GROOTE SCHUUR — Photograph Copyright South African Railways
II
Yet Smuts continued as Premier which means that he brought the life of Parliament to a close without a sharp division. Moreover, he manœuvered his forces into a position that saved the day for Union and himself. How did he do it?
I can demonstrate one way and with a rather personal incident. During the week I spent in Capetown Smuts was an absorbed person as you may imagine. The House was in session day and night and there were endless demands on him. The best opportunities that we had for talk were at meal-time. One evening I dined with him in the House restaurant. When we sat down we thought that we had the place to ourselves. Suddenly Smuts cast his eye over the long room and saw a solitary man just commencing his dinner in the opposite corner. Turning to me he said:
"Do you know Cresswell?"
"I was introduced to him yesterday," I replied.
"Would you mind if I asked him to dine with us?"
When I assured him that I would be delighted, the Prime Minister got up, walked over to Cresswell and asked him to join us, which he did.
The significant part of this apparently simple performance, which had its important outcome, was this. Colonel F. H. P. Cresswell is the leader of the Labour Party in South Africa. By profession a mining engineer, he led the forces of revolt in the historic industrial upheaval in the Rand in what Smuts denounced as a "Syndicalist Conspiracy." Riot, bloodshed, and confusion reigned for a considerable period at Johannesburg and large bodies of troops had to be called out to restore order. At the very moment that we sat down to dine that night no one knew just what Cresswell and the Labourites with their new-won power would do. Smuts, as Minister of Finance, had deported some of Cresswell's men and Cresswell himself narrowly escaped drastic punishment.