FOOTNOTES:
See p. [691].
See p. [697].
CHAPTER XLIII.
THE LAST YEARS OF QUEEN VICTORIA, 1886-1901—THE SOUTH AFRICAN WAR, 1899-1902.
In August, 1886, Lord Salisbury took office, with the most powerful majority at his back that any minister had enjoyed since the days of Lord Grey and the Reform Bill. He was supported by 316 Conservatives and aided by 78 Liberal Unionists, while the Gladstonian Liberals had shrunk to 191, so that the Parnellites with their 85 votes no longer had the balance of power in their hands.
Some political prophets had expected that the return of a majority pledged to resist Home Rule to the death would render the situation in Ireland more hopeless than ever, and lead to a general outburst of riot and assassination. The reverse was the case. A distinct improvement was perceptible after the fall of the Gladstone ministry, and in 1887-8 matters began to quiet down. The Parnellites indeed tried to embitter matters by a scheme called the "Plan of Campaign," by which the peasantry were to refuse to pay more rent than they thought proper. But it failed, and a stringent Coercion Bill, passed in July, 1887, did much to repress disorder. A Land Bill which accompanied the Coercion Act was less successful; it pleased neither landlords nor tenants, and had no appreciable result, good or bad. But on the whole, Mr. Arthur Balfour, the new Secretary for Ireland, had a far more prosperous career than any of his predecessors. He was one of the very few politicians who gained rather than lost credit while holding the unenviable post now assigned to him.
In 1887 the Irish question began at last to recede into the background, and ceased to monopolize public attention. In that year occurred the Queen's first Jubilee (June 21); the celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of her accession was taken as the opportunity for a great imperial pageant, in which representatives drawn not only from the United Kingdom, but from India and all the colonies, did homage to their admirable sovereign. The display of respect and love for the Queen, reported from every corner of her dominions, showed that the crown, when placed on a worthy head, might be not the least of the links which bind the empire together.
Foreign politics during the first Salisbury administration sometimes looked threatening, but never reached any dangerous crisis. There was occasional friction with France concerning the question of Egypt; Mr. Gladstone had unwisely promised to evacuate that country when peace was restored, and the French Government repeatedly hinted that the time had arrived. Fortunately, the continued existence of the Mahdi's savage hordes on the Upper Nile, and their frequent attempts to penetrate down stream, supplied a sufficient reason for the continuation of the British protectorate, and the retention of the British garrison. But with Germany our relations were also sometimes very delicate. This was due to that wholesale annexation of unoccupied corners of the earth, which was the main feature of German colonial policy between 1885 and 1891. The regions (generally most uninviting in character) which Germany annexed were in close proximity to old British settlements both in Africa and Australasia, and lay in some cases in quarters where British influence had hitherto been paramount. Much friction ensued, and ultimately (as we shall see in our colonial chapter) complicated exchanges and delimitations of territory had to be carried out. This was the period in which we first discovered that Germany, no less than France, was for the future to be a rival in colonial expansion.
Meanwhile continental politics were suffering radical changes, which had to be carefully watched. With the death of the aged Emperor William of Germany in 1888, and the dismissal of Prince Bismarck from office in 1890, the old conditions of the balance of power in Europe were altered. The Czar Alexander III. was no friend to Germany, and the young Kaiser William II. did not share his grandfather's regard for Russia. For the "league of the three emperors" (Russia, Germany, Austria), which had been the predominant fact in the seventies and early eighties, there was substituted a new system of alliances. Germany and Austria took Italy into partnership, while Russia drew nearer to France, when it was seen that there was some stability in the republic—a fact that was not certain until the ridiculous fiasco of the theatrical adventurer General Boulanger in 1888. By 1891, in the later days of the first Salisbury ministry, this new arrangement of the powers of Europe was definitely established. It had for Great Britain the advantage that the two leagues balanced each other, and that it was unlikely that both at once would take a hostile attitude towards us. The wisdom of that policy of neutrality and of abstention from interference in purely continental affairs, which had long been our practice, became under the circumstances more obvious than ever. The danger for the future lay in colonial questions rather than in the internal politics of Europe.
