Night and morning in the far south were vividly reflected to Sir GeorgeGrey in tales of Rauparaha and Rangihaeta, Maori chieftains, and ofSiapo, Loyalty Islander.
Before his arrival in New Zealand, the Maoris had been divorced from their cannibal practices. Yet, the horrid traffic was not remote, if he were to accept a lasting rumour of Rauparaha and Rangihaeta. The pair were making their own war stir for him, and must be tackled. It was earlier that, sitting on a hillside in friendly converse, they sent a slave girl for a pail of water. As she tripped off to do their bidding, Rauparaha, the story was, shot her through the back for a meal. No doubt cannibalism among the Maoris had thriven on the absence of animal meat, for New Zealand was peculiar in that respect. Its one large creature of the lower world was the moa, of which Sir George said 'It was akin to the ostrich, but no European, I believe, ever saw it alive.'
Governor Grey and Bishop Selwyn were out together on a walking expedition, and it was Easter Sunday. 'Christ has risen!' Selwyn reverently welcomed the day, and his companion joined, 'Indeed He has.' They were communing in that spirit when a bundle of letters, sent from Auckland to intercept them, was brought into the tent. One to Selwyn bore the news of the death of Siapo, who had become a Christian under his teaching, and who was being educated with other natives, at his seminary in Auckland.
The Bishop, overcome with grief, burst into tears; then broke some moments of silence with the words, 'Why, you have not shed a single tear!'
'No,' said Sir George, 'I have been so wrapped in thought that I could not weep. I have been thinking of the prophecy that men of every race were to be assembled in the kingdom of heaven. I have tried to imagine the wonder and joy prevailing there, at the coming of Siapo, the first Christian of his race. He would be glad evidence that another people of the world, had been added to the teaching of Christ.'
'Yes, yes,' Selwyn remarked, drying his tears, 'that is the true idea to entertain, and I shall not cry any more.' What a touching incident! It shows us the depth of feeling which united Governor and Bishop. Only Sir George's version ran, 'It illustrated Selwyn's great, good heart. Stalwart, quite the muscular Christian, he had the simple heart of the child. He was a man entirely devoted to his duty, counting nothing of trouble or reward. We worked hand in hand. During an illness in New Zealand, I drew out a constitution, such as I believed would best suit the Church of England there. Broadly, it came into operation, and in a speech, when he was leaving New Zealand, Selwyn told of its origin.'
You seek life pictures, rather than any chronology of dates, and therefore to a second incident of Sir George and Selwyn on tramp. They were in the Taupo range of mountains, and their supply of food had run very short. By the borders of Lake Taupo they sighted the house of a Maori chief who, being absent, had shut it up. Believing he might find inside a stay to their wants, Sir George forced the door, and after that a cupboard. In it were rice and sugar and other supplies, which he exhibited to Selwyn with the triumphant shout, 'Here, I'll make you a present of all this!'
'I'm afraid,' the Bishop gently remonstrated, 'that there will be trouble about our doings. You see we have really broken into somebody's house.'
'Oh, no,' Sir George reassured him, 'I know the chief who owns the place, and he would give us part of himself.' On the following day they met the chief, as he was returning home at the head of a string of his men. Sir George informed him of the straits to which he and the Bishop had been put, and of what they had done, and received this approval, 'Well, that was like true friends, and I'm so glad you did it!'
'You can realise,' Sir George drew the inference, 'how easy it was for me to get on with so chivalrous a race as the Maoris!' He and they had arrived at a mutual comprehension of each other. They recognised his parts, the manner in which he could make himself felt where least expected, the difficulty of beating him in expedients, his desire to advance their interests and happiness, his tender care for them as a father, after he had ridden as the Caesar. Towards the full understanding, his bout with Rauparaha and Rangihaeta was, perhaps, an assistance.
'The name Rauparaha,' he narrated, 'means in Maori a cabbage leaf; a wild cabbage leaf. The tradition was that Rauparaha's father was killed and eaten by some rival chief. While eating him, the other chief mumbled with inward satisfaction, "This man eats like a young cabbage." The son, being told, vowed revenge, and took the name Rauparaha to emphasise the fact. It was insulting, he felt, to laugh over the eating of his father.'
Sir George's pledge for peace was the opening up of the country by means of roads, and he drove these hither and thither. The power of resistance which the Maoris manifested in warfare, kept anxiety simmering at Downing Street. 'In that connection,' Sir George said, 'Earl Grey, as Colonial Secretary, consulted the Duke of Wellington on the best policy for securing the durable settlement of the Maoris. The Duke, I learned from Earl Grey himself, advised the making of roads which would knit New Zealand, and employ the natives. Just after Earl Grey had seen the Duke, he had despatches from me, in which I outlined, in almost as many words, what I had been doing.'
The coincidence struck Sir George, and it gratified him to have the Duke in agreement. He was supported by another eminent soldier, when, at a London dinner party, being asked to give his opinion of the conduct of the Crimean War, he answered, 'I should have attacked upon the St. Petersburg side, where you could really get at Russia, instead of on the Crimean side, with its strong forts, its distance from the centre of the empire, and a food supply confined to that carried by the ships.'
In New Zealand he had no difficulty in getting Maori labour, since it was fairly paid, and excellent trunk roads were the result. Rauparaha took the innovation with a seeming unconcern, meant to hide an adverse feeling, which Rangihaeta, however, frankly expressed. He could look back upon his years, old Rauparaha, and mark in them enough stir and fight to satisfy a score of warriors. Age had crawled on to his shoulders, causing his furtive eyes to rest on the ground. But he was still himself, as Sir George Grey realised, on receiving certain information. It indicated that Rauparaha was in a league of mischief, that he had quietly given a signal, and that large bodies of natives were drawing down the coast to his aid. Farther, it was put to Sir George that an attack on Wellington was the evident object. This would be calamity, for the forces available as a defence, at short notice, were small. Now for the Governor's action, which some criticised as high-handed.
