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LORD KITCHENER

BY

G. K. CHESTERTON

LO
OON

19 1 7

LORD

I( IT C I I E N I
f<

I IORATIO I-I ER BERT IZ ITCH E
ER was Irish hy
birth but English by extraêtion, being born in
County I(erry, the son of an English colonel. '[he
fanciful might see in this first and accidental íact,
the presence of this siInplc and practical Illéln
amid the Illore Inystical \vestern probleins. and
dreallls \vhich were very distant froIll his nlind, an
element ,yhich clings to all his career and gives it an
unconscious poetry. He had Inany qualities of the
epic hero, and especially this-that he was the last
man in the ,,"orId to be the epic poet. '[here is
something almost provocative to superstition in tll<'
,yay in \vhich he stands at every turn as the sYInbol
of the special trials and the moclLrn tr;lI
sfìgtlration
of Engl?nd; froIn this InOlnent when he was born
aInong the peclsants of Ireland to the 111nllH'nt
\vhen he died upon the sea, seeking at the ot her ('nd
of the world the other gn'at peasant civilisïtioll of
Russia. Yet at each of t hes(' SYIll bolic IlH>lncllts
he is. if not as unconscious as a synlboI, t 11('n as
silent as a sYInbol; he is spcechless and suprelncly
significant, like an ensign or a fLlg, I'he sup(
rfìcial
picturesqueness of his lif,
, at least, lies vpry 11luch
in this-that he \vas like a h!.
ro condemned by fate
to act an allegory.

t

[ B
J

LOI
D IZITCI-IENER.

\Ve find this, for instance, in one of the very first
and perhaps one of the mo.;;t picturesque of all the
facts that are recorded or reported of him. As a
youth, tall, very shy a.nd quiet, he was only notable
for inteIìectual interests of the soberest and most
Inethodical sort, especially for the close study of
Jllathematics. This also, incidentally, \vas typical
enough, for his \vork in Egypt and the Soudan, by
,,'hich his fame \\"as established, \\'as based \vholly
upon such calculations. It was not Inerely
Inathematical but literally geometrical. His work
bore the same relation to Gordon's that a rigid
Inathen1atical diagraln bears to d. rough pencil
sketch on \vhich it is based. Yet the student tthus
Lent on the strictest side of his profession, studying
it at \V oohvich and entering the Engineers as the
Inost severely scientifÌc branch of the army, had as
a first expericnce of war something so rOlnantic that
it has been counted incredible, yet something so,
relevant to the great reality of to-day that it might
ha ,.e been Inade up centuries after his death, as a
ITJ)'th is made up about a god. He happened to be
in France in the most tragic hour that France has
ever known or, please God, will ever know. She
,,'as bearing alone the \vcight of that alien tyranny,
of that hopeless and aln10st lifeless violence, \"hich
the other nations have since found to be the \vorst of
all the terrors \vhich God tolerates in this \\"orld. She
trod that \vinepress alone; and of the peoples there
were none to help her. J n 1870 the Prussian had
already encircleq Paris, and General Cranzy ""as
fighting against enormous odds to push no!"th
\'ards

2

LORD I(ITCIIENER.

to its relief, \vhen his army \vas joined by the young
and silent traveller from England. All that was in
Kitchener's mind or nlotives will perhaps never be
known. France was still something of an ideal of
civilisation for many of the more generous English
gentry. Prussia was never really an ideal for anybody,
even the Prussians, and mere success, ,,'hich could
not make her an ideal, had not yet calalnitously Illade
her a model. There \vas in it also, no doubt, a
touch of the schoolboy who runs away to sea-
that touch of the schoolboy \vithout the sense of
which the staidest Englishman will always be
inexp'licable. But considered historically there is
something strangely moving about the incident-the
fact that Kitchenpr \\?as a French soldier altnost
before he \vas an English one. As Hannibal ,vas
dedicated in boyhood to 'war against the eagles of
Rome, Kitchener 'was dedicated, almost in boyhood,
to "rar against the eagles of Gerrriany. Ronlance
came to this realist, ,,'hether by ilnpulse or by
accident, like a ,vind froIll without, as first lo\.t>
\vill conle to the \\Toman-hater. He \vas already,
both by fate and choice, sOll1ething Blore than he
had meant to be. The Inathenlatician, \\rc Inight
almost say the calculating boy, ,vas already gaInbling
in the highest lottery ,vhich led to the high(
st
and most historic loss. 1'he engineer devoted to
discipline ,vas already a free lance, because alreaJy
a knight-errant.
He returned to England to continue his COIll-
paratively humdrum order of advancement j and the
next call thdt canle to hinl was of a strangcl y

J

LOT
0 I{ITCIIE
ER'.

different and yet also of a strangely significant kind.
rl'he Palestine Exploratioa Fund sent him \vith
another officer to conduct topographical and anti-
quarian investigations in a country \vhere practical
exertions are always relieved against a curiously
incongruous background-as if they \vere setting up
telegraph-posts through the Garden of Eden or
opening a railway station. at the Ne\v Jerusaleln.
But the contrast bet\veen antiquity and modernity
\vas not the only one j there was still the sort of
contrast that can be a collision. I(itchener \vas
almost immediately to conle in contact \vith \vhat
\vas to be, in various aspects, the problem of his
life-the modern fanaticisms of the Near East.
There i
an English proverb which asks \vhether
the mountain goes to l\Iahomet or he to the
Inountain, and it may be a question whether his
religion be the cause or the effect of a certain
spirit, vivid and yet strangely negative, \vhich dwells
in such deserts. \Valking alnong the olives of Gaza
or looking on the Philistine plain, such travellers
may well feèl that they are treading on cold
volcanoes, as empty as the mountains of the moon.
But the mountain of Mahomet is not yet an extinct
volcano.
I<itchener, in these first days of seemingly mild
and minute duties, was early aware of it. At Safed,
in the Galilean hills, his small party had found
itself surrounded by an Arab mob, stricken suddenly
mad with emotions unintelligible to the political
mobs of the \Vest. He \\'as hiInself ,,-ounded,
but, defending hinlself as Lest he coulJ \\rith a
.J.

