- -..: Dan to Beersheba TUNIS, KAIROUAN AND CARTHAGE. Described and Illustrated with 48 Coloured Plates. By Graham Petrie, R.I. Royal 8vo. Price 16s. net. AFTER WATERLOO: Reminiscences of European Travel from 1815 to 1819. By Major W. E. Frve. Edited by Dr. Salomon Rejnach (Membre de l'lnstitut). 1 vol. Demy 8vo. Price 15s. net. JAPAN: Rambles in the Sanctuaries of Art. By Gaston Migeon (Conservateur an Musee du Louvre). With many Illustrations. Price 6s. net. PERSIA: The Awakening East. By YV. P. Ckksson, F.R.G.S. 8vo. Illustrated. Price 12s. 6d. net. SYRIA. By Gertrude Lothian Bei.l. Demy 8vo. Illustrated. Price 6s. net. LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN, 21, BEDFORD STREET, W.C. / f/r/f / /'f//r/ -v ' ■/'/// ///////// "/ '■'/ Dan to Beersheba Work and Travel in Four Continents By Archibald R. Colquhoun Author of 1 ' The Mastery of the Pacific," etc. With Frontispiece from a painting by Herman G. Herkomer and a facsimile letter of Cecil Rhoaes London William Heinemann 1908 Copyright, London, 190S, hy William Heinemann; and Washington, U.S. A. ,hj tin Macmillan Company. To My Fellow-Worker and Fellow-Traveller " I pity the man who can travel from Dan to Beersheba and cry ''tis all barren !' ; and so it is, and so is all the world to him who will not cultivate the fruits it offers. 1 ' — Sterne. CONTENTS INTRODUCTION PAGE Origin of family and name of Colquhoun — Complicated etymology — My ancestors — The feud with the Macgregors — Colquhoun of Camstradden — An old Scots family — Hereditary influences— My father waits — Tribute to our mother-land . xv CHAPTER I MY FATHER GOES TO INDIA My great-grandfather — Connectioirwith Smolletts and " Hum- phrey Clinker" — The Earldom of Annandale — A curious coincidence — My grandfather's career in the army — Youth- ful half-pay officers — My grandfather's Indian diary — My grandmother and her six daughters — My father a typical Scot of a vanishing type — His influence on my character — " He would be a soldier," but had to be a doctor — The East India Company's service — Qualifications of an assistant surgeon — -Voyage to India round the Cape and " Overland" — The young cadet at the ''India House" — An enormous outfit — The lady passenger — Husband-hunting — -A stormy voyage — Arrival of a " griffin " at Calcutta — -The native servant's view — Life in India in the " 'twenties "—Some old letters — A revelation of my father's character — His romantic marriage to a girl of sixteen — Off to the Army of the Indus. i CHAPTER II MY FATHER (iOES TO KANDAHAR AND KABUL Why we went to war — Russophobia — The garbled Blue Book — Shah Suja and Oost Mohammed — The Army of the Indus — The tomasha at Ferozepore — The " Lion of the Punjaub " — The "military promenade" — Sufferings of troops — My father's task — Operations under difficulties— Ouetta — Nott is left to " rot " — Through the Bolan Pass — " Colkie" at Ouetta — Kandahar at last — Mv father in action — The "fighting viii CONTENTS PAGE doctor " earns his title — Rawlinson — A narrow squeak for the doctor — Winter at Kandahar — Mure righting — Affairs at Kabul — Macnaghten's optimism — Murder of Burnes — The disaster — My father with Maclaren's brigade — Failure to get to relief of Kabul — The retreat — Brydon arrives at Jellalabad — A year at Kandahar — Rawlinson's narrow escape — Kandahar nearly taken by Afghans — Christie and the rassaldar— The rescue force under Pollock starts — " Retire by Kabul" — The gates of Somnath — Xott tights his way to Kabul — Recovery of prisoners — The storming of Istalif — The march to India and the triumph — Ellenborough's pageant — Character of Nott — My lather's reputation in the army of Bengal 17 CHAPTER III MY MOTHER GOES " HOME " Preparations — Journey down Ganges — A "deader'' at close quarters — Friends at Calcutta — The voyage on the " India- man " — London and new relations — ■ Smart clothes — To Edinburgh by packet— " Grandmamma" — The battle of the porridge bowl — Deportment — The hrst snow- — Some cousins — To Glasgow by canal — Riddrie Park and its master — An old-fashioned Scottish home — The tea merchant — Christmas at Riddrie — "Papa" comes home from the war — Little girls at school — A young ladies' fashionable seminary — A summer holiday — Glimpse of the Oueen and little Prince of Wales — A new home — Sir Walter Scott — My parents back in India — Sikh campaign — Sobraon — Ill-health — My father retires and comes home — My arrival on the voyage — My father dabbles in speculation — "Jim Courtney" — Voyage to Australia — Adventures of the Antelope — Return to Scot- land — My father refuses to practise medicine — The post- man's leg — The Company's "bad bargain" — My grand- mother's death — Loss of family relics and papers — Family portraits — My brothers and sisters — Some stories of my father — " The sin of pride " — " Putting up petitions " — The Highland parson — My fathers notes and mine — A half-sheet of note-paper — Adventures in outline — An historical puzzle. 