'At first,' he related the exploit, 'I was doubtful whether I could fairly attribute the scheme to Rauparaha. However, I satisfied myself that the information which had reached me was well-founded. It had been brought by a man who was in touch with the Maoris creeping down the coast, and who could speak Maori. These bodies of natives, you understand, had prevented all news travelling. That was how they were able to get so near, without our being aware of it.
'What was I to do? Was I to delay until actually attacked? That would have been to wait for too much proof of the plot; and my information satisfied me. I had a picked force put on board a man-of-war lying at Wellington, and with it, and another small vessel, we set out for Rauparaha's country. Besides myself, only three or four of the officers, I suppose, knew the nature of our mission. We landed, after dark, at a point of the sea coast near Rauparaha's camp, quietly surrounded it, burst in and captured him. The thing was to swoop into the camp before the Maoris could have any warning, or attempt to resist. Thus an encounter, involving slain and wounded, would be avoided. Rauparaha was taken off to the ships in a boat, and we conveyed him to Wellington.
'The results were as I had anticipated, for Rauparaha being our prisoner, there was nobody to give the word of command to the Maori disaffectants, who melted away. I told Rauparaha there were two courses open to him. He could take his trial, before an open court, for what he had done, or he could remain a prisoner, until I thought the interests of peace would permit me to release him. He elected to continue my prisoner, and other chiefs became bail for him when I did let him go.
'Rauparaha's defence was that he intended no harm, and that he was not in the plot, for he admitted there was a plot. I asked him why, if he meant no harm, he did not tell me that all these men had come so near. To that he had no answer, and besides I submitted to him a letter, which had been sent up the coast, telling the men to march down. He called the letter a forgery, but there was no question, in my judgment, that it was dictated by him and circulated by his desire. The best proof of its genuineness was that its plan was carried out, that the Maoris did collect in response to it. Nobody could have managed the business but Rauparaha.
'What would have been the outcome of an attack on Wellington? Turmoil! I certainly believe that it would have been attacked. Then, a large force must have been sent to punish the raiders, or Wellington would have had to be abandoned. In either event, the progress of New Zealand would have been thrown back for years.'
Though restored to his tribe, Rauparaha never regained his power, and was a desolate man. It was a characteristic of the Maoris, that when a chief had a tumble he lost his influence. To that detail Sir George added another, namely that Rauparaha was a very good speaker. Indeed, many of the Maoris had the true gift of eloquence. Rauparaha left some Maori manuscripts, about himself, to the Governor who had so unceremoniously made him captive. It was a tribute to that Governor's genius for attaching the regard of men, converting even enemies into friends.
Another instance, and another incident, lie in the conversion of Rangihaeta to road-making. He had rushed to the rescue of Rauparaha, on hearing of his capture. It was the chivalrous daring of one chief, towards the brother in distress, but unavailing. Not a hair of anybody's head had been hurt, yet Rauparaha was already beyond his friend's reach. Rangihaeta sulked into his own fastnesses—a rumble of discontent and vengeance. Sir George did not wish him to remain in a state holding so little happiness. Moreover, the all-important high roads must invade even Rangihaeta's territory. Diplomatic overtures were not wasted; they blossomed quietly, and then bloomed on an inspiration.
'When the old fellow had begun to get frail and ill,' said Sir George, 'I sent him a pretty pony and trap. The sea shore, at his part of New Zealand, offered a splendid stretch of firm sand, one of the finest drives in the world. Delighted with his carriage, he would use it; only a breadth of rough land intervened between his pa and the beach. He could not drive across it, so what does he do but turn out his men to make a roadway.
'There was merriment in Maoriland at the idea that Rangihaeta, hitherto sternly opposed to our roads, should himself be constructing one. That was as I had hoped, and he made no more difficulties for us. How could he? There he was, almost every afternoon, driving on the sands in all the pride of peacock feathers. Not merely that, but he aired his sister Topera, a woman of first-rate abilities, and of wide influence among the Maoris.'
Meanwhile, an outbreak at Wanganui furnished Sir George with material for his administrative wits. He was strolling up and down, deep in meditation, on a sort of terrace at his residence in Auckland. Turning, he noticed a Maori running towards him, and the next moment the Maori was rubbing his nose against the Governor's, the native fashion of salute.
Sir George, himself, had raced one of the fleetest members of a Maori tribe, throwing off his coat to do it, and proving the victor. 'I was somewhere on the coast, with several of my officers and a number of Maori chiefs, and there was a debate as to running. I ventured the statement that I could, perhaps, beat the Maoris at a distance contest. They selected their best man, a young chief, and I fancy it took me more than half a mile to get away from him.'
Those civilities were very well in their place, but the Governor would have dispensed with the nose rubbing of the native at his doorstep, so anxious was he to learn the reason. There was news in the man's face, and when he gathered words, it proved to be that of the Wanganui outbreak.
A spark there, had been the going off, by mishap, of a midshipmite's pistol. The lad was toying with it, amusing himself and a Maori chief. 'Look here, old fellow!' he had exclaimed, and to his own amazement the pistol went bang, hurting the chief in the face.
Extracting from his Maori mercury, every point of information he could furnish, Sir George ordained silence upon him, lest uneasiness might be caused among the people of Auckland. Then, on the plea of making a rapid tour of the outposts of the Colony, he organised a move on Wanganui. He went thither by sea, with a contingent of troops and a body-guard of leading Maori chiefs.
