General Gatacre Part 30

CHAPTER XVIII

1904-1906

ABYSSINIA

Although Gatacre undoubtedly indulged hopes of further employment, he had not much confidence in such expectations. While prepared to move onwards should his desires be fulfilled, he was simultaneously safeguarding his retreat.

During the manoeuvres he had made inquiries about the working of the Remount Department in the counties, and had discovered that there was a post open to him which would provide both congenial occupation and reasonable remuneration, namely 500 a year in addition to pension.

He bought a little house in the Cotswold Hills, and for the first few weeks enjoyed the leisure, as he had always enjoyed the leisure of his sixty days' leave.

Although the post he coveted was vacant, and although similar posts were being worked by retired officers of his rank, unaccountable difficulties arose in securing it. In the hope of wearing down these obstacles, whatever might be their origin, Gatacre got permission to hold the post for eight months, but the pay attached was withheld, the arrangement being that he was to draw allowances only, {274} on the scale fixed by Government for all such duty, which is calculated to cover actual travelling expenses. The work consisted mainly of overhauling and replenishing the list of registered horses, over an area of twenty-two counties. These included Wales and Cornwall to the west, while on the east a line drawn from Cheshire to Hampshire inclusive of these two counties would form a rough boundary. He very soon got profoundly interested in his task.

He invented a new system of tabulating all sorts of information useful to the Department. He found that to complete what was properly a year's work in eight months involved working under more pressure than could justly be expected, more especially as his services were voluntary; but the old incentive of reaching his own self-imposed standard would not let him leave his work unfinished. The facts he had collected were useless, his labour would be in vain, unless he could record them in a form that would be handy for reference. His reports were to be the _vade mec.u.m_ of the Remount and Yeomanry Officer in each county; there was one little volume for each county, and a General Directory for use at Headquarters. Permission was obtained from Sir Evelyn Wood, commanding the Second Army Corps, to employ an army clerk and two typewriting clerks (women) in an office in Salisbury, and there Gatacre worked for six weeks in July and August 1904. In order to complete his task in the allotted time, he had to stick so closely to his desk that he {275} grudged the loss of working hours which would be the consequence of a Sunday at home. But it occurred to him that as the nights were short and cool he could save the time that would be wasted in the train by doing the journey by night on his bicycle. The distance was sixty-four miles; the first time it worked very well and he met with no mishap, but on the return journey he punctured at 2 a.m., and as it was too dark to do his own repairs, he had to complete the last twenty-four miles on foot.

[Sidenote: On the road]

A fortnight later he was on the road again, but decided to come by day.

He telegraphed to me that he was leaving Salisbury at noon on Sat.u.r.day.

Having remonstrated with him about making this journey in one stretch, as he had done previously, I wired that I would meet him at Malmesbury at 5 p.m., reckoning that he could not complete his forty-eight miles in less than five hours, and that my presence would ensure a break in the long spin. He arrived five minutes before time, but we did not start off again till six. On another occasion he started at daybreak, and we met at nine o'clock for breakfast at Malmesbury. His age was then sixty; the story is told in order to show not only that he still possessed staying powers above the average, but that he still found the highest delight in using such powers.

In September he was informed that the Remount Department had no longer any use for his services. Across the letter to this effect I find written in his own hand "Disappointing, {276} very!" Once more it seemed to him that his devotion and exertion counted for naught; he had done good work, but he had mysteriously failed to make it of any account.

[Sidenote: 1905]

There was, however, an interpretation of the situation which, though hidden from his eyes, can be read between the lines of the file of correspondence. He could see and could gauge the usefulness of his services and ideas, but his humble-mindedness hid from him the fact that it was his own value that stood in his way. His highly trained administrative faculties immediately grasped all the bearings and possibilities of the problem before him, and he could not resist the desire to improve upon existing methods. This was not what the Department wanted. Although willing to admit the intrinsic merits of his scheme, the authorities were not prepared to put in force such a comprehensive measure of reorganisation; so that while they could honestly say that his "work would serve as a model," they had no option but to discontinue using a tool that was too powerful, too keen, for their purpose. His military rank and his administrative ability made it impossible to employ him in the subordinate position that he coveted.

