I remember one amusing instance of the idiosyncrasy referred to.  There was in Johannesburg a man who, having arrived there with twenty-five pounds in his pockets—­as he liked to relate with evident pride in the fact—­had, in the course of two years, amassed together a fortune of two millions sterling.  One day during dinner at Groote Schuur he enlarged upon the subject with such offensiveness that an English lady, newly arrived in South Africa and not yet experienced in the things which at the time were better left unsaid, was so annoyed at his persistency that she interrupted the speaker with the remark: 

“Well, if I were you, I would not be so eager to let the world know that I had made two millions out of twenty-five pounds.  It sounds exactly like the story of the man who says that in order to catch a train at six o’clock in the morning he gets up at ten minutes to six.  You know at once that he cannot possibly have washed, whilst your story shows that you could not possibly have been honest.”

I leave the reader to imagine the consternation produced among those present by these words.  But what were their feelings when they heard Rhodes say in reply: 

“Well, one does not always find water to wash in, and at Kimberley this happened oftener than one imagines; as for being honest, who cares for honesty nowadays?”

“Those who have not lived in South Africa, Mr. Rhodes,” was the retort which silenced the Colossus.

This man of the get-rich-quick variety was one of those who had mastered the difficult operation of passing off to others the mines out of which he had already extracted most of the gold, an occupation which, in the early Johannesburg days, had been a favourite one with many of the inhabitants of this wonderful town.  One must not forget that as soon as the fame of the gold fields of the Transvaal began to spread adventurers hastened there, together with a few honest pioneers, desirous of making a fortune out of the riches of a soil which, especially in prospectuses lavishly distributed on the London and Paris Stock Exchanges, was described as a modern Golconda.  Concessions were bought and sold, companies were formed with a rapidity which savoured of the fabulous.  Men made not only a living, but also large profits, by reselling plots of ground which they had bought but a few hours before, and one heard nothing but loud praises of this or that mine that could be had for a song, “owing to family circumstances” or other reasons which obliged their owner to part with it.

The individual who had boasted of the intelligent manner with which he had transformed his twenty-five pounds into two solid millions had, early in his career, invested some of his capital in one of these mines.  Its only merit was its high-sounding name.  He tried for some time without success to dispose of it.  At last he happened to meet a Frenchman, newly arrived in Johannesburg, who wanted to acquire some