'These,' Sir George smiled, 'had been vowing all sorts of handsome things to me, and I took them at their word. I said to them that no better opportunity could arise, enabling them to fulfil their promises. They would be beside me, ready to send orders to their several tribes, should the assistance of these be needed. I need hardly add, that nothing untoward could happen in the localities which the chiefs denoted, while they were absent with me. Generally, I went about with a group of them in my train, as I preferred to have the possibilities of trouble with me. They took kindly to travel, and they always behaved most admirably towards me.'
As his vessel touched the Wanganui shore, a Maori was seen scouring along it, in desperate haste. Behind, there raced a thread of enemies, Maoris on the war-path, but the man plunged into the surf before they could overtake him. Sir George imagined that here was another messenger, with information from the little Wanganui garrison of British soldiers. It was necessary he should hear tidings without a moment's delay, and he jumped into the ship's boat, which had been lowered to pick up the swimmer. The latter was pulled into it dripping wet, and in a rare state of excitement.
He seized Sir George, to salute him in Maori fashion, and the roll of the boat sent them both sprawling among the thwarts. Not minding that, the Maori kept vigorously rubbing the nose of his Excellency, who made the plaintive comment, 'I could not help myself. Besides, I had no grievance, unless that the Maori was using up, with his nose, precious minutes, to which he might better have given his tongue. That's an unusual compliment to pay the latter human member.'
The Wanganui crisis was settled by a show of strength, and a shrewd ukase, for Sir George set himself against more fighting. The recalcitrant Maoris had been accustomed to come down the river to trade, getting in return, sugar, tobacco, and other dainty necessaries.
'I shut them off from all that, until such time as they should submit, and undertake to live in peace. Neither could they meet their friends, and tiring of these laws, they gave in.' It was the boycott, employed by a Queen's servant, long before the word itself entered our language.
During the disturbances, a Maori leader, in sincere quest for tobacco, found something more deadly. He was rummaging a provision chest, not his own, when a wandering bullet plunged through the roof of the wooden cottage. It entered his head and put out his pipe for ever. The occurrence gave the Maoris an eerie shiver, for it was as if death had fallen straight from Heaven. They were learning to look up there, though a chief, the story went, once rebuked a missionary: 'You tell me to turn my gaze to Heaven, not to care for earthly things, and all the time you are grabbing my land.'
Nothing is small in the making of an empire. It is the seeming trifles that often shape the way, fair or foul. This was a clear article of faith in Sir George Grey, and he would give it picturesque sittings. It had been with him wherever he carried the flag; it dotted Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa with milestones of policy. These might not be visible to others, but he knew, having planted them. They told of what had been done, by means of the little things; a bulwark against the undoing of the great things. Ever, the handling of personal elements was the master touch, the vast secret.
Take Sir George's entrance into the circle of Knights Commanders of the Bath, with Waka Nene and Te Puni for Esquires. He was one of the youngest K.C.B.'s ever nominated, being only thirty-six, and he just preceded his old friend Sir James Stephen. 'It struck me as a great shame,' his feeling had been, 'that one to whom I was so much attached, whose services to the State were so much longer than mine, should be made to follow me in the "Gazette." I could have cried over it.'
The notion of Esquires belongs, no doubt, to the truculent age when a brace of henchmen were useful beside the stirrup of a knight. Sir George did not revive them, in New Zealand, as a body-guard in any warlike meaning. Herein, there possibly lay a certain disappointment for his friends Waka Nene and Te Puni, both Maori chiefs of martial qualities. The purpose was to identify the Maori people with a reward, which the Queen of England had conferred upon her representative in New Zealand. 'It is not for me alone,' Sir George Grey put the honour, 'but for all of us in this distant part of the realm. Therefore you, Waka Nene and Te Puni, shall join in the acceptance, in proof that the Queen forgets none of her subjects, no matter who they may be, or where they may dwell.'
This was a sprig of the policy which he felt must be pursued by an Empire called to boundless limits. Did it rest its control of the nations, successively adopted into it, upon their fears, upon a compelled obedience? Why, it would but grow the weaker as it spread, until eventually a time must arrive when, from its very vastness, it would fall into fragments. On the other hand, if, as it spread its dominion, it also spread equal laws, the Christian faith, Christian knowledge, and Christian virtues, it would link firmly to itself, by the ties of love and gratitude, each nation it adopted. Thus, it would grow in strength as it grew in area, its dominion being an object sought for, rather than submitted to impatiently.
Go into the engine-room of administration, and listen to the clatter of yon modest pinion in a corner! That is, follow the avoidance of a peril in New Zealand, which might easily have sown more seeds of race warfare. There had been a mysterious, deadly tragedy on the outskirts of Auckland, a retired naval lieutenant and his family the victims. The affair profoundly moved the young community, having regard to the unrest which had been rife in the land. Several natives were arrested as suspects, and Europeans put it to the Governor, 'We shall certainly all be murdered, unless you deal sharply with them.'
A leading Maori chief of the district went away, to be out of the serious trouble which, he feared, might arise at any moment. The Governor sent after him the message: 'The manner in which to meet difficulty is not to flee from it, and you must come back. I relied upon you to behave with sense and courage, and I'm confident you will still bear me out in that view.' The chief did return, but said Sir George, 'He upbraided me as being, to all appearance, a Governor quite unable to deal with such a problem as confronted me.' This was an exquisite turning of the tables.
'Why,' argued the old Maori, 'could you not at once have hanged the natives who were arrested? If you had done that, everybody's mind would have been at rest, but, as things are, nobody feels safe. We imagine that we may be blamed for the crime, while the English can have no confidence so long as no person has been punished. You see at what we have arrived.'
