</span> -state of our national defences, we might either -have lost India or had to wage such an exhausting -war for it that we could not possibly have -taken the decisive share that we afterwards did in -the overthrow of the French power.</p> - -<p>As he said in one of his most famous utterances -while the British fleet was streaming into the bay: -“Where there is room for a Frenchman to swing, -there is room for an Englishman to get alongside -him.”</p> - -<p>That was Nelson. His idea was always to get -alongside, to get as close as possible to the enemy -and to hit him as hard as he could. Mere defeat -was not enough for him. He wanted a fight to -a finish, the finish being the absolute destruction -or capture of the hostile force.</p> - -<p>This was not because there was anything particularly -ferocious in his nature. On the contrary, -a more tender-hearted man never lived.</p> - -<p>Before that one defeat of his at Teneriffe when -he lost his arm, he wrote to his Commander-in-chief—this -letter, by the way, was the last he -ever wrote with his right hand—expressing solicitude -for everybody but himself. None knew -better than he the desperate nature of the -venture, for in this very letter he said that on -the morrow his head would probably be crowned -either with laurel or cypress, and the last thing -he did before he left his ship was to call his -stepson to help him in burning his wife’s letters,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_209">209</span> -and then ordered him to remain behind, saying: -“Should we both fall, what would become of your -poor mother?”</p> - -<p>Happily Lieutenant Nisbet disobeyed the order -to his face and went. When the bullet shattered -Nelson’s arm at the elbow, it was his stepson -who had the presence of mind to whip off his silk -handkerchief and bind it round above the wound. -But for this, Nelson would never have fought -another battle, for he must have bled to death -before he reached his ship.</p> - -<p>It so happened that he could have been put -much sooner on board the <i>Sea Horse</i>, but her -commander, Captain Freemantle, was still on -shore, and, for all he knew, might be dead or -alive. His wife was on board the <i>Sea Horse</i>, -and Nelson, wounded and bleeding as he was, -insisted on going on, saying: “I would rather -suffer death than alarm Mrs. Freemantle by -letting her see me in this state when I can -give her no tidings of her husband.” Freemantle, -as it turned out, had been wounded in -almost exactly the same place only a few minutes -before.</p> - -<p>When Nelson got back to his own ship, he -would not hear of being slung or carried up -on deck.</p> - -<p>“I’ve got one arm and two legs left,” he said, -“and I’ll get up by myself.”</p> - -<p>And so he did, and up a single rope at that.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_210">210</span> -In a strong man this would have been wonderful; -in a mere weakling as Nelson physically was, it -was little short of a miracle.</p> - -<p>This was the man who, in the Battle of Cape -St. Vincent, with an utterly disabled ship, boarded -and took two Spanish men-of-war both bigger than -his own. One of them had eighty and the other a -hundred and twelve guns; his own only mounted -seventy-four.</p> - -<p>It is, of course, entirely out of the question that -in such a mere sketch as this I should attempt to -follow Nelson through even a moderate proportion -of the hundred and five engagements in which he -personally fought, nor would it be fitting that I -should attempt to emulate the brilliant and detailed -descriptions which have illustrated the principal of -them.</p> - -<p>With his doings at Naples and Palermo, and his -much-debated and inexplicable attachment to Lady -Hamilton which unhappily began during this period, -we have here no concern. The hero of the Nile, -like every other great man, had his faults. Those -who cavil at them are really blaming their possessors -for not being perfect, for if really great -men had no faults they would be perfect, and that -is impossible, and, so much being said, the scene -may now shift forthwith from the Mediterranean -to the Baltic.</p> - -<p>The Armed Neutrality is now only a phrase in -history, but in the year 1801 it was a very serious<span class="pagenum" id="Page_211">211</span> -reality. It was a league between Russia, Sweden, -and Denmark. From the English point of view -it meant this—that France, with whom we had now -practically embarked in a struggle to the death, -would be able, under the sanction of this league, -to import from the shores of the Baltic the very -articles that we did not wish her to have, and which -she couldn’t get elsewhere. These were naval -stores, pine-trees for masts and spars, hemp for -rigging, tar, and so on.</p> - -<p>It was very easy to see that this Armed Neutrality -meant in plain English that these three Powers were -quite agreeable to the smashing-up of Great Britain -by France provided that they were not called upon -to pay any of the expenses or suffer any of the other -losses of the war. Denmark was therefore politely -but firmly requested to detach herself from this -league, the reason being that Denmark in those -days kept the key of the Baltic. Denmark refused, -and unhappily for her she did so just at the time -when the Victor of the Nile had come home for a -well-earned holiday.</p> - -<p>We are not accustomed now, in the pride of our -unequalled naval strength, to take very much account -of the fleets of these three countries, but -just before the Battle of the Baltic was fought it -was a very different matter.</p> - -<p>The Danes had twenty-three line-of-battle ships -and thirty-one frigates, not counting bomb-vessels -and guard-ships. Sweden had eighteen ships of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_212">212</span> -line, fourteen frigates and sloops and seventy-four -galleys, as well as a small swarm of gun-boats, -while Russia could put to sea eighty-two line-of-battle -ships and forty-two frigates.</p> - -<p>Such a force within the narrow waters of the -Baltic was a very formidable one, but before we -can arrive at a just appreciation of the magnificence -and importance of the service which Nelson did for -his country we must remember that of all European -waters those of the Baltic, and especially of the -approaches to it, are the most difficult and dangerous. -Even with the aid of steam it would be no light -matter to take a fleet into the Baltic under the guns -of Elsinore and Kronberg were the lamps of the -lighthouses extinguished and all the buoys removed.</p> - -<p>What then must it have been to go in with a fleet -of sailing ships utterly at the mercy of wind and -current, to say nothing of the ice? Indeed, Southey -tells us that when Nelson went to Yarmouth to join -the fleet under Admiral Sir Hyde-Parker he found -him a little nervous about dark nights and ice-floes.</p> - -<p>His own remarks on the subject are very well -worthy of remembrance: “These are not times for -nervous systems,” he said. “I hope we shall give -our northern enemies that hailstorm of bullets which -gives our dear country the dominion of the sea. We -have it and all the devils in the North cannot take it -from us if our wooden walls have fair play.”</p> - -<p>It was a most egregious mistake not to have made -the Victor of the Nile and the Conqueror of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_213">213</span> -Mediterranean commander-in-chief of the Northern -Squadron. His fame was already resounding -through the world, and every one except the -Lords of the Admiralty seems to have already -recognised the fact that he was by far the finest -sailor of the age.</p> - -<p>Here again, too, officialism at home sadly crippled -the work of valour and genius abroad. As usual -Nelson had his own plans, and as usual they were -the very best possible. His idea was to attack the -Russian Squadron in Reval and the Danish in -Copenhagen simultaneously, and by preventing -their coalition make it too risky for the Swedes -to join in.</p> - -<p>Captain Mahan, who is certainly entitled to be -considered one of the foremost naval authorities of -the day, describes Nelson’s plan of attack as worthy -of Napoleon himself, and says that if adopted it -“would have brought down the Baltic Confederacy -with a crash that would have resounded throughout -Europe.” As it was, more timid counsels prevailed, -but thanks to Nelson the end was the same, or -nearly so.</p> - -<p>We may gather some notion of the difficulty of -getting on to the scene of battle when we read that -no less than three English line-of-battle ships went -aground before the battle began, and we also get an -interesting glimpse of that old hand-to-hand style of -naval warfare which has now passed away for ever, -when we are told that the ships opened fire at a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_214">214</span> -range of two hundred yards! Nowadays firing would -begin at between three and four thousand. If two -modern fleets were to get to business at that range -the said business would probably consist of one -broadside from each, one discharge of the big guns, -and after that general wreck and ruin. It is not -likely that either side would win, and it is certain -that both sides would lose.</p> - -<p>From ten to one the battle raged fast and furious, -and so much damage had been done on the English -side that Sir Hyde-Parker made a signal to leave off -action. It was at this moment that Nelson uttered -those immortal words, which were destined to be as -famous even as his signal at Trafalgar:</p> - -<p>“What? Leave off action? No, damn me if I -do! You know, Foley, I have a right to be blind -sometimes. No, I really don’t see the signal. Fire -away!”</p> - -<p>Those were days of hard swearing as well as hard -hitting, and, considering all the circumstances, even -the purest of modern purists may forgive a little -vehemence of expression to the man who that day -did such good work, not only for our grandfathers, -but for us and our children.</p> - -<div id="ip_214" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_214.jpg" width="1200" height="1980" alt="" /><div class="caption">NELSON AT COPENHAGEN.</div></div> - -<p>An hour or so later Nelson performed one of the -most memorable actions even of his life. The -Danish ships and floating batteries were moored -in-shore. The fire of the English guns was, as -usual, terribly accurate, but as fast as the Danes -were shot down, fresh crews were put on board<span class="pagenum" id="Page_215">215</span> -the ships, and Nelson very soon saw that this simply -meant butchery as long as a Danish ship floated.</p> - -<p>Consequently he sat down and wrote a note to the -Crown Prince of Denmark which he sent on shore -under a flag of truce. This was the letter:</p> - -<p>“Lord Nelson has directions to spare Denmark -when no longer resisting, but if the firing is continued -on the part of Denmark, Lord Nelson will -be obliged to set on fire all the floating batteries -he has taken without having the power of saving -the brave Danes who have defended them.”</p> - -<p>The result of this letter was a truce, and the truce -led to an armistice and the separation of Denmark -from the Armed Neutrality. This was very different -treatment, we may well imagine, to anything that the -French might have expected. In their case he considered -extermination to be the only remedy for the -disease which in his eyes they represented on earth.</p> - -<p>It was curious that after such a day’s work this -man, who had probably saved Europe from one -of the greatest menaces that ever threatened it, -should go back to his cabin and copy out love -verses to send to Lady Hamilton—and yet that is -just what he did, and at the end of them he wrote: -“<i>St. George</i>, April 2nd, 1801, at 9 o’clock at night. -Very tired after a hard fought battle.”</p> - -<p>The Battle of Copenhagen and the death of the -Tsar Paul put an end to the Northern Confederacy -and to all the hopes of France in that direction. -But Nelson was not satisfied, for the Russian fleet<span class="pagenum" id="Page_216">216</span> -had escaped. He was, however, in some measure -consoled by the recall of Sir Hyde-Parker and the -realisation of his old ambition by his own appointment -as commander-in-chief.</p> - -<p>His next service was as commander of a sort of -patrol fleet on the East Coast. Those were the days -of the great invasion scare. Nelson never believed -in it. In one of his letters to Lord Addington on -the subject he said:</p> - -<p>“What a forlorn undertaking! It is perfectly -right to be prepared against a mad government, -but with the active force your lordship has given me -I may pronounce it impracticable.”</p> - -<p>Soon after this, preliminaries of peace were signed, -and to Nelson’s intense disgust the French Ambassador -was enthusiastically received in London. -Writing to his physician soon after he said:</p> - -<p>“Can you cure madness? for I am mad that our -damned scoundrels dragged the Frenchman’s carriage. -I am ashamed for my country.”</p> - -<p>The Peace was hollow and brief, for the mastery -of the sea was not yet decided, and by the middle of -1803 we find Nelson back in the Mediterranean, not -blockading Toulon, but rather trying to tempt the -French out to a battle.</p> - -<p>He even went so far as to appear to run away, -and the French Admiral, Latouche-Treville, promptly -wrote a letter giving a most glowing account of how -he had chased the English away from Toulon. The -idea of a Frenchman daring to say such a thing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_217">217</span> -naturally made Nelson furious. Writing about it to -his brother he said:</p> - -<p>“If this fleet gets fairly up with M. Latouche his -letter with all his ingenuity must be different from -his last. We had fancied that we had chased him -into Toulon, but from the time of his meeting Captain -Hawker of the <i>Isis</i> I never heard of his acting -otherwise than as a poltroon and a liar. I am -keeping his letter, and if I take him by God he -shall eat it.”</p> - -<p>This amiable design, however, the French Admiral -baulked by dying, and when Nelson heard the -news he remarked half-angrily: “He is gone, and all -his lies with him.”</p> - -<p>That is what he thought of the Admiral. This -is what he thought of the fleet: “The French fleet -yesterday was to appearance in high feather and as -fine as paint could make them. Our weather-beaten -ships, I have no fear, will make their sides like a -plum-pudding.”</p> - -<p>The interval between the ending of the Toulon -blockade and the Battle of Trafalgar was filled chiefly -by what may be described as a huge naval hunt. -On the one hand, there were three French fleets -manœuvring to get out and come together in the -Channel with the object of overwhelming any English -force that might try to prevent the embarkation -of the Grand Army at Boulogne. But they had -another object, and that was to get as far as possible -out of Nelson’s way.</p> - -<p>The first idea was to make a feint at the West -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_218">218</span> -Indies, and so away went Admiral Villeneuve with -his fleet across the Atlantic, and away went Nelson -post-haste after him. He got to the West Indies -only to find that the Frenchmen had doubled on -their tracks and gone back again, and so he immediately -turned the prows of his weather-beaten -and almost unseaworthy ships to the eastward, and -for the second time chased the French across the -Atlantic. But he missed them again, and on July -20, 1805, Nelson made an entry in his diary to -the effect that he had that day gone ashore at -Gibraltar—the first time that he had left the <i>Victory</i> -for two years all but ten days!</p> - -<p>From Gibraltar he came home and spent a few -weeks of rest at Merton, the estate which he had -bought in Surrey. During this time a momentous -naval duel was fought in the Channel. Admiral -Villeneuve had sent some very important dispatches -containing the plans for the concentration of the -French and Spanish fleets to the commander of the -Rochefort squadron by the <i>Didon</i>, a forty-four-gun -frigate; but on her way the <i>Didon</i> was met by the -<i>Phœnix</i>, an English forty-gun frigate which, after -the fashion of the times, proceeded to pound her to -helplessness, then ran alongside and carried her by -the board in the good old style. The result of this -was that Villeneuve gave up all hope of the concentration -and retreated to Cadiz, where he anchored -on August 17th.</p> - -<p>Admiral Collingwood, in command of the Atlantic -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_219">219</span> -squadron, at once sent off the frigate <i>Euryalus</i> home -with news. She dropped anchor at Spithead on the -1st of September. At five o’clock the next morning -her captain presented himself at Merton and -found Nelson already up and dressed. The moment -Captain Blackwood entered the room Nelson’s face -lit up and he said:</p> - -<p>“I’m sure you bring me news of the French and -Spanish fleets and I think I shall have to give them -a beating yet. Depend upon it, Blackwood, I shall -yet give Mr. Villeneuve a drubbing.”</p> - -<p>He left for London the same day to consult with -the Admiralty, and it was on one of the visits that -he then paid to the Secretary of State that he met -for a few minutes—and for the only time in his life—the -man whose name was destined to be linked -with his in everlasting fame. This was Arthur -Wellesley, some day to be Duke of Wellington, -who was to do for the French on land what Nelson -had been doing for them at sea.</p> - -<p>Sir Arthur came away with a curious opinion of -the little, pale, nervous, fidgety, one-armed man, -who had won the two greatest battles in the history -of naval warfare, and was about to surpass himself -by winning yet a greater one.</p> - -<p>From one point of view he was a vain, boastful, -and somewhat womanish little man. From another, -he was not only a great leader of men, but a statesman -to boot. On the whole, the future Iron Duke<span class="pagenum" id="Page_220">220</span> -came to the conclusion that the Hero of the Nile -was “a very superior person.”</p> - -<p>Nelson’s opinion of Wellington is unhappily lost -to posterity. One can imagine the sort of language -he would have used if any one had told him that a -soldier had ventured to call him “a superior person.”</p> - -<p>“For charity’s sake, send us Lord Nelson, ye -men of power.” Such was the prayer of Captain -Codrington of the <i>Orion</i>, serving with Collingwood’s -fleet off Cadiz. But by the time this letter -got home Nelson was with the fleet, and it is -worthy of note that he reached the last and most -glorious of his hundred battlefields on his birthday, -the twenty-ninth of September.