"4. Take them as a whole, the Boers are not pleasant people to live with, especially to those who are within their power, as the natives have found out sufficiently, and as the British have found out ever since Majuba, and the retrocession of the Transvaal. The wrongs of the Uitlanders were only one symptom of a disease which originated at Pretoria in 1881, and was steadily spreading itself all over South Africa.

"5. With regard to the equal rights question, it is quite true that all is not as it ought to be in the Cape Colony. But the condition of the native in the Transvaal is 100 years behind that of our natives in the Cape Colony, and you may take it as a broad fact that in proportion as Boer domination prevails the gravitation of the native towards slavery will be accelerated."

In conclusion, Mr. Moffat has this to say of the "Boer dream of Afrikander predominance": "We, who have been living out here, have been hearing about this thing for years, but we have tried not to believe it. We felt, many of us, that the struggle had to come, but we held our peace because we did not want to be charged with fomenting race hatred." He refers to Ben Viljoen's manifesto of September 29th, and to President Steyn's manifesto, and State Secretary Reitz's proclamation of October 11th, and says, "When I read these in conjunction with the history of South Africa for the last 18 years, I see that the cause of peace was hopeless in such hands."

* * * * *

Almost contemporaneously with the expression of opinion of Dr. Moffat (in 1877), the following report was written by M. Dieterlen, to the Committee of the Missions Evangeliques de Paris:—

"Lessouto, June 28th, 1876.

"Gentlemen,

"I must give you details of the journey which I have just made with four native evangelists; for no doubt you will wish to know why a missionary expedition, begun under the happiest auspices, and with the good wishes of so many Christians, has come to grief, on account of the ill-will of certain men, and has been, from a human point of view, a humiliating failure. Having placed myself at the head of the expedition, and being the only white man in the missionary group, I must bear the whole responsibility of our return, and if there is anyone to blame it is I.

"From our departure from Leriba, as far as the other side of Pretoria, our voyage was most agreeable. We went on with energy, thinking only of our destination, the Banyais country, making plans for our settling amongst those people, and full of happiness at the thought of our new enterprise. An excellent spirit prevailed in our little troop,—serious and gay at the same time; no regrets, no murmurings; with a presentiment, indeed, that the Transvaal Government might make some objection to our advance, but with the certainty that God was with us, and would over-rule all that man might try to do. We crossed the Orange Free State without hindrance, we passed the Vaal, and continued our route towards the capital of the Transvaal; we reached the first village through which we must pass—Heidelberg—and encamped some distance from there. There they told us that the Boers knew that we were about to pass, and if they wished to stop us, it would be there they would do it. Let us take courage, therefore, we said, and be ready for everything. We unharnessed, and walked through the village in full daylight, posting our letters, etc. No one stopped us or spoke to us, and we retired to our encampment, thanking God that He had kept us through this critical moment. Some days later, we approached a charming spot, within three hours of Pretoria, near a clear stream, surrounded with lovely trees and flowers; we took the Communion together, strengthening each other for the future. Monday, at nine o'clock, we reached Pretoria. We were looked at with curiosity; they read our names on the sides of my waggon, they seemed surprised, and held discussions among themselves; the Field Cornet himself saw us pass, they told me sometime later. But we passed through the town without opposition.

"We continued our way to the north-east full of thankfulness, saying to each other that after all the Government of the Transvaal was not so ill-disposed towards us. Our oxen continued to walk with sturdy steps; we had not yet lost one, although the cattle plague was prevalent at the time. Wednesday, at four o'clock in the evening, we left the house of an English merchant, with whom we had passed a little time, and who had placed at our disposal everything which we needed. Towards eight o'clock, by a splendid moonlight, I was walking in front of my waggon with Asser (one of the native missionaries), seeking a suitable place where we could pass the night, when two horsemen galloped up, and drawing bridle, brusquely asked for my papers, and seeing that I had not the papers that they desired, ordered us to turn round and go back to Pretoria. One of these men was the Sheriff, who showed me a warrant for my arrest, and putting his hand on my shoulder, declared me to be his prisoner. This, I may say in passing, made little impression on me. We retraced our steps, always believing that when we had paid some duty exacted for our luggage and our goods, we should be allowed to go in peace. Towards midnight they permitted us to unharness near a farm. The next morning these gentlemen searched all through the waggon of the native evangelists, and put any objects which they suspected aside. All this, with my waggon, must be sent back to Pretoria, there to be inspected by anyone who chose.

"That same day I arrived in Pretoria in a cart, seated between the Field Cornet and the Sheriff, who were much softened when they saw that I did not reply to them in the tone which they themselves adopted, and that I had not much the look of a smuggler. The Secretary of the Executive Council exacted from me bail to the amount of L300 sterling, for which a German missionary from Berlin, Mr. Grueneberger, had the goodness to be my guarantor. I made a deposition, saying who we were, whence we came, and where we were going, insisting that we had no merchandise in our waggon, only little objects of exchange by which we could procure food in countries where money has no value. We had no intention of establishing ourselves within the limits of the Transvaal; we were going beyond the Limpopo, and consequently were simple travellers, and were not legally required to take any steps in regard to the Government, nor even to ask a passport. All this was written down and addressed to the Executive Committee, who took the matter in hand.