Any spark might now fire the bracken, and it was the task of Sir George to prevent that. His despatches and blue-books, fodder for the browse of Downing Street, had to wait upon this other business, which would not even go into them. Not unless there was a crash, during a moment's want of vigilance, or by lack of perfectly deft management. The greater empire making, it is evident, was not to have to write any blue-books. None were written, for the tension between European and Maori healed in the hands of the patient doctor. It turned out that a Van Diemen's Land convict was the villain of that remote New Zealand drama.
Patoune, an influential Maori chief, had been zealous in the unfathoming of the mystery, and mentioning that, Sir George Grey was led to say, 'Some time before his death Patoune rowed over from Auckland to my island at Kawau. Seeing the boat coming, I walked down to the shore to meet its occupant and conduct him indoors, where he had a long conversation. On leaving he spoke, "Yes, I wanted to be with you once more, before I go the way of all men. I have had my last fallen-out tooth set in a walking- stick, which pray accept, a mark of our friendship." As you can suppose, this affected me deeply. A piece of bone is a kind of Maori talisman, and Patoune meant his tooth to bring luck to me. He thought my carrying it about with me, might one day save me from misfortune.'
The incidents of governing are incongruous; they jostle queerly. An official letter was put into the hands of Sir George Grey, as he stood on the seashore at Wanganui, watching a skirmish in progress with the Maoris. He seated himself, opened the envelope, and forgot the crack of muskets in the document it contained. This was the first constitution for New Zealand, and he was instructed to introduce the same. He didn't; only that is a very red-letter tale. It should be told simply, as Sir George Grey told it.
'In the middle of the turmoil at Wanganui,' he stated, 'out comes a constitution which had been passed by the British Parliament, and published in the "Gazette." It was, you understand, to be the instrument under which the New Zealand people should take their full, free place in the Empire. Up to that date they had not been self-governing; the Governor ruled. Well, having studied it carefully where I sat, I arrived at the conclusion that it would not do at all.
'Conceive my surroundings! There I was, with Maori chiefs whom I had brought from Auckland and Wellington. They trusted me; they were helping me all they could to bring about a peace. This constitution, I discovered, would destroy, at one stroke, a treaty—that of Waitangi, which every Maori in New Zealand held to be sacred. It was a treaty securing them in their lands; it was their Magna Charta in every respect. Yet the constitution would go back upon all that, and I should be held traitor to every one of my pledges to the Maoris. Moreover, it would have seemed as if I had taken the chiefs away from their various tribes, in order that these might be the more readily despoiled of their lands.
'Its treatment of the Maoris made the constitution impossible, in my judgment, and there were other far-reaching objections. It was formed on the cast-iron methods of the Old World—the methods which, I held, ought to be kept absolutely out of the New World. My motto might have been, "Leave us to ourselves; let us try what we can contrive." What was I to do with a constitution unjust to the bulk of the colonists, as well as to the Maoris; a plan going tilt against the federation idea which I hoped would, in future years, uprise in every country speaking the English tongue?
'What was I to do indeed? My instruction was not alone that of the Colonial Office; but the constitution had been sanctioned by Parliament. A man's responsibility, in the largest sense, is, after adequate deliberation, to proceed as he determines to be just and wise. If he has to decide, not for himself only, but for others, unto future generations, there lies his course all the more. There was one clear line for me, simply to hang up the constitution, and intimate to the home authorities my ideas about it. This I did, and fortunately, as I thought, my plea prevailed with the Colonial Secretary and with Parliament. The latter not merely went back upon its act, a quite extraordinary event in English Parliamentary history, but empowered me to draw up another constitution for New Zealand.'
You seek, for a moment, to contemplate the Mother of Parliaments having a measure she had given forth, bluntly returned upon her. It was a trying experience, but she emerged from it more worthy than ever of her proud title. 'We shall give him,' Peel declared, when Sir George Grey went to New Zealand, 'an assurance of entire confidence. We shall entrust to him, so far as is consistent with the constitution and laws of this country, an unfettered discretion.' Parliament lived up to that promise, and Sir George set himself to the mapping out of an adequate constitution.
'The circumstances under which I drafted it,' he resumed his account, 'were peculiar, not to say romantic. The folks in New Zealand were aware of the work that had been delegated to me, and of the date at which it must be carried out. I was to have the constitution going within five years. There were various interests, and some of these would advance the request, "Tell us what you are to recommend; let us have a part in framing the laws under which we are to be governed. You are an autocrat in your ways, and it is intolerable that we should not have a voice in the matter."
'Then I consulted my Executive Council, and I found it the autocrat, unwilling to let me do anything at all. I believed that, if left to myself, I could fashion something which would secure the gratitude of New Zealand for all time. I fancied I was capable of that: as I had visions of a new form of constitution being helpful, far beyond New Zealand. In the end, when my thoughts had bent to a shape, I went up into the mountains between Auckland and Wellington, camped on Ruapehu, in a little gipsy tent, and set to the task. A few Maoris accompanied me to carry the baggage; nobody else, for I could not have drawn the constitution with a cloud of advisers about me.
'Where did I get my inspiration? Oh, by talking to the hills and trees, from long walks, and many hints from the United States constitution. I sought a scheme of government which should be broad, free, charged with a young nation's vitality. But the greatest merit of my constitution, was that the people of New Zealand could alter it at any point, should they desire to do so. That was why it appeared to me unnecessary to ask a number of leading men: Did they approve what I was doing? I aimed at a most liberal constitution, and they could change it to their wishes as time went on.'
