Even his work as a diplomatist, though so supremely
skilful, was never properly understood at home. There was a vague notion
that he had played a lone hand against all the Powers and had won out,
but success here could not possibly have obtained for Lord Cromer that
unbounded confidence which was shown him by the nation.
The respect and veneration which the British public felt for Lord Cromer
would, if his health had permitted, have called him to power at the
moment of worst crisis in the war; yet those who called him could not
have said why they felt sure he would prove the organizer of victory.
They were content to believe that it was so.
What was the quality that placed Lord Cromer so high in the regard of
his fellow-countrymen throughout Britain and the Empire? What was it
that made him universally respected,--as much by soldiers as by
civilians, by officials as by Members of Parliament, by Whigs as by
Radicals, by Socialists as by Individualists? The answer is to be found
in the spirit in which Lord Cromer did his work. What raised him above
the rank-and-file of our public men was his obedience to a very plain
and obvious rule. It was this: _to govern always in the interests of
the governed_.
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