"You won't get into Pretoria," said one melancholy man, "so it's no use
trying. The Boers will just catch you and kill you, and there will be
an end of it. You had better leave the girl to look after herself and go
back to Mooifontein."

But this was not John's view of the matter. "Well," he answered, "at any
rate I'll have a try." Indeed, he had a sort of bull-dog nature about
him which led him to believe that if he made up his mind to do a thing,
he would do it somehow, unless he should be physically incapacitated by
circumstances beyond his own control. It is wonderful how far a mood
of the kind will take a man. Indeed, it is the widespread possession of
this sentiment that has made England what she is. Now it is beginning
to die down and to be legislated out of our national character, and the
results are already commencing to appear in the incipient decay of our
power. We cannot govern Ireland. It is beyond us; let Ireland have Home
Rule! We cannot cope with our Imperial responsibilities; let them be
cast off: and so on. The Englishmen of fifty years ago did not talk in
this "weary Titan" strain.

Well, every nation becomes emasculated sooner or later, that seems to be
the universal fate; and it appears that it is our lot to be emasculated,
not by the want of law but by a plethora thereof. This country was made,
not by Governments, but for the most part in despite of them by the
independent efforts of generations of individuals. The tendency nowadays
is to merge the individual in the Government, and to limit or even
forcibly to destroy personal enterprise and responsibility. Everything
is to be legislated for or legislated against. As yet the system is only
in its bud. When it blooms, if it is ever allowed to bloom, the Empire
will lose touch of its constituent atoms and become a vast soulless
machine, which will first get out of order, then break down, and, last
of all, break up. We owe more to sturdy, determined, unconvinceable
Englishmen like John Niel than we know, or, perhaps, should be willing
to acknowledge in these enlightened days. "Long live the Caucus!" that
is the cry of the nineteenth century. But what will Englishmen cry in
the twentieth?[*]

[*] These words were written some ten years ago; but since
then, with all gratitude be it said, a change has come over
the spirit of the nation, or rather, the spirit of the
nation has re-asserted itself. Though the "Little England"
par