Sir George held man's highest education to be that, which taught him the rights and duties of citizenship. No call could be more noble; indeed, here was the essence of all service and religion. Therefore, he conceived the best system of government, to be one wherein the opportunities for the exercise of citizenship were the fullest. What could be more pathetic than the cramping of aspirations, such as had been seen in the case of Ireland? It was as if the roots of a tree were half destroyed, so preventing the full flow of strength into the trunk.
Sir George Grey's New Zealand constitution was thus inspired. There was in it the breath of the mountains; to which he had gone, as the great law-giver of the Jews went up into them to pray. It proclaimed a minute self-government, ending in a central Parliament. The powers in London approved it, with a modification which, looking backward, he pronounced a vital wound. He made both the Houses of Parliament elective; the modification made one nominative. It spoiled the fabric of his handiwork.
'The kernel of my plan,' he said, 'was a form of complete home rule, denominated in provinces. My idea was to give all the localities the right to levy their own taxes, and establish their own immediate rules. The great landowners were always antagonistic to this, believing that these councils would tax them, when a single Parliament, by the influence they might assert upon it, especially through a nominated Upper House, would not do so. Such was the force which, twenty years later, led to the destruction of the New Zealand Provincial Councils.'
The old war-horse was not neighing for the fray, that being all over; he was just putting his footnote to a piece of history he had fashioned. It suggested another. The Duke of Newcastle was concerned in the drawing up of the Canadian constitution. He informed the author of the New Zealand one, that he had been largely indebted to it. Mention of the Duke brought a smile on Sir George's lips, but he had doubts whether he should divulge the cause.
'You know,' the reminiscence ran, 'I used, when in England, to visit the Duke of Newcastle at Clumber. I was there, a member of a party, on a wet day when we were cooped up in the house, unable to find occupation. Towards afternoon, everybody being in despair, I proposed, "Why not have some cock-fighting?" Not the illegal cock-fighting of course, but the nursery-room style, where you have your hands tied in front of your knees, and try to turn an opponent over with your toes. My proposal was received with delight, and I suppose half a dozen of the leading men of England were that afternoon kicking their heels in the air.'
Sir George could catch laughter, when a burden really did rest upon his acts—catch it, to carry the burden away. The quaint instance of how he got the better of the Maori children of Poa was in point. A member of that New Zealand tribe had come under the weights of justice at Auckland. The clansmen mustered to his rescue, and were willed to turn Auckland upside down, if necessary, in achieving it. The Governor heard betimes of the advance of their war canoes, and he arranged his welcome.
'I called out our defensive forces, including a corps of pensioners settled in the locality, and placed them in position round the bight, where I supposed the Maoris would land. A man-of-war, which was in the harbour, I sent out to sea, with instructions to return when the invaders had arrived, and to block their exit. But everything was as if there had been nothing; not a sign that we expected callers with hostile intent.
'The Maoris rowed to the landing with vigour and confidence, forming indeed a picturesque sight, though I was little inclined to dwell on that at the moment. Next, they began to drag their canoes ashore; but here a signal was given, and our half-circle of troops revealed themselves. The Ngatipoa evidently did not know what to make of the changed situation, or what to do. I sat on a hill and watched them, waiting for a move on their part, which presently came. It was no business of mine to do more than I had done; let them now propose? They sent up their leader, escorted by a few men, to ask what I meant to do in the circumstances. That was considerate.
'I had already agreed with myself that the thing was, by hook or crook, to get rid of the Ngatipoa in a peaceable fashion. To make prisoners of them all was not possible, even had it been wisdom; the others might have done mischief. There were friends of my own among the Maoris, and I relied upon them as an assistance towards a solution. I must make the vaunted Ngatipoa in a measure ridiculous; treat them as if they were naughty children. I addressed the chief, "How could you be so foolish? I had thought you a wise fellow." He did not say what he thought I was, but admitted frankly the object of the raid. He asked me to allow them to leave quietly, and I consented, on condition they went at once.
'They petitioned to remain until the tide was at the flow, when they could readily get their big canoes afloat. But I was firm, fearing that if they lingered they might mix with the townspeople, be chaffed, and retaliate. Besides, I was determined that they should, as a lesson in humility, have the labour and indignity of pulling their canoes over the shingle. It vexed them sore, after having arrived with a war-whoop, to be obliged to beat so menial a retreat. However, they must submit to the toil and the jeers they had laid up for themselves, by their behaviour. As they were exhausted, I granted them leave to remain for the night at a pa, some miles distant from Auckland. Next day they forwarded me a penitent letter, through Selwyn, if I remember aright.
'The folks of Auckland had all turned out to witness the sport, and were very proud of the successful result. They were convinced, most of them, that they had something to do with bringing it about. A picture of the scene was painted to commemorate it. What worried me, was that I was made to look so young beside my officers—younger really than I was. Earlier, Peel had said of me, on the same text, that youth ought to be no bar to public employment, and that, anyhow, it was a fault which was always mending.'
Sir George Grey had established New Zealand with peace, and an ever rising prosperity. The two fondled these isles, as the Pacific Ocean lapped their shores. 'On your arrival,' wrote the Maoris in one of their many farewell addresses to him, 'the rain was beating, and the wind blowing fiercely; and then you lifted up your voice to calm the raging elements.'
England needed his spell elsewhere.
The example of one gallant-minded, stout cadet, was maybe with Carlyle when he pictured the Queen in Council to pick out some other, still unoccupied, and adjure him in royal words:
'Young fellow, if there do be in you potentialities of governing, a gradual finding, leading, and coercing to a noble goal, how sad it is that that should be all lost. I have scores on scores of colonies. One of these you shall have. Go and grapple with it in the name of Heaven, and let us see what you will build of it.'