45 CHAPTER IV MY liOYHUUD My first disappointment— The phantom boat — Loneliness — A first smoke — My fathers system — Felicia's wedding — Janet CONTENTS ix and Agnes — A " cheeky" boy — I learn nothing at school— Neuwied — Von Stein wins my heart— My mother's death- Office life at Glasgow — My stepmother — Theatrical distrac- tions — Helen Faucit— The Glovers, Mr. Kendal, Henrietta Hodson and Lydia Thompson, Sam Bough, the scene painter — Charles Dickens reads " The Christmas Carol " — Thackeray — Dr. Norman Macleod — The idle apprentice — Indian stories — The Mutiny — Adventures of the Lennox family — My father's friends : Rawlinson, Broadfoot, Pottinger, Gardner, Skinner of "Skinner's Horse" — The Thugs — I run away — The Wanderjahr — Shipped to India as a black sheep 68 CHAPTER V I GO TO INDIA Voyage round the Cape — Vanishing seaman types — India in the 'sixties — Life on an indigo estate — Station life — Society — The Mofussil — Intellectual stagnation — The verb ;- to col- lect " — I go to Roorkee— Some comrades and professors — Work and play — Sport in the Mofussil — a true " tiger story " — Bachelor bungalows — Pillows ad lib — Hot nights — Camp life — My brother-in-law and sister — A debt of gratitude . 88 CHAPTER VI IN LOWER BURMA First impression — Contrast with India — Early days in Burma — Sir Arthur Phayre — Bishop Bigandet— Rev. Dr. Marks — Theebaw at school— Rangoon in the 'seventies — Unhealthi- ness — -Moulmein — Tennasserim — Theo Fforde — " Pickled tea " and ngapee — Burmese character ; have we improved it ? Letter from a head-man — Happiness v. efficiency — Life in a lonely station — Gilbertian situation — All sorts of work — The " Thoogyec's niece " —River life — The " great bore " — A " snake " story — My entrance into literature — Strictly anony- mous ! — Some personalities — My nickname — " C. B." — How I got my chance ......... 99 CHAPTER VII A MISSION TO SIAM Bangkok and King Chulalongkorn — His predecessor a typical Oriental potentate — A quaint menage — Condition of Sunn x CONTENTS PAGE — '•'Johnny'' Davis the dacoit hunter — Our march to Zimmay — The Karens — "Bangilla" — Dress and undress — The Was — Sepoys a nuisance — Our imposing procession — Elephants and their ways —An embarrassing episode — Our reception at Zimmay — Paris in Siam — Morning markets — Prisoners and jails — A quaint guard of honour — "Who come dar?" — Saluting extraordinary — A much married chief — Missionaries and Buddhism— Education in Siam — I have a scheme — My first furlough — Sir Henry Yule — My ambitious project — Charles Wahab joins me — We start for Canton . . . . . . . . . . .116 CHAPTER VIII 1 EXPLORE SOUTHERN CHINA Meet Sir Harry Parkes — Previous explorations of Southern China — My own plan — Hong Kong and Pope Hennessy — Preparations at Canton — The interpreter difficulty — Jordan and Lockhart — Cooks and food in China — Our "house- boat " — We start off — The captain's contract — Protected by ■•gun-boat " — Our disguise — Fishing with cormorants — Hostility of people — Trouble with servants — A reward for our heads ! — Hong Beng-Kaw deserts us — We begin our march — Get into Shan country — Primitive accommodation — Scenery — I am baffled —The tinchai is surprised — March to Tali — Poisoned water in Yunnan — An English missionary — The journey to Bhamo — A French missionary — We get lost — Difficulties and dangers — We outwit the tinchai — Pere Vial offers to accompany us — A terrible march — Starvation and imprisonment — We reach Bhamo — The delights of civilization — Pack to Rangoon — Poor Wahab — I pay allying visit to Simla -Lord Ripon and Evelyn Paring — My lost dinner — I go home — An autumn's work and pleasure — "Across Chryse" — Sir Henry Yule and my father — Colborne Baber — Terrien cie Lacouperie — The Royal Geographical Society's gold medal — Henry Stanley — Lord Salisbury — Stanley's offer — I join the Times and start for Tongking 