e adventurers, who composed the mass of the motley
population which flourished on the Rand, would prove a source of annoyance
to any State in the world. On the other hand, the importance acquired by
the so-called financial magnates was daily becoming a public danger,
inasmuch as it tended to substitute the reign of a particular class of
individuals for the ruling of those responsible for the welfare of the
country. These persons individually believed that they each understood
better than the Government the conditions prevailing in South Africa, and
perpetually accused Downing Street of not realising and never protecting
British interests there.

Amidst their recriminations and the publicity they could command from the
Press, it is no wonder that Sir Alfred Milner felt bewildered. It is to
his everlasting honour that he did not allow himself to be overpowered. He
was polite to everybody; listened carefully to all the many wonderful
tales that were being related to him, and, without compromising himself,
proceeded to a work of quiet mental elimination that very soon made him
thoroughly grasp the intricacies of any situation. He quickly came to the
conclusion that President Kruger was not the principal obstacle to a
peaceful development of British Imperialism in South Africa. If ever a
conflict was foisted on two countries for mercenary motives it was the
Transvaal War, and a shrewd and impartial mind like Milner's did not take
long to discover that such was the case.

He was not, however, a man capable of lending himself meekly to schemes of
greed, however wilily they were cloaked. His was not the kind of nature
that for the sake of peace submits to things of which it does not approve.
This man, who was represented as an oppressor of the Dutch, was in reality
their best friend, and perhaps the one who believed the most in their
eventual loyalty to the English Crown. It is a thousand pities that when
the famous Bloemfontein Conference took place Sir Alfred Milner, as he
still was at that time, had not yet acquired the experience which later
became his concerning the true state of things in the Transvaal. Had he at
that time possessed the knowledge which he was later to gain, when the
beginning of hostilities obliged so many of the ruling spirits of
Johannesburg to migrate to the Cape, it is likely that he would have acted
differently. It was not easy for the High Commissioner to shake off the
influence of all that he heard