The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1897-02-13
The STORY OF An empire BUILDER.
Cecil Rhodes: AdVenrer. Fnancer Soldier Administrator
Diplomat and ''Nlan of Destiny"


L rom the New OIk tribune.
They have just been apotheosizing
Duplex in Paris, on the two hundredth
anniversary of his birth. AT exactly
the same time in London, they have
been lookin askant at Cecil Rhodes, and
admiring him under protest. Yet the
two men played the same colossal game.
The one lost, and is dead. The other is
winning, and is alive. Must the saying
of the Preacher be considered, and a
dead lion be recloned better than a live
one-not dog. but lion, too? For be sure
this young master of South Africa is
of the true leonne type, and is very
much alive, as two continents well
know.
Not a particularly promising cub at
the beginning, though, nor perhaps self
eNpectant of what has been attained.
TWentyodd years ago he was a weak
ly, slender lad, doomed to consumption
if he remained at home in England. A
few rounds at lawn tennis wearied him,
and oxford studies told most ominously
upon his vital force. The dry air of the
South African uplands might save him !:
the one desperate chance. So he was
taken from Oriel, his course half-finish-
brother to take care of him and to make
money enough in the mines or on the
cattle plans, to pay the way of both, for
they We're a poor mans sons. The air
of Natal put new life into him, and
when, soon after his arrival. the rush to
the blue earth of Kimberley began, he
was strong enough to join it. AS an in
diVidual miner he swung the pick and
fingered the crumbling blue" for dia-
monds. He found them too, and won
health and wealth together. In sur
prisingly short time he had amassed a
snug little fortune, secured stock in un-
developed enterprises of vast potential
ity, and transformed himself into a
brawny, robust athlete. Then, to the
amazement of his envious comrades, he
"cut" the diamond fields and went home
to finish his course in Oxford.
But it was only to finish his course.
His degree Secured-"cum laude," too,
for he was good student-he hastened
back to Kimberley. The various con-
Germs in which he was a Stockholder
We're paying handsomely, and the fever
or speculation was rife. He made his
headquarters not at the mines, but at
the Diamond Exchange, and bought
and sold and bought again the shares
of the mines, on a scale that bewildered
and dismayed all competitors and with
coolness of nerve and sanity of judg-
ment that gave him almost unvarying
success. Presently he secured a ma
Jorlty of the stock of the great De Beers
mine, with $lOOO,OOO capital; reorgan-
lied it's workings so as to double it's
profits; using it as a basis, worked upon
"a NJ hnt tf,,f.
them, too; and finally, some eight years
back, united them all, every mine in the
whole Kimberley region, in the great
De Beers Consolidated. with a capital
of close to $2O,OOO,OOO and a yearly rev.
enue that would gorge many a royal ex-
chequer.
An oxford graduate, a multi-million-
are ana the poSSessor of superb physi-
cal health, and still far on the sunny
SIDE of forty years, what more had he
TO ask? The answer was unmistakable.
He had as yet made only his prepara- :
lions. The real work of his life was vet
to be done, for which wealth. health
and learning We're but tools. 1t is an
ola story, but worth again repeating.
chlelly because it differs from MANY
good stories in being true. Soon after
ms return from England with his Oriel
sheepskin, he was standing one day in
the o1tice of friend a Kimberley dia-
lnond merchant. A large map of Africa
hung on the wall. He gazed at it at
tehtlVely, then laid his hand upon il.
upon the great central region from the
cape 10 Hambesi and even beyond TO
Lake TanEanyika. That all that" he
SAID Tor England. That is my dream!"
mat Is your dream, Is it?" said his
IIIehd' Wen, I'll give you ten years
to wake in"
Truly, the project seemed chimerica1
The Beers We're far more likely to set
the land; or the Portuguese. who al
ready claimed it; or the Germans. who
We're laying hands on the Zanzibar
coast. Memories of Rorke's Drift and
MaJupa Hill made further British CON
quests seem impracticable. But This
was dreamer who would undertake
win ms own hands to make his dream
colle true. He went at the tasl,
WIN complete faith, and in ex-
actiS the same way in which, on the
pasis Oh single mine, he built nm
t"e sledt De Beers consolation. He he
sun with cape Colony, hitherto a mass
VI Jarrlhs, warning factions; showed
i,hsHsh ana Dutch and all the rest
'hat thelr interests were identical.
hlaue the whole colony united as one
man. ana himself the unchallenged
leader. Then he moved beyond the
orange river, and beyond the Kala-
harl Desert, and took up all the land.
10 do this readily he formed a second