The daily morning journal and courier., 1899-11-13
SIR BULLER'S PERSONAL SIDE
OBSTINACY IND GRIM DETER MIN-
 4TION
Are Among the British Generals Most Prominent Chnracteristics-H Talks Little, but What He Says Is to the Point.

Among the many sketches of Sir Red
 vers Butler, the British commander in
 chief in South Africa, which have re-
 gently appeared in print none gives a
 better idea of the mans personal side
 than the following from Mainly About
 People:''
 What manner of man is Redvers
 Butler, who left last Saturday, amid the
 plaudts of the crowd, carrying with
 him the good wishes of all? Well, he is
 a soldier of distinction, one who has won
 battles and wears the V. C., who has
 led and followed the lead of others, who
 has worked his way up step by step
 with no particular influence to help
 him. to the highest prize of his profess
 sion, the command of what will be the
 largest British army that has ever left
 these shores. All this you know; you
 know his counterfeit presentment, too,
 but not to very large extent for Bull
 Ter is a rare product in this advertising
 age; he has always been averse from
 giving an interview to pressman or a
 photograph to newspaper, and if his
 picture is to be seen in print or in the
 London shop fronts to-day it is but
 recent and certainly a grudging conces-
 sion. Butler in undress on horseback
 reviewing troops; Butler as sim young colonel-a Queens aide-de-camp; Butler as a middle-aged man of greater girth and with something of jowl; all these are familiar enough to you now. But the Butler In time, the personal Butler, himself, his traits, character, fdiosyncrasies; how much does the pub lie at large know of these? Little enough, and only through a glass dark 1y It is high time that the generalis- simo of her majesty's forces in South Africa who will shortly bearsa great burden fraught with the most moment ous national issues should be better understood by his fellow countrymen.
 First and before all it cannot be stated too clearly and emphatically that he is what our friends across the pond call a real live man. There is no humbug about him, nor anything un- real; what he says he means; what he promises, he performs; what is given to him to do, he does, or has done so far, and that is much to say in this dis appointing world. His fitness for the job now entrusted to him cannot be questioned. He is the best soldier of his standing available for the present cris- is. Lord Wolseley's time for field serv- ice is pretty well over, so is that of Lofd Roberts. The Sirdar can afford to wait for his next great chance and, | seriously speaking, he has not Buffers | qualifications for this particular busi- ness.
 Butler knows his trade by heart, is up to every move, can handle every tool bo of ho craftsman. He has studied soldering practiced 1t continually, and gained an intimate acquaintance with that most difficult profession, war. Those who have seen him at work will bear ample testimony to his worth. He has the natural gifts indispensable to good general; he is watchful and observ- ant, with keen eye for country, full when it should be done; he can wait for the right moment and then strike with concentrated effect. He has the cool judgment that comes of profound self reliance, and his courage is not only of the physical two o'clock in the kind amply shown by feats of daring that are household words, but the rarer moral quality that rises su- | ous crisis of war His record tells but badly of the day at Fl Teb, or that other day at Tamal, when the shaken squares stiffened into fresh and success Full resistance under his personal drec- ion; or the masterly manner in which he got the desert column out of the .ightest places at Metemmeh iafter Herbert Stewart and Burnaby had been struck down at Abu Klea.
 A British general called to high com nand Has more to do than march and to bring his enemy to bat le and meet him. He has to manipu- ate the threads of the somewhat cum- ,rous military machinery that holds him ight, and may often hamper and hinder jim from distance. He is never quite { rec of War Office control, for he is at he end of the wire, and may always l xpect interference, Not the least of ( 3uIler's merits is that he knows our var office by heart, for he has been ( loosely associated with it for years as |
 military staff officer in the highest I Trades. He has profound contempt ( or it, too His evidence given before q he committee for decentralizins war ! flee work, and giving more initiative
  nd stations at home and abroad, was uite amusing in it's outspoken ridicule t f war office methods. He gave it as is opinion that the clerks thought the . rmy existed solely for them, and that | hey had invented half the red tape and outline simply that the might justify q heir existence and that one of the first asults of decentralization would be to Il ut down their number. Butler is no courier, but he has al- l avs been popular with the royal fam v. There is a strong bond of personal T ttachment between him and the Duke f Cambridge. He was long the trust ] friend and right hand of the late II in chief, to such an extent s' lat he was practically the head of the D rmy for years. It was then, no doubt, lat Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman, as ecretary of War, conceived that high oinion of him which so nearly made Il i'm the dukes successor. Butler could Il ly anything to the duke. A year after u le latter's retirement he was sitting in uller's room (the duke could not keep way from the war office at first; the lhit had become ingrGinCd) bem0auiug fl