134 CHAPTER IX THE EAR EAST IN PEACE AND WAR UajJ'aire Toiikinois — My mission — The Times gives me carte 'jlanche — What the war was about — My impressions — Hie CONTENTS xi PAGE launch — Position of French — My conclusions— The un- welcome truth — My "record" telegram and how it was written — A telegraph story — The effect in Paris — War correspondents de luxe — Our unpopularity — Sontay and Bacninh — I go down river — How I got back — An Irish friend in need — Press censorship and how it was eluded — Cameron tries to steal a march — Cameron and Gilder — I go home — Sent back at once — Life at Hong Kong— Sir "Jaw Bone" — Rochfort Maguire — "Jaw Bahadur" — "No, Malcolm, no!" — A curious war — Treaty-making extra- ordinary — My friend Detring intervenes — Courbet sinks the Chinese fleet — Pelham Warren refuses to be hurried — Franco-Chinese "war " declared at last — I go to Port Arthur — Admiral Ting and Admiral Lang — "Notre ami Li Hung Chang" — Von Hanneken's escape — The conclusion of the war — "A dramatic extravaganza" — Fall of Jules Ferry — Irony of fate — The duel — Some people I met — Alexander Michie — Li Hung Chang — "Baron Mickiewitz" — Sheng Taotai — Loh fung-loh — Halliday Macartney — Robert Hart — British servants of the Chinese Government — My travels — I go home — Peace declared between France and China . 165 CHAPTER X A CAMPAIGN AT HOME Second visit to Siam— Meet Hallett — On railway projects — Con- nection of Burma and China — The favoured line — Curzon's cold douche — I offend the King — A case of obstinacy — My work at home — -The Chambers of Commerce — A petition that failed — "Amongst the Shans" — Sir Arthur Phayre — ■ Immigration into Burma — Our policy — French designs — King Theebaw and his Oueen — Lord Randolph Churchill in office — My attacks on Lord Ripon — Dufferin's ultimatum — My newspaper friends — Joe Cowen — Interviewers — The World — "As others see us" — Edmund Yates — Blowitz — ■ On public speakers — A Slav story — My mission to Lord Dufferin — My "warning" — Bear Wood — The great John Walter — Leader writing — John Macdonald — A note on the present government of Burma . . . . . 194 CHAPTER XI IN UP P E R DUK M A Early days in Upper Burma — The work of a deputy com- missioner — A heavy death-roll — How the ranks were xii CONTENTS PAGE recruited — My first district — Dacoit hunting—" The buffalo in the elephant-grass " — The three dacoit brothers — Mounted infantry— Penn Symons — Some victims — A brave stand — Some recollections — Forbes on bravery— Smith and I are surprised — Why the Sepoys went on — A suggestion for a policy — I take fever and go home — My letter to the Times on Burmese affairs — I am reproved — I go to the Ruby Mines — Illicit rubies — Maung Hmat — The " Momeit affair" — I am blamed — I reply — The letter which went astray — An affair of high treason — My excuses — 1 am "suspended " and go home — -The " Momeit affair" again — I remonstrate and am (ultimately) acquitted — The moral of the letter incident — Fate and sealing wax — My punishment — I meet Alfred Beit — His kindness — The die is cast — Good-bye to the East, but not for ever . . . . 21S CHAPTER XII SOUTH AFRICA AND RHODHs A hurried departure — Arrival in South Africa — I get a job — • About Cecil Rhodes — Some real stories — Was Rhodes brave? — Afraid of ghosts — Kimberley and its club — I.D.B. — Society — Rhodes and his clothes —The Imperialism of an empire builder — The origin of the "Cape to Cairo" — Schnadhorst — Rhodes on the power of money — I do not make a good investment — Expert opinions on "the Rand" --Railways in South Africa — Visit to Pretoria — President Kruger as I saw him -Xelmapius — Stage-coach travelling in South Africa — Refreshments for travellers, and accom- modation — The delights oi trekking — Wagon versus motor — Johannesburg in the 'eighties — A contrast — Cape Town — The origin of the British .Douth Africa Company — Why we went to Mashonaland ........ 