"As they, however, accused us of being smugglers, and having somewhere a cannon, they proceeded to the examination of my waggon. They opened everything, ran their hands in everywhere, into biscuit boxes, among clothes, among candles, etc., and found neither cannon nor petroleum. The comedy of the smuggling ended, they took note of the contents of my boxes, and then attacked us from another side. They decided to treat me as a missionary. The Solicitor-General said to me that the Government did not care to have French missionaries going to the other side of the Limpopo. I said, 'these countries do not belong to the Transvaal;' to which they replied, 'Do you know what our intentions are? Have you not heard of the treaties which we have been able to make with the natives and with the Portuguese?' There! that is the reply which they made to me. They took good care not to inscribe it in the document in which they ordered us to leave the Transvaal immediately. These are things which they do not care to write, lest they should awaken the just susceptibilities of other Governments, or arouse the indignation of all true Christians. But there is the secret of the policy of the Transvaal in regard to us missionaries; they feared us, because they know our attachment to the natives, and our devotion to their interests.

"They then ordered me to retrace at once my steps, threatening confiscation of our goods and the imprisonment of our persons if we attempted to force a passage through the country. I had to pay L14 sterling for the expenses of this mock trial. They brought the four native Evangelists out of the prison where they had spent two nights and a day in a very unpleasant manner; they gave me leave to take our two waggons out of the square of the Hotel de Ville where they had been put, together with the Transvaal Artillery, some pieces of ordnance, a large Prussian cannon and a French mitrailleuse from Berlin.

"We were free, we were again united, but what a sorrowful reunion! We could hardly believe that all was ended, and that we must retrace our steps; so many hopes dissipated in a moment! and the thought of having to turn back after having arrived so near to our destination, was heart breaking. We were all rather sad, asking each other if we were merely the sport of a bad dream or if this was indeed the will of God. T resolved to make one more effort and ask an interview with the President of the Transvaal, Mr. Burgers. It was granted to me. I went therefore to the Cabinet of the President and spoke a long time with the Solicitor-General, protesting energetically against the force they had used against us, and I discussed the matter also with the President himself, but without being able to obtain any reasonable reply to the objections I raised. I saw clearly that I had to do with men determined to have their own way, and putting what they chose to consider the interests of the State above those of all Divine and human laws.

"Their Parliament (Raad) was sitting, and I addressed myself to two of its members whom I had seen the day before, and who had seemed annoyed at the conduct of the Government towards us. I besought them for the honour of their country, to bring before their Parliament a question on the subject; but they dared not consent to this, declaring that if the Government were to put the matter before the representatives of the country these latter would decide in our favour, but that they could never take the initiative.

"I had now exhausted all the means at my disposal. I did all I could to obtain leave to continue our journey, and only capitulated at the last extremity. I received a written order from the Government telling me to leave the soil of the Republic immediately.

"These gentlemen had made me wait a long time, perhaps because they found it more difficult and dangerous to put down on paper orders which it was much easier to give vocally. This note was only a reproduction of the accusations they had made against us from the beginning. They declared to us that we were driven from the country because we had introduced guns, ammunition, and a great quantity of merchandise, and because we had entered the Transvaal without a passport, in spite of the Government itself having recently proclaimed a passport unnecessary for evangelists going through the country. In this document they systematically misrepresented and violated the right which every white man had had until then of travelling without permission. From the beginning to the end of this document it was open to criticism, which the feeblest jurist could have made; but in the Transvaal, as elsewhere, might dominates right, and we have to suffer the consequences of this odious principle.

"We sorrowfully retraced the route towards the Vaal; this time no more joyous singing around our fire at night, no more cheerful projects, no more the hope of being the first to announce the glad Evangel among pagan populations. The veldt we traversed seemed to have lost its poetry and to have become desolate. To add to our misfortunes the epidemic seized our oxen. We lost first one and then a second,—altogether eight. Those which were left, tired and lean, dragged slowly and with pain the waggons which before they had drawn along with such vigour. At last we were in sight of Mabolela, and arrived at our destination, sorrowful, yet not unhappy, determined not to be discouraged by this first check. And now we were again at Lessouto, waiting for God to open to us a new door."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 12: The extract commences at chapter II, page 29.]

[Footnote 13: Near Pretoria.]

[Footnote 14: Livingstone had given to the Chief, Sechele, a large iron pot for cooking purposes, and the form of it excited the suspicions of the Boers, who reported that it was a cannon. That pot is now in the Museum, at Cape Town.]



IV.

