The Irish standard., 1903-12-12

/
reminded me of Lord Westbury's
famous eXpostulation which he ad
dressed to an overbearing barrister
"Pray remember" said the famous
judge, "that 1 am at least vertebrate
animal. Your tone could hardly be
justified if God Almighty were ad-
dressing black beetle"
The notion that the Beers could
make any effective resistance was
| scotfed at with drunken ribaldry. The
mighty force of 10000 men armed
with lyddite shells would simply
crush out the Boer resistance as a
steam roller crushes the frogs which
find themselves beneath it's wheels.
Il am going to be very kind to the
Boers, said Miner shortly before
war broke out. IL am going to give
them thorough beating. and then
will replace them in their old position
under the convention of 1881" Il am
going to give the Boers," said one
doughty British general. 1.-The damn
dest licking they ever had in their
lives in one stand up fight and then
it will he all ovcr.''
In six weeks. said the newspapers.
the British troops will march into
Pretoria. The Daily Mail. the most
harc-brained of all the sycoplantic
prophets of the mob. prophcsied i'm
mediate success. When Il hundred
Beers had bitten the dust. their whole
resistance would collapse. Liberal
imperalists as we'll as Tory .iingocs
shared the dclusion. The prominent
members of the Liberal league scorn-
fully laughed at :; friend of mine who
at her own dinner table ventured to
suggest that the war might be II
tougher job than they anticipated.
1t was to be IL picnic and at Il cost
of $10O0O,O0O British ascendency was
to be firmly established on an eternal
foundation over the whole of South
Africa. 10 doubt this was rnpltriotic
TO suggest that after all justice
might be imminent in the affairs of
men and that morality being in the
nature Of things it might be well for
the nation to have the fear of God
before it's eyes was angril!' resented as
the outcome of treasoiable sympathy
With the enemies of England.
SO the nation was launched into
war. singing maudin songs about the
soldiers of the queen and yelling for
vengeance of AIajuba. Itudyard Kip
ling iungled the doggercl and beat his
tom-tom and all the newspapers ad-
vised their readers to prepare for IL
swift and cOstless and Il brilliant vic
tory
The willingly befooled populace re-
veled for Il few brief weeks in the
cheap and ennobling amusement Of
imaginary triumphs. Then the cur
| tain, lifted on the reality of things and
| disaster after disaster reduced the
proud boasters to such an extremity
| of alarm that when ut last, after
| months of fighting, they succeeded in
| relieving couple of beleaguered gar
| rSons. the mob went mad with de-
!irium and celebrated their belated
| and trllmpery victories by an orgy of
| drunken extravaganza that filled the
| world with wondering amaZement. 10
such Il depth had England fallen.
The campaign which was to have
| been over in six weeks lasted two
years and six months. The eXpcndi-
tllre which was to have been covered
hy SoO.000.0OO mounted up to the
enormous sum of over 81 900, 900. 900.
More soldiers We're nvalided home
than the total force which was to
| have steanl-rOllcrcd the Beers into
submission.
When the war began the war Of
! flee was confident that $4,000 horses
would see it through. When the war
was over it was reported that no fewer
than 51S.OOo horses had been supplied
to the army in the field and that 347,-
600 Of them had left their bones to