Spring ends, and Love is ended:
His lute has lost its tone.

And the cadence, once so splendid,
Dies in a wailing moan.'

The pathetic note which is the prevalent tone in most of Lord De Tabley's poetry has found its happiest expression in his beautiful elegy, 'The Churchyard on the Sands.' Unfortunately this poem, the only one of his lyrics which has really attained popularity, is too long to be quoted, as it deserves, in full. We can only give the last three stanzas:

'Ah, render sere no silken bent,

That by her head-stone waves;
Let noon and golden summer blent
Pervade these ocean graves.
And, ah, dear heart, in thy still nest,
Resign this earth of woes,
Forget the ardours of the west,
Neglect the morning glows.

Sleep, and forget all things but one,
Heard in each wave of sea—

How lonely all the years will run
Until I rest by thee.'

We will end these quotations with some fine lines from an Ode which, in its severe and lofty strains, its measured rhythm, and its sad consciousness of a stern unalterable Fate, recalls the chorus of a Greek tragedy:

Strong are alone the dead.

They need not bow the head,

Or reach one hand in ineffectual prayer.

Safe in their iron sleep

What wrong shall make them weep,

What sting of human anguish reach them there?

They are gone safe beyond the strong one's reign.

Who shall decree against them any pain?

Will they entreat in tears

The inexorable years

To sprinkle trouble gently on their head?

Safe in their house of grass,

Eternity may pass,

And be to these an instant in its tread,
Calm as an autumn night, brief as the song

Of the wood-dove. The dead alone are strong.'

ART. XIII.-1. Official Telegrams from South Africa.

2. Reports of Special Correspondents.

3. Private Information.

A

PAUSE in the war in South Africa marked the end of the year 1899. We propose to deal with the period before this pause, and to treat it as a whole, leaving later events to be dealt with on some future occasion. We purpose to touch as little as possible upon the political issues involved, but to deal almost exclusively with military affairs. Nevertheless it is obvious that certain questions of responsibility, which are closely connected with political or quasi-political issues, are an essential element in the history of the war, and that certain quasi-political considerations have, at least at the outset, exerted a potent influence upon its results. The time is not opportune, nor have we as yet sufficient information, for a full discussion of these topics; we shall hope to return to them on a later occasion. We can only briefly allude to some of them now, premising that when popular opinion is strongly aroused with regard to military concerns to which it has been hitherto wholly indifferent, it is apt to fix responsibility in the wrong quarters; and that, even when it rightly assumes that certain offices or certain individuals have been in the wrong, it is too often ignorant of the conditions which have tended to produce the mischief.

The first question which is in the mouth of every one is 'How did it happen that we allowed ourselves to be caught by the Boers with an inadequate army in South Africa?' There can be no doubt that there was a time when it would have been an easy matter for us to land an overwhelming force, whilst the Boers would have been unable to do anything against us. That was during the summer, when, from the absence of rain, and the consequent want of grass, it would have been impossible for the Boers to invade Natal. They could not have found food for their cattle and their trek-animals, and must have remained quiescent whilst we poured into South Africa as many troops as we pleased. The latest date when that could have been done with full effect was probably August last. For not seizing that opportunity the Cabinet is alone responsible. But let us consider! If in August the Cabinet had disembarked an army in South Africa, even this might not have prevented war. In the light of subsequent events, and with our present knowledge of Boer preparations, such a result is at least doubtful. But it would certainly have laid the Government open to the charge, not only of having failed to do

their best to keep the peace, but of having by their minatory action precipitated war; and such a charge it would have been difficult to rebut. In that case, not only would they have found the country lukewarm and divided in its views, but in all human probability they would, by their action, have perpetuated, for the duration of the war and after it, that condition of popular opinion. Nor is that all. Six months ago the ostensible leader of the Liberal party was proclaiming in the constituencies, as well as in the House of Commons, not only that he saw no occasion for war, but that he saw no cause for warlike preparations. Had strong action been taken then, his followers would gradually, almost unconsciously, have been committed to opposing the Government. Instead of fighting, we will not say as a United Kingdom, but as a United Empire, we should have fought as a nation divided against itself. The statement that a Cabinet with a majority of one hundred and fifty need have cared for none of these things seems to us the language of mere partisan critics. The Cabinet, of course, could have declared war, and could have carried on war in the teeth of the most active opposition that could have been gathered against it; but conceive the difference between a war waged with such national enthusiasm in all parts of the Empire as we now see, and a war like that of 1878 against Afghanistan or like the Boer War of 1881, when the nation had no heart in the cause. For our part we have no doubt that every thoughtful statesman, soldier, and citizen, and even those who have suffered bitter losses consequent upon our temporary weakness in this struggle, will agree that it is far better that we should have incurred the initial loss that we have incurred in the field than that the army should have fought with uncertain support from the nation behind it, and with a great party anxious to take advantage of any temporary unpopularity of the Government in order to reverse its policy and undo its acts. We enjoy the blessings of a constitutional and representative government. We cannot enjoy the blessings without also suffering from the defects. Il faut souffrir pour

être libres.'

