Undoubtedly one of the most pathetic incidents in Kruger’s life was his departure from Pretoria when the British army was only a short distance south of that city.  It was bitter enough to him to witness the conquest of the veld district, the farms and the plantations, but when the conquerors were about to possess the capital of the country which he himself had seen growing out of the barren veld into a beautiful city of brick and stone, it was indeed a grave epoch for an old man to pass through.  It hurt him little to see Johannesburg fall to the enemy, for that city was ever in his enemy’s hands, but when Pretoria, distinctly the Boer city, was about to become British, perhaps for ever, the old man might have been expected to display signs of the great sorrow which he undoubtedly felt in his heart.  At the threshold of such a great calamity to his cause it might have been anticipated that he would acknowledge defeat and ask for mercy from a magnanimous foe.  It was not dreamt of that a man of almost four score years would desert his home and family, his farms and flocks, the result of a lifetime’s labour, and endure the discomforts of the field merely because he believed in a cause which, it seemed, was about to be extinguished by force of arms.  But adversity caused no changes in the President’s demeanour.  When he bade farewell to his good old wife—­perhaps it was a final farewell—­he cheered and comforted her, and when the weeping citizens and friends of many years gathered at his little cottage to bid him goodbye he chided them for their lack of faith in the cause, and encouraged them to believe that victory would crown the Boers’ efforts.  Seven months before, Kruger stood on the verandah of his residence, and, doffing his hat to the first British prisoners that arrived in the city, asked his burghers not to rejoice unseemingly; in May the old man, about to flee before the enemy, inspired his people to take new courage, and ridiculed their ideas that all was lost.

Whether the Boers were in the first flush of victory or in the depths of despair Paul Kruger was ever the same to them—­patriot, adviser, encourager, leader, and friend.

It was an easy matter to see the President when he was at his residence at Pretoria, and he appeared to be deeply interested in learning the opinions of the many foreigners who arrived in his country.  The little verandah of the Executive Mansion—­a pompous name for the small, one-storey cottage—­was the President’s favourite resting and working place during the day.  Just as in the days of peace he sat there in a big armchair, discussing politics with groups of his countrymen, so while the war was in progress he was seated there pondering the grave subjects of the time.  The countrymen who could always be observed with him at almost any time of the day were missing.  They were at the front.  Occasionally two or three old Boers could be seen chatting with him behind Barnato’s marble lions, but invariably they had bandoliers around their bodies and rifles across their knees.  Few of the old Boers who knew the President intimately returned from the front on leaves-of-absence unless they called on him to explain to him the tide and progress of the war.