ORD I(ITCHE:\ER.

walking-stick, not only saved his own life but that
of his fellow-officer, Lieutenant Conder, \vho had
been beaten to the earth \vith an Arab club. He
continued his work indeed \vith prosaic pertinacity"
and developed in the survey of the Holy L
nd all
that almost secretive enthusiasm for detail \vhich
lasted all his life. Of the most famous English
guide-book he made the characteristic reInark,
"\Vhere Murray has seven nan1es I have a hundred
and sixteen." Most men, in speaking or writing of
such a thing, would certainly have said" a hundred."
It is characteristic of his type that he did not even
think in rour:d numbers. But there was in hin1,
parallel. to this almost arithmetical passion, another
quality which is, in a double sense, the secret of his
life. . For it \vas the cause of at least half his
success; and yet he very successfully concealed it
-especially from his admirers.
The paradox of all this part of his life lies in
this-that, destined as he \vas to be the greatest
enemy of l\lahomedanism, he was quite exceptionally
a friend of M"aholnedans. He had been first received
in that land, so to speak, with a blow on the head
\vith a club; he was destined to break the sword of
the last Arab conqueror, to \vreck his holy city anù
treat all the religious traditions of it with a deliberate
desecration \vhich has often been held oppressive
and was undoubtedly ruthless. Yet \vith the indi-
vidual Moslem he had a sort of natural brotherhood
\vhiéh has never been explained. Had it been shown
by a soldier of the Crusades, it \voulJ have been
called witchcraft. In this, as in many other cases,
5

LO I{ 0 [Z 1 T' C I I E 1'\ E R.

the advance of a larger enlightenment prevents us
froIll calling it dnything. There ,,'as mixed with it,
no doubt, the deep l\Ioslem admiration for mere
Inasculinity, which has prc!Jably by its exaggeration
permitted the l\Ioslem subordination of \vomén.
But I(itchener (,,'ho \vas hiInself accused, rightly
or wrongly, of a disdain for ,,'ornen) Inust have
himself contributed SOBle other element to the-
strangest of international sympathies. \Vhatever
it was, it nlust be constantly kept in mind as
run"ning parallel to his scientific industry and
particularity; for it \vas these hvo po\vers, used
systematically for many years before the event, that
prepared the ground for the overthro,,' of that wild
papacy and \\randering empire \vhich so long hung
in the desert, like a mirage to mislead and to
destroy.
Kitchener \vas called away in 1878 to similar
surveying duties in Cyprus, and afterwards in
Anatolia, where the saIne faculty obtain
d him a
fìr1Jzall, making him safe in all the Holy Cities
of Islam. He also dealt much with the Turkish
fugitives fleeing from the Russian guns to Erzerum
-\vhither, so long after,. the guns were to follo\v.
But it is \vith his later summons to
gypt that
we fee] he has returned to the theatre of the great
things of his life. It is not necessary in this rough
sketch to discuss the rights and \\ rongs or the
genpral international origin of the British occupa,tion
of Egypt; the degree of praise or blame to be
given to the Khedive, who W3S the Jlominal ruler,
or to Arabi, the Nationalist leader, who for a time
6

LORD l(ITCIIE
EH.,

seized the chief power in his place. I(itchener's
services in the op
rations by which Arabi \vas
defeated \\'ere confined to some reconnaissance
\vork irnlnediately prpcLJing the bombardment of
Alexandria; and the problem \vith which his own,
personality became identified was not that of the-
Governlnent of Egypt, but of the more barbaric
power beyond, by which Egypt, and any powers
ruling it, came to be increasingly irnperilled. And
what advanced hiIn rapidly to posts of real responsi-
bility in the new politics of the country \vas the
knowledge he already had of \vilder nlen and more
mysterious forces than could be founJ in Egyptian
courts or even Egyptian calnps. I t was the cOInbi-
nation, of which we ha ve already spoken, of detailed
experience. and almost eccentric sYInpathy. .In
practice it \vas his knowledge of Arabic, and still
more his knowledge of Arabs.
There is in Islam a paradox which is perhap3 a
permanent nlenace. The great creed born in tlH>
desert creates a kind of ecstasy out of the vt'ry
emptiness of its own land, and e\'en, one In:
y say,
out of the emptiness' of its own theology. It af1ìnns,
with no little sublin1ity, sonlething that is not tnerely
the singleness but rather the solitude of God,
There is the sanle extreIne simplification in the
solitary figure of the Prophet; and yet this isolation
perpetually reacts into its o\\'n opposite. A voill
is tnade in the heart of Islanl \vhich has to be
filled up again and again by a mere repetition of th(>
revolution that founded it. l'here are no sacralnents ;
the only th
ng that can happell is a sort
f apocalypsp,
7

[ c J

L 0 I { I ) IZ rr elf E:\ E R .

as unique as the cnn uf the \\"orlù; so the
apocal fpse can only be repeated and the world
end again and again. Thl're are no priests; and yet
this equality can only bn
ed a Inultitlldt
ùf la\rless
propht"ts alrnùst as IlUln
rOUS as priests. l'he \'l'ry
dog'na that thère is only on
:\Iaholnet proùuces an
endless prvcession of :\I.tholnets. Of these the
Illightiest in III oJ ern tin1è
\\'ere the In an whose
I1aIne was ,:\.h HIed, and \rhose I110re falnous titk

was the :\Iahdi; and his Illore ferocious successor
.. \bdullahi, who \vas generally known as the I(halifa.
These great fanatics, or great creators of fanaticism,
succeeded in Inaking a InilitarisITI alInost as fatnous
and fonnidablc as that of the 'Turkish Elnpire on
\\'hose frontiers it ho\'ered, and in spreading a reign
of terror such as can seldonl be organised except
by civilisation. \ Yith !\ apoleonic suddenness anù
success the i\Iahdist hordes had fallen on the anny
of I licks Pasha, \\'hen it lelt its caInp :it Olndunn;ul,
on the Xile opposite l(hartouIll, and had cut it to
pieces in a fashion incredible. '1'hey had establisheù
at Olndunnan their IIoly City, the Ronle of their
nnlnadic ROlnan EIllpire. 'fowards that terrible
pl:tcf
Inany ad\'enturous nlcn, like puor Ifi.cks, had
((\ )fl
anu were destined to
o.
rhc sands that

u
l'l1circll'ù it 'Yen.: like that entrance to the lion's
C;L\'t:rn in the fable, towards which 111 any footprints
pointed, anù fronl which none returneù.
'rhe last of these "..tS Gordon, that r0l11antic and
e\'en eccentric figure of wholn so Inuch Illight be
said. Perhaps the nlost essential thing to say of
him hert..: is that fortune OnCe again playeu the artist
8

L()RI) I
I'rCIIE='IEI{.

