Newspaper Page Text
8
This Is a peculiar figure that steps
forward to take its place in the front
ranks in the March of the Conquer
ors.
Even now, with the laurels of his
achievements fresh, men acclaim him
not nearly so much for what he did as
for the way he did It.
This is a conqueror whose men do
not go mad with love and adoration
of him when he rides over the stricken
field.
A frightening, silent man—well fitted
to go down in British history as The
Silent Destroyer. Less man than sol
dier, less man than slayer, less man
than machine—mark him as he moves
through the dead routine of drilling
hopeless native troops, the dead rout
ine of a practice march—iron jawed,
wordless, expressionless, emotionless,
Iron jawed, wordless, expressionless,
emotionless, mark him moving living
men toward other living men on the
battlefields. Dongola, Atbara, Omdur
man! Move after move, check, check
mate! For all that any man knows
this man moved other men, discarded
them, took them, lost them -with as
calm method as the chess player loses
and takes the chessmen.
All the world saw the man, with his
unreadable, still face, move to his place
on the vast, bloody chessboard of the
Transvaal —a chessboard from which
England's pieces were being swept
fast; all the world saw him move the
pieces. All the world saw the :a me
still wavering, going here and going
there, with England's pawns still be
ing swept away. And then! Check
mate!
Look back a quarter of a century.
In the Bible lands of Palestine, in Gal
ilee, is a tall, gaunt, bony subaltern,
with a hard face, burned brick red,
laying the lines of survey, mapping
the country where a figure once went
through the Passion for the world.
Standing there on storied hills did that
young Englishman, looking out over
the scenes of the most wonderful his
tory that ever was, see himself to be
one day Lord of Khartoum?
Men who know him as well as ha
permits them to know him say em
phatically, "Yes." They say that this
man is a man consumed with ambi
tion, consumed the more that he
keeps its fires deep pent with
in him and does not let the
world see so much as a gleam of their
flames. They say that from his youth
he moved steadily, unrestingly,
never to be turned aside, toward the
prize that his ambition had marked out
for him. If he did not dream of be
ing Lord Khartoum, be sure he dream
ed—nay, knew, that he was to be a
lard of men somewhere, somehow. Con
cerning all which speculation, what re
ply will you get front Horatio Herbert
Kitchener? No smile, no frown—noth
ing but that same level, still, unmoved
glance that has been cast over drill
grounds in little villages, over battle
scenes and over crowds of shouting,
enthusiasm-drunken multitudes, strik
ing their ardor cool within them.
Who 'Was Hef
If any man in England had asked
any other well informed man in Eng
land twenty-five- years ago “Who is
Kitchener?” the answer probably
would have been a polite shrug of the
shoulders. There were ten times ten
hundred young Englishmen like him
scattered around the world and its
seas, and doing the work of the empire
well or ill, and in either case unknown
and unheeded, except for the heavy
official machine that fed them tut
and checked them off and kept records
of them as they gave bone and sinew
and life for the thing that men call
a government and a country.
His history up to that time was :hat
of most of the other young men whom
England sends away from home to
build for her greatness. His father
was a soldier of no very high rank.
He managed to climb to the lieuten
ant-colonelcy of a dragoon regimmt,
the Thirteenth, a good, hard riding,
straight fighting band. Little Kit h
ener was born In Ireland, but he is
more French than Irish, for Lieut.-
Go| Kitchener was a Suffolk man and
Mrs Kitchener was a Chevalier end
descended straight from patrician
French Huguenot#
The boy grew up tike til English
boys of his class One day h* was sent
away from home to learn to be a rrysl j
engineer And an engineer he tv*. ime j
engineer he lemaloed and an
engineer ha la. x great, steady, unfal- j
All EwfiUWP Cannot Read
f ' j This Riddle:-
MM M ’ '
R.UJMS OF ACHAVALLIN CHURCH.
Cos. Kerry n
tering piston rod of a man this —driv-
ing along in absolute consonance with
the throbbing of the vast machine of
fate. What is there in engineering
that produces so many fighting men?
We have had them here and England
Is full of them there.