INTERVIEW WITH DR. JAMES STEWART, MODERATOR (1899) OF THE FREE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND. LETTER OF MR. BELLOWS TO SENATOR HOAR, U.S.A. THE REV. C. PHILLIPS. EXTRACTS FROM THE "CHRISTIAN AGE," AND FROM M. ELISEE RECLUS, GEOGRAPHER. RETROCESSION OF THE TRANSVAAL. MR. GLADSTONE'S ACTION. ITS EFFECT ON THE TRANSVAAL LEADERS, AND ITS CONSEQUENCES FOR THE NATIVE SUBJECTS OF GREAT BRITAIN.

The Rev. Dr. James Stewart, of Lovedale Mission Institute, South Africa, who, in May, 1899, was elected Moderator of the General Assembly of the Scotch Free Church, imparted his views with regard to the Transvaal question to a representative of the New York Tribune on the occasion of his visit to Washington in the autumn of 1899, to attend the Pan-Presbyterian Council as a delegate from the Free Church of Scotland.

Dr. Stewart's title to speak on matters connected with the Transvaal rests upon thirty years' residence in South Africa.

On the morning of his election as Moderator of the General Assembly the Scotsman coupled his name with that of Dr. Livingstone as the men to whom the British Central Africa Protectorate was due.

The interview was published in the Tribune of September 24th, 1899.

Dr. Stewart said:—

"As to the principle politically in dispute, the British Government asks nothing more than this—That British subjects in the Transvaal shall enjoy—I cannot say the same privileges, but a faint shadow of what every Dutchman, as well as every man, white and black, in the Cape Colony enjoys. Every Dutchman in the Cape Colony is treated exactly as if he were an Englishman; and every subject of Her Majesty the Queen, black and white, is treated in the Transvaal, and has always been, as a man of an alien and subject race. The franchise is only one of many grievances, and it is utterly a mistake to suppose that England is going to war over a question of mere franchise. Let us be just, however. There are in the Cape Colony and out of it loyal Dutchmen, loyal as the day, to the British power, which is the ruling power. They know the freedom they enjoy under it, and the folly and futility of trying to upset it.

"No superfluous pity or sympathy need be wasted on President Kruger or the Transvaal Republic. The latter (Republic) is a shadow of a name, and as great a travesty and burlesque on the word as it is possible to conceive.

"Paul Kruger is at the present moment the real troubler of South Africa. If the spirit and principles which he himself and his Government represent were to prevail in this struggle, it would arrest the development of the southern half of the continent. It is too late in the day by the world's clock for that type of man or government to continue.

"The plain fact is this:—President Kruger does not mean to give, never meant to give, and will not give anything as a concession in the shape of just and necessary rights, except what he is forced to give. He wants also to get rid of the suzerainty. That darkens and poisons his days and disturbs his nights by fearful dreams. There is no excuse for him, and, as I say, there need be no sentiment wasted on the subject. Let President Kruger and his supporters do what is right, and give what is barely and simply and only necessary as well as right, and the whole difficulty will pass into solution, to the relief of all concerned and the preservation of peace in South Africa. If not, the blame must rest with him.

"I am sorry I cannot give any information or express any views different from what I have now stated. They are the result of thirty years' residence in Africa. But I would ask your readers to believe that the British Government are rather being forced into war than choosing it of their own accord. I would also ask your readers to believe that Sir Alfred Milner, the present Governor of Cape Colony, though undoubtedly a strong man, is also one of the least aggressive, most cautious, and pacific of men; and that he has the entire confidence of the whole British population of the Cape Colony. I know also that when he began his rule three years ago, he did so with the expectation that by pacific measures the Dutch question was capable of a happier and better solution than that in which the situation finds it to-day. The question and trouble to-day is, briefly, whether the British Government is able to give protection and secure reasonable rights for its subjects abroad."

* * * * *

The following was addressed by Mr. John Bellows of Gloucester, to Senator Hoar, United States, America, and was published in the New York Tribune, Feb. 22nd, 1900. Mr. Bellows, on seeing the publication of his letter, wrote the following postscript, to Senator Hoar:—

"As the foregoing letter was headed by the Editor of the New York Tribune, 'A Quaker on the War,' I would say, to prevent misunderstanding, that I speak for myself only, and not for the Society of Friends, although I entirely believe in its teaching, that if we love all men we can under no circumstances go to war. There is, however, a spurious advocacy of peace, which is based, not upon love to men so much as upon enmity to our own Government, and which levels against it untrue charges of having caused the Transvaal War. It was to show the erroneousness of these charges that I wrote this letter."

The following is the text of the letter:—

"Dear Friend, I am glad to receive thy letter, as it gives me the opportunity of pointing out a misconception into which thou hast fallen in reference to the Transvaal and its position with respect to the present war.

"Thou sayest: 'I am myself a great lover of England; but I do not like to see the two countries joining hands for warlike purposes, and especially to crush out the freedom of small and weak nations.'