in sending such a man, at once as the leader and
the herald of a Inan like J<itchener; to show the
way and to n1ake the occasion; to be a sacrifice
and a signal for vengeance. \Vhate\'er else then-'
was about Gordon, then-' was abl-)ut hilll thf" air not
only of a hero, but of the h
ro ef a tragedy. SOlne-
thing Oriental in his own Inysticisl11, sOlnething
Inost of his countrYInen would have called n1UOll-
shine, something perverse in his courage, somethiTlg
childish and beautiful in that perversity, Inarked hiln
out as the man who \valks to doon1-the man \rho in
a hundred pOeIllS or fables goes up to a city to be
crucified. He had gone to Khartoum to arrange the
\vithdrawal of the tro:::>ps from the Soudan, the Govèrn-
mpnt having decided, if possible, to live at peace \vith
the new l\Iahdist dictatorship; and he went through
the deserts aln10st as solitary as a bird, on a journey
as lonely as. his end. He was cut off and besieged in
I(hartout11 by the Mahdist annies, and fell with the
falling city. Long before his end he had been
in touch \vith I{itchener, now of the Egyptian
Intelligence DepartInent, and weaving very carefully
a vast net of diploll1acy and strategy in whiçh the
slayers of Gordon \vere to be taken at last.
A \vell-known English journalist, Bennet
Burleigh, \vanJering near Dongola, fell into con-
versation \vith an &'\rab who spoke excellent English,
and \vho, ,,-ith a hospitality highly ill1proper in a
1\IosleIn, produced two bottles of claret for his
entertainment. The naIne of this Arab was
Kitchener; and the two bottles \v__'re all he had.
T

lournalist obtained, along with the claret, his'
9

[ c
j

L()J
} ) I\: I'f (' II E
F R,

fìrst glitnpse of th
great and extraorJinary scltenles
with \\'hich I(iteh{
ner \\-as already wurking to
a \.enge the cOInrade who had fallen in }<hartourn.
'l'his part of the work was as per:-;onal as that of a
priYat
detecti\ge plotting ag<linst a private rnurderer
in a Inodcrn detecti\'e story. IZitchcner had learned
to speak the Arah. tongue not only freely but
sociably. He ,,'ore th
.\rab dress and fen illto the
.\rab type of courtesy so effectively that even hi

blue northern eyes did not betray hinl. Above all,
he sYInpathised \vith the Arab character j and in
a thousand places sprinkled over the map of
North-East Africa he made friends for hilnself and
therefore enen1Îes for the l\lahdi. This \vas the
first and superficially the BlOSt indi,'idual of
the converging plans \rhich \vere to checkmate
the desert etnpire; and its effects \rere very far-
reaching. Again and again, in subsequent years,
when the Inissionaries of the l\lahdist rt-'ligion
pushed northward, they found theInselves entangled
anlong tribes \,'hich the English power held not so
I1luch conquered as converted. 1'he legend of the
great Prophet encountered son1ething nlore elusive
than laws or tnilitary plans; it encounten
d another
legend-an influence which also c3rried the echoes
of the voice of a Inan. 1'he Ababdeh Arabs, it was
said, made a chain across the desert, \vhich the new
and awful faith could not pass. The Mudir of
Dongola was on the point of joining the ever-
yjctorious Prophet of OIndunnan. I<itchener, clad
as an Arab, went out ,tltnost alone to speak \vith
hin). \Vhat passed, perhaps, we can never tell; but

10

LO J{ f) I
IT C flE:\ E R ,

before his guest had l:\'en Ie ft hiIn the :\1 udir nl
\\"
to anns, fell upon the Prophet's hosts at I(orti, and
dro\
e them befor
hin1.
The second and superficially J110re solid process
of preparation is nluch bettcr known. I twas thc
education of the nati\.c Egyptian anny. It is not
necessary to swallow all thc natural jingoisln of
English journalisln in ordf'r to sec something truly
historic about. the English orficer's \rod.:: with the
Fellaheen, or nati\
e race of Egypt. l
"or centuries
they had lain as Icyel as the slin1e of the Nïle, and
all the conquerors in the chroniclt.:s of Inen h
d
passed over them like a p.1.vernent. '[hough pro-
fessing the challenging crèed of the 1\1 nslenls, t hl'r
seeJl1' to havè reached s0I11t'thinp' likc the } )cssiInist
,:>
patience of the I-lindoos, 'r 0 ha ve turned this slilne
once nlore into a human riv
rJ to haye lifted this
pavement once rnore into a hUI11an rampart or
barricade, is not a sInall thing, nor a thing that
could possihly be done even by Inere PO'\\"E>r, still
less by mere nloney-and this I{itchener and his
English companions certain]y did. '-[here 111ust have
been sOInething Inuch nlore than a Inere cynical
severity in" organis:ltion IJ in the In'ln \rho did it.
There Inust be son1ethin
r In0re than a Inere cOln-
.

rnercial COIntnon-Sènsc in the nation in whose n
lIn
it \\
as done. I t is easy enough, with suftìcient
dulness and greed of detail, to " organise" anything
or anybody. It is easy enough to Inake people
obey a bugle (or a factory ho. )ter) as tl
e Prussian
soldiers obey a bugle. But it is no sllch trumpet
that Inakes possible the resurr
ction of the dead

I I

LORO 1
ITC}IEXER.

The success of this second of the three
con\'crging designs of I{itchener, the making of
a new Egyptian army, \vas soon seen in the
expedition against I)ûngola. It had been .fore-
shadowed in a successful defence of Suakin, in
which l,itchencr was wounded; a defence against
OsnIan 11igna, -perhaps the first of the M ahdist
gl'llcrals whose o\\'n strongholds \\'ere eyentuaHy
stunned at Genlaizch: and in the victory at Toski,
where fell the great \varrior \Vad el N jume, \vhose
stratcgy had struck down both Hicks and Gordon.
nut the turn of the tide \\'as Dongola. In 18 9 2
General, now Lord Grenfell, who had been Sirdar,
or COlnmandcr-in-Chief of the Egyptian Anny, and
ordered the advance at T oski, retired and left his
post \'acanl. The great public servant known
latterly as Lord CrOITIer had long had his eye on
IZitchener and the part he had played, even as a
young lieutenant, in the new military formation of the
Fellaheen. He \\"as now put at the head of the \\'hole
ne\\' anny j and the first \\"ork that fell to him \vas
leading the new expedition. In three days after the
order \\'as received the force started at nightfalI and
nlarchcd southward into the night. The detail is
SOllIet hing Inorc than picturesque; for on all
accounts of that fonnidable attack on the Mahdi's
power a quality of darkness rests like a kind of cloud.
It was, for onc thing, a surprise attack and a very
secret one, so that the cloud ,,"as as practical as a
cloak; but it ,,'as also the re-entrance of a territory
\\"hich an instinct h.ls It,d the English to ca1l the
I)ark Continent c\'en undL'r its blazing noon. [here

J

LORD KITCHENER.

