d me cordially enough; but my friend Judge Beyers,
the gentleman who presented me, by mentioning that I was on a voyage
around the world, unwittingly gave great offense to the venerable
statesman, which we both regretted deeply. Mr. Kruger corrected the
judge rather sharply, reminding him that the world is flat. "You don't
mean _round_ the world," said the president; "it is impossible! You
mean _in_ the world. Impossible!" he said, "impossible!" and not
another word did he utter either to the judge or to me. The judge
looked at me and I looked at the judge, who should have known his
ground, so to speak, and Mr. Kruger glowered at us both. My friend the
judge seemed embarrassed, but I was delighted; the incident pleased me
more than anything else that could have happened. It was a nugget of
information quarried out of Oom Paul, some of whose sayings are
famous. Of the English he said, "They took first my coat and then my
trousers." He also said, "Dynamite is the corner-stone of the South
African Republic." Only unthinking people call President Kruger dull.

[Illustration: Cartoon printed in the Cape Town "Owl" of March 5,
1898, in connection with an item about Captain Slocum's trip to
Pretoria.]

Soon after my arrival at the cape, Mr. Kruger's friend Colonel
Saunderson,[G] who had arrived from Durban some time before, invited me
to Newlands Vineyard, where I met many agreeable people. His Excellency
Sir Alfred Milner, the governor, found time to come aboard with a party.
The governor, after making a survey of the deck, found a seat on a box
in my cabin; Lady Muriel sat on a keg, and Lady Saunderson sat by the
skipper at the wheel, while the colonel, with his kodak, away in the
dinghy, took snap shots of the sloop and her distinguished visitors. Dr.
David Gill, astronomer royal, who was of the party, invited me the next
day to the famous Cape Observatory. An hour with Dr. Gill was an hour
among the stars. His discoveries in stellar photography are well known.
He showed me the great astronomical clock of the observatory, and I
showed him the tin clock on the _Spray_, and we went over the subject of
standard time at sea, and how it was found from the deck of the little
sloop without the aid of a clock of any kind. Later it was advertised
that Dr. Gill would preside at a talk about the voyage of the _Spray_:
that alone secured for me a full house. The hall was packed, and many
were not able to get in. This success brought m