John Morley: “A cabinet without him would hold its councils without the most important of the influences on which it depended.”

He was a soldier of infinite personal courage and daring; of striking military energy, initiative, and resource; a high, pure, and single character, dwelling much in the region of the unseen.

With a few exceptions, a political speech like the manna in the wilderness loses its savour on the second day.

Could ministers justify abandonment, without far stronger evidence than they then possessed that they could not govern the Transvaal peaceably?

But we have no right to cast on him any responsibility beyond what is strictly military.