politics gave a decided aim to his ambitions and inspired him to a new
activity, directing his wonderful organising faculties toward other than
financial victories and instilling within him the desire to make for
himself a name not solely associated with speculation, but one which would
rank with those great Englishmen who had carried far and wide British
renown and spread the fame of their Mother Country across the seas.

Rhodes' ambitions were not as unselfish as those of Clive, to mention only
that one name. He thought far more of himself than of his native land in
the hours when he meditated on all the advantages which he might obtain
from a political career. He saw the way to become at last absolutely free
to give shape to his dreams of conquest, and to hold under his sway the
vast continent which he had insensibly come to consider as his private
property. And by this I do not mean Rhodesia only--which he always spoke
of as "My country"--but he also referred to Cape Colony in the same way.
With one distinction, however, which was remarkable: he called it "My old
country," thus expressing his conviction that the new one possessed all
his affections. It is probable that, had time and opportunity been granted
him to bring into execution his further plans, thereby to establish
himself at Johannesburg and at Pretoria as firmly as he had done at
Kimberley and Buluwayo, the latter townships would have come to occupy the
same secondary importance in his thoughts as that which Cape Colony had
assumed. Mr. Rhodes may have had a penchant for old clothes, but he
certainly preferred new countries to ones already explored. To give Rhodes
his due, he was not the money-grubbing man one would think, judging by his
companions. He was constantly planning, constantly dreaming of wider areas
to conquer and to civilise. The possession of gold was for him a means,
not an aim; he appreciated riches for the power they produced to do
absolutely all that he wished, but not for the boast of having so many
millions standing to his account at a bank. He meant to become a king in