ey possessed a
natural instinct of government. The old order was being swept away:
history was being made indeed. Then the colossus put forth his strength,
and, blundering again, at last blundered into the semblance of victory.
Cronje surrendered at Paardeberg, Ladysmith was relieved, and at the
beginning of March Lord Roberts marched into Bloemfontein.

It was two or three days after the news of this reached London that
Macalister came into the tavern in Beak Street and announced joyfully that
things were looking brighter on the Stock Exchange. Peace was in sight,
Roberts would march into Pretoria within a few weeks, and shares were
going up already. There was bound to be a boom.

"Now's the time to come in," he told Philip. "It's no good waiting till
the public gets on to it. It's now or never."

He had inside information. The manager of a mine in South Africa had
cabled to the senior partner of his firm that the plant was uninjured.
They would start working again as soon as possible. It wasn't a
speculation, it was an investment. To show how good a thing the senior
partner thought it Macalister told Philip that he had bought five hundred
shares for both his sisters: he never put them into anything that wasn't
as safe as the Bank of England.

"I'm going to put my shirt on it myself," he said.

The shares were two and an eighth to a quarter. He advised Philip not to
be greedy, but to be satisfied with a ten-shilling rise. He was buying
three hundred for himself and suggested that Philip should do the same. He
would hold them and sell when he thought fit. Philip had great faith in
him, partly because he was a Scotsman and therefore by nature cautious,
and partly because he had been right before. He jumped at the suggestion.

"I daresay we shall be able to sell before the account," said Macalister,
"but if not, I'll arrange to carry them over for you."

It seemed a capital system to Philip. You held on till you got your
profit, and you never even had to put your hand in your pocket. He began
to watch the Stock Exchange columns of the paper with new interest. Next
day everything was up a little, and Macalister wrote to say that he had
had to pay two and a quarter for the shares. He said that the market was
firm. But in a day or two there was a set-back. The news that came from
South Africa was less reassuring, and Philip with anxiety saw that his
shares had fallen to two; but Macalister was optimistic, the Boers
co