The domestic policy of the Salisbury cabinet followed the lines that Lord Beaconsfield had laid down in 1874-80, the aim of the ministers being to show that the Conservative party could be as fruitful in measures of practical reform as their predecessors. To this period belong the Local Government Bill of 1888, creating the "County Councils," which have worked so well ever since, the Free Education Act of 1891, and the great conversion of the National Debt. By this latter measure Mr. Goschen, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, reduced the 3 per cent. interest on the National Debt to 2-3/4 per cent., paying off in ready money the few creditors of the nation who refused to accept the reduction. Thus £1,400,000 a year was saved, and the new stock, till the financial disturbance caused by the late South African war, was generally worth in the market more than the old 3 per cents.
Fall of Parnell.
The chief event in home politics during the later years of the Salisbury ministry, was the disappearance of Parnell, the dominating spirit of the Irish party for the last ten years. In 1889 he had triumphantly vindicated himself from a charge of having approved the Phœnix Park murders, and had obtained £5000 damages from the Times newspaper for having circulated the charge, on the authority of a forger named Piggott. But less than a year later he appeared as defendant, and not as plaintiff, in the law courts, in the unenviable capacity of co-respondent in a discreditable divorce case. The time has long gone by when a notorious evil liver can be accepted as the leader of a great party. Mr. Gladstone announced to the Irish members that they must depose their chief; the majority consented, but Parnell, supported by a few of his followers, refused to accept "British dictation," or to bow before the "Nonconformist conscience." The Irish party split up into the fiercely opposed factions of "Parnellites" and "Anti-Parnellites," whose abuse of each other did much to disgust their Liberal allies. Parnell himself died in 1891, but the schism continued and lasted for nearly ten years, destroying much of the power of the Home Rule movement and the Irish party.
Nine months after Parnell's death, Lord Salisbury dissolved Parliament (July, 1892). At the General Election which followed there was visible that "swing of the pendulum" which has usually been a feature of such times during the nineteenth century. An outgoing government has always offended some interests, and disappointed others. There are always a certain number of voters who think it fair "to give the other side a chance," and vote for the opposition, whoever may be the "ins" or the "outs." Though the Salisbury ministry had not been conspicuously unsuccessful at home or abroad, it found itself left in a minority when the elections were over.
The Queen therefore sent for Mr. Gladstone and bade him form a Liberal ministry. He had to face a difficult situation, for his majority was small, and composed entirely of the Irish, very exacting, untrustworthy, and reckless supporters. The new parliament showed 274 Gladstonians and 81 Irish Home Rulers, 269 Conservatives and 46 Liberal Unionists. Being compelled to rely on the Irish for his majority, Gladstone had to make Home Rule the main plank of his party platform. This was not at all to the taste of many of his British followers, who would have liked to give precedence to their own particular schemes—for the abolition of the House of Lords, the disestablishment of the Welsh and Scottish Churches, the introduction of Temperance Legislation, of Universal Suffrage, and of numberless other local and sectional projects.
The second Home Rule Bill.
In February, 1893, Mr. Gladstone produced his second Home Rule Bill, which differed from the first mainly in providing Ireland with two, instead of one, Houses of Parliament, and in leaving at Westminster eighty Irish members, who were to vote on imperial, but not on purely British, concerns. Essentially it was the same as its predecessor of 1885. The measure was debated with great fierceness, and at enormous length; it occupied the House of Commons from February to September, and was only carried finally when the discussion of many clauses had been stifled by the use of the "closure." The third reading passed on September 1 by a majority of 34—301 to 267 votes. The Bill then went up to the House of Lords, who made short work of it, casting it out on September 8 by a majority of ten to one (419 to 41).
