his account of the parcels was correct. The officials, secure in their
man, commended him on his report of himself, which, they joked, was
capital. Sir John Herschel! A brilliant idea! In the end Sir John had to
send for friends who could vouch for him, and who were amazed at his
plight. With many expressions of regret for the blunder, the police then
allowed him to depart. He was late, to be sure, for dinner, but the worst
of it was that he had no excuse to offer; at all events he had none which
he cared, then and there, to communicate to his wife and guests.'
Nobody likes to be haled before the world at a disadvantage, as Sir John
Herschel was in the above experience. People, great and small, naturally
wish to appear fairly in the sight of others. Anything else, were to
count out a human instinct which Sir George Grey utilised, when he
visited the Kaffir chief Sandilli. Sir George discovered the innocent
ways, by which the kingdom of civilisation could be advanced, to be a
surprising number. Moreover, they were the most effective.
Sandilli was a chief of wide influence, and as yet had not quite taken to
the new order of native administration. When the Governor walked into his
kraal, a full-rigged dance was in progress. Sandilli himself was leading
it, and he stopped for a minute in order to welcome the visitor. 'Then he
went on, more merrily than ever,' Sir George described, 'in order that I
might witness how well he could dance. He wished to impress me, to show
me that here was a chief, strong, agile, graceful, a Kaffir of true
kingly parts. The natives were grouped in a great circle, and the ground
almost shook while they danced. They sang as they leapt about, and what
they sang was "It burns! It burns! It burns!" until you could almost feel
the glow of fire about you. They were, in imagination, burning the kraals
of some other tribe with whom they had a quarrel. "It burns! It burns! It
burns!" I can hear them still, and realise how easily, in such a
condition, they could have been led to do anything. It was fanaticism a-
brew.'
The dance over, there followed business with Sandilli. He made certain
requests, with which the Governor was not able to agree. It was necessary
to reserve them, but this must be done in such a manner that Sandilli
would not be offended.
'You know,' Sir George enjoined him, 'that a child born into the world is
long before it can distinguish its parents from other persons, and longer
still before it can distinguish friends from foes. As yet, I am almost a
new-born child in this country, and can answer no matter hurriedly.
Hence, let all affairs be submitted to me in writing, and no mistakes can
possibly arise.
Sandilli and his headmen were disappointed, for they liked quick results
in their diplomacy. Noting this, the Governor whipped the talk to
thoughts agreeable to them. He carried them off in a happy flight, and
their faces changed from gloom to mirth. When he had ridden from the
kraal, and they could reflect, it was perhaps in the sense, 'We cannot
quarrel with that Governor whatever may happen. He gives us no chance,
but, on the contrary, entertains us.'
While Sir George Grey was King of the Cape, Moselekatsi was King of the
Matabele, and the two exchanged greetings and gifts. 'Moselekatsi,' Sir
George remarked, 'had left the Zulus, and set up a new nation. We never
met personally, but we were on very good terms. In those days there was a
great hunter in South Africa, an Englishman who had come from India, and
he presented Moselekatsi with a coveted uniform. It was of the old-
fashioned kind, with bulky epaulettes on the shoulders; and what must
Moselekatsi do, but remove them from there and add them to the tails! A
humorous picture he must have made, in his distorted white man's finery.'
In South Africa Sir George had the companion-ship of Colenso, as in New
Zealand he had that of Selwyn, He likened them to each other, in their
simple sincerity of nature, in their devotion to the ministry, and in
their elevated ideals. They dined with those they were up-bringing in the
Christian faith, sitting at the head of the table, and they were complete
shepherds of the flock. As Selwyn had been a walker, Colenso was a
horseman, making a handsome figure in the saddle. He and Sir George would
cover many a mile of veldt, eager in talk upon a Scriptural subject. It
was thus when they first met, that being under the roof of Samuel
Wilberforce, the famed Bishop of Oxford. Sir George had a hunting
incident of Wilberforce. On one occasion he was having a gallop with him
across, the green English country. Turning a corner, they met a pack of
hounds, which had lost the scent and were trying to recover it.
Said Wilberforce to Sir George, 'As. a bishop I have no business to go
into the field, but my two boys have just donned red coats to-day, and I
want to see them very much. You must, therefore, lead me into the field,
not to follow the fox, but that I may note my boys among the company.'