24S CHAPTER XIII MASHONALAND AND GROOT SCHUUR he Pioneers — We start off quietly — Khama and his people — East news from home — Our march — Difficulties of the road — The bivouac 'Die " great white eye " — Lion story — We reach Mount Hampden— I go to Manika — Xo sign of Portuguese — The great King Umtassa A treaty is signed — Jameson's accident — A letter from him — The Portuguese CONTEXTS mission of remonstrance — An imposing cortege — Move and counter-move — -"Pat"' Forbes checkmates — We take two important prisoners — Great excitement in Portugal — The Pioneers at work — Short commons — A desperate situation — - Founding a colony — I leave Rhodesia — A letter from Rhodes — Some of our men — The first London dinner of Rhodesian Pioneers — " We do not live in Park Lane ! " — At Groot Schuur — Rhodes's curiosities — Some of his guests — Hofmeyr "the Mole" — John Merriman — Biblical perversions — I meet Lord Randolph Churchill for the last time — Say good- bye to Rhodes — Reasons for leaving — My " Government House " in Mashonaland— My views on marriage . . 272 CHAPTER XIV A VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES Return home — Climate and cold baths — -The fresh air cure — Press work — Literary friends — Andrew Tuerandhis circle — " Red with the blood of authors " — Norman Maccoll — A receipt for growing hair — A season in town — I meet my fate, but bungle matters — A wet day at Henley — Some people I have met — Sir Richard Burton, Stillman, Edwin Arnold — I get bored — Go to the United States — Life in the Southern States — John C. Calhoun — Atlanta and Chicago — Chicago and another place — On the farms — The British not popular — School books and prejudice — The Negro problem — The " poor white 1 ' — The perils of an editor — A Western story — Some American statesmen — John Hay — Theodore Roose- velt — William H. Taft — Tales of the White House — I make an investment — Facilis dcccnsus ■ — About lecturing and lectures — "Max O'Rell" — A tu quoque — I fall ill — The demon nurse — Convalescence — A tangled situation . . 296 CHAPTER XV IN CENTRAL AMERICA The ruling passion — I go to Central America — Some notes on the Panama Canal — A question of expense — The Admiral does not like Times correspondents— I take a deck passage, and fare very well — Corinto — The Spanish Main — Spanish America — Social life in Nicaragua — Hotels and baths — Food and cooking — I'.eds and bedfellows — ''Patience, rleas ! " — Club life — Street life — The ladies — Love-making — xiv CONTENTS Amusements — Roads — "Beggars on horseback" — Politics — The right to vote — Revolutions on a tennis court, and elsewhere — The man of honour — " The Key of the Pacific " — The Canal question — Lake Nicaragua — The Panama difficulty solved — Trinidad and Lady Proome — I get home — Literary work — The Morning Post — My politics — Resume of last eight years' work — My motto INTRODUCTION As I am frequently asked about my family and the meaning of our peculiar name, a few words on the subject may be of interest. My earliest known ancestor was Humphrey de Kilpatrick, so called because he hailed from the district of that name in the Leven-achs, the land of the powerful family of Lennox. Humphrey received from his liege lord the Earl of Lennox, in ngo, the gift of the lands of Colchune, which were situated in the west of Kilpatrick, running down to the Clyde and including the point on which stood (and still stands in decay) an ancient fortress known as Dunglass. No place-name Colchune (or Colquhoun) still survives, but the modern town of Milton was the " middle-toun " of the Colchune country, and Chapelton commemorates the sitejof the Colchune Chapel, while a muir and a burn still bear the name. The reason for the disappearance of the place or district name is probably found in the fact that the^head of the family, in the third generation from the first Humphrey, married the heiress of a big estate on Loch Lomond and went to live there at Luss, which became the centre of the family possessions. Cadets were planted out in the old Colchune country, but little by little it was sold, until no part of it to-day belongs to the Colquhouns. Luss, on the contrary, became the centre of an estate which was constantly increased, until at the present time it^extends along nearly the whole western shore of Loch Lomond and is one of the finest in the Western Highlands. The etymology of the name Colchune (which became Colquhoun by the mediaeval Gaelic transliteration into Latin, qn being commonly used for ch) is somewhat xvi INTRODUCTION obscure. It is derived by some authorities from coil cumhann (mh mute) " a narrow wood," and by others from the Gaelic words for " a sea coasting corner or point," alluding to the castle of Uunglass, which was a family mansion of the Colquhouns for many generations. In any case the original form was both spelt and pronounced Colchune or Cuchuin, the / being mute in the first, and the