vast dìstances alone made a veil like that of darkness,
and there the lives of Gordon and Hicks and
hundreds more had been s\val1owed up in an ancient
silence. Perhaps \ve caniìot guess to-day, after
the colder completion of Kitchener's \vork,
\vhat it meant for those Who \vent on that
nocturnal march j \vho crept up in t\VO linp.s, one
along the river and the other along an abandoned
raih\'ay track, moving through the black night j and
in the black night encamped, and ,vaited for the
rising of the moon. Anyhow, the tale told of it
strikes this note, especially in one touch of \vhat can
only be caned a terrible triviality. I mean the
reference to the new noise heard just before day-
break, revealing the nC.1rness of the enemy: the
dreadful drum of Islam, calling for prayer to an
awful God-a God not to be \vorshipped by the
chang:ing ánd sometimes cheerful notes of harp or
organ, but only by the drum that maddens by
nlere repetition.
But the third of Kitchener's lines of approach
remains to consider. The surprise attack, \vhich
captured the riverside village of Firket, had even-
tually led, in spite of storms that ,varred .on the
adv;}nce like armies, and in one place practically
\"iped out a brigade, to the fall of Dongola itself.
But. Dongola \"as not the high place of the enemy;
it was not there that (;ordon died or that Abdullahi
was still alive. Far aw
y up the dark river \vere the
twin cities of the tragedy, the city of the murder and
t he city of the murderer. It ,vas in relation to this
Qxed point of fact th:lt IZitchpner's next proceeding
13

Lel R I) 1, I TC I I EX E R,

is 5e
11 to b:

'..lprenlPly characteristic, He was so
anxious to dn one thing that he \\yas cautious about
doing it. Ill" "-as nlorc concerned to obtain a success
t h=ll1 tn a ppear to desrr\'c it; he did not "rant a
1l1oral yictory, but a Inathenlatical certainty. So far
frpIll following up the dash in the dark, upon Firket
or I Jongnla, with Inore rOlnantic risks, he decided
not to ;u.h-ance on the :\Iahdi's host a Ininute faster
than nlen could foHo,," him building a raihvay_
lIt" created ut"hind hi:n a coloss:ll causeway of
('nIl11lIunicatiolls, going out alone into \\';lstes where
there ,yas and had been no other morlal tr:lce
or t rack. The engineering genius of Girouard,
a Canadian, designed aDd developed it witla
what was. considering the nature of the t:lsk,
hrilliant rapidity; but by the standards of desert
warfare it must ha\ye
eemed that Kitchener and his
English Inade ,rar as slowly as grass grows or
orchards hear fruit. The horselnen of ..<\raby, darting
to and fro like s\\"al1ows, nlust ha\"c felt as if they
were nlenaced by the ad,"ance of :t giant snail. But
it ,,"as a snail that left a shining track unknown to
those sands; for t he first tinle since Rome decay
d
sotn<,t hing ""as hping Inadc there that could reInain.
rrh.. effect uf this gro\,.ing road, on
Inight alnlost
say this li,"ing road, began to be felt. Mahmoud
tlu' :\Iahdist military leader, fell back froln Berber,
:lnd
at hcred his hosts mOft
closely round the
sacred city ()11 the :\ile. l(itchencr, nlaking another
night Inarch up the .-'\tbara ri\ycr, stormed t he Arab
(:nnp and tOîk
tahlnoud prisoner. Then at Jast
he tnovcd lìl1dl1y up tht
western bank of the Nile

14

tCJ k r J I\: I T C r I EX E R 0

and came in sight of OIndurrnan. It is sOlncwhat
of a disproportion to dwell on the fight that followed
and the fall of the great city. The fìghtin..
had
been done already, and nlore than haH Of it was
\vorking; fighting a long fight against thp centuries,
against age
of sloth and the great sle
p of the
desert, where there had been nothing but \'i
ion
,
and against a racial decline that men haù accepted
as a doon1. On the fol1o,,-ing Sunday a 111eInorial
ser\.ice for Charles Gordon "ras held in the place
,,'here he ".as slain.
The fact that l<itchcner fought with rails as ITIuch
as with guns rather fixed from this tinle forward the
fashionable vie\\' of his character. He was taJ!,cd
of as if he ".ere himself made of Inetal, \\.ith a head
filled not only with calculations but \vith clockwork.
This is symbolically true, in so far as it means that
he was by tenlper what he ".as by trade, an enginc(
r.
He had conquered the lVIahdi, where many haft
failed to do so. But whAt he had chiefly conquered
\vas the desert-a great and greedy giant. J--Ie
hrought Cairo to Khartounl; \\re n1ight say that
he brought London or Li\-erpool ,,"ith hin1 to
the o'ates of the stranf!e cit y . of OIlldunnan. SOllll'

.

parts of his action supported, even regnottably, th,.
reputation of rigidity_ But if any adnlirer haù, in
this hour of triumph, been
taring at hinì as at a
stone sphinx of inflexible fate, that adlnin>r wou!d
have been ,"pry much puzzled by the next. passage f Ii
his life. l{itchener ""as somet hing 111uch Inore than
a machinc; for in the mind, as Jnuch as in the hí}dy,
flexibility is far nlore m;c-)culiIJc than infl(.xibllity.
15

I J) R f) 1'- I Tell E
E H..

:\ sit ua tion dl'\'l'lopl"d ahnost instant ly after his
\"ictor\' in which he was to show that he ,vas a
d i plorl1;l t ist cl
well as a sold ier. At F ash()[Ia, a
little farther up tht'
ill', he found sornething Blare

urprisil1g, and pt'rha ps .lll0re rotnantic, than the
wildl'st .den'ish of the desert solitu(tes. A French
oOlccr, and one of t h
1l1o:..t ,"aliant and distinguisht.j
of Frl'nch officers, :\Iaj 'r :\Iarchand, had penetrated
to tl1t' place with the pt'rtinacity of a great explorer,
and
l'c'Inl'd prcpared to hold it with all the uns(.ltìsh
;1rr o gal1ct: of a patriot. I t is said that thp
Fn'nchlnan not onl\" \relcolllcd I{itchener in the
n;une of France, but in,'ited hi Ill, with courtt'(ìUS
irony, to partake nf ,'cgt'tables grown on thp
pot.
;1 syrnbol of stabl,' occup.ltiou. '[he story, if it be
tnl',', is adlI1irably French; for it rc"eal

t on('('
tht. wit and tht, pt'asant. But th(' hUIHour of th(
Englishlnan was worthily equal to the wit of tht'
Frl'nchlnan; and it was hun10ur of that san(' sort
which \re call good htlInour. Political papt'rs in
p:lcifìc England and FralH't' ravcd and ranted O\'t'r
the crisis, responsible journals howled with jingoism;
but through it clll, until the ITIOlllent when the
Fn 'neh agreed to retire) the two Jllost placable and
t'\"\'n
oC ia hIe fi gu n'
were the t\\"o gri In tropical
tra\'t,llt-rs and soldiers who faced e:lch other on the
hUrl11n

ands or Fashoda. l\S we see thenl facing

'cl('h ot her, Wl' have again the ,'ague sense of a
sign or a parable \\'hich runs through this story.
Fo:' they \\'l're to nH' ,t again long afterwards
lS
a1"lit '
. wh('n hot h wen' leading their CouIltrYI11en
ag;1in
t the great enelny in the Great \Var.
If>