The Conservative leaders had taken this bold step because they believed that the country at large was profoundly uninterested in the bill, and would view its rejection with equanimity. If it had been really a popular measure, the House of Lords would not have dared to deal with it in such a drastic fashion. By their abrupt action they challenged Mr. Gladstone to a second appeal to the nation; if he chose to dissolve parliament, held another general election, and was once more triumphant, the peers would have to bow to the general wish of the country. But Gladstone and his colleagues had no desire to try the experiment: while professing much righteous indignation, they proclaimed their determination to put Home Rule aside for the moment, and to proceed to the introduction of other measures of radical reform. This resolve incensed the Irish, on whom the Government's majority depended, while the English Radicals were so much split up into cliques with different ideals, that it was hard to keep them together. The Gladstone Government passed nothing but a "Parish Councils Bill," which extended to small communities that same power of governing themselves by elective boards which the late Conservative ministry had granted to the counties.
Lord Rosebery Premier.
In March, 1894, the premier announced that he was compelled to retire from office by his increasing physical infirmities. Even his splendid constitution was at last giving way, and with no immediate prospect of carrying out any great measure before him, he had resolved to retire from public life. He was succeeded by Lord Rosebery, his Foreign Secretary, who was rather a type of the Whig than of the Radical. He had ably managed the external relations of Great Britain, and had shown himself an exponent of colonial expansion rather than an "anti-imperialist." Like many a Whig statesman of the eighteenth century, he was a keen lover of sport, and alone among British premiers has run winners for the Derby. He had never professed any great belief in, or love for, Home Rule. His character and his views seemed little adapted to make him an appropriate leader for the Gladstonian party: but as its ablest man he was charged with the formation of the new ministry.
His tenure of power lasted for sixteen months (March, 1894-June, 1895). It was mainly filled by a record of Bills introduced, but never carried: a Welsh Disestablishment Act, an Irish Land Act, and a "Local Option" Act to please the Temperance party, were all brought forward, but none reached fruition. The votaries of each measure hindered the progress of the others, in disgust that their own was not given priority. The party was rent by feuds and intrigues, and in disgust at the situation Lord Rosebery took the opportunity of a casual vote on a small military matter, which had gone against the ministry, and dissolved parliament.
Lord Salisbury's Second Ministry.
The ensuing General Election resulted in the complete rout of the Liberal party; they had been in power for three years, but had accomplished nothing, owing to their internal divisions and the necessary dependence on the Irish vote, which hampered all their enterprises. Tired of their futile proceedings, the electors made a clean sweep of them, and gave Lord Salisbury a majority even larger than he had possessed in 1886. The new House of Commons of August, 1895, showed 340 Conservatives and 71 Liberal Unionists, but only 177 Liberals, with 70 Anti-Parnellite and 12 Parnellite Home Rulers. Lord Salisbury's second ministry was differentiated from his first by the fact that it opened its ranks to the Liberal Unionists. Mr. Chamberlain, representing the Radicals, and Lord Hartington, representing the Whig wings of that party, received cabinet office, and minor posts went to their followers.
This ministry was destined to see the century out, to survive the venerable Queen Victoria, and to face with success the ordeal of a general election, which no cabinet had done since Lord Palmerston's day. Its record has been a stormy one, mainly because it has carried out the mandate given to it in 1895, by taking in hand a strong imperial and colonial policy. In its first year it became involved in a noisy quarrel with the President of the United States, who had interfered with language of an unnecessarily brusque and provocative kind in a frontier dispute concerning boundaries in Guiana, which had been forced upon Britain by the republic of Venezuela. Fortunately the cabinet kept cool, American feeling calmed down, and the dispute ended in a satisfactory arbitration, which gave us practically all that we had ever claimed.
Jameson's Raid.
