“Master Lionel’s speech has been very foolish, and is likely to do a great deal of harm and no good—unless his instructions are to incite to bloodshed—and I can scarcely imagine such instructions to have gone out while the boom is lasting. If there is anything that is likely to put Paul Kruger’s back up, it is threats; and unless Cecil Rhodes is prepared to back up with his Matabele heroes those threats, you will find the Volksraad of 1896 give an unmistakable answer to what they will wrongly call ‘British threats.’” How the real state of things was comprehended locally is evinced in the answer to that letter, dated December the 10th: “Your remark concerning Rhodes’ Matabele heroes is probably more prophetic than you yourself are aware of. South Africa is, as you say, the land of surprises.” Among the parties privy to the conspiracy the date of uprising was spoken of as the “day of flotation.” It was carefully discussed, as was the use that could be made of the British crown officials at the Cape. Arms and ammunition for the use of the revolutionists continued to arrive at Johannesburg, concealed in coal trucks and oil tanks. It looked like an appointment when, on the 21st of December, Colonel Rhodes, brother and representative of Cecil Rhodes at Johannesburg, telegraphed to the Cape that a high official, whom he called the “Chairman,” should interfere at the earliest possible moment, and that he and Mr. Cecil Rhodes should start from Cape Town for Johannesburg on the “day of flotation.” This telegram has been interpreted to mean that the conspirators wanted to create just enough of disturbance to justify alarming telegrams and calls for help, but not so prolonged and violent as to make it necessary for them to lead a hand-to-hand fight against the burghers in the streets of Johannesburg. They would have the Jameson force near enough to take the brunt of the fighting, and the High Commissioner to come in opportunely to mediate a peace favoring the re-establishment of British control in the Transvaal.