</p> - -<p>The first thing that he did was to send home for -more ships, not because he wasn’t ready to fight the -French with what he had, but simply in pursuance -of his constant policy with regard to them. In his -dispatch to the Admiralty he said:</p> - -<p>“Should they come out, I shall immediately -bring them to battle, but though I should not doubt -of spoiling any voyage they may attempt, yet I -hope for the arrival of the ships from England that -as an enemy’s fleet they may be annihilated.”</p> - -<p>In a private letter which he wrote at the same -time he said:</p> - -<p>“It is annihilation that the country wants and -not merely a splendid victory of twenty-three to -thirty-six—honourable to the parties concerned, but -absolutely useless in the extended scale to bring<span class="pagenum" id="Page_221">221</span> -Buonaparte to his marrow-bones. Numbers can -only annihilate. Therefore I hope the Admiralty -will send the fixed force as soon as possible.”</p> - -<p>He hoped for forty sail of the line, but when the -ever memorable morning of the 21st had dawned -he was only able to muster twenty-seven against -thirty-three. At half-past eleven the famous signal: -“England expects that every man will do his -duty!” flew from the main-royal of the <i>Victory</i>.</p> - -<p>I have no intention of attempting to re-write the -thousand-times told tale of Trafalgar or of the -disaster which plunged the nation into mourning in -the midst of the exultation of triumph, for to do so -would be alike superfluous and impertinent. Let it -be enough to point out that the firing of the first -gun marked the moment that Nelson had lived and -fought for.</p> - -<p>He was Commander-in-chief, as he had so often -prayed to be, of the British Fleet, and there in -front of him was the last fleet of any strength that -his hated enemy France could muster. The battle, -like the triumph, was his and his alone. Every -man who that day did his duty fought by Nelson’s -directions and, as it were, under Nelson’s eye, and -never was victory more complete or defeat more -crushing.</p> - -<p>When it was over eighteen out of the thirty-three -French and Spanish ships had been captured, and -finally only eleven got back to Cadiz so shattered -that they never again took the sea as men-of-war.</p> - -<p>The crowning triumph of Nelson’s life left Britain -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_222">222</span> -without a rival so far as the mastery of the sea was -concerned and threw the way open for conquest -and colonisation in all parts of the world. Well -might the great Admiral say when he lay dying in -Captain Hardy’s arms: “Thank God, I’ve done -my duty!”</p> - -<p>No man ever died with nobler or more truly -spoken words on his lips than these, for he had not -only given his country the empire of the sea, but he -had saved her from invasion by one who was -perhaps the greatest military genius the world has -known.</p> - -<p>On the heights above Boulogne there stands a -tall column surmounted by a figure of Napoleon. -It was raised to commemorate the assembly of the -Grand Army—that army which during the next ten -years swept in an irresistible torrent of conquest -from one end of Europe to the other. Napoleon’s -back is turned on the white cliffs of England. If -Nelson had never lived, he might have been facing -the other way.</p> -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_223">223</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="X">X<br /> - -<i>WELLINGTON</i><br /> - -<span class="subheadx">“<i>THE PRIDE AND THE GENIUS OF HIS COUNTRY.</i>”<br /> -<span class="smcap right"><span class="smaller">—Queen Victoria.</span></span></span> -</h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_225">225</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">X<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">WELLINGTON</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="firstword">There</span> is a very considerable amount of uncertainty, -and there are also a few somewhat -remarkable coincidences associated with the -early youth of Arthur Wesley, better known to -fame under the expanded form Wellesley, son of -Garret, Earl of Mornington, and his wife Ann Hill, -one of the daughters of Lord Dungannon.</p> - -<p>It is somewhat singular, for instance, that the -birthday of a child born in such a position should -not be known within a day or two. His mother, -who ought to have spoken with authority, said that -the future conqueror of the great Napoleon entered -the world on May-Day, 1769.</p> - -<p>The date on his baptismal certificate is the 30th -of May, and twenty-one years later a committee of -the Irish House of Commons, to which he had just -been elected, investigated the question on a petition -which sought to show that he was not of full age, -and this committee decided that he was born on or -before the 29th of April. With regard to this latter -date, however, it has been suggested that with the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_226">226</span> -money and influence that he had behind him there -would have been no difficulty in getting the Irish -Parliament of those days to make him any age that -he pleased.</p> - -<p>But these things are only trifles. The fact of -moment to the world is that Arthur Wellesley -managed to get born into the world some three -months before a certain other boy-baby was born -at Ajaccio in Corsica. No one, of course, dreamt -then that these two babies were going to grow up -into Titans whose final struggle for the mastery of -Europe was to shake the world forty-six years later.</p> - -<p>There is perhaps no more noteworthy coincidence -in modern history than the fact that Nelson, -Wellington, and Napoleon should all have been -born about the same time—for without Nelson’s -victories at sea, Napoleon would in all probability -have been irresistible on land, while, without -Wellington’s splendid conduct of the Peninsular -War, the crowning victory of Waterloo would -perhaps never have been won, and so at least -half the effects of Nelson’s hundred and five fights -would have been destroyed.</p> - -<p>This is all the more singular from the fact that -nothing within the limits of human probability save -the supreme genius and individual capacity of this -Englishman and this Anglo-Irishman could possibly -have stemmed the tide of Napoleonic conquest.</p> - -<p>As I have pointed out in another of these -sketches, the last decade but one of the eighteenth<span class="pagenum" id="Page_227">227</span> -century was one of disaster and degradation for this -country both at home and abroad. The national -strength was sapped by corruption, and the national -spirit was daunted by defeat.</p> - -<p>The history of the next thirty or forty years -distinctly shows that we had but one Nelson at sea, -and but one Wellington on land. If they had been -born a quarter of a century later, or even if they -had not both come into the world about the same -time as their mighty antagonist, the map of Europe -would certainly be very different to what it is to-day, -and it is also fairly safe to say that the map of the -world would not now show nearly as much red as -it does.</p> - -<p>Arthur Wellesley, like certain others of our -Empire-Makers who will be remembered, was a -delicate, weakly boy and also, curiously enough, a -dunce at school. As far as we know he was first -sent to a school at Chelsea, whence in due course -he went to Eton. Now there came a time when -Eton was very proud indeed of being his Alma-Mater; -but when she came to look back to see if -she could remember anything about him she found -that his career was absolutely undistinguished.</p> - -<p>There was only one incident in it all that any -one remembered, and that was a fight that he had -had with one Bob or “Bobus” Smith, of whom also -nothing is known save the fact that he had a -brother who was afterwards known to the world as -Sydney Smith—not the defender of Acre, but the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_228">228</span> -clerical humourist who divided the human race into -three sexes: Men, women, and curates.</p> - -<p>It would seem that he was all along intended -for the army, for when his undistinguished career -at Eton had closed he went to a French military -school at Angers, somewhere about the same time -that a certain young cadet of Artillery was beginning -to learn his business in Toulon. Here, again, -we get very dim glimpses of the future conqueror, -Empire-Maker, and preserver. One of them, however, -is fairly distinct. He had a little terrier -called Vick to which he was a great deal more -attentive than he was to his studies and which -repaid his attention by constant and unswerving -devotion.</p> - -<p>When he left Angers is not known to a year or -so, but in 1787 we come across something definite, -for in this year Arthur Wesley, as he still spelt -himself, was gazetted as ensign to His Majesty’s -73rd Regiment of Foot.</p> - -<p>He now stood on the lowest of the gentlemanly -rungs of the military ladder and his upward progress -was for a time somewhat bewildering. Those -were the days when money and social and political -influence, which came to about the same thing, did -everything in the Army, the Navy, the Church, and -everywhere else, and, curiously enough, this apparently -absurd system produced the finest array of -soldiers and sailors that has ever adorned the annals -of our empire. There are, indeed, certain blasphemers<span class="pagenum" id="Page_229">229</span> -who venture to suggest that it worked -quite as well as our much-boasted compound of -mechanical cramming and competitive examination -does now.</p> - -<p>But, be this as it may, Arthur Wesley’s first steps -up the ladder were distinctly erratic. First he -became a lieutenant of the 76th and 41st, then a -sub. in the 12th Light Dragoons, then a captain in -the 58th Foot, then captain of the 18th Light -Dragoons, and so on till by the autumn of 1793, -when he had reached the mature age of twenty-four, -he was gazetted lieutenant-colonel of the 33rd -Foot.</p> - -<p>There were two reasons for this rapid promotion. -The first undoubtedly is the fact that his elder -brother Richard was now Earl of Mornington and -a wealthy man and a social power to boot. The -second, as Mr. George Hooper in his excellent -biography suggests, is probably the perception by -his brother of qualities which so far nobody else -had discovered.</p> - -<p>How far his Lordship was justified was speedily -shown when in 1793—which the historical reader -will note was the date of the driving out of the -English and Royalists from Toulon by the well-directed -guns of Citizen Buonaparte—he was given -the command of the 33rd Foot. A few months -later the 33rd was officially recognised as the most -effective regiment on the Irish establishment.</p> - -<p>The next year Lieutenant-Colonel Wesley saw<span class="pagenum" id="Page_230">230</span> -his first active service. It was not an encouraging -experience, but it was sufficient to show the sort of -stuff that the future Iron Duke was made of. The -allied armies in the Netherlands, with the English -under the Duke of York among them, were retreating -after a series of disasters before the triumphant -onrush of the French legions.</p> - -<p>Near the town of Boxtell the retreat began to -get uncomfortably like a rout. Horse and foot were -getting mixed up in a narrow lane and the French, -seeing this, were getting ready to charge into them; -whereupon Colonel Wesley planted his men skilfully -across the mouth of the lane and, when the French -charged, the well-drilled 33rd stood so steadily and -used their muskets with such deadly precision that -the French thought better of it and the pursuit -stopped there and then.</p> - -<p>That was the young Colonel’s first experience of -actual war. It was also the first check the French -had so far received in the Netherlands, which is -also significant in the light of after events.</p> - -<p>After that he commanded the rear-guard in the -retreat to the British transports at Bremen. He -did his duty as well as the hopeless carelessness and -incompetency of those over and above him permitted. -“It was a perfect marvel,” he said afterwards, -“how a single man of us escaped,” from which -it will be gathered that British military genius and -discipline were somewhat at a discount during the -campaign which we may regard as the prelude to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_231">231</span> -the stupendous struggle which was to culminate on -the field of Waterloo.</p> - -<p>When Colonel Wesley got home he did a very -curious thing. He asked to be allowed to resign -his commission and to be given some post, however -humble, in the Civil Service. It is easy to see from -his letter of application to Lord Camden that he -was utterly disgusted with the Army, or rather with -the way in which it was mismanaged. He also -felt, as he distinctly says, that he had in him the -makings of a successful financier, and certainly if -great business capacity, instantaneous knowledge of -men, unequalled power of organisation, and absolutely -tireless energy are the principal requisites for -commercial success, Arthur Wesley might have died -a millionaire.</p> - -<p>Happily, however, Lord Camden refused to grant -his request. No doubt the Earl of Mornington had -something to say about it and good officers were quite -rare enough just then to make the abilities of the -Colonel of the 33rd fairly conspicuous. Soon after -this he had an attack of yellow fever in Ireland, -probably by infection, which very nearly killed him. -Just at this time too, that is to say the end of 1795, -an expedition was organised to the West Indies -and the 33rd were to form part of it.</p> - -<p>It is interesting to us with our wind-defying -monsters of steel and steam to learn that the -squadron tried for six weeks to get out of the -Channel and then had to come back. By this time<span class="pagenum" id="Page_232">232</span> -the destination of the expedition had been changed -from the West to the East Indies. The Colonel of -the 33rd was too ill to sail with his regiment. A -swift frigate enabled him to overtake it at the Cape; -but for all that he was nearly thirteen months before -he got to Calcutta.</p> - -<p>Arthur Wellesley, as he now began to sign himself, -although nothing more in the eyes of his comrades -and commanders than a Colonel of Foot who was a -good disciplinarian and a promising soldier, had now -entered that theatre on the stage of which he was -to play a brilliant part to a world-wide audience.</p> - -<p>Nearly thirteen years before Warren Hastings -had finished his work and gone home to take his -reward in impeachment and ruin. The brilliant -administration of Lord Cornwallis and the less conspicuous -rule of Sir John Shore were now to be -followed by a double command which was to extend, -complete, and crown the great work of empire-making -in the East which had begun when Robert -Clive left his desk to go and capture Arcot.</p> - -<p>A few weeks after Colonel Wellesley landed in Calcutta, -his brilliant brother, the Earl of Mornington -took his seat on the Viceregal throne. No happier -combination could well have been possible. The -elder brother was a scholar, a statesman, and a -broad-minded man of affairs. The younger was, -even then, the same man who won Vittoria, Talavera, -and Waterloo.</p> - -<p>The two acted in perfect unison. There was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_233">233</span> -none of that bungling timidity and incompetency in -high places which confused the counsels and crippled -the activity of Robert Clive and Warren Hastings, -and the result was, as might have been expected, a -succession of triumphs won, be it noted, not only -by consummate generalship, but also by incessant -vigilance and hard work resulting in perfect organisation.</p> - -<p>These triumphs culminated, as every one knows, -in the crushing of the Mahratta power—the last -serious obstacle to the universality of British rule in -India—on the memorial field of Assaye.</p> - -<p>It was a magnificent combination of courage, -calculation, and generalship. With a force of five -thousand men and eighteen guns and with only two -thousand European troops in his army, Wellesley -defeated and utterly cut up an army of over forty -thousand men and an artillery force of a hundred -guns, and these, too, were the finest native fighting -troops in the Peninsula. In less than three hours -after the first assault the five thousand had conquered -the forty thousand and captured a hundred -and two guns and all the stores and ammunition, -and it should always be remembered that Assaye -was a very different business to Plassey. It was a -battle, not a rout, a tragedy rather than a farce. -Of the two thousand Europeans over four hundred -were killed and wounded, and of the three thousand -natives, who fought magnificently as they have ever -since done in company with British troops, there<span class="pagenum" id="Page_234">234</span> -were no less than sixteen hundred killed and -wounded.</p> - -<p>As for Wellesley himself, he was wherever he was -wanted, and that was usually in the thick of the -fight. But there is another fact which gives us a -glimpse of the great general who was the master -spirit of the Peninsular Campaign. His men fought -the battle of Assaye at the end of a twenty-four -mile march, and no military force that is not commanded -by a military genius could do that.</p> - -<p>There were other actions after Assaye, but it was -there that the final blow was really struck. Holkar, -it is true, had seemed to turn the tide for the time, -but in the December of 1804 General Lake finally -crumpled him up. In March, 1805, the Colonel of -the 33rd, now Sir Arthur Wellesley, sailed from -Madras in the frigate <i>Tridant</i>. We may pause to -note that in the following July he wrote from the -Island of St. Helena to tell his brother that his -health, which had been very bad, was now restored.</p> - -<p>He said: “I was wasting away daily, and latterly -when at Madras, I found my strength failed which -had before held out.” If his strength really had -failed, it is quite probable that St. Helena would -never have known its most distinguished resident.</p> - -<p>A short time after, Wellington returned to -England—he was known just then as the “Sepoy -General”—William Pitt remarked that he was at -a loss which most to admire—his modesty or his -talents, and he added that “he had never met with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_235">235</span> -any military officer with whom it was so satisfactory -to converse.” This was a saying both accurate -and just, and it must be admitted that there is a -very considerable difference between the dispatches -which Nelson wrote and those which Wellington -sent home after his greatest victories.