"To this I willingly assent. I am certain that war is in all circumstances opposed to that sympathy all men owe one to another, and to that Greater Source of love and sympathy in which 'we live and move and have our being.' Where this bond has been broken, we long for its restoration; but it cannot but tend to retard this restoration, to impute to one or other of the parties concerned motives that are entirely foreign to its action. Peace, to be lasting, must stand on a foundation of truth; and there is no truth whatever in the idea that the English Government provoked the present war, or that it intended, at any time during the negotiations that preceded the war, an attack on the independence either of the Transvaal or of the Orange Free State. It is true that President Kruger has for many years carefully propagated the fear of such an attempt among the Dutch in South Africa, as a means of separating Boers and Englishmen into two camps, and as an incentive to their preparing the colossal armament that has now been brought into play, not to keep the English out of the Transvaal, but to realise what is called the Afrikander programme of a Dutch domination over the whole of South Africa. Thus, he a short time ago imported from Europe 149,000 rifles—nearly five times as many as the whole military population of the Transvaal—clearly with a view to arming the Cape Dutch in case of the general rising he hoped for. The Jameson Raid gave him exactly the grievance he wanted—to persuade these Cape Dutch that England sought to crush the Transvaal.

"An examination of the 'Blue Book,' which contains the whole of the correspondence immediately preceding the war, will at once show the patient efforts put forth by the London Cabinet to maintain peace. There are no irritating words used, and the last despatch of importance before the outbreak of hostilities, dealing with the insinuations just alluded to, is not only most courteous and conciliatory in tone, but it states that the Queen's Government will give the most solemn guarantees against any attack upon the independence of the Transvaal either by Great Britain or the Colonies, or by any foreign power. I am absolutely certain that no American reading that despatch would say that President Kruger was justified in seizing the Netherlands Railway line within one week after he had received it, and cutting the telegraph wires, to prepare for the invasion of British territory, in which act of violence lay his last and only hope of forcing England to fight; his last and desperate chance of setting up a racial domination instead of the freedom and equality of the two races that prevail in the Cape and Natal, and that did prevail in the Orange Free State.

"The cause of the dispute was this: In 1884 a Convention was agreed on between Great Britain and the Transvaal, acknowledging the independence of the Transvaal, subject to three conditions: that the Boers should not make treaties with foreign Powers without the consent of the paramount Power in South Africa, i.e., England; that they should not make slaves of the native tribes; and that they should guarantee equal treatment for all the white inhabitants of the country as respects taxation. As the whole war has risen out of Kruger's persistent refusal to keep his promises, both verbal and in writing, that he would observe this condition, I append the clause giving rise to the contention:—

"Article XIV. (1884 Convention).—'All persons other than natives conforming themselves to the laws of the South African Republic will not be subject in respect to their persons or property or in respect of their commerce and industry to any taxes, whether general or local, other than those which are or may be imposed upon citizens of the said Republic.

"The mines brought so large a population to Johannesburg that it at last outnumbered by very far the entire Boer burghers in the State. Kruger, seeing that the inevitable effect of such an increase must be the same amalgamation of the new and old populations which was going on in Natal and Cape Colony, and to a smaller extent in the Orange Free State, unless artificial barriers could be devised to keep the races apart, at once set to to scheme modes of taxation that should evade Article XIV. of the Convention, throwing the entire burden on the Uitlanders, and letting the Boers, who were nearly all farmers, escape scot free. Farmers, for example, use no dynamite, miners do; and President Kruger gave a monopoly of its supply to a German, non-resident in the country, who taxed the miners for this article alone $2,600,000 a year beyond the highest price it could otherwise have been bought for. This was his own act, the Volksraad not being consulted. Besides the high price, the quality of the explosive was bad, often causing accident or death. When it did cause accident or death, the miners were prosecuted by the Government, from whose agent they were compelled to buy it, and fined for having used it!

"At the time the Convention was signed, in 1884, the franchise was obtainable after one year's residence. President Kruger determined to serve the Uitlanders, however, as George III.'s Government served the American Colonists, that is, tax them while refusing them representation in the control of the taxes. He went on at one and the same time increasing their burdens monstrously, while he prolonged the period of residence that qualified for a vote from one year to five, and so on, till he made it fourteen years—or fourteen times as long as when the Convention was signed. Nor was this all. He reserved the right personally to veto any Uitlander being placed on the register even after the fourteen years if he thought he was for any reason objectionable. That is, the majority of the taxpayers were disfranchised for ever! These Uitlanders had bought and paid for 60 per cent. of all the property in the Transvaal, and 90 per cent. of the taxes were levied from them; an amount equal to giving every Boer in the country $200 a year of plunder.

"Is a country that is so governed justly to be called a 'Republic?'

