1899] Milner's Mission to Make War 325 



measure an Irishman, while Dillon has Catholic sympathies which pre- 

 vent his quite disapproving the crusade. In this way Balfour's absurd 

 argument held its ground, and I suppose will hold it in history. 



" 15th June. — The plot for annexing the Transvaal has taken a new 

 development. Chamberlain, to force the hand of the Government, has 

 published a despatch of Milner's written on the 4th of May of the 

 most aggressive kind, and the newspapers are full of flame and fury, 

 the ' Daily News ' leading the chorus. They talk about Milner's ' cool 

 and impartial judgment' just as if Milner had not been specially 

 selected by Chamberlain to put the job through. Milner was sent to 

 Egypt ten years ago to convert English Liberal opinion to the plan of 

 remaining on there instead of withdrawing the garrison, and having 

 succeeded in that mission he has been sent to the Cape to convert 

 English Liberal opinion to the idea of reannexing the Transvaal. 

 Milner, though an excellent fellow personally, is quite an extremist 

 as an imperial agent, and his journalistic experience on the ' Pall Mall 

 Gazette ' has given him the length of John Bull's foot very accurately, 

 so that he is invaluable to the Empire builders. Now there will cer- 

 tainly be war in South Africa. They have tried every kind of fraud 

 to get their way, but old Kruger has been too astute for them, so they 

 will try force. They seem to have squared the German Emperor, 

 France is in chaos, they think their opportunity come. Chamberlain 

 will not rest until he has Kruger's head on a charger. The Boers, 

 however, will fight, and there is some chance of a general war between 

 the Dutch and the English in South Africa, which may alleviate the 

 condition of the only people there whose interests I really care for in 

 the quarrel, namely the blacks. It will also be a beautiful exposure 

 of our English sham philanthropy, if at the very moment the Peace 

 Congress is sitting at The Hague, we flout its mediation and launch 

 into an aggressive war. Anything is better than the general hand-shak- 

 ing of the great white thieves and their amicable division of the spoils. 



" I am now staying at Oxford with York Powell at Christ-Church. 

 Powell is an excellent good fellow, and seems to be much liked at Ox- 

 ford in spite of his somewhat heterodox views on politics, for he has 

 a certain Socialistic tendency enough to have widened his mind. We 

 had a deal of talk to-day, principally on poetry and literature, of which 

 he has a large knowledge. I told him, among other things, of my 

 having consulted Jowett fifteen years ago half seriously about the pos- 

 sibility of my entering the University as an Undergraduate, and how 

 he had answered me. ' You could never pass the examination for 

 Balliol, but might try Christ-Church.' ' Insolent clog! ' said Powell, re- 

 senting the slur on his College. It is lovely weather, the Christ-Church 

 Meadow looking its best, and while we sat on a bench in the Elm 

 Avenue talking, a little redstart was watching us. Then we went into 