This dispute was in full career when a much more dangerous question was opened, by the mad and piratical "Jameson raid." Ever since Mr. Gladstone had granted independence to the Transvaal Boers, after the defeat of Majuba Hill, [67] the condition of affairs in South Africa had grown progressively worse. The two races of white settlers in that region nourished incompatible ambitions. To the British colonist it seemed natural and proper that all the southern end of the "Dark Continent" should some day federate itself under the Union Jack. The Dutch had another ideal, that of a Republican South Africa, in which their own nationality should be dominant. It was shared not only by the burghers of the Transvaal and the Orange River Free State, but by the larger part of the Dutch-born inhabitants of Cape Colony. These rival ideals were inevitably bound to lead to a collision. The Boers were much incensed at our annexations to the north of their homes, which in 1889 made Matabeleland and Mashonaland British, and cut off from them the power of expanding towards the interior. The main agent in this advance had been Mr. Cecil Rhodes, the founder of the "British South African Company" which first seized and exploited the coveted territories: this brought upon him much indignation from the Boers, and he was soon to merit more. Meanwhile the British section in South Africa also had its grievances. The discovery of rich gold-reefs in the Transvaal brought to that land a large mining population, mainly of British extraction, and led to the founding of the "golden city" of Johannesburg. Willing to profit from the discovery of the mines, but frightened and angered by the influx of aliens, the Transvaal Government refused the settlers any of the duties and privileges of citizenship. Their autocratic ruler, President Kruger, a clever but narrow-minded and unscrupulous old man, made it the keystone of his policy to keep down the miners and refuse them all political rights. His corrupt and retrograde government irritated the "Uitlanders," and in 1895 they formed a conspiracy to rise at Johannesburg and win their desire by armed rebellion. When the plot had come to a head, Dr. Jameson, a trusted lieutenant of Mr. Rhodes, crossed the British frontier with five hundred mounted police, and dashed for Johannesburg. He was surrounded, beaten, and captured with all his followers, whereupon the "Uitlander" malcontents also laid down their arms. On inquiry, it was found that Mr. Rhodes himself had a guilty knowledge of the plan, a thing utterly incompatible with his position as British premier of Cape Colony. President Kruger imprisoned his captives for some time, and then fined them and let them go. The British Government cashiered the officers concerned in the plot, but did nothing to Rhodes, though he soon lost his premiership at the Cape. An unwisely worded telegram of congratulation sent by the German Emperor to Mr. Kruger caused considerable indignation in England, and led to a temporary coolness between Berlin and London. But this was the smallest of the evil results of the "Jameson Raid," which embittered to an intolerable degree the already existing feud between the British and the Dutch inhabitants of South Africa. Yet it was to be nearly four years more before this deep-lying hatred led to open war.
Meanwhile there was a delusive interval of quiet, during which there took place the second "Jubilee" of Queen Victoria, who had now reached the sixtieth year of her reign and the seventy-eighth of her life. It was celebrated (June 20, 1897) with the deepest personal devotion to the aged sovereign, and with an even greater display of imperial sentiment all round the British world than had been seen in 1887. Ere three years had elapsed, it was to be proved that this display of loyalty to the crown and the empire from the British colonies was no vain show, but the manifestation of a very real solidarity of sentiment and interests.
Death of Mr. Gladstone.
Domestic politics meanwhile remained barren and uninteresting; the Government carried through nothing more than a few small measures of social reform, and an Irish Local Government Act (1898) of doubtful expediency. But their opponents showed no rallying power. Mr. Gladstone died on May 19, 1898, at the great age of eighty-eight: after his decease his late followers were more divided than ever, and seemed unable to formulate any common political programme, or to discover any means of appealing to popular sentiment. The Radical party changed its leader twice in three years, and could never make up its mind whether "Home Rule was dead," or whether it had to be resuscitated as a war-cry with which Irish allies might be lured back to the fold.
Reconquest of the Soudan.
The Fashoda incident.