Certainly there was little in Kitch
ener’s early surroundings to provoke
fighting blood. Asa Royal Engineer,
he was trotted around to various un
endingly peaceable lands to view them
through the blass in his theodolite and
measure them with a steel tape and
otherwise disport himself. So we see
him doing in the four years from
to 1878. It is hard to conceive now
that much of the topographical knowl
edge of the Holy Land that is pos
sessed by the w'orld to-day Is owing to
the work of the man who since then
has been depicted in European prints
as a hanger of men, a slayer of babes,
and a scourger of women.
lit Cjprn*.
In 1878 England, in the methodical
movement of her red tape machine,
sent him to Cyprus, where he did
"something or another” about
the organization of the land courts.
England had only just then
acquired Cyprus, and there was
lots of dull, deadly, monot-
onous work to do. He remained there,
off and on. until 1882.
Imagine the man who was to he My
Lord Khartoum, sitting in his hot of
fice in that year, listening to the drone |
of a sleepy complainant and a still '
more sleepy defendant, both quarreling
about a matter concerning which truth !
lay at the bottom of a well far too!
deep for human sounding—and not 1
three hundred miles away British guns
roaring and British shells thundering j
at Alexandria, and young Condor j
Beresford lying under fire and “having
the time of his life” and big history
making all around!
Now it is almost an established fact
that one Kitchener did witness the
bombardment of Alexandria. It is a
completely established fact that there
is no official record giving any Kitch
ener leave to go away from Cyprus.
But ■Cyprus did not suffer, nor did the
, bombardment.
Then things began to happen fast and
! furious in Egypt. And then did a cer
tain brick red. bony and almost un
pleasantly silent youth rage in high
quarters against law courts and civil
organization a.nd office work in. Cyprus,
where a man had to wear, a dress suit
at dinner every night and do other
things equally futile.
Dress suits thereupon became things
of the past with Kitchener. After Tel
el-Kebir saw the breaking of Arabi's
mad might, England had to take in
hand the reorganization of the Egyp
tion army, so called by courtesy. Sir
Evelyn Wood was appointed Sirdar
(commander.) He demanded twenty
five British officers for the work. Being
about as hopeless and unpleasant, and
unprofitable and unpromising a job as
ever faced white men, there was a rush
of young Britons. Kitchener was
among them. He became an officer in
the glorious army of the Khedive—one
of thdt curious corps who worked loy
ally for the little brown ruler and were
ready at any moment to knock his head
off if they or dear old England didn't
like anything that he did.
A llopelcMK Arm?.
The Egyptian army was a band of
underpaid, underfed, undertreated and
undermined fellaheen. It was an army
without stomach, without heart and
without backbone. It went forth to
war only with a view to retreating at
the earliest possible moment, tl slouch
ed and loafed and did not wash. It
could not shoot. And Kitchener worked
over those helpless reeds of broken na
tives and gripped them and squeezed
them, and, being a man himself, found
the man in the weak-kneed levies be
fore him.
He made such men out of them that
In JBB7 they made him commander id
Suakln. and there are remnants of
desert hordes yet who remember cer
tain ensuing lean years. They remem
br yet how the gaunt man steppe l
calmly Into their camp one night, un
armed and alone, and cherfully flicked
thlr sacred chief into the fare with .<
riding whip in the midst of hia spear
hearers and gun carriers, because that
sar red chief was Just preparing to eg.
ecute s British soldier who had bsei .
caught that afternoon
< nip Dlgna s men who still are
alive remember Mm, for he took hie j
Kf)|tUas levies Into Htut4iilt tons dt/ 4 1
SAVANNAH MORNING NEWS: SUNDAY. JUNE 22. 1902.
jUNSBOROVGHHOV.SE, Cos. KERRXS||
The great bearded Emirs and the sav
age. hairy, fighting men laughed
through their teeth tvhen they saw him
come. They had made the poor rice
eaters of Egypt run too often to dream
of anything else except an easy
slaughter. But this time the men
whom Kitcehner had found in the fel
laheen were behind those brown skins,
in which once there had been room
for nothing but quaking hearts. And
Emirs and*halry fighting men snapped
their teeth in the dust in dying and
spearmen fell to rise no more.
