he brunt of the battle lament his
loss, and remark, when a railway was to be built or a new part of the
country opened up, how much more expeditiously it would be done were Mr.
Beit still alive.

Other names that occur to me are Mr. Abe Bailey, well known in racing
circles to-day, and then reputed a millionaire, the foundation of whose
fortune consisted in a ten-pound note borrowed from a friend. Mr. Wools
Sampson,[2] who subsequently so greatly distinguished himself at
Ladysmith, where he was dangerously wounded, had an individuality all
his own; he had seen every side of life as a soldier of fortune,
attached to different regiments, during all the fighting in South Africa
of the preceding years. He was then a mining expert, associated with
Mr. Bailey in Lydenburg, but his heart evidently lay in fighting and in
pursuing the different kinds of wild animals that make their home on the
African veldt. Dr. Rutherford Harris, then the Secretary of the
Chartered Company; Mr. Henry Milner, an old friend; Mr. Geoffrey Glyn
and Mr. F. Guest, are others whom I specially remember; besides many
more, some of whom have joined the vast majority, and others whom I have
altogether lost sight of, but who helped to make the voyage a very
pleasant one.

We landed at Cape Town shortly before Christmas Day. As I have since
learnt by the experience of many voyages, it is nearly always at dawn
that a liner is brought alongside the quay at the conclusion of a long
voyage; in consequence, sleep is almost out of the question the last
night at sea, owing to the noisy manipulations of the mail-bags and
luggage. However, one is always so glad to get on shore that it is of
very little import, and on this occasion we were all anxious to glean
the latest news after being cut off from the world for so many days. The
papers contained gloomy accounts of the markets. "King Slump" still held
his sway, and things abroad looked very unsettled; so most of our
friends appeared, when we met later, with very long faces. After
breakfast, leaving our luggage to the tender mercies of some officious
agent, who professed to see it "through the Customs," we took a hansom
and drove to the Grand Hotel, _en route_ to the hotel, in the suburb of
Newlands, where we had taken rooms. My first impressions of Cape Town
certainly were not prepossessing, and well I remember them, even after
all these years. The dust was blowing in clouds, stirred up by the
"south-easter" one h