"But even the Boers themselves have been adroitly edged out of power by Paul Kruger. The Grondwet, or Constitution, provided that to prevent abuses in legislation, no new law should be passed until the bill for it had been published three months in advance. To evade this, Kruger passed all kinds of measures as amendments to existing laws; which, as he explained, not being new laws, required no notification! Finally, however, he got the Volksraad to rescind this article of the Grondwet; and now, as for some time past, any law of any sort can be passed by a small clique of Kruger's in secret session of the Raad without notice of any sort, and without the knowledge or assent of the people. The Boers have no more voice in such legislation than if they were Chinese. The Transvaal is only a Republic in the same sense that a nutshell is a nut, or a fossil oyster shell is an oyster.

"All that the British Government has ever contended for with President Kruger has been the fair and honourable observance of his engagement in respect of equal rights in Article XIV. of the 1884 Convention. This he has persistently and doggedly refused, while he has been using the millions of money he has wrung from the Uitlanders to purchase the material for the war he has been long years preparing on such a colossal scale to drive the English out of those Colonies in which they have given absolute equality to all. It is this very equality which has upset his calculations, by its leaving too few malcontents among the Dutch population to make any general rising of them possible in Natal or the Cape, on which rising Kruger staked his hope of success in the struggle. As for the Transvaal Boers, the only part they have in the war is to fight for their independence, which was never threatened until they invaded British territory, and thus compelled the Queen's Government to defend it.

"The only alternative left to England to refuse fighting would have been the ground that all war is wrong; but as neither England nor any other nation has ever taken this Christian ground, there was in reality no alternative. Is it fair to stigmatise England as endeavouring to crush two small and weak nations because they have been so small in wisdom and weak in common sense as to become the tools of the daring and crafty autocrat who has decoyed both friend and foe into this war?—I am, with high esteem, thy friend,—JOHN BELLOWS."

It does not come within the scope of this treatise to deal with the case of the Uitlanders, but I have given the foregoing, because it is a clear and concise statement of that case, and because it expresses the strong conviction that I and many others have had from the first, that the worst enemy the Boers have is their own Government. A Government could scarcely be found less amenable to the principles of all just Law, which exists alike for Rulers and ruled. These principles have been violated in the most reckless manner by President Kruger and his immediate supporters. The Boers are suffering now, and paying with their life-blood for the sins of their Government. Pity and sympathy for them, (more especially for those among them who undoubtedly possess higher qualities than mere military prowess and physical courage,) are consistent with the strongest condemnation of the duplicity and lawlessness of their Government.

* * * * *

The Rev. Charles Phillips, who has been eleven years in South Africa, has given his opinion on the native question.

It was part of the Constitution of the Transvaal that no equality in Church or State should be permitted between whites and blacks. In Cape Colony, on the contrary, the Constitution insisted that there should be no difference in consequence of colour. Mr. Phillips enumerates the oppressive conditions under which the natives live in the Transvaal. They may not walk on the sidepaths, or trade even as small hucksters, or hold land. Until two years ago there was no marriage law for the blacks, and that which was then passed was so bad—a L3 fee being demanded for every marriage, with many other difficulties placed in the way of marriage—that the missionaries endeavoured to procure its abolition, and to return to the old state of things. No help is given towards the education of native children, though the natives pay 3 per cent. of the revenue, the Boers paying 7-1/2, and the Uitlanders 89-1/2. The natives have, therefore, actually been helping to educate the Boer children. "In 1896," says Mr. Phillips, "only L650 was granted to the schools of those who paid nine-tenths of the revenue, L63,000 being spent upon the Boer Schools. In other words, the Uitlander child gets 1s. 10d., the Boer child L8 6s. 1d. The Uitlander pays L7 per head for the education of every Boer child, and he has to provide in addition for the education of his own children."

* * * * *

The following extract is from a more general point of view, but one which it is unphilosophical to overlook.

The Christian Age reproduces a communication from an American gentleman residing in the Transvaal to the New York Independent.

"The Boers," Mr. Dunn says, "are, as a race—with, of course, individual exceptions—an extraordinary instance of an arrested civilisation, the date of stoppage being somewhere about the conclusion of the seventeenth century. But they have not even stood still at that point. They have distinctly and dangerously degenerated even from the general standard of civilisation existing when Jan van Riebeck hoisted the flag of the Dutch East India Company at Cape Point. The great cardinal fact in connection with the Uitlander population is that, owing to their numbers and activity, they have brought in their train an influx of new wealth into the Transvaal of truly colossal dimensions. Thus, to sum up the distinctive and divergent characteristics of the two classes into which the population of the South African Republic is divided—the Boers, or old population, are conservative, ignorant, stagnant, and a minority; the Uitlanders, or new population, are progressive, full of enterprise, energy and work, and constitute a large majority of the total number of inhabitants.

