War had been declared. We had known for a long time that it was coming. For
months past the bellicose bench of Bishops had been preaching war in all
the Cathedrals of the land. Field Marshal the Duke of WOLSELEY, who was
then a simple lord, had written articles in all the prominent American
reviews, and had proved to demonstration that with 50,000 boys and the new
patent revolving ammunition belt, Britain (for that too was the name of my
late country) was ready to defy and conquer the world. Rear-Admiral and
Lieutenant-General Sir WILLIAM T. STEAD, G.C.B., C.S.I., K.G., V.C.--the
great journalist in the shade of whose colossal mounted statue we are now
sitting--had suddenly become a convert to the doctrine that war is the
great purifier, and had offered in a spirit of extraordinary
self-abnegation to command both the Army and the Fleet in action. Volunteer
corps armed with scythes, paper-knives, walking-sticks and umbrellas had
sprung up all over the country, and had provided their own uniforms and
equipment. Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL, father of the present Earl of South
Africa, had been recalled to office by an alarmed country, and had united
in his own person the offices of Secretary of State for War, First Lord of
the Admiralty, Premier, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Lord Privy Seal. As
a first step towards restoring confidence, he had, with his own hands,
beheaded the former Prime Minister, the Marquis of SALISBURY, and had
published a cheap and popular edition of his epoch-making Letters from
Mashonaland. His Lordship's official residence had been established at the
Amphitryon Club where they still preserve on constant relays of ice the
_Bécassine bardée aux truffes_ which Lord RANDOLPH was about to eat when he
snubbed the united ambassadors of Germany, France, Austria, Russia, Italy
and the Republic of Andorra. The immediate consequence was a declaration of
war against us.

CHAPTER III.