though satisfactory, is very hard to understand. Why did they
declare war if they had nothing up their sleeves? Why are they wasting
time now? Such were the questions. Then we sailed again, and again
silence shut down, this time, however, on a more even keel.

Speculation arises out of ignorance. Many and various are the
predictions as to what will be the state of the game when we shall have
come to anchor in Table Bay. Forecasts range from the capture of
Pretoria by Sir George White and the confinement of President Kruger in
the deepest level beneath the Johannesburg Exchange, on the one hand, to
the surrender of Cape Town to the Boers, the proclamation of Mr.
Schreiner as King of South Africa, and a fall of two points in Rand
Mines on the other. Between these wild extremes all shades of opinion
are represented. Only one possibility is unanimously excluded--an
inconclusive peace. There are on board officers who travelled this road
eighteen years ago with Lord Roberts, and reached Cape Town only to
return by the next boat. But no one anticipates such a result this time.

Monotony is the characteristic of a modern voyage, and who shall
describe it? The lover of realism might suggest that writing the same
paragraph over and over again would enable the reader to experience its
weariness, if he were truly desirous of so doing. But I hesitate to
take such a course, and trust that some of these lines even once
repeated may convey some inkling of the dulness of the days. Monotony of
view--for we live at the centre of a complete circle of sea and sky;
monotony of food--for all things taste the same on board ship; monotony
of existence--for each day is but a barren repetition of the last; all
fall to the lot of the passenger on great waters. It were malevolent to
try to bring the realisation home to others. Yet all earthly evils have
their compensations, and even monotony is not without its secret joy.
For a time we drop out of the larger world, with its interests and its
obligations, and become the independent citizens of a tiny State:--a
Utopian State where few toil and none go hungry--bounded on all sides by
the sea and vassal only to the winds and waves. Here during a period
which is too long while it lasts, too short when it is over, we may
placidly reflect on the busy world that lies behind and the tumult that
is before us. The journalists read books about South Africa; the
politician--were the affair still in the domain o