</p> - -<p>It was during this brief stay at home that the -one little romance of Wellington’s life had a happy -“finis” written to it. In the days before he had -given any public sign of the great genius that was -in him, he had wooed Lady Catherine Pakenham, -a daughter of Lord Longford. Not possibly without -apparent reason, Lord and Lady Longford -came to the conclusion that he was an altogether -ineligible person, and refused their consent, and -Arthur Wesley sailed away to the East, disconsolate -but not despairing.</p> - -<p>It is pleasant to be able to look over his shoulder -just before he returned, and read a letter in which -Lady Catherine tells him that such beauty as she -had has been ravaged by small-pox. It is pleasanter -still to know that this information by no means -cooled his ardour to get home, and that when he -did come back a Major-General, the victor in many -fights, and Sir Arthur Wellesley, my Lord and my -Lady had reversed their decision, and the course of -true love was allowed to run with perfectly satisfactory -smoothness.</p> - -<p>Just before this he entered Parliament as member -for Rye, on the invitation of Lord Grenville. One<span class="pagenum" id="Page_236">236</span> -didn’t need much more than the invitation of a -powerful minister to get into Parliament in those -days. At Westminster he distinguished himself -chiefly as the vindicator of his brother’s policy in -India, and, more than this, he used his pen, which -was not much addicted to flourishes, but nevertheless -wrote good, strong, nervous English, to the -same good purpose. There is one sentence in an -open letter to his brother which exactly sums up -the situation.</p> - -<p>“By your firmness and decision you have not -only saved, but enlarged and secured the invaluable -Empire entrusted to your government at a time -when everything else was a wreck, and the existence -even of Great Britain was problematic.”</p> - -<p>Those are weighty words indeed, coming as they -do from the man who won the battle of Assaye and -established, let us hope for ever, the British Empire -in India.</p> - -<p>All the same he doesn’t seem to have liked this -talking business in Parliament at all, for in a letter -written in July, 1806, he says: “You will have -seen that I am in Parliament, and a difficult and -most unpleasant game I have had to play in the -present extraordinary state of parties.” From this -it will be seen that Arthur Wellesley, like any -other good man of action and capable Empire-Maker, -had a wholesome contempt for the miserable -and sordid game which is called party politics.</p> - -<p>All the same we find him a few months afterwards<span class="pagenum" id="Page_237">237</span> -as Chief Secretary for Ireland, buying, that -is to say bribing and corrupting with open candour -and unconcealed disgust, a sufficiency of votes and -influence to keep the Ministry in power. He said -plainly: “Almost every man of mark in the state -has his price.” And when he was taxed with -bribery and corruption, he remarked with that -marvellous insight of his, that an inquiry into such -practices would open up the whole theory of constitutional -government.</p> - -<p>We are supposed to have improved ourselves out -of the venality of buying and selling votes and seats, -at any rate for cash down, but we still bribe and -we still corrupt. There are still titles for rich men -who will spend lavishly to support their party, there -are still innumerable advantages for the tradesman, -and the contractor who are loyal to their party and -their ticket, and so it will be while constitutional -government and human nature remain what they -are; but for all that we may learn a good deal from -a remark like this made by a man who was so -absolutely incorruptible that when he was made -Captain-General of the Spanish Army, he refused -to draw his salary, and who later on when his justly -grateful country presented him with an estate, paid -the rent of it into the Treasury as long as the war -lasted.</p> - -<p>It is not often, even among the great ones of the -earth, that you meet with an absolutely honest man, -but there is no doubt about Wellington.</p> - -<p>After a little subordinate foreign service in Denmark, -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_238">238</span> -in which he distinguished himself as usual, -he went back to the Irish office for about eight -months. This particular eight months was a very -critical period indeed, and looking back at the facts -across a gulf of eighty years, one is inclined to -wonder how it was that no better work could be -found for the already well-proved genius of Arthur -Wellesley than the ordinary routine work which a -very much smaller man could have done, if not as -well, at least sufficiently well. It will have been -noticed more than once by those who have -managed to get through the foregoing pages, that -one of the greatest and most dangerous faults of -British officialism, has been the employment of -giants to do the work of pigmies. But officialism -would not be official if it were not dull, so I suppose -there is no help for it. One of the elements -of greatness is the faculty of recognising greatness -in others, and officialism is very seldom great.</p> - -<p>This was the year 1807, and that is the same -thing as saying that it was the period which marked -the zenith of Napoleon’s power. The little cadet -of Artillery who had been teaching the raw republicans -of France how to construct fortifications, -and how to knock them down, while Arthur Wellesley -was training the 33rd Foot, was now Emperor -of the French.</p> - -<p>More than that, he was practically master of -Europe. From the Atlantic Ocean to the Ural<span class="pagenum" id="Page_239">239</span> -mountains he had not a single foe left in arms. -Some he had crushed, others he had over-awed or -conciliated, but all the nations of Europe were -either his subjects or his forced allies. Nelson, it -is true, had made Britain the mistress of the seas, -but, saving only these little islands of ours, it must -be confessed that Napoleon was master of the land.</p> - -<p>There was, however, just one weak point, one -loose joint, as it were, in the armour of the conquering -Colossus who now bestrode the Continent from -one end to the other.</p> - -<p>If you take the map of Europe you will see that -Portugal is a very small patch on it, and yet if it -had not been for Portugal being just where it is, -and if there had not been such a man as Sir Arthur -Wellesley ready to turn its geographical advantages -to the best possible use, Napoleon would very -probably have ended his career on a throne, instead -of on that lonely island in the Atlantic.</p> - -<p>This is not the place for me to attempt to redescribe -the long glories of the Peninsular War. -In the first place, to do so would necessitate more -pages than I have paragraphs at my disposal; and, -in the second place, are they not already painted -with a worthy splendour on the glowing pages of -Napier and Allison?</p> - -<p>But what does fall within the scope of such a -sketch as this is the business of pointing out a fact -which the school books say nothing about. The -work that Wellington did in the Peninsula was of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_240">240</span> -two sorts. He not only saw the weak joint in -Napoleon’s armour and struck hard and straight at -it. He did a great deal more than that.</p> - -<p>The genius of his combinations, the tenacity of -his purpose, and that inspired confidence which -practically doubled the effectiveness of his fighting -force, compelled Napoleon to employ his greatest -generals, and some of his finest troops in the work -of “flinging the English into the sea,” as he himself -phrased it.</p> - -<p>“There is nothing,” he told his marshals over -and over again, “there is nothing to be reckoned -with except the English.” And it may be added -that if the English had not been led by such a -man as he who was now Viscount Wellington and -Baron Douro the reckoning might have been a -somewhat short one.</p> - -<p>The actual effect of the Peninsular War and of -Wellington’s genius is not to be seen so much in -the splendid triumphs of Vittoria and Salamanca, -or the awful slaughters of Albuera and Busaco. -It is to be found rather in the fact that Soult, -Ney, and Masséna, the three finest marshals of the -Grand Army, were kept there, campaign after -campaign, fighting battle after battle, and suffering -defeat after defeat, in the hopeless effort to do -what it was absolutely necessary to be done if the -conquests of Napoleon were to be anything more -than a passing dream of empire.</p> - -<p>Thus, for instance, when at the end of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_241">241</span> -campaign of 1810, Masséna finally retired upon -Salamanca he had lost every fight in which he -had engaged, and the Grand Army was the poorer -by no fewer than thirty thousand men. We have -simply to ask ourselves what Napoleon would have -been able to do if he had only had all these men -free to work his will upon Continental troops and -win more triumphs like Austerlitz and Jena, instead -of being forced to send them battalion after battalion, -and army after army, to dash themselves to pieces -against that unbreakable phalanx of British valour -and determination which the genius of Wellington -had drawn up across the Portuguese frontier.</p> - -<p>Magnificent as were the efforts he made, and -tremendous as were the sacrifices which France -submitted to for his sake, all the genius even of -Napoleon was of no avail as long as the life-blood -of the Napoleonic system was draining away -through that open wound in the Peninsula. But -for this there would have been no Leipsic, and -probably no Moscow, no Waterloo, and no St. -Helena.</p> - -<p>The most splendid military triumph in the history -of the world is the uninterrupted march of victory -made by Wellington and the soldiers whom his -genius had made unconquerable for more than a -thousand miles from the lines of Torres Vedras -to the banks of the Seine. But behind the -brilliance of this incomparable triumph there is -something better still, something which Napoleon<span class="pagenum" id="Page_242">242</span> -himself was first to see, and this was the supreme -genius which planned, and the untirable pertinacity -which carried out, without one hitch or fault from -start to finish, that marvellous series of operations -which began with the first move of the pawns at -Rolica, and ended with the triumphant checkmate -at Waterloo.</p> - -<p>Although, as I say, it would be quite out of the -question to attempt to draw even the briefest outline -of these magnificent campaigns, yet there are -one or two incidents in them which may be looked -at in passing for the sake of the glimpses they -afford of the man in the midst of his work, and, -few though they may be, there is yet more -real knowledge to be got from them than from -many pages of descriptions of battles and -sieges.</p> - -<p>Thus, for instance, shortly after he landed for -the second time in Portugal there was a conspiracy -among the French officers to depose Marshal Soult, -and one of these men came to Wellington across -the Douro to tell him of this so that he might make -their work easier by a crushing defeat. This might -have been of enormous advantage to him, but he -refused point blank to avail himself of such base -assistance, and sent the traitor back to the master -whom he had betrayed. He was not the man to -work by methods like this. He had his own -methods, and so effectual were they that ten days -after he had landed at Lisbon there was not a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_243">243</span> -single French soldier on Portuguese soil who was -not a prisoner of war.</p> - -<p>A month afterwards Napoleon writing to Soult -and Ney said: “You are to advance on the English, -pursue them without cessation, beat them and fling -them into the sea. The English alone are redoubtable—they -alone. If the army is not differently -managed, before the lapse of a few months they will -bring upon it a catastrophe.” How prophetic these -words were a glance at the splendidly inscribed -colours of the British Peninsular Regiments will -amply suffice to show.</p> - -<p>As usual, Wellington in the Peninsula, like -Nelson in the Mediterranean, was forced by the -incompetence or imbecility of the authorities at -home to do his tremendous work with most inadequate -means. In Spain the people whom he -had come to save refused his soldiers food, and -those at home, whom he was no less fighting to -save, refused him money enough to buy it. In a -letter written in January, 1811, he put the position -very plainly.</p> - -<p>“If we cannot persevere in carrying on the -contest in the Peninsula or elsewhere on the -Continent we must prepare to make one of our own -islands the seat of war. I am equally certain that -if Buonaparte cannot root us out of this country he -must alter his system in Europe and give us such -a peace as we ought to accept.”</p> - -<p>This was the work that he had to do and did,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_244">244</span> -and here is a glimpse of the means he had to do -it with. “I have not,” he says in the same letter, -“authority to give a shilling or a stand of arms -or a round of ammunition to anybody. I do give -all, it is true, but it is contrary to my instructions -and at my peril. Not another officer in the army -would even look at the risks that I have to incur -every day.” There are not many more eloquent -pictures than this of a man serving his country -and saving it in spite of itself.</p> - -<p>Like all good generals, Wellington insisted upon -absolute obedience, and nothing could excuse in his -eyes even the most splendid breach of discipline. -After the taking of Ciudad Rodrigo, General Crawford, -the leader of the famous Light Division, had -been ordered not to push his operations beyond the -river Coa, but he forgot his instructions in the -temptation to make a splendid dash at an overwhelming -force under Ney.</p> - -<p>Nothing but the magnificent valour and discipline -of the Division saved it from utter destruction. -Still it was saved, and when its gallant leader -reported himself to Wellington he said: “I am -glad to see you safe, Crawford.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, we were in no danger I can assure you!” -was the answer.</p> - -<p>“No, but I was through your conduct!” came -the dry retort, and Crawford walked away crestfallen, -remarking to himself that the General was -“damned crusty to-day.”</p> - -<p>Wellington’s best known title is the Iron Duke, -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_245">245</span> -and yet no man ever had less iron in him than -he. It is true that he armed himself from head -to foot with a mail which his enemies found impenetrable, -but the gallant heart whose high courage -carried him through so many dangers and difficulties -was withal as tender as a woman’s.</p> - -<p>When his last great fight had been fought and -won, when the long tragedy of the Napoleonic wars -was over, and the curtain had just fallen upon the -tremendous climax of Waterloo, Dr. Hume, his -physician, went to see him early on the morning -of the 19th of June to tell him of the death during -the night of his friend Gordon, and this is how -he described the conqueror on the morrow of his -greatest victory.</p> - -<p>“He had, as usual, taken off his clothes, but had -not washed himself. As I entered he sat up in bed, -his face covered with the dust and sweat of the -previous day, and extended his hand to me which I -took and held in mine while I told him of Gordon’s -death and of such of the casualties as had come -to my knowledge. He was much affected. I felt -the tears dropping fast upon my hand, and, looking -towards him, saw them chasing one another in furrows -over his dusty cheeks.”</p> - -<p>This is a touching little picture of the one man in -the world who has proved himself capable of grappling -with and overthrowing the Corsican Colossus, -and with it we may here bid him farewell. Waterloo<span class="pagenum" id="Page_246">246</span> -was the last as well as the greatest of his fights. -He had given the world peace. He had overthrown -the most grievous tyranny that had threatened it for -many a long century.</p> - -<p>He had found Europe under the heel of France. -He had conquered her conqueror; and yet it was he -who, when terms of peace were being dictated in -Paris, stopped his ferocious old ally Blücher from -blowing up the Bridge of Jena, and got such concessions -for France in the hour of her defeat and -humiliation as none but the victor of the Peninsula -and the hero of Waterloo could have done. Like -all really strong men, he was merciful in his -strength; and like all really great soldiers he looked -upon his enemies as his friends as soon as he had -soundly thrashed them.</p> - -<p>With his after career as a politician and a statesman -I have here nothing to do. His empire-making -ended with the order that sent the whole -steadfast British line streaming down from the -rising ground which they had held so stubbornly -all through that famous day. It is better to take -leave of him here, for Arthur Wellesley was too -good and too great a man for politics. He was -the idol of the army he had created, but he didn’t -know how to lead a mob.</p> - -<div id="ip_246" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_246.jpg" width="1200" height="1969" alt="" /><div class="caption">THE ORDER THAT SENT THE BRITISH LINE STREAMING DOWN FROM -THE RISING GROUND.</div></div> - -<p>Seventeen years after Waterloo, to the very -day, he was beset in London streets by a howling -multitude of the very people he had served -so splendidly.</p> - -<p>If he had not found a refuge in the Temple and a -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_247">247</span> -bodyguard of Benchers, it is probable that they -would have pulled him from his horse and torn him -limb from limb. It is a sorry spectacle, although -relieved by the quaintness of the vision of this -unconquered hero of a hundred fights trusting -for his life to a bodyguard of lawyers.