VISIT TO SOUTH AFRICA. 
289 
The idea that it is a second Rand is exploded ; it is not the Eldorado 
that people used to try to make it out, hut it does not deserve the abuse 
that has been heaped upon it by disappointed people. I believe that 
many parts will prove successful both in mining and in agriculture. 
The British public must discriminate between the wheat and the 
chaff ; there is wheat and there is chaff. Whether the British public 
makes money out of Rhodesia or not, I feel sure that Rhodesia will 
make money out of the British public. 
The unqualified belief in Rhodes is a thing which strikes one very 
much ; everywhere, all through the country, it is “ Mr. Rhodes will do 
this,” or “ Mr. Rhodes will do that ” ; in fact the enormous necessity 
for ‘ The Man of Africa ’ is extraordinary. Under these circumstances 
perhaps, before sinking any great amount of money in Rhodesia, it 
might be well to insure Mr. Rhodes’ life, and be safe in any case. 
The Johannesburg .opinion is rather against it being a gold-mining 
country. I heard several practical men say “ Oh yes ! we know all 
about gold in Rhodesia, we know it is all played out.” Now consider 
the enormous amount of capital sunk in that land by men who know 
what they are about, and also that every man who leaves Rhodesia does 
his level best to get back there again. Those things are very much in 
its favour. 
It is certainly extraordinary that all knowledge of these gold mines 
should have been lost to humanity for so many years. 
When a man goes out in that country to look for gold, he does not go 
out in the orthodox way with a hammer and pick to chip off bits of 
rock; he hunts for old workings. The term ‘ old workings ’ is 
capacious, and to some wily prospectors includes old wells, brick fields, 
etc., caveat emptor. 
Even if it was not an interesting country for anyone else, it is a most 
remarkable country to antiquarians. The Zimbabye ruins, for instance, 
repay in interest a journey to Rhodesia. 
It is generally thought that the Phoenicians worked those mines ; but 
whoever it was it is a most extraordinary thing that, if it is such a 
wonderful gold country, there should be no history or record left of it. 
There is probably no alluvial gold left in the country. By alluvial 
gold I mean gold in nuggets, as opposed to quarried ore. The ancients 
probably cleared that out. I believe that payable alluvial gold in South 
Africa varies from alluvial gold in other parts of the world, insomuch 
that in South Africa it is generally found at considerable altitudes 
where it has escaped denudation and not, as in Australia and elsewhere, 
in river beds and recently-deposited plains. 
Before its mining and agricultural prospects can be looked at favorably 
there must be a thorough settlement of the native question, and in many 
parts of the country a proper consideration of the water supply. 
I saw Matabeleland at its very worst; arriving after two years’ 
locusts, about three years’ drought, rinderpest, and the Matabele war. 
The rinderpest was perhaps not an unmitigated evil, because it has 
taken the railway to Buluwayo. I described the difficulties of the road. 
1 can add that the railway will make “ Rhod-esia.” 
Apart from those principal evils, there are one or two minor which 
might be mentioned. 
In the absence of rinderpest they have always the lung disease with 
them, and cattle suffer to a tremendous extent : after inoculation against 
this lung disease the tails of the cattle drop off, giving them rather a 
forlorn appearance. 
