THE MEN OF PRETORIA. 137 



Jew also by his very cosmopolitanism becomes a good 

 citizen, and some of the largest industries are being 

 founded by him. His natural gaiety leavens the solemn 

 national lump of Boer respectability. His literary 

 abilities have largely contributed to the success of the 

 Press, and in the Transvaal he is always " en evidence." 

 I am speaking of the intelligent Jew, and not the scum of 

 Houndsditch, which may also too plentifully be found, 

 but which no more represents the race than numerous 

 drunken ruffians who hail from Britain are to be taken 

 as typical Englishmen. Like the travelling Christian, 

 the migratory Jew does not let the rules of his creed 

 sit very heavily on his shoulders ; both eat at the same 

 table of the same food, and there seems no particular 

 restriction as to meat. Both creeds also afforded unique 

 representatives. A Polish Jew who sat at my hotel 

 table, and proved a very amusing companion, belonged 

 to the most orthodox Hebrew sect ; he was fairly 

 learned in the Bible and Talmud, was of extreme and 

 often violent orthodox-bigotry, but plainly admitted that 

 his views had no claim on him in Pretoria, as Jews 

 were only there to make money, and he certainly did 

 not seek to remove that impression. I also knew a 

 Hollander, who passed as a devout Christian, and who 

 often told me that the Bible he read every day was the 

 best of all books, and the New Testament his special 

 delight. He also informed me of the different stages by 

 which he was endeavouring to obtain a government 

 appointment, in which the salary could be increased, not 

 by bribes, but by what he more euphoniously called 

 " additions that fell between the quay and the ship." 

 But I regret to say that both of these acquaintances, 

 the Jew and the Christian, had considerable doubts as 

 to my orthodoxy, and regarded me with all the suspicion 

 of " odium theolosncum." 



o 



Commercial morality is a matter of constant evolu- 

 tion, subject to the stage of surrounding public opinion 

 in which it exists. Some fortunes held in the Transvaal 

 were mainly begun by the profit of buying diamonds 

 from Kafirs who did not state the means by which 



