Tall, erect, somewhat pompous, but withal very active in his carriage, he carried all the remains of a strong manhood. Of his face I can only say that it was typical of his class: square with a large firm mouth kept closely shut, and carrying, from long habit, an affectation of purpose and determination which was far from the habitual tenor of his mind. His hair was quite white but abundant; he parted it with care upon the left side, and brushed it up clear from his forehead as befitted his sure sense of what was decent in such things. His eyebrows were contracted into a slight mechanical frown, acquired perhaps in the habit of attention, but certainly expressing no anxiety nor even any particular keenness in bargaining. His hands were remarkably steady, his gestures firm and sure. I have heard it said, with a colonial exaggeration, that to see him open his umbrella was to comprehend England from the Reform Bill to Home Rule. The young gentleman who composed this facile epigram, a student with a nasal accent and weak in every organ, was born and bred in Port Elizabeth, to which distant centre of African loyalty he has returned. Let me forget him and continue the description of my friend. His eyes, of a pale grey, were alight with so singular an honesty as to border upon ignorance of the world. He had perhaps never in his life deceived a human being. His business, founded upon ample capital, demanding no credit, existing as a wholesale resource for the trade and independent of advertisement, never required it of him to lie, to cheat, to gamble, or to destroy another’s wealth. Its expansion had been automatic; if his success had raised in him any evil, it was certainly nothing worse than a slight tincture of pride. Of his patriotism I fear to speak lest I should destroy by too violent a praise the impression I desire to produce. It was abundant, it was like a perennial spring; it was the deepest thing in the man. I am certain that had England been in danger he would cheerfully have sacrificed his fortune. He had known nothing but his country; his very religion was in some odd way muddled up with her vices, her spirit, and the peculiar beauties of her landscapes, the less obvious effects of her towns. Indeed, he would have died for her ... perhaps in a sense he _did_ die for her ... his name, manner, and habit of life seemed to me who knew him to be always England, England. With all this there was a failing, which neither I nor even those who were in more daily intimacy with him, could hope to eradicate. The national life, to which he was so deeply attached, had stood still with him for many years.