The troops were beaten off at last,
but Kitchener, although defeated in
this his first real battle, had broken
his Egyptian soldiery to fighting and
killing as sportsmen “blood” a deer
hound. He got a bullet in the face as
a souvenir of the occasion. A few
, years ago. whilejie was eating at ta
■ ble, the bullet surtuenly worked its way
I out and fell into his plate. He lifted
it out with his fork, stared in disap
proval at his servant, who had too
lively an expression of surprise on his
face, and went on eating without say
ing a word.
Kevenge fur Hnndub.
Within a year after Handub he led
a brigade of Soudanese over the
trenches at Gemaizeh and incidentally
over Osman's men who had incautious
ly occupied them. In 1889 he agian
commanded a brigade. All this time
lie was gazing at the Soudan, studying
it, laying his plans to subdue it. He
had profited hy all the experiences of
others. As intelligence officer with
Stewart’s ill-starred desert column, he
had noted for future use the break
down of the system of communications.
It was Kitchener who plunged into
the Korosko desert and in less than
three weeks came out not only alive
(then a feat in itself), but'with the in
formation that he had succeeded in es
tablishing a chain of outposts extend
ing to the Red Sea and guarded by 2,-
000 friendly Arabs.
It was Kitchener whose native cav
alry sent the Dervishes In rout across
the desert and stopped all Arab inva
sion for a year.
And it was Kitchener, who, in 1890,
was appointed Sirdar.
And in 1898 the Soudan was con
quered.
Before he could move to conquer the
Soudan he had to conquer the Khedive.
He did. The Khedive said something
insulting about British officers. Kitcn
ener rode up close to him and—the
Khedive issued a General Order prais
ing the army and particularly its Brit
ish officers. Queen Victoria made
Kitchener a K. C. M. G. that time
Then began the game of war. Im
pastive, passionless, uncommunicative
drtllmaster, farrier, commissary and
railroad engineer by turns, the silent
man made plans and laid them to m
-\erge on one point. Many thousand
instruments, bent by his supreme will,
toiled blindly for him, not knowing
whether they were working for a hope
lessly stupid victim of dull red tape or
• man with a colossal acheme. and,
what is more, not daring to try to
know.
A year passed by and still the army
drilled and the engineers planned and
instead of gun firing and sword clash
ing the blows of pickaxes and the
a* taping of spade* made monot. nous
mumi day after day Foot by foot,
mile by mile, a railroad began to < taw)
lew*}' Irwin vauip lpio Ue dwu dv*ci\
sacred till then to Mahdist raids and
retaliatory expeditions by British sol
diers that were little more effective
than raids.
There were to be no raids with Kitch
ener. He meant to take no army out
and bring a cut-up, starving, panic
stricken remnant back. He meant to
send no columns winding for miles
through gorges, while at their rear the
shouting followers of the Prophet were
tutting out the wagon trains of sup
plies and ammunition. He meant to
have no rushed camps, no sniping, no
desultory, hart-breaking fighting.
The march began. Day after day,
week after week, month after month,
the slow progress went on. Men work
ed all day to move trains and barges,
they slept all night as securely as if
they were In the heart of friendly
country. To a world waiting for glori
ous deeds this was gall and worm
wood. Kitchener became a by-word
for something that defied patience.
This was not war. This was shopkeep
ing, farming, land measuring, anything
but war. And Kitchener, the unlovely,
who they say never looked at woman
with tenderness or sentiment, heard
the talk of the world as it drifted to
him in his Nile camps. He listened to
it with that level, unspeaking glance,
and sent war correspondents back
home with scant courtesy and less
waste of time. That was his answer.
In it no word was wasted.
Anti the Oiudurnian.
And one morning, on September 2,
1898, something happened In a far place
called Omdurman, where there were
gathered great hosts of brave Emirs
and tall desert fighters and women of
the harem and much treasure. And
when the something had done happen
ing the field was “white with Jibbah
clad corpses, like a meadow dotted with
snowdrifts.” Khalifa Abdullah, who
had boasted that morning that Kitch
ener’s head should roll before night
where the brave Gordon's had rolled,
was hiding. The fierce Osman Digna,
the Sword <af the Soudan, was fleeing
with a handful of survivors. Along the
river mounted British troops were can
tering and spearing the Dervishes
who had escaped the bath of fire. The
despised Egyptian troops, those same
men who once had been sheep before
the Dervish wolves, were guarding fif
teen thousand sullen desert dwelllers,
whose deserts were never to know
their fierce forays agian.
