Appointed Commissioner to report to Secretary of State for Colonies on Salvation Army Labour Colonies in U.S.A. — Alfred Lyttelton — H. R. H.‘s daughter Angela goes with him as secretary — Washington — Mr. Hay — President Roosevelt — The White House — Notes of interview with Roosevelt — Correspondence with Roosevelt.

On January 1905 I received, quite unexpectedly, the following letter from the Right Hon. Alfred Lyttelton, who at that date was Secretary of State for the Colonies.

Downing Street: January 14, 1905.

Dear Mr. Rider Haggard, — The Rhodes trustees have agreed to give a sum of 300 pounds (inclusive of all expenses) to defray the expense of sending a Commissioner to the United States to inspect and report upon the “Labour Colonies” established in the United States by the Salvation Army. There appear to be at present three of these, in California, Colorado, and Ohio, and they are used for the transmigration of persons from the big American cities. It is thought that if on inquiry this system is found to be financially sound and to be a real benefit to the poorer classes, it might prove a useful model for some analogous system of settlement from the United Kingdom to the Colonies.

It is the desire of the Rhodes Trustees that the Commissioner should be nominated by and report to the Secretary of State for the Colonies.

I should be very glad if you would consent to do the work, for which your experience as an observer both of men and agricultural affairs so eminently qualifies you. The remuneration is not very great, but the interest of the question to which the inquiry will relate and the public service which the Commissioner will be able to do may induce you, I hope, to undertake it.

If you go, you would in the first place be put into communication with the Salvation Army authorities. Mr. Booth Tucker, who commands their United States branch, considers that the Commissioner should start as early in the year as practicable, because he would have better opportunities of seeing the settlers and talking with them before the more strenuous agricultural operations have commenced.

I should therefore be obliged if you would be so good as to let me know in a few days whether you will be able and willing to go, and if so, whether you could start in February.

Yours faithfully,
Alfred Lyttelton.

H. Rider Haggard, Esq.

I extract the following passage from my answer:

I thank you for your letter and the compliment you have paid me. I accept your invitation to undertake this mission, especially as the subject is one that interests me very much; indeed I was speaking on a branch of it at the meeting at York last week of which Mr. Seebohm Rowntree was chairman. . . . I understand that I shall receive my appointment as Commissioner and my instructions from you as Secretary of State, not from the Rhodes Trustees, and that it will be so gazetted.

Shortly after I received a letter from Mr. Lyttelton’s secretary, Mr. Graham, which I print to show what were the exact terms of my instructions.

Downing Street: January 31, 1905.

Sir, — I am directed by Mr. Secretary Lyttelton to inform you that he has nominated you to be a Commissioner to proceed to the United States, and to inspect and to report to him upon the conditions and character of the Agricultural and Industrial Settlements which have been established there by the Salvation Army, with a view to the transmigration of suitable persons from the great cities of the United States to the land and the formation of Agricultural Communities.

2. It appears to the Secretary of State that, if these experiments are found to be successful, some analogous system might with great advantage be applied in transferring the urban populations of the United Kingdom to different parts of the British Empire.

3. You should pay special attention to the class of persons taken by the Salvation Army, their training and success as agricultural settlers, and the general effect upon character and social happiness; you should also consider the financial aspects of the experiments.

4. It would be desirable that, after you have inspected the several Settlements, you should proceed to Ottawa and discuss the subject with Lord Grey, who has taken great interest in it, as well as with such local authorities as may be indicated to you by the Governor–General as likely to aid you with advice and assistance as to the application of the system in a British Colony.

5. The Rhodes Trustees, with whom the suggestion of the Inquiry originated, and by whom Mr. Lyttelton has been asked to nominate a Commissioner, have made a grant of 300 pounds, including all travel expenses, to meet the cost of the Inquiry.

I am, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
Fred. Graham.

H. Rider Haggard, Esq.

I remember that when I went to see the Colonial Secretary to receive his verbal instructions before sailing, by some accident I missed the right entrance to the Colonial Office and finally obtained admission through a little back-door. At the time this circumstance struck me as curiously emblematic of my position. For after a cessation of twenty-six years was I not once again entering the official service of my country through a back-door, by means of this unexpected commission with which I was now honoured?