pronunciation has not really altered, though on non- Scottish tongues the name sounds more like Kohoon. Americans who drop the superfluous syllables and spell the name Calhoon or Calhoun, pronouncing the /, make a mistake. They get neither the original spelling nor pro- nunciation. The form Cahoon, which I have met, is really better, being a fairly good phonetic rendering of the name. The family deeds and records at Luss establish the position of the Colquhouns as people of some importance, especially after the marriage of Robert, in 13S6, with the Fair Maid of Luss. From this time the lairds of Luss played their part in the history of Scotland, holding offices under the king, rearing large families, and continually adding, little by little, to their estates. They had enemies, such as the Macgregors, who on a celebrated occasion, mentioned (with many inaccuracies) by Sir Walter Scott in "The Lady of the Lake" and " Rob Roy," descended on them and massacred a great number of the clan. For this crime — the massacre of Glenfruin— the Macgregors were proscribed and became the "nameless clan." Over all enemies, great and small, the Colquhouns triumphed, and, though but a small clan, they held their own and helped to keep the balance between the civilised Lowlands :>nd the wild tribes of the Western Highlands. Eventually they were absorbed into the industrial civilisation of the former, and to-day they are found scattered throughout the busy towns of the Lowlands as well as living in model villages on the estate of their chief. The city with which they have, perhaps, been most intimately connected, and INTRODUCTION xvii which knows them best, is Dumbarton, which is actually in the old Colchune country. Sir Robert and the Fair Maid of Luss had many sons, the eldest of whom inherited Luss and was chief of the clan. To his younger brother Robert he gave the estate of Camstradden, on the shores of Loch Lomond, a little south of Luss. The descendants of Robert from father to son held this estate of Camstradden for fifteen generations, during a period of 435 years (1390 — 1825), and then it was sold to Sir James Colquhoun of Luss. From this cadet branch of the chiefs of Colquhoun I am descended, and can trace my ancestry in the male line back for twenty-one generations to Humphrey de Kilpatrick in 1 190. As the Camstradden family split off in the fourteenth century, our connection with the Colquhouns of Luss is too distant to be called relationship ; moreover, their male line failed in the time of Queen Anne, and was continued through the son of the heiress of Colquhoun, who had married a Grant, taking his mother's name. The history of such an old Scots family as mine, if there were space for it, would be an epitome of the domestic history of Scotland and not without interest. First the clan, gathered under the wing of a land-owning chief, then the lairds, each with his " mickle land, pickle debt, law- suit and a doo-cot," then the adventurer to the colonies, the prosperous burgess, the soldier, the lawyer and adminis- trator, going forth from a poor Scots home to win fortune in distant lands. In such a story one may trace influences at work to-day and little suspected by those they govern. I, for instance, " heard the East a-calling," but did not know till I set myself to study my family history that the call came to us three or four generations back. Tricks of foreign speech and gesture, about which I have often been questioned, I now know that I owe to a Spanish ancestress unsuspected by me. But I must dilate no longer on family history and tradition, for my father waits to be introduced, and he, D.B. b xviii INTRODUCTION who never waited patiently for any one or any thing, would not forgive me if I kept him longer for what he would certainly call — it was a favourite expression — " a pack of balderdash ! " He was as democratic in principle as he was autocratic in practice, and I am convinced that he felt not the slightest pride in a long and honourable descent. Consequently the family tradition played little part in my own upbringing, and if I include this brief account of my ancestry in this book it is because I am so often asked about it, and because we poor Scots, who have done some work for the Empire to which we belong, are proud of the country that bore us and the poverty- stricken lairds who were our forbears, and think with affection of the too-often barren acres to which our families clun