Meanwhile foreign affairs once more grew threatening, and in 1898 we were to be upon the brink of a struggle with our nearest European neighbour. Ever since the Gladstone ministry in 1885 abandoned the Soudan to the fanatical followers of the Mahdi [68] the southern frontier of Egypt had been exposed to the raids of the wild Soudanese. To end this nuisance the Salisbury Government resolved to undertake the reconquest of Khartoum and the destruction of the Mahdist power. In 1896 the first step was taken, when Sir Herbert Kitchener subdued Dongola and the northern provinces which obeyed the "Khalifa" Abdullah, the successor of the Mahdi. In 1898 an Egyptian army, strengthened by a large British contingent, marched under the same commander to complete the work. In a great battle outside Omdurman the hordes of the Khalifa were routed, and he himself forced to fly into the desert, where he perished a year later in a small skirmish. But when Kitchener took over the administration of the reconquered lands, he was surprised to find a French force on the Upper Nile, at Fashoda, above Khartoum. A small expedition under a Major Marchand had pushed across from the Congo, and established itself in the middle of one of the old Egyptian provinces, where the tricolour had been hoisted, apparently with the intention of setting up a claim to territorial acquisitions in the Soudan. The French Government had been warned long before that an invasion of this region would be regarded as an unfriendly act. It was now summoned to withdraw Marchand or face the consequences. For a moment war seemed probable, but fortunately the ministers of the republic faltered and withdrew their claim. This was a happy chance, as Great Britain a year later was to be engaged in another struggle, which would have taken a very different turn if we had already been engaged in hostilities with a great European power.
In 1899 the South African problem, which had been growing more and more dangerous since the "Jameson Raid," came to a head. President Kruger had spent the time in accumulating enormous stores of arms and munitions of war from Europe, in concluding an offensive and defensive alliance with his neighbours of the Orange Free State, and in establishing relations with the discontented Dutch colonists of the Cape. This last was the most disquieting feature of the situation: an association called the "Africander Bond" organized the Colonial burghers into almost openly avowed hostility to the British connection, and manifested effusive sympathy with Kruger's policy. The old president's rule over the Uitlanders had become more oppressive than ever since the "Raid:" he very naturally regarded these aliens as enemies, refused them any concessions, and maddened them with monopolies, corrupt legislation, and insulting speeches. In April, 1899, a great petition signed by 21,000 British subjects in the Transvaal was sent to the Queen, setting forth their unhappy condition, and begging that an inquiry might be made into their wrongs.
The Bloemfontein Conference.
This appeal led to the "Bloemfontein Conference" of May, 1899, in which Sir Alfred Milner met President Kruger, and tried to induce him to grant the Uitlanders the power of obtaining civic rights after five years' residence in the Transvaal. The president not only refused this, but disputed the existence of the British suzerainty over the Republic established by the convention of 1882. The negotiators parted in a state of mutual exasperation, Milner reporting to London that the British suzerainty was in danger, and that he could only get the most vague and illusory promises of concession for the Uitlanders; while Kruger told his Raad that "though he did not desire war, he could not give way an inch."
From this moment armed strife was inevitable, though the British Government and nation do not seem to have realized the fact. Mr. Chamberlain kept making proposals for a resumption of negotiations during the summer, but, after long delays, received in September nothing but a formal notice that the President disowned any British suzerainty over the Transvaal. This looked ominous, and the cabinet resolved to reinforce the garrisons of the Cape and Natal, where in August there were in all only 6000 troops. By September this force was nearly tripled by battalions sent in from India and from the home stations.
Kruger declares war.
Then followed, to the intense surprise of all who had not been studying African politics very closely, an insulting ultimatum from Pretoria, to the effect that if the reinforcements were not at once withdrawn, a declaration of war would follow in twenty-four hours (October 9, 1899). Next day hostilities began, and the Boer army, which had been mobilizing for many days, crossed the frontier of Natal. The Orange River Free State declared war on the same day.
The strength of the two republics had been utterly miscalculated by the home authorities, even when they saw war impending. The Burghers could put 70,000 well-armed mounted riflemen into the field, and were supplied with superabundant stores of modern cannon and munitions. They were also relying on the support of a general rebellion of the Cape Dutch, who had been secretly armed and organized during the preceding months.
Siege of Ladysmith.