I inspected the Salvation Army colony at Hadleigh. Also I had a long interview with General Booth, and in due course I arrived at New York accompanied by my daughter Angela, who acted as my secretary. Here I was seized upon by interviewers, one instance of which I must record, because it is amusing. In the Waldorf Hotel we had three rooms — my daughter’s, my own, and a place for sitting. About two o’clock one night the telephone in each of these rooms (every room in an American hotel has a telephone) began to ring furiously. I leapt from my bed and tried to attend to two of them. While I was doing so my poor daughter arrived shivering in her nightgown (there were many degrees of frost), exclaiming, “Oh, Dad, do come here! There is a lunatic on the telephone who says he wants me to come out walking in the streets.”

It turned out that some enterprising newspaper was distributing food to the New York poor, and thought that it might get an advertisement by our presence at the process.

After this the young lady in question became artful. When she went to bed she took the receiver off the telephone. After I had cut my foot open in a sudden and sleepy midnight rush to that instrument, so did I!

Having paid some official visits we went to Philadelphia, where I inspected the vacant lots which a local society enabled poor people to cultivate. Also I was entertained at lunch by the Franklin Club, a society of gentlemen connected with literature, of which Dr. Weir Mitchell, the great nerve specialist, was the venerated president. This was a truly delightful meal, and one of which I shall always retain most grateful recollections.

From Philadelphia I proceeded to Washington, where I lunched with the late Secretary of State, Mr. Hay, a most refined and agreeable man who, I found, was a friend of my brother William. His name is now prominently before the public in connection with the Hay Pauncefote Treaty re the Panama Canal. On the 9th of March the Under–Secretary, Mr. Loomis, took us to see the President, Mr. Roosevelt, who was then celebrating his inauguration. The White House was crowded with people waiting to shake hands with the new Chief of the State, amongst whom I noted a band of Indian chiefs, men with long black hair, copper-coloured skins, and strongly marked features. Mr. Loomis took us to the President’s private room, a double chamber connected with a large ante-room by folding doors. These doors stood open, and beyond them were gathered a number of gentlemen awaiting the President. I take it that they were the Council of State or Cabinet.

Then the President appeared and shook hands with us warmly. He was, and indeed still is,30 a short, stout man with a fair, fresh complexion and rows of very even teeth, which he shows in their entirety every time he smiles. In manner he is frank and earnest, nor does he mince his words and opinions.

29 Written in 1912. — Ed.

First he waved his hand towards the gentlemen in the ante-room and, pointing to the door, beyond which the crowds through which we had passed were gathered, said that there I beheld the aftermath of a presidential election in a democratic country. Then he asked me my views upon the South African situation, adding that he was himself of Dutch descent.

I gave them, and he expressed his hope that the Boers in South Africa, with whom he had great sympathy, would settle down, learn English, and become a dominant factor in that country under the British flag and rule. He added that he had expressed these views strongly to those of their leaders who had visited him in America, which shows that he, at least, was not working against us in the South African War.

Our talk next turned upon matters connected with the land and with the absolute necessity of keeping the population on the soil and not allowing it to flock into the cities. I found that his views and mine upon this point were identical, as he recognised the inevitable deterioration of the race which must ensue if the land-dwellers were to become city-dwellers. He spoke also on the subject of the limitation of families, and instanced the case of the French Canadians who, in some districts, were crowding out the British-born folk in the Dominion. These Frenchmen, he informed me, settle upon the land and have large families, whereas the English Canadians draw to the cities. Also he instanced the case of Australasia. He impressed me as a thoroughly sound and reliable man — one whose heart was in the right place, and who would do the best he could for his nation during the time it was in his care, and for humanity at large.

A few days later my daughter and I were entertained at luncheon at the White House, to which we went straight from another luncheon, where we were also entertained by citizens of note in Washington.

It was a most amusing meal. Especially do I recollect Mr. Roosevelt’s comic sketch of the anticipated details of a forthcoming meeting between himself and the Swiss Minister, who was attending at the White House to present his credentials.

“He,” he said, “will stand in a fine uniform and read a lot of rot to me in French, while I shall stand opposite to him and read a lot of rot in English. And that’s what they call the high ceremonies of diplomacy!”