</p> - -<p>He never forgot this, and probably never forgave -it. Every one knows how, when Apsley House was -threatened by a mob, he made ready to defend -it in a businesslike and soldierly way. When the -mob broke his windows he coolly ordered iron -shutters and put them up. Afterwards, when the -fickle tide of popular fancy had turned the other -way, and the mob was wont to cheer instead of -cursing him, he used to point to these shutters -and laugh good-humouredly but seriously withal.</p> - -<p>In one sense, however, it is hardly true that -Wellington’s last fight was at Waterloo. The -last time that he really made a display of his -military capacity was in London. It was he who -on the 10th of April, 1848, saved London from -the Chartists. He never allowed a soldier to be -seen, much less a weapon, and when it was all -over, Sir John Campbell came to him and said:</p> - -<p>“Well, Duke, it all turned out as you foretold.”</p> - -<p>And this was the answer:</p> - -<p>“Oh, yes; I was sure of it, and I never showed -a soldier or a musket, but I was ready. I could -have stopped them whenever you liked, and if<span class="pagenum" id="Page_248">248</span> -they had been armed it would have been all the -same.”</p> - -<p>That was Wellington’s last victory—bloodless, -and, therefore, since the enemy would have been -his own countrymen, all the more glorious for that.</p> - -<p>In the article on Nelson, I mentioned the well-known -fact that the greatest soldier and the greatest -sailor of their age met but once, and that Wellington -so far gauged the character of the hero of Trafalgar -as to describe him as “a very superior person.” In -the spirit they not only met again, but they will live -together in everlasting honour in the memory of the -British people.</p> - -<p>Their last resting-places are side by side, as they -should be, in St. Paul’s Cathedral, and side by side -their glorious memories will remain as long as the -noble qualities which made them the greatest men, -not only of their nation, but of the age which their -great deeds made splendid, are held in honour—and -that is the same thing as saying as long as the -human race endures.</p> -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_249">249</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="XI">XI<br /> - -“<i>CHINESE GORDON</i>”<br /> - -<span class="subhead">“<i>HONOUR—NOT HONOURS</i>”</span></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_251">251</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">XI<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">“CHINESE GORDON”</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="firstword">We</span> are living rather too near to the days of -the man himself, to be able to say what -place History will ultimately assign to the greatest -and most famous of the old fighting stock of the -Gordons. Probably the discriminating historian of -the day after to-morrow will look upon him ethnologically -as a queer survival or throwback—a man -who lived and did his work in the nineteenth -century in the style of the fifteenth, or even the -fourteenth.</p> - -<p>In the military sense he would seem to be the last -of our great soldiers of fortune—for soldier of -fortune he undoubtedly was far more than soldier -of Britain—and the work that he did as one of the -makers of the British Empire was done under -foreign flags.</p> - -<p>It might, indeed, be asked by the superficial -observer in what sense he was an Empire-Maker at -all, or what right he has to claim a place in that long -and splendid array of great men, only a few of whom<span class="pagenum" id="Page_252">252</span> -can be silhouetted within the limits of such a volume -as this and whose succession stretches through the -centuries from William, Duke of Normandy to Cecil -John Rhodes of Rhodesia.</p> - -<p>The answer is plain enough, though not very -obvious at first sight. The British Empire is twofold. -It is not only the greatest concrete Fact that -the world has ever seen; it is also a vast and very -splendid Idea, and in this sense it covers, not only -just that portion of the earth’s surface over which -the Union Jack flies, but also every other land -known and half-known, old and new, civilised and -savage, into which the genius of the Anglo-Saxon -has forced its way and over which it has exercised -that peculiar influence for which the word -“English” stands in the dictionaries of our foreign -competitors.</p> - -<p>Charles George Gordon never added a square -yard to the British Empire, considered as a geographical -expression. He very seldom fought at -the head of British troops, and when he did, it was -not to any very great purpose—in fact his witnessing -of the murder of many hundreds of gallant British -soldiers by the officials who were guilty of the -criminal mismanagement of the Crimean War was -about the sum total of his experiences of warfare -under the Flag.</p> - -<p>It is a not altogether curious fact that, although -Gordon was one of the very ablest leaders and -organisers of men, and although he, shortly after<span class="pagenum" id="Page_253">253</span> -thirty, proved to demonstration that he possessed -most of the qualities of a great soldier, his native -country didn’t appear to have any use for him, or -at least no adequate use. As I have said before, -the curse of both our Services, and therefore, in -a very definite and practical sense, of the whole -Empire, is officialism, or officialdom.</p> - -<p>Two very different men grasped this fact in its -relation to Gordon. One was Nubar Pasha, Egyptian -Minister at Constantinople, and the other was -John Ruskin. Nubar said: “England owes little -to her officials; she owes her greatness to men of -different stamp.” Ruskin said practically the same -thing in one of his lectures at Woolwich, but in -different fashion and in many more words, while -Gordon, within a mile or so of the lecture-hall at -Woolwich, was bending his great soul to the routine -duties which appear to have been about the best -work that the British Government could find for -him to do.</p> - -<p>When the British Government did at last get him -to take his share in the doing of the most difficult -and dangerous work which was just then necessary -to be done upon the very outskirts of civilisation, -those who were responsible for the exercise of the -executive power deserted him and left him to his -death by what is probably the basest and most -criminal betrayal of a man of deeds by men of -words that can be laid to the charge of a British -Government.</p> - -<p>History will probably say with truth that every -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_254">254</span> -member of that fatally futile Cabinet who had any -hand in sending Gordon to Khartoum and neglecting -to give him reasonable support incurred a direct -and personal responsibility for his death, from -which the dispassionate verdict of Posterity will -be very slow to relieve their memories.</p> - -<p>It is a stain that can never pass away from -their public reputations. There are other faults -of a similar sort for which these men will be -arraigned at the bar of History, but the fate of -the lonely, betrayed man, who day after day left -his starving and ever-diminishing garrison to look -out across the desert from the battlements of -Khartoum for the help which, for him, never -came, will certainly be considered the blackest if -not the greatest of them all.</p> - -<p>But there is another and very practical sense in -which Gordon was a British Empire-Maker. This -realm of ours is what it is, not only because we -have fought for some parts of it and successfully -stolen others. It is ours because we knew how -to make use of it after we got it; because of all -other men now existing on the face of the earth -the Anglo-Saxon is the best leader and governor -of savage and semi-savage men that has so far -been evolved, and of such leaders and governors -Gordon plainly proved himself to be one of the -very best.</p> - -<p>Under the British flag he never won a battle for<span class="pagenum" id="Page_255">255</span> -Britain. The genius which his Motherland might -have made such splendid use of did its best work -under the dragon-flag of China and the crescent-flag -of Egypt, but nevertheless on the day when -the last mile of the British high road from Cairo -to Cape Town is thrown open, and the <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">Pax -Britannica</i> is proclaimed from north to south of -Africa, men will remember Gordon and confess -that without him this might never have been -done.</p> - -<p>It will have been noticed by those who have read -between the lines here printed that where Empire-Makers -are concerned the old-fashioned idea of -ancestry seems to be not altogether the fiction that -certain latter-day theorists, men of words to a man, -have sought to make it, and Gordon was no -exception to this rule.</p> - -<p>His lineage stretches away back into the dim -mists which lie behind the history of all these -islands into the days when Englishmen, Scotsmen, -and Irishmen had yet to be thought of, and when -the divisions of mankind were racial rather than -national.</p> - -<p>Of course the Gordons of last century were for -the most part desperate Jacobites, and as such were -hinderers rather than doers of the work of empire-making. -But, curiously enough, this particular -Gordon did not come from these. On the contrary, -there was a fight during that miserable business of -1745 in which, on the field of Gladsmuir, a couple<span class="pagenum" id="Page_256">256</span> -of thousand Highland clansmen played havoc with -some English regiments fresh back from the -Flemish wars, and after the slaughter they took -many prisoners, one of whom was David Gordon, -great-grandfather of the hero and martyr of Khartoum.</p> - -<p>From this it will be seen that, whether by design -or accident, his branch of the ancient and widespread -stock had managed to get upon the right -side—that is to say, the side which was to fight for -imperialism as distinguished from mere nationalism, -which in many cases is only another way of spelling -parochialism.</p> - -<p>It is noteworthy, by the way, that Gordon’s -grandfather, William Augustus, so named after -“Butcher Cumberland,” fought at Louisburg and -on the Heights of Abraham, after Captain Cook -had taken those soundings on the St. Lawrence. -His son, William Henry, fought as an officer of -artillery at Maida, and it was his grandson who won -the yellow jacket and mandarin’s button in suppressing -the Taiping rebellion, who refused a roomful of -gold as a bribe, and who, after carefully scratching -out the inscription, gave the huge gold medal -which he had received from the Emperor of China -anonymously to the Coventry Relief Fund.</p> - -<p>This “give away your medal,” to use his own -words, is the keynote of his whole life. Gordon -worked “for honour, not honours,” and that one -letter makes a great deal of difference. We see<span class="pagenum" id="Page_257">257</span> -here, too, the sign of his kinship with other -Empire-Makers, the faculty of seeing what work -had to be done and the power of doing it for its -own sake, whatever difficulties there might lie in -the way.</p> - -<p>As a boy he seemed to combine in the most -curious fashion a constitutional sensitiveness amounting -almost to timidity, with a contempt for personal -danger, and an equal contempt for authority which -individually he was unable to respect.</p> - -<p>Altogether, in fact, his was a nature which had -very little to expect in the way of promotion or -favour from conventional officialdom, and it was very -little that he got. This view was no doubt amply -justified by his first experience in warfare in the -trenches before Sebastopol, for if ever heroism and -devotion abroad were crucified by authority at -home, this was the case during the Crimean -War.</p> - -<p>From the Crimea the scene shifts somewhat -suddenly to China. And yet here we may note -that this is not the place to stop and worry about -the morality or otherwise of those so-called opium -wars which led up to the trouble of 1860. If the -opium trade was bad, the opening of the Flowery -Land to European commerce was good, and one -usually does find good and bad mixed up in the -most extraordinary manner in matters of this sort. -The point here is that the brief war which ended -with the taking of the Taku forts in the August of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_258">258</span> -1860, and the capture of Pekin, was the beginning -of the career of “Chinese Gordon.”</p> - -<p>He did not see the taking of the forts, but he did -see the destruction of the Summer Palace, “the -Garden of Perpetual Brightness,” which was -destroyed as an act of revenge at the order of a -British envoy who may here be left nameless in -the infamy that he earned by it. Gordon was one -of the involuntary Vandals, and this is what he said -about the business when writing home:</p> - -<p>“You can scarcely imagine the beauty and -magnificence of the palaces we burnt. It made -one’s heart sore to destroy them. It was wretchedly -demoralising work.”</p> - -<p>After this for a year and a half he fulfilled the -duties of a Captain of Engineers in the camp at -Tien-Tsin in the midst of a vast dreary plain. -During this time the Taiping rebels had been -industriously employing fire and sword to make one -of the most fertile portions of the Flowery Land -the reverse of worthy of the name and, at length -Shanghai itself, the headquarters of the foreign -traders, was threatened by the ever-advancing wave -of barbarism.</p> - -<p>A defensive force was hurriedly raised by an -American named Ward, who for nearly two years -led it to constant victory and earned for it the -somewhat magniloquent title of the Ever-Victorious -Army.</p> - -<p>Then a chance bullet killed Ward at the beginning<span class="pagenum" id="Page_259">259</span> -of what might have been a most brilliant -career. Under his successor everything went -wrong. Victory was replaced by defeat and success -by disaster. This incompetent person being removed, -the hitherto obscure officer of Engineers -stepped into his place. It was a time when a -leader of men was badly wanted. It was also the -moment when Fate knocked at the door of Charles -George Gordon and found him in.</p> - -<p>Within a very short time disorganisation was -replaced by discipline, despair by confidence, and -the Ever-Victorious Army was once more made -worthy of its name. It was here that Gordon -really began his career as a soldier of fortune. -When he took command he told Li-Hung-Chang -that he would turn the rebels out of the score of -walled cities which they had captured and strengthened, -and put the rebellion down within eighteen -months. As a matter of fact he did it in fifteen.</p> - -<p>The story of the doing of this so clearly shows -the extraordinary capacity that Gordon possessed -for both the organisation and the execution of a -military campaign, as well as the faculty of inspiring -confidence in all sorts and conditions of men, that -it is simply amazing that the home authorities did -not immediately recognise the fact that he was -something a good deal more than they had hitherto -taken him for. This, however, it was to take them -some twenty years more to find out.</p> - -<p>Still there was one incident at the close of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_260">260</span> -rebellion which might have shown even the official -mind very clearly what sort of man this Major of -Engineers was. The last incident of the war was -the surrender of the great lake-city of Soo-Chow, -and the Wangs, or chiefs of the rebels, laid down -their arms on a guarantee of safety and good treatment. -The Chinese way of acting up to this was -to chop the heads off the whole lot. Now Gordon -considered himself in a measure responsible for this -guarantee, and the way in which he marked his -sense of the breach of faith was characteristically -unique.</p> - -<p>The brilliancy of his services was recognised by -a money gift of 10,000 taels (between three and -four thousand pounds of English money). Gordon -acknowledged it by writing on the back of the -Imperial letter: “Major Gordon regrets that, owing -to the circumstances which occurred since the -capture of Soo-Chow, he is unable to receive any -mark of his Majesty the Emperor’s recognition.”</p> - -<p>If ever a sceptred monarch got the snub direct -the Son of Heaven must have got it then, although -the probability is that the 10,000 taels never found -their way back to the Imperial treasury. Gordon -also wanted to throw up the whole business, but -the rebellion suddenly broke out again in another -place, and so he went on with his work until it was -finally crushed, for he was not the sort of man -who liked to begin a thing and not get through -with it.</p> - -<p>His brilliant success in every single operation -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_261">261</span> -that he conducted clearly proved, as I have said, -that in Gordon Britain possessed a true leader of -men and master of affairs; in other words an -Empire-Maker of the first order. And yet she -first ignored and undervalued him, and then, as -David did with Uriah, put him in the forefront of -the battle and left him there to die.</p> - -<p>For twenty years after we had wars in many -places—in South and West Africa, in Egypt, -Abyssinia, and Afghanistan. In some we gained -credit and in some disgrace, but during all that -twenty years the leaden eye of officialdom never -seems to have fallen upon Gordon. The Chinamen -were quicker sighted. He was the first and -I believe the only “foreign devil” who was -endowed with the Yellow Jacket and made one -of the bodyguard of the Son of Heaven.</p> - -<p>If he had chosen he might have made an -enormous fortune and risen to any dignity short of -the throne that the Flowery Land had to offer, but -as a matter of fact he left China poorer than he -went into it, bringing away with him only that big -gold medal which he afterwards gave anonymously -to charity.</p> - -<p>And all this time he was, as one of his biographers -and a fellow soldier has truly said, “not only without -honour in his own country, but was regarded -by many of the mandarins and ruling classes of his -fellow countymen as a madman.” The use of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_262">262</span> -word “mandarin” there will be understood if we -remember that his brother mandarins of China held -him in the highest honour.</p> - -<p>He came back to England in 1865, and was -given the command of the Royal Engineers at -Gravesend, and there for six years he did the -routine work of a soldier, and in his spare time won -a reputation for missionary work of the unofficial -and unassuming sort which will live as long as his -fame as a soldier and leader of men.