It may be urged that, even if the necessity, inseparable from parliamentary government, of obtaining national support for an enterprise of any magnitude, prevented the Cabinet from anticipating the Boer advance by sending an army to the Cape last summer, it was nevertheless possible so to strengthen the force in Natal as to render it more capable at least of holding its own until supports could arrive. Another division would have sufficed to keep open the communications between Durban

and Ladysmith, and to hold the bridges which have turned out to be of such immense importance. Such a reinforcement, being obviously insufficient for offensive movements, would have evaded the objections to which the despatch of a whole army corps was exposed, and, by rendering the investment of Ladysmith impossible, or at least far more difficult and hazardous, would have radically altered the later complexion of the war. But it should be remembered that to send out such a division without raising the battalions to war-strength by the addition of their reserves would have deranged our whole military system; while, on the other hand, the calling out of the reserves would have been regarded as a challenge or a threat, and would therefore have exposed the Government to the charge of which we have already spoken. The first of these alternatives may be an argument against our military system; but, things being as they are, there seems to have been no choice except to send out a very large force, regardless of political consequences, or to wait and exhaust the chances of peace.

But the general political considerations urged above do not account for the want of transport-ships adapted to convey cavalry and artillery, for the deficiency of land transport, which has hampered the movements of our troops and so gravely compromised our position in the initial stages of the campaign, and for the inadequacy, at least in point of quantity, of our otherwise excellent artillery. Various explanations may be given, and have been given, of these defects; and a certain national self-complacency comes out in the feeble apologies which regard such initial mistakes as inevitable, or at least as inseparable from the national character. It is our way, we are told, to begin in this blundering fashion, but we always come out right in the end. No doubt it is our way, but it does not follow that it is a good way; and previous successes won in spite of initial failures do not prove that it may not lead some day to a great disaster, as it did in France in 1870. The fault, in this case, may either lie at the door of individuals, or it may be more or less inherent in our parliamentary system. The mischief may have been due to that parsimony which is the temptation of all who control finance, or to a miscalculation as to the intentions and the resources of the enemy, or to both of these causes. Our main concern is with the military results of the above-mentioned defects, but it is worth while to pause for a moment in order to consider their origin, reserving fuller discussion to a later day.

That Ministers were deceived, both as to the intentions of the

two Republics, and as to the forces at their disposal, there can, we think, be little doubt. With regard to the first point, we have Mr. Chamberlain's own assurance that the ultimatum took him by surprise, and that down to the last moment he expected that peace would be maintained. He could not say he was sanguine, but he hoped. We need not comment upon this condition of mind, except to say that, if it is a sufficient answer to those fanatical opponents who insisted that the Colonial Secretary was from the outset bent on making war, it comes, on the other hand, perilously near a fool's paradise. That it was shared by both parties may prove that the Government was not specially to blame; but they were at least unfortunate. We turn to the second point-the miscalculation of the enemy's resources. The active alliance of the Free State with the South African Republic could not, perhaps, have been foreseen, though, considering the acrimony of President Steyn's later correspondence with Sir A. Milner, and the facts which Lord Kimberley has recently revealed to the public regarding the intentions of the Free State in 1881, it might at least have been regarded as a possible contingency, and should therefore have been prepared for. It seemed indeed to many, at the outset, that the hostility of the Free State was a military blessing in disguise, because the numerical addition to the enemy's forces would be unimportant, while a comparatively easy route would be open to us through Bloemfontein to Pretoria. Moreover, as many of the Free State Boers would undoubtedly have joined the Transvaal forces in any case, it was better that the Free State should have been an open enemy than a false friend. On the other hand, it is clear that, but for the adhesion of the Free State, Kimberley would hardly have been in danger, while the enemy would have been unable to seize the passes of the Stormberg hills and to raise the Dutch population of the northern part of Cape Colony against us. It is not too much to say that, whatever the military advantages may have been-and these we have thrown away by our unfortunate change of plan-the hostility of the Free State has in other respects doubled the magnitude of our task; and that had it led-as it might have led-to a general rising in Cape Colony, that task would have become well-nigh insuperable. Yet this very serious event does not appear to have been foreseen: at all events it was not prepared for. If it was foreseen, why were not sufficient troops sent, even at the last moment, to Cape Colony as well as to Natal? The Colony, as it has turned out, required protection—perhaps we should say supervision-as much as any other part of our dominions in South Africa.