"It has so happened, therefore, that the Boers, as the ruling and dominant class, have hopelessly failed to master or comprehend the new conditions with which they have been called upon to deal. They have not, as a body, shown either capacity or desire to treat the new developments with even a remote appreciation of their inherent value and inevitable trend. The Boer has simply set his back against the floodgates, apparently oblivious or indifferent to the fact that the hugely accumulating forces behind must one day burst every barrier he may choose to set up. That is the whole Transvaal situation in a sentence.

"It is necessary to point out, further, that this blind and dogged determination on the part of the Boers to 'stop the clock' affects not merely the Transvaal; it is vitally and perniciously affecting the whole of South Africa. But for the obstructiveness and obscurantism of the Transvaal Boers, the rate of progress and development which would characterise the whole South African continent would be unparalleled in the history of any other country. The reactionary policy of the Transvaal is the one spoke in the wheel. It must therefore be removed in the name of humanity and civilisation."

* * * * *

M. Elisee Reclus, the great Geographer, an able and admittedly impartial Historian, wrote some years ago in his "Africa," Vol. 4, page 215:—

"The patriotic Boers of South Africa still dream of the day when the two Republics of the Orange and the Transvaal, at first connected by a common customs union, will be consolidated in a single 'African Holland,' possibly even in a broader confederacy, comprising all the Afrikanders from the Cape of Good Hope to the Zambesi. The Boer families, grouped in every town throughout South Africa, form, collectively, a single nationality, despite the accident of political frontiers. The question of the future union has already been frequently discussed by the delegates of the two conterminous Republics. But, unless these visions can be realized during the present generation, they are foredoomed to failure. Owing to the unprogressive character of the purely Boer communities and to the rapid expansion of the English-speaking peoples by natural increase, by direct immigration, and by the assimilation of the Boers themselves, the future 'South African Dominion' can, in any case, never be an 'African Holland.' Whenever the present political divisions are merged in one State, that State must sooner or later constitute an 'African England,' whether consolidated under the suzerainty of Great Britain or on the basis of absolute political autonomy. But the internal elements of disorder and danger are too multifarious to allow the European inhabitants of Austral Africa for many generations to dispense with the protection of the English sceptre.

"Possessing for two centuries no book except the Bible, the South African Dutch communities are fond of comparing their lot with that of the 'Chosen People.' Going forth, like the Jews, in search of a 'Promised Land,' they never for a moment doubted that the native populations were specially created for their benefit. They looked on them as mere 'Canaanites, Amorites, and Jebusites,' doomed beforehand to slavery or death.

"They turned the land into a solitude, breaking all political organization of the natives, destroying all ties of a common national feeling, and tolerating them only in the capacity of 'apprentices,' another name for slaves.

"In general, the Boers despise everything that does not contribute directly to the material prosperity of the family group. Despite their numerous treks, they have contributed next to nothing to the scientific exploration of the land.

"Of all the white intruders, the Dutch Afrikanders show themselves, as a rule, most hostile to their own kinsmen, the Netherlanders of the mother country. At a distance the two races have a certain fellow-feeling for each other, as fully attested by contemporary literature; but, when brought close together, the memory of their common origin gives place to a strange sentiment of aversion. The Boer is extremely sensitive, hence he is irritated at the civilized Hollanders, who smile at his rude African customs, and who reply, with apparent ostentation, in a pure language to the corrupt jargon spoken by the peasantry on the banks of the Vaal or Limpopo."

No impartial student of recent South African History can fail, I think, to see that the results of Mr. Gladstone's policy in the retrocession of the Transvaal have been unhappy, however good the impulse which prompted his action. To his supporters at home, and to many of his admirers throughout Europe, his action stood for pure magnanimity, and seemed a sort of prophetic instalment of the Christian spirit which, they hoped, would pervade international politics in the coming age.

To the Transvaal leaders it presented a wholly different aspect. It meant to them weakness, and an acknowledgment of defeat. "Now let us go on," they felt, "and press towards our goal, i.e., the expulsion of the British from South Africa." The attitude and conduct of the Transvaal delegates who came to London in 1883, and of their chiefs and supporters, throws much light on this effect produced by the act of Mr. Gladstone.

