Leyds arrived in England around the same time, unaware of the dispatches. A few days later he received a telegram about them from his deputy in Pretoria, Van Boeschoten. He couldn’t make head or tail of Van Boeschoten’s message. The actual text of the dispatches came just under a week later. As a result, he decided to change his plans, and informed Pretoria of this at the end of April. The original idea was that he would present himself as an envoy in various capital cities. He had his diplomatic credentials, but he would have to travel and do ‘the whole round... official receptions and other solemnities’. In view of the dispatches, he felt it would be better not to give up his position as ‘state secretary at large’, and to spend as much time as possible in London. ‘People don’t know me and they’ve got the wrong idea. They think I’m deliberately avoiding London out of hostility. They think I’ll go plotting and playing up to Germany and France, and if I go there now, they’ll use that to stir up the worst sentiments of the English by talking about German intrigues etc. At the moment I believe I can be of most use in London.’ With that idea in mind, he had moved into the apartment of Montagu White, the Transvaal consul in London, for four months. It was a good base from which to meet as many people as possible. He began right away. ‘Next week I’ll be having lunch with friend and foe.’114
Leyds wanted to talk to prominent lawyers as well as politicians. In his professional opinion, there was nothing legally wrong with the recent legislation in the Transvaal, or the treaty with the Orange Free State. But his case would be stronger if he could get internationally respected legal experts to endorse it. Tobias Asser, who had been one of his mentors in Amsterdam, had already agreed to look into the matter, as had the Utrecht jurist Jan de Louter. For obvious reasons Leyds also wanted confirmation from an Englishman. He succeeded. John Westlake, the top British authority on international law, was prepared to examine the documents. And through Westlake, Leyds came into contact with his French counterpart, Edouard Clunet.
Unfortunately, the learned gentlemen did not all agree. Asser’s advice wasn’t much help. Leyds should try to find precedents, he suggested. By way of explanation, Leyds mentioned that Asser’s wife was seriously ill and Asser himself ‘very down’. In De Louter’s opinion the treaty between the Transvaal and the Orange Free State was consistent with the letter but not the spirit of the London Convention. Clunet concluded that the Transvaal was free to enter into any agreements it wanted with the Orange Free State, including this treaty, which gave citizens of the Orange Free State unrestricted admission to the Transvaal. Westlake saw things differently. According to him, it implied that Britain was entitled to claim the same right for its citizens. Also, he maintained that the Aliens Act was not in conflict with the London Convention, but the Extradition Act was. This was not the unanimous expert opinion Leyds had wanted, but at least he was no longer empty-handed.115
In the meantime Leyds had expressed his views loud and clear on another contentious issue, the Uitlanders. Soon after arriving in Plymouth he had been interviewed by the French newspaper Le Temps. He prepared his case well. To begin with, he said, the Transvaal’s mining legislation could stand comparison with that in other countries. Taxes and import duties for the mining industry had been lowered, along with the cost of telegraphs, thanks to a subsidy from the Transvaal government. According to Leyds, the price of coal and dynamite—the biggest bone of contention—was open to debate. But, he reminded them, these were relatively small costs. The average monthly gold yield on the Rand was worth at least £800,000. And coal cost the mine owners little more than £30,000 a month. Less than four per cent. You could hardly call that a deterrent. Finally, Leyds said that even the Uitlanders’ grievances could be solved. As long as that handful of financiers and imperialists who were bent on war didn’t keep stoking them up.116