[Sidenote: Retired]

Yet another blow was hanging over him. On March 22,1905, he went to London to attend the Memorial Service to His Royal Highness the Duke of Cambridge in Westminster Abbey. At such a gathering he naturally found many friends (more especially as the Duke had been Colonel-in-Chief of the Middles.e.x Regiment), {277} and, according to one who was amongst the number, it was a pleasure to see how many distinguished men came to greet him, civilians as well as soldiers, and among them men of political standing who knew him more by reputation than in person.

This was the last flicker of his public life, for when he returned to the country that evening the intimation of his immediate retirement lay among his correspondence. By contrast to his mood when a few hours earlier he had stood honoured among his peers, this letter seemed a stinging blow, and I can confidently say that he did not expect it.

There were still eight months to run before he reached the age of sixty-two, at which point he would (in the event of his not having been promoted to the rank of Lieutenant-General) have had to "retire" under the regulations.

The one thing that we had vaguely dreaded had come to pa.s.s. The thing was unthinkable, but it was true--the words in his friend's letter had become prophecy: he was to "have no opportunity of justifying himself,"

no chance of obliterating the slur that had been cast on his name. His career was at an end, and it had closed a dishonoured career, when to have held one more appointment, however insignificant, would have implied recognition of the facts of the case and compensation for the hasty judgment.

It was some time in the summer of 1905 that the late Sir Lepel Griffin invited Gatacre to sit on the board of the Kordofan Trading Company.

{278} We welcomed the new interest. I thought that the pretext for regular visits to London was a desirable thing; I liked to think of his moving amongst busy men, and having something to occupy his mind.

There was no idea of making a fortune; we had very little spare capital, and he only invested the small amount necessary to qualify as a Director.

From the first he foresaw the opportunity that might arise of visiting the territory specified in the concession. The prospect attracted him wildly. As the season approached when such a proposition could be seriously entertained, his spirits rose, and he revelled in the idea of starting off for the desert; he took the keenest pleasure in preparing every contrivance for his comfort that his experience of camp-life could suggest; he set about getting books and pamphlets in which he could learn the history of the trade in rubber and the chemical processes of its manufacture.

A telegram which reached us on November 10, asking whether he could be ready to start by the Peninsular and Oriental night mail of the 17th, lifted him into the highest spirits: from that moment he talked of nothing but tents, rifles, and such-like necessities, and thought of nothing but the valuable report that he would prepare for his co-Directors.

To those who have been inclined to blame me for letting him go, I would reply that it still appears to me that any attempt to stop him would have been dictated by selfish motives. He was offered a delightful trip, one that would {279} afford him all those arduous pleasures that his soul loved. Why should I stand in his way? I did desire greatly to accompany him, but in such a short s.p.a.ce it would have been impossible to wind up his affairs and so set me free to go.

[Sidenote: Up the Nile]

The rubber forests that were the objective of the trip lay in Abyssinia, east and south of Addis Abeba. The party consisted of the General, in command; an experienced Syrian trader named Idlibi, who had acted as his interpreter during the Egyptian Campaign of 1898; one or two men of a similar cla.s.s, and a suitable number of servants and porters. Amongst Sir William's three personal servants, one was a Mahommedan bearer from India, with whom he could talk freely in Hindustani, and who could therefore act as interpreter to the Arab servants. The route selected involved a trip in steamers of about 500 miles up the White Nile to Taufikia, and then, turning eastward, a further 250 miles up the tributary river Sobat, which in its upper reaches is called the Baro, to Gambela, from which it is 300 miles by a good caravan track to Addis Abeba.

At Fashoda, which is now officially called Kodok, the party came across an English missionary boat. Gatacre went on board and had tea with the five missionaries a few days before Christmas.

It was hoped that there would have been enough water in the river to float the shallow craft right on to Gambela, but first one boat and then the two smaller craft ran aground. {280} It was therefore necessary to open communications from Keg, where the last barge stranded, to Gambela by road, a distance of about thirty-eight miles.

Leaving Idlibi in charge of the caravan, Sir William accomplished this march on foot in three days, accompanied by his servants and a few porters.

[Sidenote: 1906]

Gambela is an important trading centre, and was the first objective of the journey. Politically it is known as an Enclave--that is, a tract of country leased by the King of Abyssinia to the Soudan Government.