And that night Sirdar Kitchener rode
through the camp and he looked
around him as he had looked around
him at drill many years before. j n
• hat hard, unmoved face waM sign of
neither triumph or elation or relief
or weariness. Hla men cheered when
they saw hint, but even an the cheer*
rang out they would die away, for
this grim, changeless, passionless
creature was not one to arouse wild
outbursts.
And eo he passed through tb* crowds
of England when he returned home
He had aged a bit Tjvenry-flve yeara
In Egypt, beaten by sands that cut
•he fa.es of t ha pyramid*, will mark
even the face of a Kitchener But
in all else, m eapro*alon in mar>ri*r,
in attitude he wae the Kitchenar who
as a eubal'ern, oat forth to measure
•he land of Canaan and ft* Vi j
Urn Pi * Ifitloft *• fe#
have received the terse, perfunctory
commendation of the official to whom
he presented his maps of survey.
So, too, he went to South Africa.
But there he met new men, men who
wore uniforms for “fun,” went to the
front for “fun,” talked of fighting as
“fun.” Now, if hard, earnest, stiff
fighting soldiers do not love Kitchener
and enthuse over him, it hardly was
to be expected that dandies would.
They didn’t. Neither did Kitchener
over them. Within a month ‘England
was flooded with letters that conveyed
wails of disgust. “Kitchener is act
ing like an overbearing bully.”
"Kitchener is making himself hated
everywhere.” “Kitchener has offend
ed every woman in. Cape Town.”
"Kitchener is insulting volunteer offi
cers of noble birth daily.” To all of
which Kitchener answered with —Si-
lence. It was noted that the wails
grew less, however. But that was
mainly because the wailers were be
ing sent home as fast as ships could
carry them. Some of them were sent
to less comfortable places by the grim,
homely Sirdar. They were sent to bat
tle. Many of them died. He never
showed by any sign that he was sor
ry or glad or relieved or indifferent.
Just that level glance and that en
tire Silence. “Kitchener is making a
failure of it,” rang the dispatches.
Silence. “Kitchener is to be super
seded.” Silence. “Kitchener is de
spairing of winning out.” Silence.
“Another appalling defeat for our
arms.” Silence.
Once he broke that silence. He
sent a dispatch—“ Send me more men.”
It was the march on Ogidurman over
again. Silence and work and Silence
—and then—the End.
THE POPULAR PANAMA.
How the Present lint Habit Grew
Ip.
From the New York Tribune.
The moth-eaten and threadbare Jokes
about the expensive hats for women in
comparison with the democratic head
gear of the men of a family must be
laid away for a while. For many years
there has been little change in the
prices of men's straw hats. The regu
lar article ranged from 11.50 to $5, with
bargain counter variations. The man
who waits for bargains until the sea
son is well advanced Is rewarded by
securing a “first-class article” from a
huckster's wagon at 50 cents.
But this summer has brought anew
straw hat condition, because of the
popularity of the Panama. In discuss
ing the matter a hat dealer aald that the
Panama hat habit waa an outgrowth
of expansion. "Our people have been
going to the tropical possessions of
late," he aald. “and the big. light straw
hats, which are IM Panama.' be.
* use the* come from almost any old
place down south except Panama, are
among the souvenirs which they bring
hs< k with them. One person in a fam
ily having one of theee hale made the
others want the same bind, and in that
w#y little ordere b*< erne Urge ones,
hate were made in large quantities for
'Veobee trade, and the Panama hat
habit iiei ame established "
The chief shipping point of
tl )| Hftjf if
(he vt * men haul at tut point
that the first South American hats of
the Alpine shape were made. Before
1897 all of these hats were ,of the
shapeless sombrero shape, with a
crease across the top of the crown.
