Rhodes himself had more than once expressed his conviction that the destruction of the Boers would not take more than three months at the most, and this assurance was accepted as gospel by most of the financiers of Johannesburg.  An exception was Mr. F. Eckstein, the general manager and partner in the concern of Wernher, Beit & Co., and one of the ablest financiers in that city.  From the first he was quite pessimistic in regard to the length of time the war would take.

As the war dragged on without there seeming any chance of its being brought to a rapid conclusion, it became evident that England, after all the sacrifices which she was making, would never consent to leave the leaders of the movement—­the ostensible object of which had been to grant to the Uitlanders certain privileges to which they had no right—­as sole and absolute masters of the situation.  In fact, the difficulties of the war made it evident that, once peace was proclaimed, public opinion at home would demand that the Transvaal, together with the Orange Free State, should be annexed to the British Empire in view of a future federation of the whole of South Africa, about which the English Press was already beginning to speak.

That South Africa should not remain a sphere of exploitation sent shivers down the spines of the financiers.  The South African League was observed to become quite active in discovering rebels.  Their zeal in this direction was felt all over Cape Colony.  Their aim was to reduce the register in order to bring about a considerable falling off of voters for the Afrikander Bond, and thereby substantially influence the results of the next election to the Cape Parliament.

At this period certain overtures were made once again to the Bond party.  They proceeded apparently from men supposed to act on their own initiative, but who were known to be in favour at Groote Schuur.  These advances met with no response, but when the rumour that they had been made spread among the public owing to an indiscretion, Rhodes hastened to deny that he had been a party to the plan—­as was his wont when he failed to achieve.  All the same, it is a fact that members of the House of Assembly belonging to the Afrikander party visited Groote Schuur in the course of that last winter which Rhodes spent there, and were warmly welcomed.  Rhodes showed himself unusually gracious.  He hoped these forerunners would rally his former friends to his side once more.  But Rhodes was expecting too much, considering ail the circumstances.  Faithful to his usual tactics, even whilst his Afrikander guests were being persuaded to lend themselves to an intrigue from which they had hoped to win something, Rhodes was making himself responsible for another step likely to render the always strong hatred even more acute than ever.  More than that, he was advocating, through certain underground channels, the suspension of the Constitution in Cape Colony.

[Illustration:  The RT.  Hon.  Sir W.F.  Hely-Hutchinson]