It may have been in return for this service, that Wilberforce handed on
to Sir George a vaunted cure for sleeplessness. The Bishop suffered, now
and then, from that canker of a busy life, and some person offered to
send him a sure remedy, on receipt of one sovereign, no more. Wilberforce
invested, not expecting to get much, and in that not being disappointed.
'He was instructed,' Sir George bore witness, 'to imagine a flock of
sheep making for a gap in a wall. Then, as he lay sleepless on his
pillow, he was to watch the leader jump the gap, and count the other
sheep, one by one, as they followed. The undertaking: was that before the
last sheep had cleared the gap, sleep should woo him. Nothing new, you
see!
'But, having paid his sovereign the Bishop fancied that he might try the
notion, and he did so. He confessed, with amusement, that the remedy had
not done him any good, and enjoined that I might experiment without pre-
payment. To carry on the fun I did this, and upon my word I think the
remedy helped me once or twice. It was rather unfair to the Bishop that I
should reap the harvest of his sovereign.'
There were to be sleepless nights for Sir George, arising from an event
which he believed to be unique in history. Some of the Kaffir chiefs,
especially the older ones, saw a danger signal in the lamp of native
progress. To them, it denoted the rising power of the white, before whom
all black men would be driven out. These fears were magnetised into a
great upheaval, at the word of a young Kaffir girl turned prophetess. She
uprose, a dark but comely Maid of Orleans, a Messiah to her people and
her message swept Kaffraria like a wind.
As any maiden might have done, Nongkause went to fetch a pitcher of
water. Most maidens, when they filled the pitcher, would have seen the
shadow of a sweetheart in the eddies. Nongkause saw more. Strange beings,
such as were not then in Kaffraria, were about her, and strange sounds
fell upon her ears. The remote ancestors of the Kaffirs were revealing
themselves; their spirits were consulting on the affairs of men.
Nongkause hurried to tell her uncle Umhlakaza, and, he helped to proclaim
the visions. To him and to others they were, no doubt, expected, and
certainly they were welcome. For what was their message? Nongkause had it
from the council of spirits, sitting under the water, a corner of which
lifted to allow of communication.
Disease was making itself felt among the cattle that formed the main
wealth of the Kaffirs. However, the heroic chiefs who had long gone
hence, were only waiting to return with endless herds. These were of
vastly improved breed, nor could any earthly sickness harm them. From the
unknown, there would also arrive all manner of desirable things; no
Kaffir could even imagine them. Finally, those who were to bring the
lustrous Kaffraria would march before a giant army. By it, the white
would be driven into the sea, and Kaffir rule would direct a Kaffir land.
It was a queen's speech, indeed, that Nongkause put forth; yet there were
conditions attached. Before anything could happen, the Kaffirs must
destroy their own cattle, grain, and other belongings, to the uttermost.
The chief who had many oxen must slaughter them, and throw the bodies to
the wild beasts. The clansman who had a little store of corn must
straight way destroy it. Even the kraals, which gave shelter from the
elements, were to be burned down, as if an enemy were being pillaged.
Otherwise the new heaven would not appear; while the starry heaven above,
would fall and destroy the disobedient.
'When I heard of the movement,' Sir George Grey narrated, 'I at once
hurried north to grapple with it. I could not have believed it so
serious, until I was actually on the spot. Kaffraria was in a ferment,
and a wave of destruction might roll from it across Cape Colony. Here
were nearly a quarter of a million of Kaffirs, a large proportion of whom
were busy acting upon the advice of the prophetess. They were destroying
their cattle and produce, and looking forward eagerly to a triumph over
the whites.
'I went among the chiefs, although warned that I endangered myself
unduly, hoping to check the movement. However, it was useless to talk to
natives aflame with superstition and passion. Those who doubted the
prophetess, would do nothing to keep within bounds the majority who
accepted her as a divinity. Yet, the chiefs invariably received me with
kindness, and thanked me for the counsel I gave them. Simply, they could
not accept it.'