“It is an odd thing, Mr. Haggard,” he said, as he entered the private drawing-room after luncheon, “that you and I, brought up in different countries and following such different pursuits, should have identical ideas and aims. I have been reading your book, ‘Rural England,’ and I tell you that what you think, I think, and what you want to do, I want to do. We are one man in the matter”; or words to that effect.

I could only answer that I was extremely glad to hear it.

I may add that I was not wrong in supposing that the President would try to put these ideas into action, as indeed is shown by his famous Conservation Act, the passing of which he subsequently brought about; also by many other of his administrative deeds. Further, should he ever return to power again, I am convinced that he will push on along these lines.

In proof of what I say — since, before proceeding with the account of my American mission, I think that for convenience’s sake it will be well here to finish the story of my relations with President Roosevelt — I will quote the substance of a note I made of an interview which I had with him in London more than five years later. Also I will quote several letters which have subsequently passed between us.

June 2, 1910.

I saw Mr. Roosevelt and his family this afternoon at 10 Chesterfield Street. He was extremely pressed, and informed me that he had not even found time to put on a black coat since coming up from staying with Selous. I told him the result of my American mission. He said that it was most disheartening, but always the case where officials could have their way. I congratulated him upon his Natural Resources Conservation Policy. He answered that he was making a big fight upon that point.

The Bishop of Massachusetts, who was present, said to Mr. Roosevelt that I approved of his famous Guildhall speech.

“Ah!” he said, “I knew I should have Haggard’s support.”

(On this point Kermit Roosevelt, his son, told me that both Balfour and Grey were pleased with the speech.)

I informed Mr. Roosevelt of the investigations that I had just arranged to carry out for the Salvation Army. He said that this was “a grand work” which I proposed to do, and he only wished that he could have found time to come round with me, adding with much earnestness:

“Why not make use of all this charitable energy, now often misdirected, for national ends?”

“What I have called ‘the waste forces of Benevolence,’” I said. “It is odd, Mr. Roosevelt, that we should both have come to that conclusion.”

“Yes, that’s the term,” he answered. “You see, the reason is that we are both sensible men who understand.”

In saying good-bye to me, Mr. Roosevelt said, “It’s a barren thing to say, but I want to tell you how deeply I admire all your social work, and, if you care to know it, I should like to add that I have found it a strength and a support to myself in my own struggles. . . . It’s almost an insult to ask you here rushed as I am, but I did want to have a word with you, and had no other chance.”

I also spoke to him about Horace Plunkett’s work. He answered that he thought most highly of him and that he, Plunkett, was coming over to America to see him.

Subsequently I read in the American Outlook a most interesting signed article by Mr. Roosevelt a propos of my social work, and especially of the book called “Regeneration” that I had written on the Salvation Army.

As to this review Mr. Roosevelt wrote to me regretting that he could not have made the article ten times as long.

To this I answered on August 8, 1911:

I thank you most heartily. I cannot tell you how greatly I appreciate the good opinion of a man like yourself, and what is so very rare, the public expression of that opinion. As a private individual I find my task very hard: to drive into the intelligence of a blind and careless generation certain elementary facts which it cannot or will not understand is always difficult, especially if the wielder of the hammer is not rich. If I could afford it I would devote the rest of my life to this kind of educational work in my own land and others. But I fear I can’t, and in this country no kind of help is forthcoming to make such efforts possible.

Of Mr. Roosevelt’s long answer I quote the beginning and the end, omitting all the central part of the letter, which deals with various social problems. I will call special attention to the last lines of this letter, which I think show a high and fine spirit.

The Outlook, 287 Fourth Avenue,
New York: August 22, 1911.

Dear Mr. Haggard, — I have been reading “Rural Denmark” with genuine interest, and I congratulate you upon the work. I was especially interested in the rather melancholy chapter at the end

— “What might be and what is.” I agree with every word you say about the land . . . .

I do not wonder that you feel discouraged and blue at times. As you say, it seems a hard and thankless task to have to try to hammer into your generation what is vital for them to learn and what they refuse to learn. I half smiled when I read what you wrote, because I so often ha............