the diamonds in Kimberley worth, that one Christian man should fall by the
hand of his fellows--aye, or one heathen brother?'

"And she answered, 'Oh, that is all very well. If you were a really
eloquent preacher, and could draw hundreds of men about you, and in time
form a great party with you at its head, I shouldn't mind what you said.
But you, with your little figure and your little voice, who will ever
follow you? You will be left all alone; that is all the good that will
ever come to you through it.'

"And he said, 'Oh my wife, have I not waited and watched and hoped that
they who are nobler and stronger than I, all over this land, would lift up
their voices and speak--and there is only a deadly silence? Here and there
one has dared to speak aloud; but the rest whisper behind the hand; one
says, 'My son has a post, he would lose it if I spoke loud'; and another
says, 'I have a promise of land'; and another, 'I am socially intimate with
these men, and should lose my social standing if I let my voice be heard.'
Oh my wife, our land, our goodly land, which we had hoped would be free and
strong among the peoples of earth, is rotten and honeycombed with the
tyranny of gold! We who had hoped to stand first in the Anglo-Saxon
sisterhood for justice and freedom, are not even fit to stand last. Do I
not know only too bitterly how weak is my voice; and that that which I can
do is as nothing: but shall I remain silent? Shall the glow-worm refuse
to give its light, because it is not a star set up on high; shall the
broken stick refuse to burn and warm one frozen man's hands, because it is
not a beacon-light flaming across the earth? Ever a voice is behind my
shoulder, that whispers to me--'Why break your head against a stone wall?
Leave this work to the greater and larger men of your people; they who will
do it better than you can do it! Why break your heart when life could be
so fair to you?' But, oh my wife, the strong men are silent! and shall I