It was fortunate for Britain that the Boers' strategy was very bad: instead of entering Cape Colony, where they could have raised the whole countryside in their aid, they sent their main army into Natal, and most of their other forces to besiege the outlying garrisons of Mafeking and Kimberley. This misdirection of their energy saved the British domination in South Africa. After a few preliminary skirmishes, the burghers beat Sir George White, our commander in Natal, at the battle of Lombard's Kop (October 30). He retired into a fortified position at Ladysmith, trusting that the enemy would gather round him instead of pushing further into British territory. This expectation was correct: the burghers surrounded the 12,000 men concentrated at Ladysmith, built lines to shut them in, and worried them by a fruitless bombardment; but they did not attempt to close, or to destroy the army by a general assault. The same took place in the other centres of strife: both at Mafeking and Kimberley the enemy wasted their strength in tedious blockades, while the time of their predominance was passing away. During the first two months of the war, they had a threefold superiority of numbers, and only used it in shutting up the three garrisons.
The British military authorities, still gravely underrating their adversaries, had despatched in November an army corps of 40,000 men, which they thought sufficient to end the war. There was such a misconception of the numbers and fighting power of the Boers, that when the colonies began to offer aid, the War Office actually told them that "infantry would be preferred," for a campaign in which the enemy consisted entirely of lightly moving mounted riflemen! The command was given to Sir Redvers Buller, a veteran of the Zulu and Soudan wars, of whom much was expected.
The "Black Week."
Buller went to Natal himself with 18,000 men, sending the rest of his troops to Cape Colony, where one column under Lord Methuen marched to relieve Kimberley, while another under General Gatacre moved up to suppress the rebellion already springing up in the northern parts of Cape Colony. Then followed the "Black Week" of December 9-16, 1899. The force under Lord Methuen forced its way almost to Kimberley, after severe fighting, but on December 11 was beaten back with great loss from an attempt to storm by night the lines of Magersfontein. At the same time the column under Gatacre was routed by the rebels at Stormberg. But the worst disaster was suffered by Buller himself. He found the main Boer army still round Ladysmith, with a "covering force" arranged behind the Tugela in the lines of Colenso. In an attempt to break through, by a reckless and unskilful frontal attack, he suffered a complete defeat, losing ten guns and 1000 men. So entirely was his confidence destroyed, that he suggested to Sir George White that he might have to surrender Ladysmith, and reported that the Colenso position could not be forced.
Fortunately, the enemy did not take the offensive. Both at Magersfontein and at Colenso they remained passive in their lines, and allowed the British to rally and reform. The only wise move which they made was to begin to send considerable forces into Cape Colony, where many districts at once rose in rebellion to aid them. But their main strength still lay round in the beleaguered towns of Ladysmith, Mafeking, and Kimberley, where they accomplished nothing.
THEATRE OF THE SOUTH AFRICAN WAR OF 1899-1902.
The disasters of December caused intense dismay in England. But the cabinet and the nation faced the situation with coolness and determination; there was no panic, but only a resolve that the full force of the empire should be turned upon South Africa. Not only were the few remaining regular battalions from the home stations sent out, and the militia mobilized for garrison duty, but a general appeal was made for volunteers both in Britain and in the colonies. It was at last realized that mounted men were required: the mother country gave 12,000 "yeomanry" at the first summons, but the colonies did even more, both Canada and Australia contributing men and horses with a liberality that was absolutely astounding. The Australian colonies and New Zealand sent to South Africa, in the space of two years, no less than 22,000 mounted rifles; the South African loyalists gave 12,000, Canada 6000, and other colonies smaller numbers.
Victories of Lord Roberts.
But a new commander was even more needed than new troops. Lord Roberts, the hero of the Cabul-Candahar march, was sent out to take charge of the war, with Lord Kitchener, the victor of Omdurman, as his chief of the staff. Even before the bulk of the reinforcements had arrived, the change in the direction of affairs was soon marked by a turn in the tide of success. Lord Roberts massed 35,000 men on the western line of advance, where Methuen was still standing at bay opposite the entrenchments of Magersfontein. By a sudden flank march he evicted the Boers from this position, relieved Kimberley, and captured General Cronje and 4000 of the late besiegers at Paardeberg (February 27). Then moving into the heart of the Orange Free State, he swept aside all opposition and occupied Bloemfontein, its capital (March 11, 1900).