It thus becomes a frontier post of the Soudan, and has a small Soudanese garrison, which in January 1906 was under the command of the Memour Mehined Riad Effendi.

The Memour was exceedingly hospitable to Sir William, receiving him as a guest in his house, and doing everything in his power to facilitate his journey. Gatacre's letters speak most gratefully of the kindness he received at this officer's hands. At Gambela he discovered the Company's agent, and arranged with him to procure three hundred coolies, who should march to Keg, and then carry the merchandise from the boats along the track by which Sir William himself had just travelled.

[Sidenote: His death in the desert]

Having completed his business, Gatacre started back to join Idlibi, and report progress. On this return journey he was unfortunate in his camping-grounds. Tents being superfluous in such a climate, the party just bivouacked where they halted when the sudden darkness of {281} the tropics fell upon them. In a small notebook of daily jottings, which at his leisure Gatacre worked up into a more formal journal, I find the following entry on January 11, 1906: "Camped in a swamp--horrible water." He reached Keg next day, and was pleased to find that Idlibi had disembarked all the stuff and divided it into suitable loads for the men to carry. A few days later, being impatient at the non-arrival of the coolies, Gatacre decided again to make his way to Gambela, but was attacked with fever on the road, and died at a place known as Iddeni.

His body was conveyed in a canoe to Gambela, where Mehined Riad Effendi saw to its burial in the Abyssinian Christian Cemetery, with due formality.

On Idlibi's arrival with the merchandise a court of inquiry was held, at which the Memour presided. The depositions of all the servants were formally taken, and a translation of their words was forwarded through the British Consul at Addis Abeba to the Foreign Office in London. It appears therein that there was another Englishman moving to and fro during that week, and that he pa.s.sed the General on the Tuesday previous to his death, which took place on Thursday, January 18, 1906.

I mention this to show that the locality was not unknown to civilisation, and that Gatacre was not the only one to brave the climate.

It is clear that darkness overtook him on the 11th while on swampy ground, so that he was {282} compelled to pa.s.s the night exposed to dangerous miasmas. I am convinced that had it not been for this misfortune, or some similar accidental misadventure, he would have returned with the rest of the mission on June 10 as young and high-spirited as he was on his departure.

Lofty designs must close in like effects: Loftily lying, Leave him--still loftier than the world suspects, Living and dying.

The key-note to Gatacre's character may be said to be willingness--an eager and fearless willingness to follow the right, the best, an unconditional spending of himself in carrying out the lofty conceptions of duty and service with which he was gifted. Everything he undertook, everything he accomplished, was done with an eager gallantry and a joyful zeal. The effect of these qualities was enhanced by a proud indifference to the cost to himself.

His soldierly heedlessness in risking his life had its moral counterpart in his willingness to accept to the full all responsibility for his actions. How should one who feared not the Hand of G.o.d--"the arrow that flieth by day, nor the pestilence that walketh in darkness"--how should such a one fear the judgment of man?

It is to the remarkable a.s.sociation of an exalted sense of duty with exceptional physical powers that Gatacre owes much of his distinction.

His {283} standard of efficiency and discipline was as far above the average as were his powers of bodily endurance. His lowliness of mind, however, hid from him the true measure of his endowments, and led him to try to inspire all men with his own lofty ideals. During his long services as staff officer he was always ready to show to his Chief the enthusiastic co-operation that he expected from those who were serving under him. Though some officers may have smarted under his sarcasms, though they may have thought that he overtaxed his troops, it is admitted on all sides that his exactions were prompted solely by the interests of the service, and that his life was the expression of the precepts that he instilled. In the final act of his military career Gatacre proved that he was ready to do as he would be done by--to submit himself without question to the word of authority. Many a time had he been face to face with death; when something more precious than life itself was demanded he laid aside his reputation without a murmur.

[Sidenote: The broken arcs]

Therefore to whom do I turn but to Thee, the ineffable Name?

Builder and Maker, Thou, of houses not made with hands!

What, have fear of change from Thee who art ever the same?

Doubt that Thy power can fill the heart that Thy power expands?

There shall never be one lost good! What was, shall live as before; The evil is null, is nought, is silence implying sound; What was good, shall be good, with, for evil, so much good more; On the earth the broken arcs; in the heaven a perfect round.