These were unusually strong statements for Leyds to make in public and they drew a lot of attention. Apparently he wasn’t intending to keep a low profile in Europe. As a prelude to the talks he was planning, the interview didn’t do any harm. It aroused people’s interest. In his three weeks in London—late April to 19 May 1897, interrupted by a few days in Paris—he managed to speak to many leading politicians. Not to the prime minister and foreign secretary, Lord Salisbury himself, but to his cousin, Arthur Balfour, leader of the House of Commons and ‘an extraordinary man’, along with Salisbury’s son-in-law, Lord Selborne, the undersecretary at the Colonial Office, and influential parliamentarians such as Herbert Asquith and Henry Labouchère, who was also the publisher of the controversial weekly journal Truth. He also had meetings with Sir Henry Loch, the former high commissioner to South Africa, and the businessman Sir Charles Tennant, ‘one of the richest men in England’, who had money in ‘the dynamite business’. He had to decline an invitation to dine with Lord and Lady Rothschild because he already had commitments in Paris.117
But the most important meeting was the one with Chamberlain. Leyds received the official invitation on 10 May, a few days after the Volksraad in Pretoria had decided to repeal the Aliens Act. It had done so at the insistence of the Executive Council on the pretext of complaints from neighbouring states. Chamberlain’s invitation explicitly mentioned this conciliatory gesture on the part of the Transvaal government, which made it possible for them to discuss their differences on an amicable footing. Informally to start with, that seemed best. Would lunch at two o’clock the following Saturday, 15 May, be convenient?118
It was. Afterwards, Leyds sent a detailed report to Van Boeschoten. Pretoria soon knew that the talks had not been ‘hostile’ and became ‘more cordial towards the end’. Under-Secretary Lord Selborne had also been present, but Chamberlain did most of the talking. He started by stating his intentions. ‘Britain has a paramount interest in S.A. which it intends to defend at all costs. As far as the Convention [of London] is concerned, Britain cannot allow any departure from it. It will adhere to it stringently and if necessary go to war for it. On this point we cannot accept arbitration.’ Having emphasised that the matter was not negotiable, Chamberlain went into more detail. The matters he had raised in his dispatches were ‘not of great importance’. It was everything taken together that had led him to conclude that the Transvaal was trying to sidestep the Convention. That wasn’t only the view of the ministry but also of the public in general. Then there was the legal interpretation of the Convention. ‘I understand you and I have been given different legal advice.’ Chamberlain realised that ‘one can seek the opinion of this or that lawyer on any matter, as one wishes’. But he was now citing ‘the opinion of lawyers of the Crown’ and they came to a different conclusion.
Then there was also ‘the Uitlander question’. The Transvaal government insisted that it was an internal affair, but Chamberlain argued that it concerned British subjects. He had the right to defend them, just as he would if they were in France, for instance. Did Leyds realise how many complaints he had received? ‘You cannot imagine the position we are in at the moment, the British public in Africa and here, the floods of letters we have been receiving with complaints against you (at least 90 out of 100 to go to war).’ A year earlier, Kruger had declined to travel to England to discuss the matter personally. Would it be an idea ‘for President Kruger to authorise you to discuss the Uitlanders’ grievances with me and decide in consultation how they can be resolved’?
In reply, Leyds promptly denied that Pretoria had any intention of violating the London Convention. The Executive Council and the Volksraad were totally unaware that the Transvaal’s signing of the Geneva Convention, for example, could harm Britain’s interests. After all, Britain had signed it too. Moreover, there was a precedent—Leyds and his private secretary, F.A. van der Hoeven, had heeded Asser’s advice. ‘Namely, we signed the Universal Postal Union Treaty, just as you did, and you did not object.’ Leyds felt that this argument in particular hit its mark. Chamberlain and Selborne ‘made a gesture suggesting there was something to be said for it’.
Chamberlain was als
o open-minded about the disputed legislation. The Aliens Act had been scrapped and the Extradition Act and the Press Act were ‘in themselves not breaches’ of the London Convention. It was more that they opened the way for the Transvaal government to commit violations. In other words, ‘if you deport criminals or prostitutes, I shall say nothing about it, but I shall speak out if for political reasons you deport any person who has done nothing.’ Leyds was pleased with this last statement; it kept the door open. For the time being, he warned Pretoria, apply the legislation in question only to those two categories: criminals and prostitutes.