Buller meanwhile, with the army of Natal, made two more ill-managed attempts to relieve Ladysmith. They failed, but a third assault was more successful, and the Boer lines were pierced after much hard fighting, ending in the battle of Pieter's Hill. The enemy withdrew to defend the Transvaal, and Sir George White's garrison was relieved when it had been reduced to starvation point, and was at the very end of its resources (February 29, 1900).
The march to Pretoria.
The second period of the war had now arrived, in which the British could take the offensive. They had by this time a vast superiority of force, having 200,000 men in South Africa, while the Cape rebels had mostly surrendered, and many even of the burghers of the two republics had retired to their homes in despair. Lord Roberts brought the regular fighting to an end in two campaigns: during the first (April-May, 1900) he fought his way to Johannesburg and Pretoria, and captured both places. After a short rest he marched against the main Boer army, which had rallied in the Eastern Transvaal, and forced it to disperse or to retire over the Portuguese frontier (August-September, 1900). President Kruger fled to Europe with the state-chest of the republic, and devoted himself to the task of stirring up public opinion on the Continent against Great Britain—a task in which he had only too much success.
Guerilla warfare.
It had been hoped that when the regular resistance of the Boers ceased, the war would come to a speedy end. After Lord Roberts returned to England, the impression was strengthened almost to certainty. But a bitter disappointment awaited the British cabinet and nation. Instead of surrendering, the enemy broke up into guerilla bands, which rode through the country cutting railways, capturing convoys, and destroying isolated detachments and small garrisons. There were still 40,000 of them in arms, and such a force ranging over a country as large as France and Germany put together, was most difficult to deal with. They maintained their desperate struggle for no less than nineteen months (October, 1900-April, 1902). Lord Kitchener finally had to subdue them by the "method of attrition." It was only by constant "drives," in which large numbers of mounted troops scoured the countryside to catch the bands, and by the building of lines of block-houses across their favourite spheres of action, that the burghers were finally worn down. They displayed an enterprise and a reckless courage in these last months of the war which they had been far from showing at its commencement. But at last even their stubborn spirits were humbled to the idea of surrender: after more than half of them had been captured or slain, and when all their families had been removed to "concentration camps," they opened negotiations (May, 1902), and finally laid down their arms to the number of 21,000 men.
Under a wise and conciliatory government there seems no reason to doubt that they may ultimately become useful and trustworthy citizens of the British empire. But it will try all the wisdom of the able administrator who now presides over all South Africa, from Cape Town to the Zambesi, to settle the multifarious problems which the war has left behind it. Meanwhile Britain is quit of the most dangerous war which she has waged since Waterloo, a war which brought to light many faults in her military system, and much incompetence among her generals, but which also revealed that the heart of her people was sound and the unity of her empire solid. It was a most reassuring sign that the nation paid no attention to the desperate attempts made to exploit the early disasters of the war for party purposes, and to get up an agitation against the Government. The movement fell flat, and at the General Election, which occurred in the middle of the war, the Salisbury cabinet was replaced in power with a very large majority. Still more notable was the splendid loyalty with which the colonies rallied round the mother-country in her day of need, and poured in their best fighting men for an imperial war, in which it might have been pleaded that they were not directly concerned. Not even the blindest observer can fail to see that it is futile to doubt any longer the existence of the "imperial sentiment."
Death of Queen Victoria.
It was a source of regret to every loyal inhabitant of the British dominions that the aged sovereign under whom the war began did not survive to see its victorious termination, and to close her eyes on a world at peace. But Queen Victoria, whose powers had been slowly failing for the last year of her life, only just lived to see the new century, and expired on the 22nd of January, 1901. She was followed to the grave by the regrets of a people who realized fully what they owed to one who had been the model of constitutional sovereigns, and had set so high the standard of public as well of domestic duty. Personally she had done more to secure the perpetuation of the British monarchy than even the most sanguine observer could have hoped, when she came to the throne, an unexperienced girl of eighteen, in the year 1837. Surveying her eventful reign of sixty-four years—the longest in English history—with all its progress and endeavour, we trust that our descendants may look upon the "Victorian Age" as not the least glorious period in our country's annals.