He himself originated the plans by which the Mediterranean and Table Bay will eventually be united by bands of steel and strands of copper, and it is through his own personal efforts that the English financiers are being induced to subscribe the money with which his plans are being carried out. The marvellous faith which the English people have in Mr. Rhodes has been illustrated on several occasions when he was called to London to meet storms of protests from shareholders, who feared that the two great enterprises were gigantic fiascos. He has invariably returned to South Africa with the renewed confidence of the timid ones and many millions of additional capital. Mr. Rhodes has tasted of the power which is absolute, and he will brook no earthly interference with his plans. The natives may destroy hundreds of miles of the telegraph lines, as they have done on several occasions. He teaches them a lesson by means of the quick-firing gun, and rebuilds the line. White men may fear the deadly fever of Central Africa, but princely salaries and life-insurance policies for a host of relatives will always attract men to take the risk. Shareholders may rebel at the expenditures, but Mr. Rhodes will indicate to them that their other properties will be ruined if they withdraw their support from the railway and telegraph. A strip of territory belonging to another nation may be an impediment to the line, but an interview with the Emperor of Germany or the King of Portugal will be all-sufficient for the accomplishment of Mr. Rhodes’s purpose. Providence may swerve him in his purpose many times, but nations and individuals rarely. All South Africans agree that Mr. Rhodes is the most remarkable Englishman that ever figured in the history of the African continent. Some will go further and declare that he has done more for the British Empire than any one man in history. No two South Africans will agree on the methods by which Mr. Rhodes attained his position in the affairs of the country. Some say that he owes his success to his great wealth; others declare that his personal magnetism is responsible for all that he ever attained. His enemies intimate that political chicanery is the foundation of his progress, while his friends resent the intimation and laud his sterling honesty as the basis of his successful career. No one has ever accused him of being the fortunate victim of circumstances which carried him to the pre-eminent rank he occupies among Englishmen, although such an opinion might readily be formed from a personal study of the man. South Africa is the indolent man’s paradise, and of that garden of physical inactivity Mr. Rhodes, by virtue of his pre-eminent qualifications, is king. "Almost as lazy as Rhodes" is a South Africanism that has caused lifelong enmities and rivers of blood.