on the other hand, seemed to be in robust health, and as calm as the
proverbial cucumber. I had an interesting talk to him before we left the
ship; he said frankly that, for the first time in his life, during six
nights of the late crisis he had not been able to sleep, and that he had
been worried to death.

"Now," he added, "I have thought the whole matter out, I have decided
what is best to be done, so I am all right again, and I do not consider
at forty-three that my career is ended."

"I am quite sure it is not, Mr. Rhodes," was my reply; "and, what is
more, I have a small bet with Mr. Lawson that in a year's time you will
be in office again, or, if not absolutely in office, as great a factor
in South African politics as you have been up to now."

He thought a minute, and then said:

"It will take ten years; better cancel your bet."[5] was careful not to
ask him any questions which might be embarrassing for him to answer, but
he volunteered that the objects of his visit to England were, first, to
do the best he could for his friends at Johannesburg, including his
brother Frank, who were now political prisoners, practically at the
mercy of the Boers, unless the Imperial Government bestirred itself on
their behalf; and, secondly, to save his Charter, if by any means it
could be saved. This doubt seemed to haunt him. "My argument is," I
remember he said, "they may take away the Charter or leave it, but there
is one fact that no man can alter--viz., that a vast and valuable
territory has been opened up by that Company in about half the time, and
at about a quarter the cost, which the Imperial Government would have
required for a like task; so that whether, in consequence of one bad