LOR () I
IT C I II
:\ E R,

SOlnething of the saIne shadow of proph('cy is
perhaps the deepest tneITIOry left by the last ,,'ar
of I<itchener before the greatest. :\fter further
activities in Egypt and the Soudan, of ".hich the
attCI11pt to educate the Fellaheen by the Gorùon
l\1emorial College ,vas the Tnost rem.arkahlt', he ".as
abruptly summoned to South Africa to be the right
hand of Lord H.oberts in the ,,'ar t hen being waged
against the Boers, IIc conducted the opening c)f
the determining battle of Paardeherg, and was
typically systematic in covering the half -conqtH'rcd
country \vith a systenl of block-houses and enclosures
like a diagram of geometry. Dut to-day, and for
nlany reasons, Englishnlen ,,'ill think first of lhC'
last scene of that war. \Vhen Botha and tlH'
Boer Generals surrendered to l
itchelH'r, tIH'I"l'
was the same goodwill among the soldiers to
contrast "rith the ill-\\rill of the journalists. Botha
also became altnost a friend; and Botha also
was to be in the far future an ally, snliting the ,
GenTIan in Africa as I<itchener smote hi In in Europe,
There \vas the same hint of prophecy about the \rar
that ended at Vereeniging as about that other war
that so nearly began at Fashoda. It sectned altnost
as if God \vcrc pitting his heroes against each ntlH'r
in tournament, before. they all rode togeth('r against.
the heathen pouring upon thenl out of Genllany.
It is with that nanle of Gcnnany that this 111c'rc'
skeleton of the facts Inust end. After t hc' SOUL.I
African \Var l<itchencr had beèn made 'COI:1I11:Llld('r-
in-Chief in India, \vhere he effccted se\'c'ral \'ita]
changes, notably the elnancipatioll of 1 hat ollìcc'
J7

LORI) I
ITCIIE:'
ER.

froln the yeto of the l\1ilitary MeInber of the
Cl)uncil of the \Ï-cproy, and \\
here he showed once
Illore, in his dealings \\
ith the Sepoys, that
o!'scure y(>t p(yxerful sYInpathy ,,'ith the Inysterious
intellect of the East. rrhence he had been again
shifted to Egypt; but t
e next sumInons that came
to hinl s\\'allowcd up all these things. A short tinle
after ,,'ar broke out \rith Germany he \\
as made
:\Iinister of \Var, and held that post until the dark
Sl."ason when he set out on a mission to Russia, which
ne\'er reached its goal. But \vhen his ship ,vent
down he had already llone a \vork and registered a
chang(' in England, ,,'ith some \vords about which
this sketch nlay ,,-ell conclude. Journalistic attacks
,,'ere indeed Inade upon hiIn, but in \\'
itin for a
.f or eig n reader I pass them by. J n s uch a place I
,,'ill not say even of the meanest of Englishmen \vhat
they \\'ere not ashaIned to say of one of the greatest.
I n his new work he \vas not only a very great man,
but one dealing ",ith very great things j and perhaps
his most historic nloment ,vas when he broke his
customary silence about the deeper elllotions of life,
and became the mouthpiece of the national horror
at the Gernlan fashion of fighting, ,,'hich he declared
to have left a stain upon the ".ho)e profession of arms.
F or, by a 1l10VCInent unusually and unconsciously
dramatic, he chose that moment to salute across the
long stretch of years the comparative chivalry and
nobility of his dead enemies of the Soudan, and to
announce that in the heart of Europe, in learned
acad('mies and ordered governlncnl offices, there
had appeared a lunacy so cruel and unclean that
,.8

I .( ) R [) I
rr C I I r
\' E I
.

the madùest dervish dead in the d
sert had a right
to disdain it \"here he lay.
Kitchener, like other Englishnlen of his type,
rnade his name outside England and even -outside
Europe. But it \vas in England, and after h:s return
to England, that he did what \viII perhaps filake his
name 1110St pennanent in history. That return to
England "'as indeed as symbolic as his last aÌ1d tragic
journey to Russia. Both will stand as syulbols of
the deepest things \vhich are rnoving I11ankind in
the Great War. In truth t:le whole of that great
European movement which \ve call the cause of the
Allies is in itself a home'vard journey. I t is a return
to native and historic ideals, after an exile in
the. hO\\Tling \vilderness of the political pessiIl1isI11
and cynicism of Prussia. After his great ad ventures
in Africa and .-\sia, the Englishman has. re-discovered
Europe; and in the very act of discovering J
urope,
the Englishman has at last discovered England.
The revelation of the forces still really to be found
in England itself, \\.hen all is said that can pos
ihly
or plausibly be said against English conllllercialisin
and selfishness, \vas the last work of LorJ IZitchcner.
He \vas the embodinlent o{ an enonnous e
periencl'
\vhich has passed through Impc.>rialisnl and rcach:'d
patriotisnl. He had been the suprelne figure (,f
that strange and spra\vling England which li(':-;
beyond England; \vhich carries the habits of
Enalish clubs and hotels into the solitudes uf the
b
Nile or up the passl's of the HiIl1alayas, ;ind is
infinitely ignorallt of things infinitely nearer hOllle.
For this type of Englishman Cairu was ncan'r than
19

L ( ) 1{ I ) I
1'1' C I I E
E I{.