The Governor adopted every means to place the borders of Cape Colony in a
state of military security. As one detail he had to ensure that, in the
event of war, the frontier settlers should not be massacred. A line of
men was drawn across country, so as to make a buttress against any
advance by the crazy Kaffirs. Each picket had charge of a stretch of
ground, and in the morning soldiers would ride sharply to right and left,
covering it. They could tell, by footmarks on the dewy grass, whether any
Kaffirs had been about in the night. The chief military officer was for
falling back upon a less extended position, where he believed he could be
more secure. He sought the Governor's authority for the step, which fact
well indicates the critical nature of the whole situation. Sir George
scribbled an emphatic 'No,' and resumed the scanty sleep from which he
had been aroused.
'I had several reasons,' he explained, 'for declining to permit of any
change of our military position. First, it would have been an
encouragement to the Kaffirs to attack us, for they would have supposed
us in retreat. Second, we should have been leaving open, country where
there were European families. Again, the appearance of weakening, on our
part, would have driven over the Kaffirs who hesitated, to the side of
those who clamoured to attack us. I made it a rule always, and in all
things, only to take a step after the most careful and mature thought;
but once it had been taken, never to go back upon it. It's a very bad
business when you begin to retreat.'
Nothing happened in the manner Nongkause and the wily Umhlakaza had
foretold, unless the destruction of Kaffir stock and grain. Two blood-red
suns did not flame in the east; neither did the moon, in any of her
humours, light the ancient chiefs along, the now precious cattle with
them. A mist came up of an afternoon, but no day of darkness followed.
Breezes blew, cheering the hot air to freshness; never a hurricane which
should break the lintels of the white man's doors. It was weary to wait
and starve, with a Governor on the flank, plucking all guidance out of an
insurrection.
If the gods of Nongkause had excited a less perfect trust, there might
have been a rush on Cape Colony. As it was, the belief lived long enough
in the Kaffirs to defeat its own purpose. Their suffering grew acute,
nature asserted itself over superstition, and their one cry was 'Give us
to eat.' They dug up roots, and they strove for the supplies which the
Governor threw into the country, when famine drove Nongkause's nostrum
out. Desperate crowds of the hungry surged over hill and plain, while
strength lasted, and then lay down to die. No question remained of
keeping a mad Kaffraria at bay. The whole effort was to rescue, as far as
was possible, the Kaffirs from death by want.
Civilisation drove forward in a mortuary cart; but it was civilisation.
The spirit of Kaffraria had been quenched; it was a last wild stand. Sir
George Grey meditated on the means, so unexpected, so beyond man's
control, which had enhanced the securities for peace in South Africa. He
could do that, believing Providence to be an all-wise, if often
inscrutable ruler, and at the same time declare: 'There was a heroic
element in the action of the Kaffirs, for we see what they were willing
to endure at the bidding, as they believed, of their ancestors, and in
the interests of themselves as a people.'
It was in Sir George's mind that Nongkause, by a queer irony, was the one
member of her family who survived the visitation.
XIV A SAVIOUR OF INDIA
It touches the imagination to have a dark Africa put forward as light for
a Bible scene; namely, that where Jacob, instructed by Rebekah, obtains
the blessing which the blind Isaac thinks himself to be conferring on his
eldest son Esau.
'This scene,' said Sir George Grey, 'did not live wholly to me, until I
met with an incident while hunting in South Africa. Coming upon a young
spring-buck, which had been exhausted by the pursuit, I lifted it into
the saddle before me, and carried it home. All the way, the velvety skin
of the little fellow was brushing against my clothes.
'These were not worn again for some time, and when I did take them out, I
was struck by their delicious smell of herbs and grasses. The scent had
been communicated by the spring-buck, accustomed to make its home among
the sweet growths of nature. It was the hunter's fragrant smell which, in
part, caused Isaac to mistake Jacob for Esau.'
While trekking through Cape Colony, to see everybody and everything for
himself, Sir George was often able to be the keen sportsman. Before his
camp was awake, of a morning, he would make a bowl of black coffee,
shoulder his rifle, and start off, with a couple of bush-boys for
gillies. He would return in the forenoon, deal with his work as Pro-
Consul until the evening, and then, perhaps, seek another shot. Or, if
his people were on the move, he might sally from them at one point, and
rejoin them later. Deer of various sorts were not scarce, and he kept the
camp larder furnished with fresh meat. The Mahomedans, among his motley
following, ate with relish the product of his rifle.
