lled arguments were powerless to move.
He had done what the religious enthusiasm of Livingstone, the
political sagacity of Grey, the splendid devotion and prescience of
Frere, and the Elizabethan statecraft of Rhodes, had failed to do. _He
had made the Boer speak out._

England was far from knowing all that these Boer aspirations meant, or
the progress already achieved in the direction of their realisation.
But this ignorance made the demands of the ultimatum seem the more
insolent. To Mr. Balfour it was as though President Krueger had gone
mad. But madness or insolence, the effect was the same. With the mass
of the nation all hesitation, all balancing of arguments, were at an
end. The one thing that was perceived was that any further attempt to
treat with a people so minded would be an admission to the world that
British supremacy had disappeared from South Africa. On this point,
outside the narrow influence of a few professional partisans and
peace-makers, there had never been any doubt: the only question was
whether British supremacy was, or was not, in danger. The Boer
challenge having resolved this question, the mind of the nation was
made up. The army, as the instrument of its will, was called upon to
give effect to its decision.

[Sidenote: An anxious situation.]

Two years and eight months elapsed between the expiration of the two
days' grace allowed by the ultimatum and the surrender of Vereeniging.
During the first twelve months of this period Lord Milner's
initiative, though his position remained arduous, anxious, and
responsible, and his activity unceasing, was necessarily subordinated
to that of the Commander-in-Chief of the British forces in South
Africa. But during the second period of the war--that is to say, from
November 29th, 1900, when Lord Kitchener succeeded Lord Roberts--the
constructive statesmanship of the High Commissioner was called forth
in an increasing degree as the area secured for peaceable occupation
became widened, and the problems involved in the settlement and future
administration of the new colonies emerged into increasing prominence
and importance. But even during the first period, when the task of the
army was the comparatively simple one of overcoming the organised
resistance of the Republics and subduing the rebellion in the Cape
Colony, Lord Milner's unshaken confidence and perfect mastery of South
African conditions proved of inestimable value.

[Sidenote: Results and unp