</p> - -<p>Here in the interval between his two careers -we may take a glance at the physical man as he -was just about now. This is how his comrade Sir -William Butler describes him: “In figure Gordon, -at forty years of age, stood somewhat under middle -height, slight but strong, active, and muscular. A -profusion of thick, brown hair clustered above -a broad, open forehead. His features were regular, -his mouth firm, and his expression when silent had -a certain undertone of sadness which instantly -vanished when he spoke.</p> - -<p>“But it was the clear, grey-blue eyes, and the -low, soft, and very distinct voice that left the most -lasting impression on the memory of the man who -had seen and spoken with Charles Gordon, and an -eye that seemed to have looked at great distances -and seen the load of life carried on men’s shoulders, -and a voice that, like the clear chime of some -Flemish belfry, had in it fresh music to welcome -the newest hour, even though it had rung out the -note of many a vanished day.”</p> - -<p>Such was, then, the outer aspect of the man who -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_263">263</span> -at length went to Egypt at the invitation of Nubar -Pasha and the Khedive Ismael, to begin that work -which in the end cost one of the most valuable of -British lives, and made the delta and valley of the -Nile what they are to-day in everything but name—a -British province.</p> - -<p>In this sense Gordon was <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">de facto</i> an Empire-Maker. -The mendacious amenities of Diplomacy -may lisp out meaningless phrases about the -evacuation of Egypt, but the fact is that we have -re-created the land of the Pharaohs, we have -brought it from bankruptcy to prosperity, we have -released the fellah from the terror of the lash and -the servitude of forced labour. We have raised -a downtrodden peasantry to the position of self-respecting -citizens, and we have turned slaves into -soldiers. This was the work that Gordon began -for us, although we did not employ him to do it, -or recognise that he was doing it; but, having -taken it over and carried it so far, it is hardly likely -that even British officialdom will commit such a -crime against civilisation as the surrender of the -almost completed task would now be.</p> - -<p>Gordon went south from Cairo by way of Suakin -and Berber to Khartoum, taking with him the -somewhat curious title of Governor of the Equator—which -of course meant the Equatorial Provinces—and -a very distinct conception of a Central -African Dominion which the soldiers and statesmen<span class="pagenum" id="Page_264">264</span> -of other generations will realise in due course, -provided always that the onward march of the -Anglo-Saxon is not turned aside or stopped by -faint-heartedness within or disaster without.</p> - -<p>His headquarters or capital was a place called -Gondokoro, situate in the midst of a ghastly region -of river, lake, and swamp, sunbaked by day, and -miasma-haunted by night. He went up by steamer -from Khartoum and, some two hundred miles above -the city, he passed the island of Abba in the White -Nile, and in one of his letters home he wrote these -words which read somewhat weirdly in the lurid -light of the camp-fires which seven years later -closed round Khartoum:</p> - -<p>“Last night, March 26th, we were going slowly -along in the moonlight and I was thinking of you -all and of the expeditions and Nubar and Co., when -all of a sudden from a large bush came peals of -laughter. I felt put out, but it turned out to be -birds, who laughed at us from the bushes for some -time in a very rude way. They are a species of -stork, and seemed in capital spirits and highly -amused at anybody thinking of going to Gondokoro -with the hope of doing anything.”</p> - -<p>But the laughing storks were not the only -inhabitants of the Island of Abba, for, in a cave -among its rocks, there was dwelling at that very -moment a certain Moslem monk, or dervish, named -Mohammed Achmet, who had already won some -reputation for sanctity among his fellow tribesmen.</p> - -<p>It would have been a most unwarrantable and, -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_265">265</span> -for Gordon, quite an impossible thing to do, and -yet, so far is fact stranger than fiction, that the -whole history of about a quarter of a continent -would have been changed for the better, and the -march of civilisation and humanity in Northern -Africa would have been incalculably accelerated if -the Governor-General of the Equator had stopped -his boat just at that point, landed his men on the -island, routed the holy man out of his cave, and -either put a bullet through his head or drowned him -in the Nile; for this recluse, then unknown beyond -the confines of his native desert, was destined seven -years later to be hailed by the Soudan tribesmen as -the Mahdi—a word which to us means so much -disgrace and disaster as well as hard and tardily -won triumph that there is no need here to further -elaborate the coincidence.</p> - -<p>It was not a pleasant land, this scene of Gordon’s -first government. As he himself says of the -wilderness: “No one can conceive the utter misery -of these lands. Heat and mosquitoes day and -night all the year round.” These are few words, -but I am able to say from personal experience that -to those who know what African heat and African -mosquitoes <em>are</em> they speak very eloquently.</p> - -<p>Here, until October, 1876, Gordon lived and -worked and suffered, making maps, building forts, -enticing traders to come to him, teaching his -soldiers to work and to till the ground and raise<span class="pagenum" id="Page_266">266</span> -crops instead of plundering the natives. One by -one his staff died about him, but still somehow the -work went on.</p> - -<p>When he first arrived he wrote: “the only -possessions Egypt has in my province are two -forts, one here at Gondokoro and the other at -Fatiko. There are three hundred men in one and -two hundred in the other. You can’t go out in -safety half a mile.”</p> - -<p>But towards the end of ’76 the line of posts had -been pushed to Duffli, a place on the Nile only -three degrees north of the Equator itself. Lake -Albert Nyanza had been circumnavigated for the -first time by a steamboat and mapped out—not by -Gordon himself, who declined the honour of first -steaming on its waters, but by an Italian lieutenant -of his, named Gessi, and his reason for doing this -was “to give a practical proof of what I think -regarding the inordinate praise which is given to an -explorer.”</p> - -<p>His idea was that those who did the hard work, -the getting up of stores and boats and other -impedimenta over rapids and across deserts, were -the real men who deserved the honour. “But all -this would go for nothing in comparison with the -fact of going on the lake, which you may say is a -small affair when you have the boats ready for you”—from -which certain much-boomed and belauded -explorers known to latter-day fame might well -learn wisdom as well as a little becoming modesty.</p> - -<p>The farther south the bounds of Equatoria were -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_267">267</span> -pushed the more dismal the country seems to have -become. He calls it “a dead, mournful spot, with -a heavy, damp dew penetrating everywhere. It is -as if the angel Azrael had spread his wings over -this land. You have little idea of the silence and -solitude. I am sure no one whom God did not -support could bear up. It is simply killing.”</p> - -<p>At length the three years of his miserable service -came to an end. In October he set his face northward -from Khartoum and ate his Christmas dinner -in London.</p> - -<p>It was in those days that Britain woke up to -some sense of her opportunities and responsibilities. -She had begun what was then called the “forward” -policy, and which to-day with wider vision and -sounder wisdom we call the Imperial policy.</p> - -<p>Unhappily the fickle breath of popular favour -soon blew the other way for a space; a halt was -called, then a retreat was sounded, and of course -with the inevitable result. The arms of Britain -were sullied by defeat, and her ancient honour -was stained by the breach of her plighted word -and the desertion of those who had trusted to her -faith.</p> - -<p>This was the dark and disgraceful period which -lasted from the end of 1880 to the beginning of -1885. It began with the desertion of the heroic -British garrisons in the Transvaal and the everlasting -shame of Majuba Hill, and it ended with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_268">268</span> -the political betrayal and the constructive murder -of Charles George Gordon.</p> - -<p>It was on January 31, 1877, that Gordon went -back to Africa as Governor-General of the Soudan. -On May 5th he was installed at Khartoum; on the -19th he left to strike his first blow against slavery; -by June 7th he had crossed four hundred miles of -wilderness and passed the frontier of Dafour.</p> - -<p>His movements during this time, amazing as they -are now to us, were absolutely paralysing to the -chiefs and officials of the country. To them a -Pasha of Egypt was a portly gentleman, never in a -hurry, never inclined to leniency or mercy, a staunch -upholder of the slave trade in its worst as well as -its best aspects, and possessing a very keen eye -indeed to the main chance.</p> - -<p>But the quite phenomenal Pasha who now flits -across their astonished vision is a lean, yellow-faced -little man, clad in the gorgeous but dusty and -travel-stained uniform of a Marshal of Turkey, -mounted on a swift dromedary which out-distances -every other animal of the desert save the beast -ridden by the Arab sheikh who accompanies him. -The two fly from point to point with incredible -rapidity; the words of the Pasha are sometimes -stern and sometimes mild, but always just and -always dead against slavery. There is no talk of -what he wants for himself, but only of what he -wants done or left undone, because this or that is -right or wrong—and what he wants he gets.</p> - -<p>The troops that came labouring after him were of -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_269">269</span> -such miserable material that they deserved only to -be made slaves themselves, and such the Arabs -would speedily have made them but for this yellow-faced, -bright-eyed man, who set them one against -another, played off their jealousies and hatreds, and -generally out-manœuvred them with such consummate -and incomprehensible skill, striking at such -vast distances with such incredible rapidity, that in -four months a seemingly impossible feat had been -accomplished, and the rebellion of the slave-kings -put down.</p> - -<p>And yet it was all hopeless. The slave trade -was too much for him, as it has so far been too -much for every one else. “I declare I see no -human way to stop it!” he writes in one of his -letters. “When you have got the ink that has -soaked into blotting-paper out of it, then slavery -will cease in these lands.”</p> - -<p>In the November of 1877 there occurred an incident -which was destined in after years to bear -terrible fruit. He travelled from Kordofan <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">viâ</i> -Khartoum to Merawy. He was on his way to -Wadi Halfa to see about pushing on the railway -from there to Dongola. But before he got there a -dispatch reached him saying that the Abyssinians -had invaded the Eastern Soudan. Back he went, -post-haste, only to find the news was false.</p> - -<p>If it had not been for this the railway would have -been completed, and the cataracts of the Nile would<span class="pagenum" id="Page_270">270</span> -not have delayed the tardily-sent Relief Expedition -until the Arab bullets had done their work and -gallant Gordon’s busy head had rolled to the foot -of the Mahdi’s throne.</p> - -<p>A few weeks after this he is once more in Cairo -in obedience to an urgent summons from the -Khedive. The work was this time financial. The -grip of the foreign bondholder was closing round -the throat of the fellaheen, and the bill for official -extravagance and incompetence had to be paid. It -was characteristic of Gordon that his first financial -reform was the cutting down of his own salary from -six thousand to three thousand a year.</p> - -<p>This was all very well, but when he proposed to -apply the same methods to other people’s salaries -he was very soon given to understand that he was -not the kind of man who was wanted in Cairo just -then, so he promptly threw up his presidency of the -Committee of Inquiry and went back to two years’ -more work in the Soudan, to fight the slave trade -again in the old heroic, hopeless fashion, and to -make maps and plans; to fly hither and thither over -the ghastly, waterless country, sometimes riding for -as much as two months at a time, till at last the -replacement of his old friend Ismael by Tewfik -Pasha once more called him back to Cairo.</p> - -<p>This time he went to Abyssinia also, and got -arrested twice, a circumstance which enabled him to -give us the following word picture of King Johannes. -“He is of the strictest sect of the Pharisees. He<span class="pagenum" id="Page_271">271</span> -talks like the Old Testament. Drunk overnight, -he is up at dawn reading the psalms. If he were -in England he would never miss a prayer-meeting, -and would have a Bible as big as a portmanteau.”</p> - -<p>After his release he came home again to rest, as -he thought, but as a fact to be called after a few -weeks’ run on the Continent to take the command -of the Colonial Forces at the Cape of Good -Hope.</p> - -<p>It was the eve of the Transvaal War, and now -Gordon made the first and the greatest mistake of -his life. He refused the command. If he had -taken it there might have been no Transvaal War; -certainly there would have been no Ingogo or -Majuba Hill. He started instead to India to be -Secretary to Lord Ripon, the new Liberal Viceroy.</p> - -<p>Three days after he landed he threw up his -appointment, and two days later he received an -urgent invitation from China. He asked for leave, -and the War Office refused. He threw up his -commission, making a present of its value, about -£6,000, to his stupid and graceless masters.</p> - -<p>He stopped the war with Russia, and sped back -again to London, receiving a telegram on the way -telling him that his leave had been cancelled and -his resignation refused.</p> - -<p>He afterwards made a futile visit to Ireland and -an equally futile trip to South Africa. He offered -to go and help in settling the Basuto trouble. The<span class="pagenum" id="Page_272">272</span> -Cape Government, to its loss and its shame, had -not even the politeness to reply to his offer, but -when two millions of money and a great number of -valuable lives had been lost, they asked him a year -later if he would renew his offer, and, like the -generous and single-hearted hero that he was, he -did so.</p> - -<p>Unhappily, however, when he got on the scene -of action he spoilt everything by allowing the -enthusiast in him to get the better of the soldier -and the skilled man of affairs. The Cape Government -was certainly in the wrong as regards the -Basuto question. Gordon’s advice to them was to -admit their wrong and begin to do right. Very -good indeed from the ethical point of view, but in -practice hopelessly wrong and bad where the South -African native is concerned. With him, as with -the Boers, to admit yourself in the wrong is to -own yourself defeated, and to invite instant aggression.</p> - -<p>Of course the Cape Government could do nothing -of the sort. To have done so would have been to -have kindled the flames of native war over the -whole southern half of the Continent. This was -the fatal policy which had already lost us the -Transvaal when Sir Evelyn Wood had it in the -hollow of his hand. To have repeated it would -probably have been to lose all South Africa. -Gordon, in his usual fashion, threw up his appointment -at once and came back to England.</p> - -<p>It was now November, 1882. Naturally he was -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_273">273</span> -coldly received at home, but his reception was -somewhat mollified by a letter which the King of -the Belgians sent him, for the second time asking -him to enter his service.</p> - -<p>“For the moment,” says his Majesty, “I have no -mission to offer you, but I wish to have you at my -disposal, and I wish to take you from this moment -as my counsellor. You can name your own terms. -You know the consideration I have for your great -qualities.”</p> - -<p>The post that he would probably have had was -the Governorship of the Congo. One can imagine -how in such a position he would have dealt with -an unhung blackguard like Lothaire, the murderer -of a man who had confided himself to his -hospitality.</p> - -<p>He spent most of the following year in travel, -chiefly in Palestine. The Delta of Egypt had been -conquered, Mohammed Achmet, the carpenter’s -son, had become Mahdi, and the Soudan revolt was -in full blast. Now at last the British Government -called upon the one man who, had his genius and -his work been recognised ten years sooner, could -have saved so much disgrace and disaster.</p> - -<p>How utterly he had been neglected and how -completely he was unknown in his own country -even now, may be guessed from a remark made by -a gentleman to an officer of the Pembroke garrison.</p> - -<p>“I see,” said this person, “that the Government<span class="pagenum" id="Page_274">274</span> -have just sent a Chinaman to the Soudan. What -can they mean by sending a native of that country -to such a place?”</p> - -<p>He thought, alas, that “Chinese Gordon” was -a yellow-faced Asiatic who wore a pigtail—and yet, -after all, did British Officialdom know very much -more about the hero it was now sending to his -death?</p> - -<p>In Egypt all was panic. The army of Hicks -Pasha had been annihilated. All Gordon’s work -was undone, and the Mahdi was practically master -of the Soudan. But meanwhile Gordon had decided -to accept the King of the Belgians’ offer. -On New Year’s Day, 1884, he reached Brussels -to tell him so, and the same day he learnt that -the British Government would not let him go. -His thoroughly justified answer was a request to -be allowed to retire from Her Majesty’s service, -“without any claim whatever for pension”—King -Leopold, with a juster estimate of the man’s value, -having promised to make up the loss to him. The -refusal was withdrawn, and he prepared to start for -the Congo.</p> - -<p>Then on the 17th of January there came that -memorable telegram from Lord Wolseley asking -him to come to London. He knew what he was -wanted for and he went. The work was the pacification -and then the evacuation of the Soudan.