The shape has been improved, but the
method of making the hats is the same
as it was many years ago, when they
received the name “Panama” because
they came by way of that place to
the United States and other distant
countries. The material used in the
making of Panama hats is the screw
palm, called by naturalists oarludovica
palmata. it is of the palm family,
and Is described by Charles R. Dodge,
expert for the United States on fibers,
as follows:
"It Is a stemless species, common
In shady places all over Panama and
along the coast of New Granada and
Ecuador. The leaves, pleated like a
fan, are borne on three-cornered
stalks, six to fourteen feet high. They
are about four feet in diameter and
deeply cut into four or five divisions,
each of which Is again cut. The
leaves are gathered while young and
stiff, and the parallel veins are re
moved, after which they are split into
shreds, but not separated at the stalk
end, and immersed in boiling water for
a short time and bleached In the
sun.” ,
These strands are about a yard long
and about a half inch wide. Before
they are ready for the braider they are
rolled from either edge and become
round, and then they are again pressed
fiat and are ready for the weaver.
In order to work the material It must
be dipped into water every few min
utes. if this is riot done the strands
become brittle and break. A hat to
command a high price must be per
fect, and in order that it may be so,
and have no loose strand, no broken
part, the weavers never work in the
White Stone Lithia Water
is the lightest mineral water on the market,
and retains its gasses longer than any other.
This is claiming a great deal, but if you will
open a bottle of White Stone Lithia Carbon
ated and at the same time open a bottle of
any other, and you will be surprised how
much longer White Stone will retain its
gasses than the other. Another test is that
hi te Stone Lithia does not burn the tongue
or stomach when drinking it as other waters
do. The hotel will open for guests on July
1. It is the largest brick hotel in South and
- orth Carolina or Georgia, covering more
than one acre of land, with all modern im
provements for summer and winter, Rich
Hill on the Southern Railroad is the station
or spring, only ten minutes ride to ho
!l w" k** water is for sale in Savannah by
tin- Masonic Temple Pharmacy.
WHITE STONE LITIUA WATER COMPANY.
Whltk Stouk bE'KiDiaq, B. C
hot hours of the day, and many of
them do their weaving only at night,
by candle light.
A first-class hat, one of the kind of.
fered in this city at the present time
for $75, usually takes about six months
to make, and when it comes here It Is
shapeless, dirty and unsightly. Here
it is cleaned and pressed Into shape.
The expert can tell by the "button,''
the central point of the crown of the
hat, where the weaver begins the work,
in which part of the country the hat
was made. Every country as Its pe
culiar style, which is taught to the
children when they begin to work.
They practice on low-grade material
for years, and when they have ac
quired sufficient skill they begin work
with the better material, but It mat
ters not what grade of hat they make,
the “button” is always made In the
same wav.
One of the famous Panama hats was
the one which was worn by Louis Na
poleon some time In the fifties. It had
a great breadth of brim, was firm In
texture as silk, pliable and exceeding
ly light. The hat was valued at SSOO.
It took a long time In those days to
order merchandise from South Amer
ica, and the Emperor had the satis
faction of possessing the only hat of
the kind In Paris. But the next sea
son the broad-brimmed Panama hats
were popular with persons who could
afford to pay high prices for the lux
ury, and the same thing happened In
Paris that has taken place here—straw
hat makers put imitation hats on the
market, and the original article suf
fered in popularity. The hat makers
in Southern France and Italy flooded
the country with "Panama'' hats, and
Napoleon 111 gave the fashion its death
stroke by presenting his famous speci
men to the head gardener of the Tuil
eries.
New Orleans w a ® tne American head
quarto™ for Panama hats before the
Civil War, and the place where they
were sold largely was the French mar
ket. In those days ice was sent to
Havana In casks padded and packed
with straw. The empty casks were
returned to New Orleans, and usually
contained, besides the refuse straw,
bundles of Panama hats, the rroflts
In which were divided between the
shipper and the skipper who smuggled
them into port.
One of the finest specimens that ever
came to New York was owned by *
man who was one of the American
agents of the Havana lottery.
928.40 Savannah to Washington M<
Return.
Tickets on sale via Southern Railway
daily through Sept. 30, good to return
up to and including Oct. 31. Leave
Savannah 1:15 noon and 12:35 mid
night. Through Pullman sleepers and
dining cars on all trains. City ticket
office, 141 Bull street.—ad.
Sunday Excursion to Brnninlfk, G.
Effective Sunday, May 11, and each
Sunday thereafter the Plant System
will sell round trip tickets to Bruns
wick, Ga., on Sundays, limited to date
of sale, at SI.OO. For information see
ticket agents.—ad.