Calai
. \ret tlh' typical figure ,,'hich "9C associated
with such places as Cairo ,,'as destined before he died
to open again the anëient gate of Calais and lead in a
new and noble fashion the return of E'
gland to
Europe. 'rh(> .gre:lt change for which his country-
IHen will probably rell1
nl ber hinl longest was \vhat
,re should call in EnglaQd the revolution of the New
,\nllies.
I t i
ahnost i,npossible to express ho\v great a
re\'o)ution it was so as to con\'ey its dimensions to
the citizens of any other great Europe
n country
,,"here Inilitary service has ]ong been the rule and
not the exception, where the people itself is only
the army in Inufti_ In its mere aspect to the eye it
was sonlething like an invasion by a strange race_
'The English professional soldier of our youth had been
conspicuous not only by his red coat but by his rarity.
\ \ïlen rare things become conlmon they do not becom{
l'O)n IHOJ1 plac
. The tnelnory of their singularity is
still strong enough to give thelll rather the'
appearance of a prodigy, as anyone can realise
by inlagining an army of hunchbacks or a city of
one-eYt-'d tnen. The English soldier had indeed
been respected as a patriotic synlbol, but rather
:\S .1 priest or a prince can be a syn1bol, as being
dh a exception and not the rule. A child was taken
to see the suldier outside DuckinghalH Palace altnost
a
ht> was taken tu See the I{ing driving out of
Buckinghanl Palace. lienee the first effect of th

enlargcIllcnt uf the annies was sotnething ahnost
like a fairv-tale-almost as if the streets were
cro
'iùeù with kings, wal king about and wearing

20

LO r
1 ) (( l'rC II E
E R.

crowns of gold. This 111erely optical vision of th(

revolution \\'as but the first iInpression of a reality
equally \'ast and new. l'he first leyies which came
to be called popularly Kitchener's Army, becaus

of the energy and inspiration with which he set
hinlself to their organisation, consisted entin"ly of
\"olunteers. I t was not till long after the \\"hol

face of England had been transformed by this
Inobilisation that the Governnlent resorted to COlll-
pulsion to bring in a mere margin of men.
a\'e
for the personality of Kitchener, the ne\\T Inilitarisrn
of England came \vholly and freely fronl the English.
While it \vas as universal as a tax, it was as SpCH1-
taneous as a riot. But it is obvious that to produce
so large and novel an effect out of the Inere psycho-
logy of a nation, apart froln its organisation I '.\"a

something \vhich required tact as well as d
cision:
and it is this \vhich illustrated a siùe of the Eng)i
h
gene;-al's character without \vhich he Inay b,'. :t.nd -
indeed has been, \\TholIy Inisunderstood.
I t is of the nature of national heroes of J( itcheller' s
type. that their adInirers are unjust to then1. 'flirl'Y
would have been better appreciated if they had bl'l'll
less praise,l. \Vhen a soldier is turned into an iù()l
there seenlS an unfortunate' tcndency to turn hiII1
into a \\"f L )den idol, like the wooùl'n fìgun' flf
I I indcnburg l'rected by. the ridiculou:, aut horitil'

of Berlin. In a nlore Inoderate and Inl.
taphorical
sense there has b
en an unfortunate t(
IlÙl'nC) to
represent I{itchener as strong by rÍ1crely fI'pn'-

t'ntinO' hinl as stiff-to su

est that h(
was Iliad.,
h . ,,-.
of wood and not of steel. 'rh
re are two Illa
irns,

21

I.()RI) KI1'{'IIE\ER.

which h.l\"l" l>l"l'n, 1 ol'lie\'l', thl' Il10ttoc" of two
English f:lInilit's, bulh of "rhich are boasts but each
thl' nHItrary of the uther. 'fhe fìrst runs, "You
can brt'a k Inc, but YOll cannot bend 1l1l'''; and the
Sl'COlld, d You C.ln bend Ine, but you cannot break
IlIt"." \\ïth all n'3pect to \rhoc\.cr 1l1ay ha\'e bornp
it, the fÌrst is the boast of thc barbarian and there-
fore of l he Prussian; l h(-"
ccond is the boa5t
of the Christian and the ci\'ilised tnan-that he is
free él!H.I flexible, yet al,,"ars returns to his true
position, like a telnpered sword. r\ow too much of
the eulogy on a Inan like lZitchener tended to
praise hiln not as a s\yord but as a poker.
f-Ie happened to rise into his first falne at a time
when n1uch of th(
English Press and governing
class was still entirely duped by Germany, and to
sOlne extent judged everything by a Bismarckian
tc'st of Llood and iron. I t tended to neglect the
\"ery re(ll disaùvantages, even in practical life, \\"hich
lie upon th' Inan of blood and iron, as compared
with the 111.1,11 of blood and bone. It is one gra,-e
disadvantage, for instance, that if a n1:1.11 Inade of
iron were to break' his bones, they would not hea1.
r n other words, the Prussian EJnpire, ,\'ith all its
perfections anù efficiencies, has one notable defect-
that it is a uead thing. It does not draw its life
fruIn :1ny priJIllry hUlnan religion or poetry; it does
not grow :L
aill froll1 within. _ \nd being a dead
thing, it suffers also 11'0111 ha\.ing 110 I1ern's to gi\re
warning ur reactiun; it reads no danger signals;
it ha..; nu pren1onitions j about its uwn spiritual
dOOll1 its sl'ntin
ls arc deaf dnd all ils spies

.?2

LO R I) I
rrc I J E:\ E I{.

are blind. On the other hanù) the British Elnpire)
with all its blunders and bad anoIllalies, to which I
aln the last person to be blind, has one noticeable
advantage-that it is a living thing. It is not that
it makes no mi';takes, but it knows it h:t:, Illldt'
thenl, as the living hand knows when it has toucht,d
hot iron_ I'hat is eX"lctl y what a h.lnd of irun \\"ould
not kno\v; anù that is exactly the error ill tht'
German ideal of a hand of iron, No candid critic
of England can read its history fairly and fail to see
a certain flexibility and self-modification; illil){'ral
policies followed by liberal ones; Inen failing in
sonlething and succeeding in sorl1ething else; lHell
sent to do one thing and being wise cnol}gh to do
another'; the human po\\'er of the li,'ing hand to
dra\v back As it happens, ({itchener was extra-
ordinarily English in this li\rely and vital nloderat iou,
.A '1d it is to be feared that the Illore Gennan ideal i-
satltJn of him, in the largely unenlightened England
before the war, has already done SOIlH' hanH to
. his reoutation, and in ITIISsIng what \,'as par-
ticularly English has Inissecl what ,vas particularly
interes t ing"
Lord I(itchener was personally a sOln('wha t sil('nt
Inafl' and his social conventions \\.('f(' those of t hi'
,
ordinary English officer) especialIy the offict'r \\ ho
has lived aInong Orientals--col1\rentions which in
any case tend in tht' direction of sil('nee. I r (' also
- really had, and to an extent of which SOIn(> P('qp!t'
complained) a certain English elIlbarraSsllH'llt about
Inaking all his purposes clear, t:specirtlJy b('f!)J ('
they were clear to hiInself. lIe probably likl'd
!J
23

LORI) 1
l'rCIIE
EI{.

