It is fortunate in the present state of public feeling
that the ten persons accused by Lord Roberts—doubtless on good evidence—of plotting his assassination by blowing up the church which he attends are not Boers, but Italians and Greeks, with one Frenchman. We incline to believe, with the Pall Mall Gazette, that they will be found to belong to the great army of cosmopolitan Anarchists, which has been irritated, not by Lord Roberts's victories, but by the suppression of two Republics, and their conversion into two provinces of a Monarchy. They strike at Lord Roberts, not for anything he has done, but as the Most conspicuous and accessible representative of the throne. Had Boers arranged the attempt, or rather the plot, or had they found the money for it, they would have directed it against Lord Kitchener, not Lord Roberts. The habitual lenity of the latter is acknowledged even by those he has defeated, but they have an idea that Lord Kitchener has no human sym- pathies. There must have been a marvellous gathering of the detritus of Western humanity both in Pretoria and Johannes- burg. Gold and diamonds attract the adventurous,--and also the burglars.
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