2 Edward VII Proclaimed [1901 



good soul, like how many of our dowagers, narrow-minded in her 

 view of things, without taste in art or literature, fond of money, having 

 a certain industry and business capacity in politics, but easily flattered 

 and expecting to be flattered, quite convinced of her own providential 

 position in the world and always ready to do anything to extend 

 and augment it. She has been so long accustomed to success that 

 she seems to have imagined that everything she did was wise and 

 right, and I should not be surprised if the discreditable failure in 

 South Africa had hastened her end. I see that Roberts went down 

 to Osborne just before the seizure took place, and perhaps she may 

 have insisted upon hearing the whole truth from him and, realizing 

 it for the first time, have had the stroke of which she died. We 

 shall probably be kept in the dark about this for a long while, for 

 the public has got to look upon the old lady as a kind of fetish or 

 idol, and nobody, even now she is dead, will dare print a word not 

 to her glorification. 



" yd Feb. — The Prince of Wales has been proclaimed as Edward 

 VII and begins his reign with the usual acclamations of the vulgar, 

 the vulgar in this instance including everybody, all his little failings 

 forgotten or hidden well out of sight. He has certain good qualities 

 of amiability and a Philistine tolerance for other people's sins which 

 endear him to rich and poor, from archbishops down cO turf book- 

 makers, and the man in the isitreet. He will make an excellent 

 king for twentieth century England. His nephew, the Emperor 

 William, has come forward to stand his sponsor in face of the world, 

 an evil conjunction, for William is the Apostle of European violence. 

 All the same I should not be surprised to see German influence 

 brought to bear upon the Boer war. Our people are pretty nearly 

 at their wits' end what to do in South Africa. The war is costing 

 them a million and a half a week and the financial gamblers are 

 losing money. There is a reaction against the war now that it looks 

 like a losing concern, and perhaps they may be glad of a pretext, 

 such as the Queen's death affords, to try and bring about an ar- 

 rangement with the Boers. William would be flattered to be the 

 Deus ex machina and so recover his popularity in Germany which has 

 been much compromised by his refusal to receive old Kruger. I am 

 not sure, however, that the Boers will accept anything short of entire 

 independence. There is talk of the Queen having expressed a strong 

 wish for peace on her death-bed. What I hear through a very 

 confidential channel is that Her Majesty's last wish was a very human 

 one, that her little dog should be allowed to jump up on her bed 

 and that it was with her till she died. 



" 6th Feb. — We are preparing for another desert expedition. 

 Things go on in South Africa without change, the Boers having 