Finally, there was the question of Leyds being authorised to confer about the Uitlanders’ grievances. It was not something he could discuss with Kruger or the Executive Council by telegram. He told Chamberlain ‘it could not even be done by letter, but would necessitate my return to Africa’. Mr Chamberlain ‘said he understood’. It seemed to him that the British secretary for the colonies ‘was willing to approach matters in a spirit of friendship’.119
Chamberlain’s attitude towards Leyds in the following days strengthened that impression. He introduced him to Sir William Harcourt, leader of the Liberal Opposition, and spoke in glowing terms about his ‘education and experience’. Leyds was optimistic too. ‘I’m happy’, he wrote to Van Boeschoten, ‘that the resentment that distressed me when I arrived here has abated, because it came from friend as well as foe. As you know, the market has gone up hugely. I played a major part in that.’ He had good reason to be satisfied with what he had accomplished.120
And then there were the celebrations to look forward to, first the Jubilee Procession on 22 June, followed by the Naval Review on the 26th. The Royal Navy would certainly be impressive. Just to be on the safe side, he decided to check which ship he had been assigned to. He didn’t want to find himself in the company of all the ‘colonial prime ministers’.121
His diligence paid off. Discreet enquiries revealed that it would not be diplomats on board the flagship Wildfire, but indeed the prime ministers of the British colonies. The scales fell from Leyds’s eyes. It had all been a sham: Chamberlain feigning kindness. An invitation to the Aldershot Review, a reception with the Prince and Princess of Wales, an invitation to Chamberlain’s home in Birmingham, and on top of it the cunning ploy of a letter from his wife, Mary, to Louise. All of it was contrived only to compromise Leyds as the South African Republic’s representative. Thank heavens he had looked into things. If he’d fallen for it, his days ‘as a republican statesman’ would have been over. He resolved to steer clear of Chamberlain as much as possible in future.122
It was too late to get out of the Jubilee Procession, but he soon thought up an excuse for the Naval Review. Besides Moltzer and Asser, another of his mentors had made it to the top. Pierson was finance minister and chairman of the Dutch Council of Ministers. Leyds arranged an invitation for another flagship, this time the flagship of the Dutch navy. ‘Please don’t trouble yourself any more,’ he wrote to Chamberlain. This was an invitation he obviously couldn’t refuse. Old friends of his would be on board. And in the days before the review he had commitments in Paris and Berlin.123
The latter was true. In Paris he had appointments with the foreign minister, Gabriel Hanotaux, and the president, Félix Faure. His talk with the president was mainly about the Transvaal’s diplomatic representation. Faure was strongly in favour of a single envoy, especially for France. With Hanotaux he discussed other affairs, mainly the ‘vast amounts of French capital’ invested in the Transvaal gold mines. ‘The Parisians’, Leyds had noted earlier, ‘are even more firmly convinced than the British that the Boers are deliberately working against the interests of the mines... I am making every possible effort to change that view.’ This was apparently what Hanotaux needed. He had been urging the French government to do all they could for the mining industry. It would be an issue in the French elections in November, and ‘in the meanwhile you’ve got time to get something done; those were more or less his words. He didn’t mean them as a threat, but as friendly advice; though when you read them, they do sound a bit like that.’124
Leyds had his own thoughts about the concerns of the French shareholders. He felt they had ‘allowed themselves to be conned. They allowed themselves to be fooled into thinking bad mines were good, and they allowed land where there isn’t a grain of gold to be palmed off as gold mines.’ And now they thought that ‘the shares would go up to their former value, if only our Government wanted them to. They got that idea from the British. It’s time they understood that it’s not possible, that they’ve been conned but not by us; that there are companies that cannot be saved even if we were to supply them with dynamite and transport everything by rail completely free of charge.’125
There was also good news for Leyds in Paris. It came from Pretoria. On 27 May 1897 he heard that he had been re-elected as state secretary, again. The result gave him an extra boost. He had won 19 of the 25 votes in the Volksraad, five went to Abraham Fischer, a candidate he had recommended, and one to Herman Coster. Leyds saw his election and particularly the percentages as ‘a signal to Britain and a victory for myself... especially since I wasn’t there in person and therefore wouldn’t have been able to do anything’.126
