Cecil Rhodes, Man and Empire-Maker

by Princess Catherine Radziwill

The wise administrator, who had studied human nature so closely as he had done politics, had based his judgments on the knowledge which he had acquired of the spirit of colonisation which makes Great Britain so superior to any other nation in the world, and his belief that her marvellous spirit of adaptation was bound to make itself felt in South Africa as it had elsewhere. Sir Alfred Milner knew that as time went on the Afrikanders would realise that their erstwhile enemies had given them the position to which they had always aspired, a position which entitled them to take a place among the other great nations of the world. He knew, too, that their natural spirit of pride and of vanity would make them cherish the Empire that had allowed them to realise their ambitions of the past. Until the war they had been proud of their gold and of their diamonds; after the war they would be proud of their country. And by the consciousness which would gradually come to them of the advantages which their Federation under the British flag had brought to them they would become also ardent British patriots—blessing the day when, in a passing fit of insanity, goaded into it by people who had never seen clearly the situation, President Kruger had declared war on England.

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INDEX

• Africa, South, charm of, [22]
  • conquest of, [1]
  • drunkenness in, [223]
  • English colonists, [14]
  • prior to Boer War, [6]
  • Union of (see Union)
• Afrikander Bond, [86], [99]
  • and Rhodes, [73], [82], [84]
  • and Sir A. Milner, [134]
• Afrikander party compel Rhodes' resignation, [50]
• Aliwal North concentration camp, [182]
• America's response to concentration camp appeal, [165]

B

• Barkly West, Rhodes elected for, [28]
• Barnato, Barney, [24], [137]
  • his awe of Rhodes, [60]
• Beit, Alfred, [24]
• Bender, Rev. Dr., Chief Rabbi of Cape Town, [194]
• Bloemfontein, concentration camp at, [182], [184]
• Bloemfontein Conference, the, [13], [16], [140]
  • failure of, [67], [104]
• Boer War, concentration camps, [157] et seq.
  • not a war of annihilation, [3]
  • prime cause of, [128], [137], [139], [178]
  • Rhodes' prophecy, [67]
• Boers, the, mistrust of England after the Raid, [200]
  • pre-war hygienic conditions of, [160] (Cf. also Dutch)
• Botha, General, [83]
  • imperialism of, [xii], [229]
• British Empire, South Africa added to, [3]
• British Government, the, a missed opportunity, [41]
  • and Boer concentration camps, [162]
• British South Africa Company, constitution of, [44] (See also Chartered Company)
• Brooke-Hunt, Miss, in Pretoria, [186]
• Buller, Sir Redvers, and siege of Kimberley, [94], [95]

C

• Cape Colony, diamond fields, [3]
  • loyalty to England, [129]
  • martial law in, [214] et seq.
  • mutiny of Dutch in, [8]
  • overcrowded prisons, [217]
  • Rhodes as Premier, [30], [43], [44]
  • Sir Gordon Sprigg as Premier, [99], [121]
• Cape to Cairo Railway, [81], [124], [229]
• Cape Town, influx of refugees, [191] et seq.
• Chamberlain, Joseph, [104]
  • policy of, [133]
• Chartered Company of South Africa, [25], [26], [78], [80]
  • sinister rumours, [45]
• Concentration camps, [141], [142], [157]
  • hygienic conditions of, [160]
  • inner organisation, [173]
  • Miss Hobhouse's charges, and Mrs. Henry Fawcett's reply to, [165], [181]
  • necessity for, [161]
  • rations, [171]
• Cronje, General, [94]

D

• De Beers Consolidated Mines, [24], [80], [112]
  • power of Company, [114]
• Delagoa Bay, [91]
• Dop tax, the, [223]
• Dutch, the, and Dr. Jameson, [149]
  • and Sir A. Milner, [151]
  • enmity with English, [11]
  • mutiny in Cape Colony, [8]
  • popularity of Rhodes with, [30], [43], [73]
  • reconciliation with English, [129] (Cf. also Boers)