To Carlyle Sir George Grey might have gone, and laid at his feet South Australia and New Zealand. He had been their fairy autocrat during fourteen years; and the rugged outlooker at Chelsea would have admitted them to be healthy brats. New Zealand having been fitted with her Parliament, Sir George turned his face homeward, on leave of absence, Selwyn a fellow voyager. Mother's boy and mother hoped to meet once more, but it was not, to be. The Motherland had kept the servant too long on duty, but he grudged her not even that.
'My mother,' said Sir George softly, 'had been in frail health for some time, and I was always hoping to get home on her account. She heard that our ship had been signalled in the English Channel, then that I had landed, and she waited my appearance with loving expectation. My young step-brother entered her room, and mistaking him for me, she grasped his hand in thankfulness. The thing excited her, so very weak was she, and her death took place before I could reach her. Happily, I had at least the consolation that she believed she had seen me.'
The danger spot, in our over-sea territory, was now South Africa, where British and Dutch were at odds with each other, and both at odds with the natives. Affairs were a chaos. The region, grown historic as the Transvaal, had been told to arrange its future as it would. The Orange Free State had been kicked outside the British line of empire, with a solatium in money, in the manner that an angry father bids adieu to a ne'er-do-well son. A white man in South Africa hardly knew what flag he was living under, or, indeed, if he could claim any. Panda, on the Zululand frontier, growled over his assegai and knobkerry. Moshesh, the Basuto, hung grimly on the face of Thaba Bosego, a Mountain of Night in very truth. The embers of a Kaffir war still glowed.
Who was to hold the arena? Its hazards were thrown to Sir George Grey. At the moment, he would, perhaps, rather have returned to New Zealand, but he was told that somebody with the necessary qualifications must hie to the Cape, and that the Government had selected him. He packed his baggage and sailed from Bristol, Sir James Stephen going down there to see him embark. Bristol, as he explained, was then endeavouring to establish relations with the Cape and Australasia, which were coming into note.
'When I reached Cape Town,' Sir George pursued, 'they had just got their first Parliament, but it was hardly in operation. Under the constitution that had been granted, the Governor remained, to all purposes, the paramount force in the country. His ministers had practically no power over him, and thus everything was more or less in his hands. On urging them, as I often did, to go in for a system under which the ministers should be directly responsible to the people, not to the Governor, I would be told, "Oh, we can always get rid of you, if you do anything wrong, by an appeal to the Colonial Office." It was not until after I left the Cape that popular government was brought into effect.
'What sort of South Africa did I find? The bulk of the whites were Boers, who were most conservative in their ideas. There were no railways, and I had great difficulty in making that innovation acceptable to the Boers. Effort was requisite for the construction of harbours, a matter of equally vital importance, which I took in hand. It was desirable to give South Africa every possible element of a high civilisation, as, farther, universities, schools, and libraries. A mixture of Saxon and Dutch, she had to work out her destiny on her own lines, untrammelled by the Old World. Also, she must enlighten that cloud of a barbarous Africa which was pressing down from the north.
'How South Africa has changed since then! To illustrate that, Bloemfontein was quite a small place in the far wilds. Nobody knew where the capital of the freshly created Orange Free State was to be. No wonder either, since, for a while, many of the people refused to accept the new form of government, and would not vote for a President. They were angry, at having been thrust forth from their heritage as British subjects. What nation, they demanded, had the right so to treat a section of its people, who had done nothing to disqualify themselves from citizenship?
'You have to remember that the movement for throwing over the Colonies, was rising as an force active in England. They had come into being almost unbidden; they were regarded with a cold interest. The notion that it would be a good thing to lop them off altogether, was being accepted among English statesmen. You could feel the heresy in the air—gusts that brushed your face like a chill.'
The South Africa thus put foot upon by Sir George Grey, was re-created to him long after, in a cablegram that he received in New Zealand. The South African railway system, which he tended in its infancy, had crawled north to Bloemfontein, as it has since gone farther, and still goes on, the iron-shod tramp. That auspicious day, Bloemfontein remembered the author of its Grey College, and gripped his hand across the sea. It made him very happy. Providence had set him to garden three countries of the Southern Hemisphere in rapid succession. That 'God bless you' from Bloemfontein, showed, perhaps, that he had not tilled in vain.
'There can be no harm,' said Sir George, 'in relating another incident, which kept up the kindly link between the Orange Free State and myself. Before my friend Mr. Reitz accepted its Presidency, he wrote and asked me would I be willing to consider the offer, provided it were made to me? I was then, I think, in the quiet of Kawau Island, and I suppose Mr. Reitz believed I might be more actively employed.
'One did not need to be already a burgher of the Free State, for President Brand had not been; at all events, that was not an obstacle. I did not see my way to regard the offer, but the making of it manifested a beautiful trait in Mr. Reitz's character. How many men, being tendered the highest post that their country could confer, would have turned to another, asking, "Will you accept it?"'
The manner in which Sir George tackled the South African embroilment, appears in his treatment of that mongrel race, the Hottentots. They recruited largely to the Queen's Colonial service, but had a grievance in that, on leaving, they did not get, as they had been led to expect, the pension of white troopers. The 'Totties,' so christened in the Colony, might be loyal and brave, but they were not whites, and anything was good enough for them, if only it meant an Imperial saving. The Governor determined, 'This must be wiped out; its effect has already been disastrous; the Queen's uniform has but one colour.' He applied to Downing Street, only to be informed that it was not possible to reward native troopers, on retirement, as whites were. This did not content him.
'I went to the Cape Parliament, which, recognising the simple justice of my proposal, adopted it with a wise liberality. There was immediate satisfaction among the Hottentots, and on no subsequent occasion did they give trouble. It was ever my endeavour to bind the natives to us by esteem, to convince them that British rule was the most desireable rule they could have.'