</p> - -<p>By the 18th of February he was in Khartoum -again. His old influence at once reasserted itself.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_275">275</span> -What followed is too recent and too well known for -detailed repetition here: the vacillation between -war and peace, between diplomacy and force, argument -when there should have been hard-hitting, -and hard-hitting when there should have been -argument.</p> - -<div id="ip_275" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_275.jpg" width="1200" height="1980" alt="" /><div class="caption">THE LONELY MAN WHO STOOD ON THE RAMPARTS -OF KHARTOUM.</div></div> - -<p>The net result was only fully known to the -lonely man who month after month stood on the -ramparts of Khartoum, beleaguered by the Mahdi’s -innumerable hosts, looking out over the desert and -down the Nile for the army of relief which ought -even then to have been there, and which was waiting -for politicians to finish their wrangles before it -even started.</p> - -<p>Then, week after week, the weary working and -waiting went on, the ring of spears drawing ever -closer and closer round the doomed city, the provisions -within rapidly dwindling, and the lonely -soldier, the last of his blood now left in Khartoum, -was still looking vainly northward.</p> - -<p>So Monday morning, the 26th of January, came, -and in the dim light that comes before the dawn -the Arabs made their last and successful assault. -The moon had set at one o’clock. The famished -garrison made but little resistance. Gordon at the -head of about a score of men faced the incoming -victors near the church of the Austrian mission.</p> - -<p>The eastern sky was just reddening with the -coming dawn when a stream of Arabs, shouting for -Islam and victory, rushed into the open space that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_276">276</span> -had been made round the church. They stopped -and put up their rifles. An irregular volley crackled -along their line, and when the smoke had drifted -away there was nothing for the belated expedition -to do but avenge the death of the betrayed and -deserted hero.</p> - -<p>It was about midday on the 28th when a couple -of steamers, with Sir Charles Wilson and a detachment -of the Sussex Regiment on board, steamed -out on to the broad stretch of river above which -Khartoum stands at the junction of the Blue and -White Nile. Half-an-hour told the miserable truth. -There was no flag flying from the battlements, and -no English voice to bid the tardy comers welcome.</p> - -<p>But there is to be a welcome of a sort, for, as -the boats come within range, the guns of Khartoum -open fire on them and a spattering hail of rifle-balls -drop about them, and the puffs of smoke leap up -from every point along the banks till the circle -round the boats is completed. Of this there could -be only one meaning: Gordon the deserted was -dead. And this meaning was true, though we did -not know the full truth of it until long after all that -was left of him on earth had been scattered, graveless -and uncared for, over the wind-swept sands of -the Soudan.</p> - -<p>There is his grave; there, too, now is his monument—the -memory of the work he did and the -deathless fame he earned. On those who sent<span class="pagenum" id="Page_277">277</span> -him to the forefront of the battle and left him -there to die History has not yet given her verdict. -When she does it will, as usual, be a just one, and, -in all probability, it will not form very pleasant -reading for those of their descendants who may be -animated with anything like a proper pride of -ancestry.</p> -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_279">279</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="XII">XII<br /> - -<i>CECIL RHODES</i><br /> - -<span class="subhead">“<i>ALL ENGLISH—THAT’S MY DREAM!</i>”</span></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_281">281</span></p> - -<hr class="nospacechap" /> - -<p class="chaphead">XII<br /> - -<span class="chapsubhead">CECIL RHODES</span></p> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="firstword">Although</span> there are obvious difficulties in -the way of writing at once without fear and -without favour of a man who is unquestionably one -of the great ones of the earth while he is still alive, -there are yet two very cogent reasons why Cecil -Rhodes should be the subject of this concluding -essay.</p> - -<p>In the first place, he is the last of our Empire-Makers -in order of time, and, in the second place, -he has done his empire-making in the last region -of the earth in which this empire, or any other, can -be extended without coming into direct armed conflict -with the great Powers of the earth.</p> - -<p>If you get a map of Africa published thirty years -ago, and lay it beside a quite recent one, a very -little intelligent observation will enable you to see, -at any rate, what I may be allowed to call <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">prima -facie</i> evidence of the magnificent work which this -last of our Empire-Makers has done, not so much<span class="pagenum" id="Page_282">282</span> -for this generation, perhaps, as for the next, and -the next.</p> - -<p>It is all very well for the goose that has never -seen over its own farmyard wall to assume a lofty, -and possibly sincere, contempt for the vast stretches -of prairie and forest land that may lie outside. He -is quite justified in saying to his brother geese: -“This is our home; all our wants are supplied here. -What do we want to go and lose ourselves for in -the long grass, or expose ourselves to the wild -animals that may be lurking about the dark depths -of the forest? This farmyard where we have -lived all our lives, and where our long and honourable -ancestry has lived before us, is surely enough -for us. There is a nice pond yonder fringed with -succulent mud. It has nice worms and other things -in it, and there doesn’t seem any prospect of our -general supply of goose-food coming to an end. -What do we care about what there is outside? -Why should we trouble ourselves about the fortunes -of silly birds who go and fly over the wall, and -lose themselves in the wilderness? Let them go. -What are they to us, even if they were born in the -same farmyard?”</p> - -<p>That is all very well as far as it goes, but there -comes a time when the farmyard fills up, and the -duck-pond becomes over-crowded, and worms and -goose-food, &c., have to be scrambled for, and -sometimes even fought for, and it is just here -that the larger wisdom of those who not only<span class="pagenum" id="Page_283">283</span> -look over, but fly over, the farmyard wall comes -in.</p> - -<p>The fact is, that the known world is fast filling -up. It may be that Nature is preparing some -colossal cataclysm for the destruction of this civilisation, -just as she has done for the subversion of -others; but, for the present, what those who have -looked over the farmyard wall have to consider is -the fact that vastly improved conditions of life in -the older countries of the world have, with the sole -and ominous exception of France, had their inevitable -result in a vast increase of population, and -that meanwhile, for the last three hundred years or -so, the available portions of the world have been -getting discovered, and filled up according to their -capacity of sustenance.</p> - -<p>It is not, therefore, a merely predatory instinct, -or a felonious desire to go and steal away from -the gentle savage those lands which he is mostly -accustomed to use as battlefields, that sends out -the pioneer to the uttermost ends of the earth. It -is that ineradicable instinct planted deep in all -healthy human nature to get elbow-room, and behind -this instinct there is the necessity which Providence -provided against when it gave us this instinct, and -that is the necessity of getting out of a place that -is overcrowded, into some other where muscles and -brains can get a better chance.</p> - -<p>It is probable, too, that that widespread passion -which we are accustomed to call “land-hunger” has<span class="pagenum" id="Page_284">284</span> -been given to us in order to compel us to carry out -the vast scheme of human progress under the impression -that we are benefiting ourselves.</p> - -<p>Of course, as a rule, we do benefit ourselves, but -it is reserved for the few to see that greater Purpose -which we are fulfilling at the same time that -we are serving ourselves, and of all the men who -ever lived no one has seen this more clearly than -Cecil Rhodes. Accident and weak lungs took him -to Africa—that is to say to the only continent in -which it is yet possible for the British Empire to -be increased without violating the territory of some -already established and recognised Power, more or -less civilised.</p> - -<p>Like Nelson and Warren Hastings, he came of -a clerical stock. If it had not been for those weak -lungs of his it is possible that he might have passed -through a distinguished career at Oxford, and either -entered the church, or gone into business—probably -the latter—but in either case the map of South -Africa would have looked very different to what it -does to-day.</p> - -<p>In one respect he presents a very strong and -striking contrast to our other Empire-Makers. -Francis Drake went on his filibustering expeditions, -looted plate-ships, and sacked towns, no -doubt with a worthy intention of hurting the -Queen’s enemies, but also with a very definite idea -of making money. John Hawkins started the -Slave Trade for the same reason; so too that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_285">285</span> -East India Company which made it possible for -Clive and Warren Hastings to do their work, was -in its beginnings a money-making concern, and -little else. It will be remembered, for instance, -how Warren Hastings was grievously hampered -in his empire-making by the incessant demands -of his directors for money.</p> - -<p>Now the distinctive fact of Cecil Rhodes’s career -is that he started the other way. The first solid -and salient fact that he appears to have grasped in -those old days in the early seventies, when he used -to sit under the burning African sun at a rough -deal table picking diamonds out from the yellow -earth as it was brought by his kaffirs from the old -Kimberley mine, was the transcendent and almost -irresistible power of money.</p> - -<p>In Drake’s day valour and endurance were used -to earn money in the first case, or, if the reader -prefers it, to steal money or its equivalent. This -was well enough in its way, and the British Empire -would have got on rather badly without it, but -Cecil Rhodes appears to have had an inspiration on -this subject of the sort which only comes to men -of real genius. He seems to have said to himself: -“How would it be to earn the money first in -thousands, in hundreds of thousands, in millions if -possible, and then use it to employ in more legitimate -work the same valour and enthusiasm which -are just as conspicuous British qualities now as -they were in the days of Queen Elizabeth?”</p> - -<p>It is quite possible that, being an Oxford undergraduate, -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_286">286</span> -he remembered the famous aphorism of -Horace: “Honestly if possible—but still make it.” -There may have been some of his transactions -which if submitted to the legal scrutiny, say, of -the Lord Chief Justice, would possibly move him -to another exhibition of that “unctuous rectitude” -such as that with which he, the sometime forensic -defender of traitors and sedition-mongers, outpoured -on Dr. Jameson and his comrades.</p> - -<p>I have heard stories of the sort myself in Kimberley -and elsewhere in South Africa, but what of -that? There are a good many things in our -history that it would be difficult to defend on moral -grounds, and yet without them we should have -little or no history at all.</p> - -<p>There are several of Cecil Rhodes’s own sayings -on record which show clearly the light in which he -looked upon large quantities of money not merely -as money, not as vulgar riches, but as an indispensable -means to an exalted end.</p> - -<p>He was with Gordon in that sadly futile expedition -of his to Basutoland, and during one of -their conversations Gordon told him how he had -been offered a roomful of gold as a reward for -his services in China.</p> - -<p>“And you mean to say you didn’t take it?” -said Rhodes, possibly with some doubt of the -great Crusader’s sanity in his mind.</p> - -<p>“No, I didn’t,” said Gordon. “I didn’t feel<span class="pagenum" id="Page_287">287</span> -altogether justified in doing so. I had been paid -already for what I’d done.”</p> - -<p>“I should have taken it, and as many more -roomfuls as they would have given me,” said -Rhodes, without hesitation. “Just think how much -more you could have done with it. It’s no use for -us to have big ideas if we have not got the money -to carry them out.”</p> - -<p>That was Cecil Rhodes. He didn’t say: “Think -how much it would have come to,” or “How rich -a man it would have made you,” or even “What -you would have been able to buy with it,” but -“What you could <em>do</em> with it.” Those who call -Cecil Rhodes a money-grabber, a financial schemer, -and all the rest of it, might learn something from -that conversation were they not as they are.</p> - -<p>There is no doubt but that he first of all devoted -himself body and soul to the making of money, -and yet in the meanwhile he must have been -slowly shaping this Ideal of his. Early in the -eighties he was talking about South Africa -generally with a friend, and during the course of -the conversation he pointed to the map and said: -“There! All English! That’s my dream.” -And all English it would have been if it had not -been for the stupidity, the ignorance, and the -cowardice of the vote-hunters in Downing Street, -who were afraid to be worried with the cares, -though they had no objection to avail themselves -of the honours and profits of empire-making.</p> - -<p>It is a favourite theory of my own that no man -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_288">288</span> -ought to be allowed to sit either in the House of -Lords or the House of Commons unless he has -been at least once round the world and visited the -greater part of the British Empire.</p> - -<p>If this had been the rule during the present -reign, I am perfectly certain that, whether by -purchase, conquest, or colonisation, the whole of -Africa from the Zambesi to the Cape would now -be coloured red, and there would probably have -been a red streak stretching from Cairo <i xml:lang="la" lang="la">viâ</i> -Khartoum to the shores of Lake Tanganyka.</p> - -<p>In one of his speeches, Cecil Rhodes aptly described -South Africa as the Cinderella of the British -Colonies, and this is perfectly true. There is -hardly a single instance in which Downing Street -has not tried to lose what every one now recognises -as of almost priceless importance.</p> - -<p>Thus, for instance, in 1872 Lord Kimberley -might have bought Delagoa Bay, “the keyhole -of Africa,” for the paltry amount of twelve or -fifteen thousand pounds and he refused the bargain. -It would be cheap now at ten millions. -Unfortunately, as his biographer aptly puts it, there -was no Cecil Rhodes then to find the money out -of his own pocket. He was still sitting on a bucket -and sorting diamonds in Kimberley.</p> - -<p>Again, in 1875, the Cape Colonial Government -strongly urged the annexation of Walfisch Bay -and Damaraland on the south-west coast. The<span class="pagenum" id="Page_289">289</span> -reply of Downing Street was: “Her Majesty can -give no encouragement to schemes for the retention -of British jurisdiction over Great Namaqualand -and Damaraland.”</p> - -<p>This, by the way, is a somewhat important point -to those who wish to get a clear view of Cecil -Rhodes’s work as an Empire-Maker in South Africa. -Twenty-two years ago Ernst von Weber, who had -been prospecting, as it were, for a German South -African Empire, said: “What would not such a -country full of such inexhaustible natural treasures -become if in course of time it is filled with German -emigrants! Besides all its own natural and subterraneous -treasures, the Transvaal offers to the -European Power which possesses it an easy access -to the immensely rich tracts of country which lie -between the Limpopo and the Central African lakes -and the Congo.”</p> - -<p>In 1884 Prince Bismarck said before a committee -of the Reichstag: “No opposition is apprehended -from the British Government, and the machinations -of the Colonial authorities must be prevented.”</p> - -<p>Now look at any modern map of South Africa. -Damaraland is now German territory, the Transvaal -has been given back to the corrupt and tyrannical -government which has of late made itself a libel -on the name of civilisation. A German railway -runs from Pretoria to Delagoa Bay, the only road -from the sea to the Transvaal which does not pass -through British territory. There is a regular line<span class="pagenum" id="Page_290">290</span> -of German steamers to Delagoa Bay, and through -this channel have come in the German officers who -have drilled the Transvaal army and built the forts -which command Johannesburg and Pretoria, as well -as the field-pieces and machine-guns, the thousands -of rifles and the millions of cartridges, which have -no other purpose than the oppression of British -subjects and the slaughter of British soldiers as -soon as the psychological moment arrives.</p> - -<p>This much for the present has been lost, and unhappily -no one has been hung for the losing of it. -Some day it will have to be taken back, probably -at a frightful loss of life and an enormous expenditure -of money.</p> - -<p>But there is one bright spot in the picture. -Between the German territory of Damaraland and -the western frontier of the Transvaal and the Free -State there is a broad stretch of red. It was only -painted red just in the nick of time, and it was Cecil -Rhodes who painted it.</p> - -<p>Another glance at the map will convince you in -a moment what would have happened if he had -not made Bechuanaland British. To the east -there is the ignorantly hostile Transvaal. Behind -that and stretching far away to the northward is -the Portuguese territory of Mozambique. Farther -north are the southern confines of the Soudan, and -the enormous virgin lands of Central Africa. To -the west is German West Africa. Hence, but for -that red strip, there would be no way either by sea<span class="pagenum" id="Page_291">291</span> -or land through British territory—that is to say, -through no territory that would not be hostile—to -the Central African Empire of the future, most of -which is, thanks to Cecil Rhodes, already called -Rhodesia.