Over Whitsun the Leyds family spent a few days together in The Hague. The children were doing ‘extremely well’, but Leyds soon had to move on. To Berlin, where he hadn’t been since his return to Europe. Much had changed since his last visit, more than a year earlier. Here, too, support for the Boer cause had declined considerably. An audience with the kaiser was no longer on the cards, but he was received by the old chancellor, Chlodwig zu Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst. ‘The tone was very friendly but there’s nothing much to report,’ he telegraphed to Pretoria. As in France, this was because German financiers were worried about their investments in the Transvaal gold mines, which were running at a loss. From the consul in Frankfurt, Leyds learned that they totalled about £15 to £20 million, ‘for southern and western Germany alone’. Here, too, accusing fingers were pointing at Pretoria. ‘They’ve been told that the situation would get better if the government were more forthcoming in certain matters.’127
So it was not support that Leyds received on the European continent. It was criticism and a demand for greater compliance with the wishes of the mining industry—and its European shareholders. Rightly or wrongly, this made no difference to the way people perceived things, he realised. What it came down to was winning the support of the public—and consequently their governments—for the Boer cause. A press campaign to challenge Rhodes’s slurs and Chamberlain’s manipulations. But that was more than the incumbent of the Transvaal’s diplomatic and consular service could cope with. ‘It’s a pity I can’t quadruplicate myself,’ he lamented in a personal letter to Van Boeschoten, ‘it’s a pity I’m not based in one place. It’s a pity I haven’t got staff.’ When he returned to Pretoria, he would advise the Executive Council to do something about it.128
But first that dodgy fortnight in London. How should he react to Chamberlain’s double-dealings? While still in Berlin he had received worrying news from Pretoria about British troop reinforcements on the borders of the Transvaal. He was asked to obtain ‘certainty’ that ‘no one has aggressive intentions towards us’. Leyds decided to tell Chamberlain frankly and honestly about the consternation in the Transvaal. Pretoria wanted peace, he wrote, and would appreciate a reassuring gesture from the British side.129
Chamberlain feigned surprise, and threw the ball back. For the past 18 months Pretoria had been busy organising reinforcements and laying in huge supplies of weapons and ammunition, he replied. That could only be seen as preparation for an armed confrontation with ‘the Paramount Power’. So in his opinion it was only logical for Britain to react. He added charmingly that Leyds was still welcome on board the British flagship for the Naval Review. He could imagine that Leyds would prefer the company of his compatriots, but then he would miss something special, because ‘the foreig
n ships of war will be stationary and will not go down the line’.130
What a hypocrite. Leyds would have to mind his step. Even photographers asking to take pictures of him were part of the ruse to frame him. When he enquired, they said it was for some ‘hall of famous men of the Empire, etc.’. At the Jubilee Procession on 22 June, he wasn’t able to avoid Chamberlain. After the pageant the Chamberlains approached Leyds and his wife and invited them to the Colonial Office. Over lunch there, Chamberlain again urged him to ‘get permission to negotiate with him’, because he couldn’t ‘discuss the same matter with two different people at the same time’. Leyds kept him at arm’s length as far as possible and not only at the Naval Review. He often had to say he was ‘out of town’, but there were also times when he spoke his mind. He made no secret, for instance, about not wanting to meet the Prince of Wales ‘because he shakes hands with Rhodes in public’.
For Leyds that was a kind of litmus test. If the main culprit behind the Jameson Raid was still a member of the Privy Council—Queen Victoria’s highest political advisory body—‘how can our people believe in the British Government’s good faith?’ He personally had little confidence left in them. Even the members of the Opposition he had spoken to, their leader, Sir William Harcourt, first and foremost, ‘couldn’t care less about us’. They defended the Boer cause not ‘in the interests of justice, but for the benefit of the party’. Back in Paris at the beginning of July, he drew his conclusions. ‘We cannot count on support in England.’ The English were ‘despised more and more around the world’. And they were well aware of it, with the result that they were ‘closing ranks more than they would otherwise; after all, an Englishman is still an Englishman, even if he’s in the Opposition’.
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