How winsomely Sir George made the Queen a living personality as well as a mighty name to the native races! 'Ha-ha!' cried Maori; African, Australian, 'the Queen is indeed our mother, for Governor Grey shows it by his acts. But the eloquent word on that, came from an old Kaffir woman, whom nobody owned, Lot Hrayi. This was her epistle, through the Governor to the Queen:
'I am very thankful to you, dearest Queen Victoria, that you have sent, for me, a good doctor, a clever man. I was sixteen years blind, Mother and Queen, but now I see perfectly. I see everything. I can see the stars, and the moon and the sun. I used to be led before; but now, Mother, O Queen, I am able to walk myself. Let God bless you as long as you live on earth; let God bless Mother! Thou must not be tired to bear our infirmities, O Queen Victoria.'
To Sir George, Lot Hrayi's despatch was a State paper. 'Native races,' he laid down, 'understood personal rule, and the great thing was to make the Queen vivid, a reality, to them. England? Yes, it was a place far distant, where there were no dark-skinned peoples. The Queen of England? Ah, yes, they could comprehend her! She sat on a throne, so beautiful that its place must be where all was beautiful and good. Her heart beat for her folk, irrespective of their colour; she would minister to their happiness. Nothing could more delight her, than to secure the well-being of those who claimed her powerful protection. That was intelligible!
'Thus, when I had a measure of mercy, of justice, or of guidance to announce, I did it directly, in the Queen's name, and in the native languages. It was the Queen's utterance, though spoken by me, and it would be difficult to indicate how well the charm worked. Go into a cottage, in almost any part of England, and you will, I judge, find a portrait of the Queen hanging on the whitewashed walls. There were no portraits in the Kaffir kraals, yet the Queen entered them, a beneficent influence in many a crisis.'
Striving to attach the Kaffirs, Sir George granted them written titles to their lands. They could not at first perceive the object of the parchment, and he would express it thus: 'If you have any trouble with your lands, it is only necessary for you to go to a judge with this document. He will read it, and if there is a real grievance, he will have it put right. Even the Queen's army might be ordered away from a place, by a few policemen, if a judge so directed.'
The chiefs would often say afterwards: 'Oh, Sir George Grey explained to us, all about the advantages under which we held the land. He told us that the Queen, herself, could not turn us off the ground, without going to the supreme courts which dispensed justice in her name. If a claimant were found not entitled to a piece of land, he would be removed by the Queen's officers. But if he had right behind his claim, why, he would be maintained in it by those officers.'
'Some people,' Sir George made comment, 'declared it absurd that I should instil those ideas into the minds of the natives, but, in reality, it resulted in their having far more respect and regard for the Queen.' Assuredly, his policy made the Kaffirs eager to get land titles, and these were always another link binding them to good behaviour. It was the contrivance of the silken thread, wound here, there, everywhere, as against the other method, of a horse-hair halter.
Should some swashbuckler have contrary views on native administration, he could relieve his fierceness by tracing the word 'Hottentot' to its origin. Sir George had an amusing story of Cape Town in controversy on this term, which the Hottentots had always insisted did not belong to their forefathers.
'With a desire to solve the problem,' he related, 'I suggested that people in Cape Town should be asked to write papers on the name. This proposal was carried out, and a small sheaf of essays came in response. Well, I was looking over an old Dutch dictionary, and there I found "Hottentot" described as meaning "Not speaking well; a stammerer." The name, apparently, had been conferred by the early Dutch settlers, in South Africa, upon the natives first met, on account of the stuttering noise these caused in speaking. All the competitors wanted to have their papers back, in order, as they pleaded, to make a few corrections.'
Again, that was a process which Sir George was ever willing to apply to himself. Yet, being very human, he loved to make the corrections in his own fashion, like the essay-writers at Cape Town. There, at the foot of Africa, he sat, bold and cautious, leading the What-Was onward to the What-Ought-To-Be. He might be compared to a charioteer driving two horses, one white in two shades, jibbish at a corner, the other black as Satan, unbroken to the bit. But the chariot must move forward steadily, evenly, to its greater glory.
Kaffraria had to be put on a peace footing. The ideas, at the root of the tribal system, were averse to the growth of civilisation, but instead of pruning these violently, and so causing friction, Sir George would adapt them. The chiefs were largely dependent for their wealth in cattle and other chattels, on the punishments which they meted out to the tribesmen for offences, or imaginary offences. Let a Kaffir prosper, and he was certain to be charged with witchcraft. That was sudden death, and the cattle went to the kraals of him who ordered it.
The chiefs had every incentive to create witchcraft cases, thus keeping the land dark. Sir George met that, and farther bonded them fiefs of the Queen, by giving them small salaries as magistrates. He established regular courts, and in these the chiefs had their seats and a white man's guidance, while the fines went to the Government. A scarred warrior exchanged his dripping assegai for the Queen's commission as a J.P. He swaggered mightily at his bargain.
'It had,' Sir George brought up an apt anecdote, 'been promised the natives that their laws and customs should not be interfered with. After I introduced the courts, a chief was discovered to have put one of his tribe to death for witchcraft. I had the affair gone into, whereupon the chief contended, "You are aware of the undertaking we got, and trial for witchcraft is part of our customs."
'He fancied there could be no answer to this, and the other chiefs within hearing grinned approval. "Very well," I addressed him, "let us take it that way. But as you have killed this man you must support his widow. That has nothing to do with any question of custom." 'All the chiefs rolled on the ground, splitting with laughter. Knowing the penalty they might incur, the heads of tribes henceforth thought twice, before sending any man to death on a charge of witchcraft. They knew I had the means of compelling them to maintain the widow and family. I could stop the necessary amount out of their salaries. It was cheaper, and more effective, to give a bonus to a native chief than to keep a large standing army in Kaffraria.'