'They trusted me,' he dwelt on that, 'to say "In the name of the Lord,"
when a beast was killed, so observing the Mahomedan rite. They would not
have eaten of its flesh, had they not known that their belief was
expressed, "You are not to destroy one of the Creator's creatures, except
by His permission." Whenever Mahomedans were with me, I undertook to
observe the rule, nor did I ever fail.'
One. sees, in that fact of chance mention, another evidence of how Sir
George came to be such a force among the raw men of the earth. He had the
genius for taking pains to understand them, and thus, even unwittingly,
made them his disciples. Just, he touched the spot.
In his reign at the Cape, the lion was still rampant far south of the
Zambesi. Twice, while hunting, he got on the trail of the monarch, but he
never slew him. A leopard would skulk into the demesne of Table Mountain
itself, and be ingloriously trapped. The lion made other sport, lying on
a high place while it was day, and going forth to roam at dark. Sir
George went to the Bible for the character sketch of the lion, in
particular to the Psalms:
Thou makest darkness, and it is night;
Wherein all the beasts of the forest do creep forth.
The young lions roar after their prey,
And seek their meat from God:
The sun ariseth, they gather themselves together,
And lay them down in their dens.
There was a hill, with a wide outlook of plain, and from it, the lesser
wild animals at feed, might be marked for the gloaming. It was covert
wherein the lion could abide, to lie in wait, a secret lurking-place. Up
the back of this hill climbed Sir George, eye and ear on the alert, for
one suspected to be about. He was about, but already bounding down the
rocky face of the ridge, in a hurry to be clear of the hunter. Sir George
mounted his horse, eager to cut him off, and rode, break-neck, the path
he had already climbed. There the lion galloped, at a kingly swing,
heading for the thick bush in the distance. As he neared it, Sir George
aimed a forlorn shot, which proved a farewell salute. He dismounted, and
waded through the growth, to the concern of his Kaffir boy, but the lion
was tracked no more.
These excursions of a leisure hour sent Sir George fresh, vigorous, full
of resource to the alarums that arraigned him in South Africa. The
greatest of them was not South African, but blew across the Indian Ocean.
On an August morning, a steamer drew wearily into Table Bay with a
message for the Governor. It was an express from Lord Elphinstone at
Bombay, red-bordered, in that it told of the tremendous affair now calmly
fixed in history as the Indian Mutiny. Here was an earnest cry, 'Come
over and help us,' addressed to the potent British satrap nearest in the
Seven Seas.
'Yes,' Sir George mentioned, 'the despatch was in no wise positive as to
the outlook in India. Trouble there had been and would be; that was
certain. But was India merely face to face with a disturbance which she
could manage herself, or was it a widespread mutiny? I was really left to
form my own view upon the situation, and I decided that things were very
serious. Apparently, religious motives were at the bottom of the affair,
and I could fancy how fanaticism, bred thereon, might sweep India. My
responsibilities in South Africa were great, for the mad Kaffir movement
had hardly been stayed; nay, my whole surroundings were as a thicket of
thorns, in their possible complications. But India, which might be lost
to us, outweighed everything else, and I felt it my duty to contribute
assistance to the utmost limit of my resources.'
He would ship troops, guns, munitions, specie, everything South Africa
could give, off to India. While he was doing it, a more splendid thing
happened--his masterful laying hands upon the troop-ships passing the
Cape for China, and his sending of them to India instead. 'I have;' he
recorded the act at the time, 'directed that all vessels arriving here
with troops for China, shall proceed direct to Calcutta instead of to
Singapore.' They are laconic words, but their place is over the front
door of the British Empire. To it they brought a service, not ordinary in
its annals, as they marked a man willing to put all to the touch. A
nation and a personality are in the incident, and, remembering that, let
us trace it out.
At this date we had a variance with China, and were undertaking warlike
operations in that country, jointly with France. Troops from England were
hurrying to Lord Elgin, who was seeing our affairs through in China. Some
of the transports reached Cape Town, a few days after Sir George Grey
received the Elphinstone message. They needed water and fresh provisions,
and receiving these would have gone on with all haste to China. It was a
throbbing moment for a Cape Governor, accustomed to think in the British
Empire. What should he do?
