ABSTRACT
The necessity for obtaining Parliamentary sanction for further war-expenditure and more borrowing forced Ministers to call the new Parliament together on December 6th. In the long debates on the Address, begun on February 14th and only ended by Closure on February 26th, Opposition was always dangerous on the war. The death of Queen Victoria, occurring as it did on January 22, 1901, when the Boer penetration into Cape Colony was almost at its maximum, added to the gloom of a gloomy season. To the “greater public”, as distinct from congregations of the Liberal faithful, speeches on the war as querulous and unsympathetic as Campbell-Bannerman’s were still very distasteful. The “public” might grumble extensively at Ministers who had had nearly two years and unlimited resources to suppress 60,000 Boers and were still very far from success. Rosebery, however, needed a critical war-disaster, whether to break up Conservative discipline or induce a Liberal majority, hungry for office, to forswear Campbell-Bannerman’s leadership.