Sir George had worn the red coat, but he was never anxious to have it picturesquely dotting a country-side, when other measures were possible. He had bartered with Downing Street for the allowance to his chiefs. Paring down on a Budget, Disraeli bethought himself of saving half of the grant for Kaffraria. Sir George Grey entered protest. He was answered, that when difficulties had to be met at home, sacrifices must be made in the Colonies.
From tribulation, Sir George built authority. 'The fact that I was fighting the battle of the chiefs with the Home Government, naturally increased my prestige among them. They saw that I was sincere in all I had done, and that I accepted them absolutely as good friends and loyal subjects of the Queen.'
What happened? From his private means, Sir George made up, to the full amount, the instalment of salaries next due. It was a stroke which he had to repeat on a larger scale.
England raised a German legion for service in the Crimea, and, the war over, did not know what to do with the men. It was not considered wise to let them loose in England, and if they went back to Germany they might have to face the music of a drumhead court-martial. Cape Colony agreed to receive the Germans as military settlers; they would be planted, a row of defence, along the borders of Kaffraria. But the condition was attached that German families, into which the men might marry, should also be sent out.
When asked to perform the second part of the bargain, Downing Street said, 'Yes, we should like very much to do so, but we can't, for Parliament won't grant the money.'
This left the matter in an unfortunate state altogether. The German firm, managing the emigration of the families, reported to Sir George, 'The scheme must fall through, unless we have twenty thousand pounds at once.'
'I was in London,' Sir George mentioned, 'at the break between my two Governorships of South Africa. I went carefully into the matter, realising all that was at stake, and I gave the assurance, "You shall have the money this afternoon." I had never raised a large amount before, but I concluded that the place to go to was the City of London. I had several thousands with my bankers, on which I could lay hands, and I supposed they would enable me, by some method of interest, to get the remainder.
'On the road to the City I met a connexion of mine, also a banker. He asked me what I was about, and I told him. "Why don't you come to us?" he said. "I have no money with you," I replied; "and never had." "No," was his response; "but you need not pass us by in this matter. I should like to help you; come and draw a cheque for twenty thousand pounds."'
That cheque was drawn, and South Africa extracted from a grave social difficulty. The emigrants became an admirable settlement, and most honourably made good the outlay which they had occasioned. 'It wasn't banking, it wasn't business, that cheque,' Sir George was bantered long years after; 'but perhaps it was better.'
'Ah!' he laughed back, 'I'm benefiting myself now, for it seems that I returned thirty-eight shillings more than was due, and that therefore I have a balance to draw upon.'
Sir George Grey rode hard and far over the South African karoo, serving the Queen's writ in letters of gold. When he rode late, and the stars were ablaze, his saddle held a dreamer in dreamland.
What a lightsome new world! The sun had bathed it in the day; night brought another radiance. Here was the emblem of all the New World should be to the Old. Not yet, perhaps, in the full, for there were things to do, but soon, when the outposts of empire, stretching to Australia, New Zealand, and beyond, had come into their own. Yes, those glorious stars overhead were only meant to shine on a New World reflecting their brightness!
One winked, and Sir George smiled. Sir John Herschel had visited the Cape to fix the southern stars. The recollection carried Sir George Grey to the astronomer's part in quite a different affair. He had the tale from Herschel himself, and classed it with the somewhat relative incidents of Carlyle and Babbage. It was worse for the victim.
'Nevertheless,' said Sir George, 'his statement of it to me, was marked by much humour and enjoyment. It was the third example of my great men coming to grief through their tailor; anyhow, there lay a contributory cause. One might have moralised to Herschel on the subject of genius and clothes; I did better, I sympathised.
'Sir John, who was living near Windsor, had been up in London, and was to return home for dinner. It occurred to him that he might call somewhere in town, about certain magnetic instruments that were being made for him, and still reach Windsor by the dinner hour. So he set off to the place, carrying in his hand certain small parcels, the contents of which were probably intended for the dinner. Remembering his quaint figure, I confess I would have given something to see him scudding along the London streets on that occasion.
'Well, when he had accomplished a good part of the journey he asked himself, "Can I do it after all?" He took out his watch, in order to ascertain what time was left him. He found that the way had occupied him longer than he had calculated; in fact, it was clearly impossible that he could go on to the instrument-maker, and also get home for dinner. He had a small party of guests that evening, and thus his punctual arrival was imperative. Having considered the dilemma for a minute, he wheeled about, satisfied that he must give up his mission if he would not spoil the dinner party. He started back in a great hurry, and at once the cry was raised, "Stop thief! Stop thief!"
'It appeared that a policeman, full of suspicion, had been watching the not very fashionable bearer of the parcels. When Sir John came to his sudden halt, this fellow reasoned, "Ah! he observes me; my suspicions are confirmed." There could be no manner of doubt, on Sir John setting to run in the opposite direction. The policeman shouted, "Stop thief!" and rushed after the astronomer, a tail of curious people gathering from all sides. Sir John jogged on, heedless of the noise, ignorant of its cause, until the policeman brought him up. What was the matter? The man of the law looked awful things, and kept a stern eye upon his prisoner, for that was now Sir John's position.
'He explained that he was hurrying home for dinner, that his wife and friends would be waiting him, and that to be detained in such fashion was a trifle absurd, especially as he was Sir John Herschel. "Sir John Herschel!" quoth the policeman; "that's your game, is it? No, no, my friend; you'll have to come to the police-station with me." And away he marched the most eminent astronomer of many a year.
'At the station Sir John could only protest his identity anew, and that 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.