You can fancy him working out his course, like a master mariner taking
the stars. Nor, must the process occupy longer. He was rapidly
despatching the forces which were at his command in South Africa. This
might prove rash, having regard to the state of the country. Events might
confuse him, and be his downfall. Still, he was not going beyond the
bounds of his commission, and there were the specious reasons why South
Africa should fly to the aid of India.
He set them out then, and their reperusal, in the armchair of his London
retirement, but emphasised their purport. As a great empire, set hither
and thither, could only be governed by the free consent of all concerned,
so it must be a unit when danger threatened any part. Here was the
British Empire, a vast area, scattered over the globe. It was essential
that everybody should see it had not overgrown its strength. Be manifest
that its vitality, its power of action, were as keen at the extremities
as at the centre. Should a portion be gravely endangered, the world must
behold all the other sections stirring themselves to meet the emergency.
Each should be a leader for the whole body, the supreme weight of which
would thus be focussed upon the menaced quarter. In the process, our
varied peoples would determine their common interests and a common pride
of dominion, incalculable in worth.
Within this singleness of the Empire, came Colonel Adrian Hope and his
gallant 93rd Highlanders, then at Cape Town on their way to China. Only,
Sir George Grey's commission, as Cape Governor, gave him no authority to
divert from its mission, an over-sea military expedition. He would be
stepping outside his own realm with a vengeance, because he would be
superseding the orders of the British Government. The contemplation of
such a step was staggering. But would it be wisdom? That decided, it
should go through, for Sir George did not bind himself by forms or
consequences. Never being an official, than which no truer word could be
writ, he was wont to give ready hostage to his official fortunes. India
was to top all.
The meagre information from there, left him, as has been seen, to act
very much on possibilities. These, however, were dark and storm-laden; he
felt that England was confronted by her whole destiny in India. On the
other hand, the operations in China were the result of a compact with
France. To deflect troops elsewhere, might be a serious breach of that
compact. It was so easy not to do anything; Sir George resolved to do
everything.
'I informed Adrian Hope,' he described the result, 'of the apparent state
of affairs in India, and of the course which seemed to me necessary. This
was that he must proceed direct from Cape Town to Calcutta, instead of
following his existing orders. Should there be no need for him at
Calcutta, he could continue his voyage to Singapore, with a loss of time
not material. Quite naturally, he was doubtful as to what he ought to do.
He was under orders for a theatre of war, and was responsible to his
superiors in London.
'I undertook the full authority for the change which I urged, and I
remarked that unless he accepted my direction, it would most likely be
refused by other officers arriving at Cape Town. He agreed to do as I
wished, on condition that I put my commands in writing, and this I did at
once. The noble fellow arrived in India in the nick of time, as did the
forces which had previously left South Africa. Sir Colin Campbell was
enabled, being so strengthened, to complete his expedition for the relief
of Lucknow.
'I caused a steamer to cruise out from Cape Town, to intercept other
troopships and send them on to China. While I was thus steadily
forwarding relief to India, I learned that Canning, the Governor-General,
was still hopeful of avoiding grave trouble. At that I was anxious lest,
after all, I had misjudged the situation and the demands upon myself to
meet it. Next, I had full tidings from India, and I knew that my efforts,
twice over, would have been useful. India was in the balance.'
Sir George had to keep the peace in turbulent Kaffraria with a mere
remnant of soldiers. The colonists, anxious to assist the relief of
India, took sentry-go at Cape Town in place of the regulars. It was all a
knitting of the Empire; the uniting of its strands by blood and bone and
sentiment; that federation, based on race and the human qualities, which
had budded and bloomed in Sir George Grey's mind.
'For instance,' he wrote from Cape Town, 'there is not one of the
gentlemen in this part of the country who will now, in his turn, abandon
his bed, to sleep for the night in the guard-house, and to walk his beat
as sentry, who will not think that he has made some sacrifice for Her
Majesty's honour and for the safety of even a distant part of the Empire,
and who will not henceforth regard any persons that assail the interests
of the Queen, or her possessions, very much in the light of personal
antagonists. In fact, all here now feel that they are useful members of a
great body corporate, in which they have their personal interest, which
arises from having made some sacrifices to promote the common good of the
whole. Such a feeling, pervading the Empire, must immeasurably increase
its strength, unity, and stability.'