Vague rumours, too, had begun to circulate concerning certain designs of the Chartered Company (one did not dare yet mention the name of its chief and chairman) on the Transvaal.

Rhodes was directly questioned upon the subject by several of his friends, amongst others by Mr.Schreiner, to whom he energetically denied that such a thing had ever been planned.

He added that Doctor Jameson, of whom the man in the street was already speaking as the man who was planning an aggression against the authority of President Kruger, was not even near the frontier of the neighbouring Republic.

The mere idea of such a thing, Rhodes emphatically declared to Mr.Schreiner, was nothing but an ill-natured hallucination to create bad blood between the English and the Dutch.

His tone seemed so sincere that Mr.Schreiner allowed himself to be convinced, and voluntarily assured his colleagues that he was convinced of the sincerity of the Prime Minister.
The only person who was really alarmed at the persistent rumours which circulated in Cape Town in regard to a possible attack in common accord with the leaders of the Reform movement in Johannesburg against the independence of the Transvaal Republic was Mrs.van Koopman.