</p> - -<p>People who only read the English papers, some -of which would appear, like the Pretoria <i>Press</i> and -the <i>Standard and Diggers News</i>, to be in the pay of -Mr. President Krüger and his corrupt legislature, -have an idea, and a very natural one too, that the -great company known as the De Beers Consolidated -Mines is just a money-making concern -and nothing else. There never was a greater -mistake. The De Beers Company is the creation -of Cecil Rhodes, and therefore it had to be an -empire-making concern one way or the other.</p> - -<p>One night there was a conversation between -three men in Kimberley, which deserves to become -historical. The three men were Alfred Beit, -Barnie Isaacs Barnato, and Cecil John Rhodes. -Each of these three men had something that the -others wanted. Beit and Barnato don’t seem to -have wanted much more than good business, but -Alfred Beit already knew Cecil Rhodes for something -much greater and better than merely a -business man and piler-up of money-bags, so he -supported them.</p> - -<p>What Rhodes wanted was nothing less than the -levying of a subsidy on the diamond mining industry -of Kimberley, for the purpose of empire-making<span class="pagenum" id="Page_292">292</span> -in the north. Barnie Barnato kicked at -this. In the end he gave way, as he always did -to Rhodes, and the result was that the De Beers -Corporation was virtually taxed to the extent of -half a million sterling for that northward expansion -which Cecil Rhodes made possible when he persuaded -Sir Hercules Robinson to proclaim the -Bechuanaland Protectorate and checkmated the -Germans on the west and the Boers on the east -just as they were going to join hands across it.</p> - -<p>What they really meant to do may be easily -inferred from Van Niekerk’s raid into the so-called -Stella-Land which necessitated Sir Charles -Warren’s expedition—for which the Pretorian -Government still owes us about a million and a -half—and Colonel Ferreira’s attempted raid across -the Limpopo into Matabeleland which was only -stopped by Dr. Jameson’s Maxims.</p> - -<p>If it had not been for Cecil Rhodes and the De -Beers half million, the British flag would not now -be flying over a region as large as France and -Germany combined which, by all appearances, is -destined to be the nucleus of the South African -Empire of the day after to-morrow.</p> - -<p>In such a vast country as South Africa—how big -it is may be guessed from the comparison between -it and England on the map—the first requisite for -advancing civilisation is a road, the next a telegraph, -and the next is a railway, and the absolute necessity -of these to the new domain that he was making for<span class="pagenum" id="Page_293">293</span> -Britain was of course plainly apparent to such a -man as Cecil Rhodes.</p> - -<p>His dream, which, if he lives long enough, he -will certainly realise, is the making of that British -high road from Cairo to Cape Town which Gordon, -but for the baseness which betrayed him to his -death, would certainly now be helping to make -from the other end. Therefore when there was a -shortness of money for the making of the railway -to Mafeking, and for carrying the telegraph up -through Rhodesia and northward across the Zambesi, -the deficiency was supplied out of the capacious -pockets of the man who, if he had only had the -chance, would have been so glad to give that -£12,000 for Delagoa Bay, and who knows Africa -well enough to see that with its rinderpest, its -locusts, and its horse-sickness, it stands in more -need of mechanical transit and communication than -any other part of the world.</p> - -<p>When the extension of the Beira railway became -necessary Cecil Rhodes, by the sheer force of his -own character, persuaded Lord Rothschild to put -down £25,000, every penny of which the great -financier believed was going to be “chucked into the -sea.” His Lordship probably thinks differently now.</p> - -<p>Perhaps the most salient feature in the contemporary -history of South Africa is the silent -but ceaseless struggle for mastery which is going -on, and has been going on for years, between Cecil -Rhodes and Paul Krüger.</p> - -<p>There are some people who say that there are -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_294">294</span> -only two men in South Africa. In the political -sense this is probably true. So far, with the single -exception, perhaps, of the Jameson Raid and the -consequences which the weakness of our officials -abroad and the cowardice of our government at -home made so deplorable, the enlightened Englishman -has scored at every move over the dishonest -cunning of the ignorant Dopper.</p> - -<p>He prevented him joining hands with the -Germans across Bechuanaland, he stopped his raid -into Matabeleland, he got his raiders stopped on -the confines of Amatongaland—and so destroyed -his cherished dream of a Transvaal seaboard—and, -worse than all, he has made Rhodesia a -so much better place even for Dutchmen to live in -than the Transvaal, that the Boers are every day -treking through the drifts of the Limpopo to live -on British soil and under British rule—that of Paul -Krüger and his German and Hollander hangers-on -becoming impossible for self-respecting men to -submit to just as fast as their avarice and stupidity -can make it so.</p> - -<p>Both these men have their dreams. Paul Krüger -is not the sort of person whom any one would -associate with an ideal. Still he has got one. It -is a United States of South Africa, under what he -is pleased to consider republican rule.</p> - -<p>He is probably too ignorant to know that, with -the possible exceptions of Russia and Turkey, there<span class="pagenum" id="Page_295">295</span> -never was a civilised or half-civilised Government -less like a republic than the corrupt and tyrannical -oligarchy of Pretoria, but that’s what he means, -and it is to fight for that and not to fight for the -independence of the Transvaal, which he knows -perfectly well is secured by the Imperial Government, -that he has built his forts and imported his -German officers, German cannon, and German -rifles and ammunition.</p> - -<p>Cecil Rhodes also has an ideal. It is a federation -of the South African states, crown colony, republic -and self-governing colony, each possessing the -management of its own affairs, and directing them -according to the will of the majority, and all united -under the ægis of the British flag, and enjoying -that equal freedom and security which cause -nineteen out of every twenty emigrants from -France and Germany to go and settle in British -colonies rather than in their own.</p> - -<p>Which of the two ideals will be realised is not -very difficult to see. The one is artificial, unnatural, -and two hundred years behind the times. The -other is natural, logical, and if anything, a little -bit ahead of the times, and the difference between -them is not altogether unlike the difference between -Paul Krüger and Cecil Rhodes.</p> - -<p>It would, of course, be quite outside the range of -human possibility for a man to have attained to the -real greatness of Cecil Rhodes without having made -a good many enemies, public and private.</p> - -<p>Of his private enemies there is no need to say -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_296">296</span> -very much. In the first place, until human nature -has changed very considerably, it would be quite -impossible for any man to have been so uniformly -and so brilliantly successful as Cecil Rhodes has -been without making plenty of enemies both -private and public. One of the very worst -methods of promoting brotherly love in the breasts -of men whose standard of manliness is not quite -up to the average is to out-distance them in the -race for political distinction, or to out-wit them -in the trickery of finance—and I don’t suppose -that any one would be readier to admit that, in -its ultimate analysis, finance is mainly trickery -than Cecil Rhodes himself.</p> - -<p>This category would include practically all the -private and personal enemies of Cecil Rhodes -save one. The exception is, I regret to say, a -woman, and that is a fact which naturally blunts -the pen of criticism when it is held in the hands -of a man. There would be no need to mention -Mrs. Cronwright-Schreiner—better known in -literary circles as Olive Schreiner—here but for -the fact that she has made it impossible to pass -her over without notice by writing the most recent -and, I fear I must also say, the most virulent and -untruthful attack that has been made upon the -personal character and public policy of our South -African Empire-Maker.</p> - -<p>And yet even this attack is in its way a sort of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_297">297</span> -testimonial to the greatness of the man whose -reputation it was intended to demolish, despite -the fact that in it Cecil Rhodes is depicted as a -monster of iniquity and as the head of a soulless -and tyrannical corporation which has not only been -guilty of all the crimes in the Decalogue, but has -invented a few new ones to go on with. Strange -to say, however, when Mrs. Cronwright-Schreiner -was once interrupted in one of her well-known -denunciations of the greatest Englishman of his day -with the remark that after all he was a great man, -she exclaimed: “A great man! Of course he is, -a very great man, and that’s the pity of it!” The -almost unanimous verdict of the English and South -African press on the deplorable literary and political -blunder which Mrs. Cronwright-Schreiner perpetrated -in writing “Trooper Peter Halkett,” goes -far to show that her personal estimate of her -enemy is a good deal more correct than her literary -and political estimate.</p> - -<p>Of the public enemies of Cecil Rhodes it will -suffice to point out briefly that, without one -exception and whatever their nationality, they are -also the enemies of his country. It is noteworthy -too that Cecil Rhodes himself seems to have an -instinctive perception of real as distinguished from -apparent or merely superficial hostility to the British -Empire.</p> - -<p>He recognised long ago, for instance, that our -most dangerous enemies both at home and abroad<span class="pagenum" id="Page_298">298</span> -are the Germans, and throughout his whole career -he has lost no opportunity of checking and checkmating, -so far as the cowardice and apathy of the -Colonial Office has permitted him, their innumerable -and dishonest attempts to undermine the -British supremacy in South Africa.</p> - -<p>If I were asked to name the three men who hate -him most bitterly I think I should say Paul Krüger, -Dr. W. J. Leyds and the German Emperor. It is -something more than a coincidence that these three -men should also be the bitterest and most determined -enemies of the British Empire.</p> - -<p>There can hardly be any doubt now in the minds -of well-informed people that the conditions which -provoked the pitiful attempt at revolution in Johannesburg -and led up to the Jameson Raid were made -in Germany, or at any rate by German hands. The -whole thing was what may be described with more -force than elegance as “a put up job.”</p> - -<p>The idea was to goad the Outlanders to revolt, -put the rebellion down by armed force, assert the -absolute independence of the Transvaal as a consequence, -and get rid of that awkward clause in the -Convention of 1884 which asserts the suzerainty -of Great Britain over the Transvaal by compelling -the Pretorian government to submit all its foreign -treaties to the supervision of the Colonial Office.</p> - -<p>The next step would have been an offensive and -defensive alliance with Germany, and then, if there -had been no Special Squadrons or obstacles of that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_299">299</span> -sort in the way, the Transvaal would have been -gradually Germanised.</p> - -<p>It was this that Cecil Rhodes foresaw when he -ordered Dr. Jameson to mass his men on the -Transvaal frontier. This was, in fact, his answer to -the German application to the Portuguese Government -for permission to land sailors and marines from -the <i>See-Adler</i> in Delagoa Bay with a view to sending -them up to Pretoria in violation of the most -explicit treaty obligations.</p> - -<p>It is quite plain now that Cecil Rhodes intended -this force as a practical hint, and not as an invading -army. I remember one night shortly after the Raid, -I was smoking the pipe of peace with some of the -Transvaal officials on the stoep of President Krüger’s -house in Pretoria. We were discussing Cecil Rhodes’s -complicity in the Raid, and in answer to a suggestion -that he was at the bottom of it all, I said: -“No doubt Rhodes knew all about it. I needn’t -tell you gentlemen that nothing happens in South -Africa that he doesn’t know, but he never meant -Jameson to cross the frontier when he did. If he -had meant invasion he would have had the country -by now, but you won’t convince me that Cecil -Rhodes is such a fool as to try and jump the Transvaal -with five hundred men.”</p> - -<p>The only answer to this was a general laugh. -President Krüger is not supposed to understand -English, but he laughed too.</p> - -<p>Of Cecil Rhodes’s enemies at home it is so difficult<span class="pagenum" id="Page_300">300</span> -to speak with anything like patience that they had -better be passed over as briefly as possible. The -unceasing hostility of a certain section of the British -Press may, to some extent, be accounted for by the -fact that he has many powerful financial rivals, and -that the Transvaal Government has almost unique -opportunities for bribery.</p> - -<p>Few newspapers are quite incorruptible. They -are primarily run to pay, and, therefore, it is hardly -to be expected that they should be entirely proof -against the manifold seductions which an individual -millionaire, or a government with a vast -secret service fund, is able to practise upon them.</p> - -<p>It is almost impossible to believe that their -hostility is really sincere. They know perfectly -well that empire-making cannot be done with kid -gloves on. They know, also, that the amount of -actual good that Cecil Rhodes has done in South -Africa, even apart from empire-making, is almost -incalculable. None know this better than the loyal -Dutch burghers of the Cape and the Kaffirs. The -former call him “the Englishman with the Afrikander -heart”; the latter call him their father. But -for him there would probably not be many loyal -Dutch at all at the Cape; and but for him also -Matabeleland and Mashonaland would still be the -happy hunting-ground of King Lobengula’s murdering, -ravaging, and slave-making impis.</p> - -<div id="ip_300" class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_300.jpg" width="1200" height="1974" alt="" /><div class="caption">THAT HISTORIC INDABA IN THE MATOPPOS.</div></div> - -<p>He is, in fact, as was plainly shown in that -historic Indaba in the Matoppos, the one white<span class="pagenum" id="Page_301">301</span> -man in South Africa whom the natives love and -trust. It is not many men who, with millions -enough to buy everything that the world has to -sell in the way of comfort and luxury and honours—as -distinguished from honour—who would have -gone as he did, armed only with a walking-stick, -into the stronghold of the Matabele, and there won -from them the title of “the bull that separates the -fighting bulls,”—in other words, the peacemaker—and -stopped a war which, if the Imperial authorities -had had their way, would have gone on into the -next year, and would have cost four or five millions -at least.</p> - -<p>It is, by the way, characteristic of the strength -of mind and fixity of purpose of this man, that he -solemnly warned Sir Richard Martin that, if, after -this, the war was continued, he would himself go -and live among the Matabele, and wash his hands -of the whole affair.</p> - -<p>It is noteworthy, too, that this man, whom Olive -Schreiner describes by the mouth of her impossible -trooper as “death on niggers,” is, in the opinion -of the niggers themselves, the greatest friend they -ever had.</p> - -<p>If all the work of all the societies and associations -of amiable old ladies of both sexes for the Protection -of the Aborigines and the Elevation of the Savage -were put together, it would not amount to a tithe -of what Cecil Rhodes has done for the natives of -South Africa. The Glen-Grey Act alone has almost<span class="pagenum" id="Page_302">302</span> -emptied the prisons of kaffir offenders, and as for -his work at Kimberley, the effects of which I have -myself seen, it would be difficult to speak too highly -of it.</p> - -<p>Thus, for instance, it is not generally known that -Cecil Rhodes is the greatest practical temperance -worker in the world. Every one knows that the -curse of all savage races in contact with civilised -peoples is liquor. When he was moving the second -reading of the Glen-Grey Act he said:</p> - -<p>“I know the curse of liquor. Personally at the -Diamond Fields I have assisted in making ten thousand -of these poor children hard-working and sober. -They are now in compounds, healthy and happy. -In their former condition the place was a hell upon -earth, therefore my heart is thoroughly with the -idea of removing liquor from the natives.”</p> - -<p>I have myself seen “these poor children” happy, -healthy, and sober, in the compounds of Kimberley. -In the Transvaal and the Portuguese territory I -have seen them drunken, degraded, and diseased, -and I am in a position to say that every word of -the above quotation is solid fact. I wonder how -many of our professional temperance agitators could -point to such a splendid achievement as that.</p> - -<p>It seems, perhaps, a good deal to say of Cecil -Rhodes that, not only has he enormously increased -our area of empire in South Africa, but that he is -the only man who can efficiently protect that empire -from the two greatest dangers which threaten it.</p> - -<p>These are, first, a war of Dutch against British, -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_303">303</span> -such as the Pretorian Government and its German -allies have been trying so hard to bring about, and -for the purposes of which they have been arming -themselves to the teeth; and, second, a general -native uprising, which would very probably follow -hard on the heels of the racial war.</p> - -<p>Now the only English statesman who is thoroughly -believed in by the Dutch majority at the Cape is -Cecil Rhodes, and the only white man who is -thoroughly trusted and respected by the natives of -all tribes is also Cecil Rhodes, and this is a fact -which goes very far to account for the desperate -anxiety of the Hollander-German-Boer party in -South Africa and Europe to get him thoroughly -disgraced and discredited over the Jameson fiasco.