think a thing out in his uwn ,,'ay and therefor
at
his own tin1e, \\'hich was not always the tin1e at
which people thought they had a fight to question
hiru. I n this way it is true of hinl, as of such
another strong rnan as the Irish patriot Parnell, that
his very sirnplicity had an effect of secrecy. But it is
a coruplete error about hi'rn, as it ""as a complete error
about Parnell, to suppose that he took the Prussian
pose of disdaining and disregarding eyerybüdy;
that he settled everything in solitary egoisnl; that he
\ras a Superman too self-sufficing to listen to friends
and too philosophical to listen to reason. I t will be
noted that e\"ery crisis of his life that is lit up by
history contradicts the colours of this picture. He
could not only take counsel with his friends, but he
\\'as abnormally successful in taking counsel \vith
his foes. I t is notable that \vhenever he came in
personal contact \vith a great captain actually or
potentially in arms against hiln, the result \vas not a
lucre collision but a nlutual comprehension. He
established the friendliest relations ,,"ith the chivalrous
and ad\"enturous ß1archanù, standing on the deadly
debatable land of Fashoda. He established equal1y
friendly relations with the Boer generJ.ls, gathered
under the dark cloud of national disappointnlent
and defeat. I n all such instances, so far as
his individuality could count, it is clear that
hl" acted as a nlodcrate and, in the universal
sense, as a liberal. 'rhc results and th
records
uf those who 111et him in such hours are .quite
suflìcicnt to provc that he did not le;ve the
irnprcssion uf a Prussian arrogance. If he was silent,
2"

J.. 0 I { r) I{ I l' C I-I E :'\ E R .

his silence must have been 1l10re friendly, I had
alInost said l11are convi\'ial, than l11anv men's
conversation., But on the larger platforn; of the
Euròpean \Var, this quiet but unique gift of open-
nlinde
ness and intellectual hospitality was destined
to do t\\'O very decisive things, \vhich Inay profoundly
affect history. In the first he dealt with the Inor

delnocratic and even revolutionary eh:Inen ts in
England; and in the second he represents a \"l'ry
real change that has passed over the Ellgli
h
traditions about Russia.
Personall y, as has already been noted I 1
ord
I{itchcner never was and never pretended to be any-
thing more or less than the good 111ilitary tnan, and by
the tiln
of the Great War he \vas already an elderly -
military man. The type has much the saine standards
and traditions in all European countries; but in
England it is, if anything, a little Blore trad itional,
for the very reason that the anny has been SOIlH'-
thing separate, professional, and relatirt'ly snlal1-:L
sort of club. rrhe military 111an W;JS all the l11un'
military because the nation was not n1Îlitary. Such
a man is ine\Oitably conservative in his \'i(.\\"s,
conventional in his manners J and simplifics tl1,'
problem of patriotism to a single-eyed obedience.
\Vhen he took over the business of raising the first
le\.ies for the present war he was confrunted wit h
the problem of the English Trades Unions-lhe \"('ry
_ last problem in the \vorld which onc could rea
()nably
expect such a Inan to understanù. r\nd yét h(' did
undt'rstand it; he \\'as perhaps the only pt'rson in
the
í. class \\Tho did. If it be hard to explain

25
::.. L
1
E-4 v ())
7ñ LlB.RA ,
.

,

a c\>

.

LORD KITCHENER.

to
he richer classes in England, it is almost
impossible to explain to any classes in any other
country, because the Eng)ish situation is largely
unique. There is the same difficulty as we have
already found in describing ho\v vast and even violent
a transformation scene the gro\vth of the great army
appeared; it has been almost impossible to describe
it to the chief conscript" countries, which take a great
arm y for gran ted. The key to the paraliel proble m
of the Trades Unions is simply this-that England
is the only European country that is practically
industrial and nothing else. Trades Unions can
never play sllch a part in countries where the masses
live on the land; such masses always have some
status and support-yes, even if they are serfs.
'fhe status of the English workman is not in the
earth; it is, so to speak, in the air-in a scaffolding
of artificial abstractions, a frame\vork of rules and .
· rights, of verbal bargdins or pdper resolutions. If
he loses this, he becomes nothing so human
or hOlnely as a slave. Rather he becomes a
\\'ild beast, a sort of wandering vermin with no
place in the state at all. It \vould be necessary
to explain this, and a great deal more ,,'hich
cannot possibly be explained here, before \ve
coulll Ineasure the cnonnity of the enigma facing
the 1
ritish of11<:ial who had to propose to the English
tht> practical suspension of the 1"rades Unions. To
this Inust be added the fdct that the Unions, already
national institutions, had just lately been in a fernlent
with ne\\" and violent doctrines: Syndicalists had
in\'oked thcIl1 as the future seats of governnlent j
26

LORD KITCHENER.

historical speculators had seen in them the return to
the great Christian Guilds of the Middle Ages; a
more revolutionary Press had appeared to champion
them; gigantic strikes had split the country in every
direction. Anyone woulp have said that under these
circumstances the very virtues and attainments of
Kitchener would ,at least make it fairly certain that
he would quarrel with the Trades Unions. I t soon
became apparent that the one loan \vho ,vas not
going to quarrel ,vith the Trades Unions \vas
Kitchener. Politicians and parliatnentary leaders, sup-
posed actually to be elected by the working classes,
were regarded, rightly or wrongly, with implacable
suspicion. The elderly and old-fashioned Anglo-
Egyptian militarist, with his doctrine and discipline
of the barrack-room and the drumhead court-Inartial,
was never regarded by the ,yorkers \vith a shade
of suspicion. They Sil11ply took him at his \vord,
and the leader of the most turbulent Trades Union
element paid to him after his death the sitnplest
tribute in the plai
est and most popular language-
" He was a
traight man.-" I am so antiquated as
to think it a better epitaph than the fashionahle
phrase about a strong Inan. SOlTIe silent inde-
scribåble geniality of fairness in the Jnan once
more prevailed against the possibility of passionate
nlisunderstandings, as it had prevailed against
the international nervousness of the atInosphere
o
Fashoda or the tragic border feud of the
Boers_ I suspect that it lay largely in the
fact that this great English!nan ,vas sufficiently
English to guess one thing - missed by many 11lore
27

I () R 1) I
rr ell E:'\ E R.