There can be no doubt that the desire to supplant British by Dutch supremacy has existed for a long time. President Kruger puts back the origin of the opposition of the two races to a very distant date. In 1881, he said, "In the Cession of the Cape of Good Hope by the King of Holland to England lies the root out of which subsequent events and our present struggle have grown." The Dutch believe themselves,—and not without reason,—capable of great things, they were moved by an ambition to seize the power which they believed,—and the retrocession fostered that belief,—was falling from England's feeble and vacillating grasp. "Long before the present trouble" says a Member of the British Parliament well acquainted with South African affairs, "I visited every town in South Africa of any importance, and was brought into close contact with every class of the population; wherever one went, one heard this ambition voiced, either advocated or deprecated, but never denied. It dates back some forty or fifty years."[15] The first reference to it is in a despatch of Governor Sir George Grey, in 1858; and it is to be found more definitely in the speeches of President Burgers in the Transvaal Raad in 1877 before the annexation, and in his apologia published after the annexation. The movement continued under the administration of Sir Bartle Frere, who wrote in a despatch (published in Blue book) in 1879, "The Anti-English opposition are sedulously courting the loyal Dutch party (a great majority of the Cape Dutch) in order to swell the already considerable minority who are disloyal to the English Crown here and in the Transvaal." Mr. Theodore Schreiner, the brother of the Cape Premier, in a letter to the "Cape Times," November, 1899, described a conversation he had some seventeen years ago with Mr. Reitz, then a judge, afterwards President of the Orange Free State, and now State Secretary of the Transvaal, in which Mr. Reitz admitted that it was his object to overthrow the British power and expel the British flag from South Africa. Mr. Schreiner adds; "During the seventeen years that have elapsed I have watched the propaganda for the overthrow of British power in South Africa being ceaselessly spread by every possible means, the press, the pulpit, the platform, the schools, the colleges, the legislature; and it has culminated in the present war, of which Mr. Reitz and his co-workers are the origin and the cause."

The Retrocession of the Transvaal (1881) gave a strong impulse to this movement, and encouraged President Kruger in his persistent efforts since that date to foster it. A friend of the late General Joubert,—in a letter which I have read,—wrote of Mr. Kruger as "the man who, for more than twenty years past, has persistently laboured to drive in the wedge between the two races. It has been his deliberate policy throughout."

I always wish that I could separate the memory of that truly great man, Mr. Gladstone, from this Act of his Administration. Few people cherish his memory with more affectionate admiration than I do. Independently of his great intellect, his eloquence, and his fidelity in following to its last consequences a conviction which had taken possession of him, I revered him because he seemed like King Saul, to stand a head and shoulders above all his fellows,—not like King Saul in physical, but in moral stature. Pure, honourable and strong in character and principles, a sincere Christian, he attracted and deserved the affection and loyalty of all to whom purity and honour are dear. I may add that I may speak of him, in a measure also as a personal friend of our family. I have memories of delightful intercourse with him at Oxford, when he represented that constituency, and later, in other places and at other times.

I recall, however, an occasion in which a chill of astonishment and regret fell upon me and my husband (politically one of his supporters), in hearing a pronouncement from him on a subject, which to us was vital, and had been pressing heavily on our hearts. I allude to a great speech which Mr. Gladstone made in Liverpool during the last period of the Civil War in America, the Abolitionist War. Our friend spoke with his accustomed fiery eloquence wholly in favour of the spirit and aims of the combatants of the Southern States, speaking of their struggle as one on behalf of liberty and independence, and wishing them success. Not one word to indicate that the question which, like burning lava in the heart of a volcano, was causing that terrible upheaval in America, had found any place in that great man's mind, or had even "cast its shadow before" in his thoughts. It appeared as though he had not even taken in the fact of the existence of those four millions of slaves, the uneasy clanking of whose chains had long foreboded the approach of the avenging hand of the Deliverer. This obscured perception of the question was that of a great part, if not of the majority, of the Press of that day, and of most persons of the "privileged" classes; but that he, a trusted leader of so many, should be suffering from such an imperfection of mental vision, was to us an astonishment and sorrow. As we left that crowded hall, my companion and I, we looked at each other in silent amazement, and for a long time we found no words.

As I look back now, there seems in this incident some explanation of Mr. Gladstone's total oblivion of the interests of our loyal native subjects of the Transvaal at the time when he handed them over to masters whose policy towards them was well known. These poor natives had appealed to the British Government, had trusted it, and were deceived by it.

I recollect that Mr. Gladstone himself confessed, with much humility it seemed to us, in a pamphlet written many years after the American War, that it "had been his misfortune" on several occasions "not to have perceived the reality and importance of a question until it was at the door." This was very true. His noble enthusiasm for some good and vital cause so engrossed him at times that the humble knocking at the door of some other, perhaps equally vital question, was not heard by him. The knocking necessarily became louder and louder, till at last the door was opened; but then it may have been too late for him to take the part in it which should have been his.

FOOTNOTE:

[Footnote 15: Speech of Mr. Drage, M.P., at Derby, December, 1899.]



V.

VISIT OF TRANSVAAL DELEGATES TO ENGLAND. THE LORD MAYOR'S REFUSAL TO RECEIVE THEM AT THE MANSION HOUSE. DR. DALE'S LETTER TO MR. GLADSTONE. MR. MACKENZIE IN ENGLAND. MEETINGS AND RESOLUTIONS ON TRANSVAAL MATTERS. MANIFESTO OF BOER DELEGATES. SPEECHES OF W.E. FORSTER, LORD SHAFTESBURY, SIR FOWELL BUXTON, AND OTHERS. THE LONDON CONVENTION (1884).