</p> - -<p>The measure of their failure is not only the -measure of his triumph. It is also the measure -of the future peace and prosperity of British South -Africa. We live too near the man to see him in -his just proportions, but, unless Downing Street -excels, if that be possible, its own blunders in the -past, and unless this royal race of ours suddenly -belies all its best traditions, a day must come when -the British flag will fly over a federated and united -South Africa, when the rule of the Boer will have -gone the way of all anachronisms—and in that day -men will look back and see, in juster perspective -than we can do, the great qualities of the man who -has made it all possible.</p> - -<p>It is probable that in that day the very names -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_304">304</span> -of his enemies and detractors will be forgotten, or -remembered only as we remember the name of -Cataline in connection with that of Cicero. Then -Cecil Rhodes will take his place beside Robert -Clive and Warren Hastings, and in some great -square of the future Metropolis of the British -African Empire, there will stand a statue of him, -and on its base will probably be inscribed those -memorable words of <span class="locked">his:—</span></p> - -<p>“All English: That’s my dream!”</p> - -<p>And with such words I, too, may fittingly bring -to a close this all too imperfect series of word-portraits -of some, at least, of the Men Who Have -Made the Empire.</p> - -<p class="p4 center small wspace">UNWIN BROTHERS, THE GRESHAM PRESS, WOKING AND LONDON.</p> - -<div class="chapter"><div class="transnote"> -<h2 class="nobreak p1" id="Transcribers_Notes">Transcriber’s Note</h2> - -<p>Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made -consistent when a predominant preference was found -in the original book; otherwise they were not changed.</p> - -<p>Simple typographical errors, including occasional -missing letters and punctuation at the ends of -some lines, were corrected; unpaired -quotation marks were remedied when the change was -obvious, and otherwise left unpaired.</p> - -<p>Illustrations in this eBook have been positioned -between paragraphs and outside quotations. In versions -of this eBook that support hyperlinks, the page -references in the List of Illustrations lead to the -corresponding illustrations.</p> - -<p><a href="#Page_8">Page 8</a>: “Oune” probably is a misprint for “Orne”.</p> - -<p><a href="#Page_204">Page 204</a>: “Sir Thomas Wren” should be “Sir -Christopher Wren”.</p> - -<p><a href="#Page_261">Page 261</a>: “countymen” may be a misprint for “countrymen”.</p> - -<p><a href="#Page_268">Page 268</a>: “Dafour” was printed that way.</p> - -</div></div> - -<p> </p> -<p> </p> -<hr class="pgx" /> -<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEN WHO HAVE MADE THE EMPIRE***</p> -<p>******* This file should be named 63148-h.htm or 63148-h.zip *******</p> -<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> -<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/6/3/1/4/63148">http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/1/4/63148</a></p> -<p> -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed.</p> - -<p>Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive -specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this -eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook -for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, -performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given -away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks -not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the -trademark license, especially commercial redistribution. -</p> - -<h2 class="pgx" title="Full Project Gutenberg License">START: FULL LICENSE<br /> -<br /> -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE<br /> -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK</h2> - -<p>To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full -Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at -www.gutenberg.org/license.</p> - -<h3 class="pgx" title="Section 1. General Terms">Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works</h3> - -<p>1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or -destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your -possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a -Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound -by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the -person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph -1.E.8.</p> - -<p>1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this -agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below.</p> - -<p>1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the -Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection -of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual -works in the collection are in the public domain in the United -States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the -United States and you are located in the United States, we do not -claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, -displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as -all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope -that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting -free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm -works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the -Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily -comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the -same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when -you share it without charge with others.</p> - -<p>1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are -in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, -check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this -agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, -distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any -other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no -representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any -country outside the United States.</p> - -<p>1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:</p> - -<p>1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other -immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear -prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work -on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, -performed, viewed, copied or distributed:</p> - -<blockquote><p>This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United - States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost - no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use - it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with - this eBook or online - at <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you - are not located in the United States, you'll have to check the laws - of the country where you are located before using this - ebook.</p></blockquote> - -<p>1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is -derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not -contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the -copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in -the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are -redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply -either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or -obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.</p> - -<p>1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any -additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms -will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works -posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the -beginning of this work.</p> - -<p>1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.</p> - -<p>1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License.</p> - -<p>1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including -any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access -to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format -other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official -version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site -(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense -to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means -of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain -Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the -full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.</p> - -<p>1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.</p> - -<p>1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -provided that</p> - -<ul> -<li>You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed - to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has - agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid - within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are - legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty - payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in - Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg - Literary Archive Foundation."</li> - -<li>You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all - copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue - all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm - works.</li> - -<li>You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of - any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of - receipt of the work.</li> - -<li>You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.</li> -</ul> - -<p>1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than -are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing -from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The -Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.</p> - -<p>1.F.</p> - -<p>1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project -Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may -contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate -or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other -intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or -other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or -cannot be read by your equipment.</p> - -<p>1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE.</p> - -<p>1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium -with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you -with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in -lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person -or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second -opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If -the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing -without further opportunities to fix the problem.</p> - -<p>1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO -OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT -LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.</p> - -<p>1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of -damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement -violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the -agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or -limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or -unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the -remaining provisions.</p> - -<p>1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in -accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the -production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, -including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of -the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this -or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or -additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any -Defect you cause. </p> - -<h3 class="pgx" title="Section 2. The Mission of Project Gutenberg">Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm</h3> - -<p>Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of -computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It -exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations -from people in all walks of life.</p> - -<p>Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future -generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see -Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at -www.gutenberg.org.</p> - -<h3 class="pgx" title="Section 3. The Project Gutenberg Literary">Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation</h3> - -<p>The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by -U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.</p> - -<p>The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the -mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its -volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous -locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt -Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to -date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and -official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact</p> - -<p>For additional contact information:</p> - -<p> Dr. Gregory B. Newby<br /> - Chief Executive and Director<br /> - gbnewby@pglaf.org</p> - -<h3 class="pgx" title="Section 4. Donations to PGLAF">Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation</h3> - -<p>Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS.</p> - -<p>The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND -DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular -state visit <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/donate">www.gutenberg.org/donate</a>.</p> - -<p>While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate.</p> - -<p>International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.</p> - -<p>Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To -donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate</p> - -<h3 class="pgx" title="Section 5. Project Gutenberg Electronic Works">Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works.</h3> - -<p>Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project -Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be -freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and -distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of -volunteer support.</p> - -<p>Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in -the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition.</p> - -<p>Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org</p> - -<p>This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.</p> - -</body> -</html> - diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/cover.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index d998439..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/cover.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_001.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_001.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index f635d85..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_001.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_010.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_010.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 1de0509..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_010.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_017.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_017.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index c656aee..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_017.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_030.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_030.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 36879bf..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_030.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_053.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_053.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 1a94d30..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_053.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_083.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_083.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index dc87357..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_083.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_094.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_094.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 980fb11..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_094.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_112.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_112.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index bf5dbef..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_112.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_113.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_113.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 47b2bdf..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_113.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_141.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_141.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 02ba8de..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_141.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_158.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_158.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 765caf2..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_158.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_185.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_185.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 89738ff..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_185.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_214.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_214.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 310edc8..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_214.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_246.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_246.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 410ef9c..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_246.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_275.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_275.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 3f31f2f..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_275.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63148-h/images/i_300.jpg b/old/63148-h/images/i_300.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 6f1c041..0000000 --- a/old/63148-h/images/i_300.jpg +++ /dev/null |