:-;nphistic,lted people-that the English Trades
C nion
an
ycry English. For gCtOÙ ur evil, they
art' natil)I1,.I; tht'y h;l\Yc yery little in common
\':ith thl' Inr)rc international SocialisI11 (.f the Conti-
nent, and nothing 'whatc,.cr in COInnlon ".ith the
pl'd:lI1lic SociaIisln nf Prussia. Understanding his
COllntryn1cn by instinct, he did not Inake a parade
of efficiency; for tIll' English dislike the synlbols of
dictatorshi l ) Inuch In )r
th:-tn dictatorship. They
hatc thl' crowl1 and sccptre of the tyrant much lTIOre
than his t yr.1.t 1 ny. They have a national tradition
which allo\\'s of far too n1uch inequality s,o long as it
i
soft('ned with a certain c;ul1:-trarierie, and in which
l'\"Cn sl1ub:; ,)nh' re/11 n Jnber the coronet of a nobIcrn1.J1
1)11 condition th'lt he shall hirnself sccrn to forget it.
'The other matter is 1l1uch 1110re important.
Though the re\'t
r
e of \Yivaciaus, l<itchener \vas
\.ery vital; an.J he had one unique mark of ,.itality-
t hat he had not stopped growing. " .A.n oak should
not be transplclnted at sixty," said the great orator
Grattan when he was transferred from the Parlia-
Il1ent of Dublin to the Parli:tn1cnt of \YestIninster.
I
itchener was sixty-four when he turntd his face
\\"l-'st\\"ard to the problèIn of his ow'n country. There
clung to hinl already all the traditional attributes of
tIlt, oak-its tlJughness, its angularity, its closen('s

of
rain and ruggedness of outline-,,'hen he was
uprooted frolll th(. Arabian sands and replanted in
tht' rernote western island. Yet the oak not only

n'w green again and put forth J1èW leaves; it was
alnlost as if, as in a legend, it could put forth a nc\v
kind of leaves. l(itchener, \vith all his taciturnity,
lS

LO R 1) I
rrCf-1 E
E f<

reany began to put forth a new order of ideas. If
a change of opiniGns is unusu;:tl in an èld{>rly tnan,
it is a!most unknown in an eldcrly Inilitary rnan,
If the hardening of time was felt eve.n bv the
poetic and en
10tional GrJ.ttan,' it would
not
have been strange if the hardening h;td bet'n
quite hopeless in the rigid and reticent Kitchencr.
Yet it \\yas not hopeless; and the fact bec ante>
the spring of much of the nati\..)}1al hope. 'The
grizzled rnartinct frcnn I ndia and Egypt showcd
a certain power which is in nearly all great nlell, but
of \\Thich St. Paul has becotne the traditional type-
the power of being a great convert as well as a great
crusader. I t is the real po\\'cr of rC'-fornling an
opinion, \rhich is the very opposite of that IHere
formlessness \vhich \\Te call fickleness, K or is the
comparison to such an exanlple as St. Paul
altogether historically disproportioI1rtte; for the point
upon which this '".cry tYFical Engli
htnan changed
his Inind ,vas a point \vhich is now the pi,"ot of the
whole future and perhaps of the very existence of
Christendom. For Inany such EnglishInen it Inight
altnost be called the disco\yerv of ChristendonL It
.I
can be called with greater precision, and illùeed wit h
almost cotnplete precision, the discovery of R us
i;t,
l'Ail 1 tary burcaucratic systeln,; everywhere ha '"t'
too much tendency to \\"ork upon one idea, and
there \vas a tiIne when the Inilitary and bureaucratic
systeIll of the British in the East worked on the
idea of the fear of l
ussia. It is needlc:;s IH
n' to
explain that sentiment, and useless to explain it
away. It ,vas partly a mere tradilion frol!! the
29

LORD KITCHENER.

natuial jingoism of the Crimean \Var; it \vas par
ly
in itself a tribute to the epic majesty of the Russian
march across m vsterious Asia to the legendary
Chinese \Yall. The point here is that it existed;
and \vhere" there exists such an idea in such
Illilitary rulers, they very seldom alter their idea.
But I<itchener did. alter his idea. Not in mere
Inilitaryobedience, but in genuine human reasonable-
ness, he caIne late in life to see the Russian as the
friend and the Prùssian as the enemy. In the
ine,ritabie division" of British ministeri3.1 councils
about the distribution of British aid and attention
he was the one In3.l1 \\,ho stood n10st enthusiastically,
one Inight say stubbornly, for the supreme importance
of munitioning the Inagnificent, Russian defence.
I Ie mystified an the English pessimists, in \vhat
secIlled to them the blackest hour of pessimism, by
announcing that Genn1.ny had (( shot her bolt ,,, ;
that she had already lost her chance, not by any of
the :\Hied attacks, but by the stupendous skill and
valour of that Russian retreat, which was more
triuInph:lnt than any attack. It is this discovery that
Inarks an epoch; for that great deliverance \vas not
only the victory of
ussia, but very specially the
victory of the Russians. Never before ,vas there
sue h a \\'ar of Incn against guns-as awful and
inspiring to \vatch dS a "ar of nlen against demons.
Perhaps the duel of a man with a nlodern gun is
more like that between a maD and an enormous
dragon; nor is there anything on the "
'eaker side
save the ultimate and ahnost metaphysical truth,
that a n1an can Blake cl gun and a gun cannot make
3 0

LORD KITCHENER.

a Inan. I t is the man-the Russian soldier and
peasant himself-who has emerged like the hero of
an epic, and who is now secure for ever from the
sophisticated s
andal-mongering and the cuhured
ignorance of the West.
And it is this that lends an epic and aln10st
prilneval symbolism to the tragedy of Kitchener's end.
Somehow the very fact that it \vas incolnplete as an
action makes it more complete as an allegory.
English in his very limitations, English in his late
emancipation from them, he was setting forth on an
eastward journey different indeed from the many
eastward journeys of his life. There are many such
noble tragedies of travel in the records of his
country; it was so, silently without a trace, that the
track of Franklin faded in the polar snows or the
track of Gordon in the desert sands. But this was
an adventure new for such adventurous men-the
finding not of strange foes but of friends yet
stranger. Many men of his blood and type-simple,
strenuous, sOlnewhat prosaic-had threaded their \Va y
through some dark continent to add son1e treasure
or territory to the English name. He was seeking
\vhat for us his countrymen has long been a dark
continent-but which contains a much more noble
treasure. The glory of a great people, long hidden
from the English by accidents and by lies, lay before
him at his journey's end. That journey was' never
ended. I t remains like a mighty bridge, the
mightier for being broken, pointing across a chasm,
and promising a mightier thoroughfare bet,veen the
east and west. I n that waste of seas beyond the
3 1

I . ( ) I { I ) I
11' C III

E I{ .

last nl)rt herl1 islets where his ship went down one
Inight fancy his spirit standing, a figure frustrated
yet prophetic and pointing to the East, \vhence are
the light of the world and the reunion of Christian
Blen_

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