In 1883, two years after the retrocession of the Transvaal, the Boers, encouraged by the hesitating policy of the British Government, sent a deputation to London of a few of their most astute statesmen, to put fresh claims before Mr. Gladstone, and Lord Derby, then Colonial Minister. They did not ask the repeal of the stipulations of the Convention of 1881—that was hardly necessary, as these stipulations had neither been observed by them nor enforced by our Government, but what they desired and asked was the complete re-establishment of the Republic, freed from any conditions of British Suzerainty. This would have given them a free hand in dealing with the natives, a power which those who knew them best were the least willing to concede.

Sir R.N. Fowler was at that time Lord Mayor of London. According to the custom when any distinguished foreigners visit our Capital, of giving them a reception at the Mansion House, these Transvaal delegates were presented for that honour. But the door of the Mansion House was closed to them, and by a Quaker Lord Mayor, renowned for his hospitality!

The explanation of this unusual act is given in the biography of Sir R. Fowler, written by J.S. Flynn, (page 260.) The following extract from that biography was sent to the Friend, the organ of the Society of Friends, in November, 1899, by Dr. Hodgkin, himself a quaker, whose name is known in the literary world:—"The scene of Sir R. Fowler's travels in 1881 was South Africa, where he went chiefly for the purpose of ascertaining how he could best serve the interests of the native inhabitants. He left no stone unturned in his search for information—visiting Sir Hercules Robinson, the Governor of the Cape, Sir Theophilus Shepstone, Sir Evelyn Wood, Colonel Mitchell, Bishops Colenso and Macrorie, the Zulu King Cetewayo, the principal statesmen, the military, the newspaper editors, the workers at the diamond-fields, and many others. The result of his inquiries was to confirm his belief of the charges which were made against the Transvaal Boers of wronging and oppressing the blacks.

"It was the opinion of many philanthropists that the only way to insure good Government in the Transvaal—justice to the natives, the suppression of slavery, the security of neighbouring tribes—was by England's insisting on the Boer's observance of the Treaty which had been made to this effect, and the delimitation of the boundary of their territory in order to prevent aggression. With this object in view meetings were held in the City, petitions presented by Members of Parliament, resolutions moved in the House; and when at last it was discovered that Mr. Gladstone's Government was unwilling to fulfil its pledges in reference to South Africa, and that in consequence the native inhabitants would not receive the support they had been led to expect, considerable indignation was felt amongst the friends of the aborigines. The demand which they made seems to have been moderate. The Transvaal, which before the war, had been reckoned, for its protection, a portion of the British dominions, was now made simply a State under British Suzerainty, with a debt to England of about a quarter of a million (in lieu of the English outlay during the three years of its annexation), and a covenant for the protection of the 800,000 natives in the State, and the Zulu, Bechuana, and Swazi tribes upon its borders. The English sympathisers with these natives simply asked that the covenant should be adhered to. There was little chance of the debt being paid, and that they were willing to forego; but they maintained that honour and humanity demanded that the Boers should not be allowed to treat their agreement with us as so much waste paper.

"The Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for the Colonies received the Transvaal delegates graciously, but the doors of the Mansion House were shut against them. Its occupant at that time would neither receive them into his house nor bid them God-speed. He had made a careful study of the South African question, and he felt no doubt that this deputation represented a body of European settlers who were depriving the natives of their land, slaying their men, and enslaving their women and children. He desired to extend the hospitality of the Mansion House to visitors from all countries, and to all creeds and political parties; but the line must be drawn somewhere, and he would draw it at the Boers. The boldness of his action on this occasion startled some even of his friends. He was, of course, attacked by that portion of the press which supported the Government. On the other hand, he had numerous sympathisers. Approving letters and telegrams came from many quarters, one telegram coming from the 'Loyalists of Kimberley' with 'hearty congratulations.' As for his opponents, he was not in the least moved by anything they said. He held it to be impossible for any respectable person who knew the Boers to support them. This was no doubt strong language, but it was not stronger than that of Moffat and Livingstone; not a whit stronger either than that used by W.E. Forster, who had been a member of the Gladstonian Government."

Dr. Hodgkin prefaced this extract by the following lines, addressed to the Editor of the Friend:

"Dear Friend,—In re-perusing a few days ago the life of my late brother-in-law, Sir R.N. Fowler, I came upon the enclosed passage, which I think worthy of our consideration at the present time.

Of late years the disputes between our Government and the African Republic have turned so entirely on questions connected with the status of the settlers in and around Johannesburg, that we may easily forget the old subjects of dispute which existed for a generation before it was known that there were any workable goldfields in South Africa, and before the word "Uitlander" had been mentioned amongst us. I must confess that for my part I had forgotten this incident of Sir R.N. Fowler's Mayoralty, and I think it may interest some of your readers to be reminded of it at the present time. I am, thine truly,—THOMAS HODGKIN. Barmoor, Northumberland."

* * * * *

The late Dr. Dale, of Birmingham, was one of those whose minds were painfully exercised on the matter of the abandonment of the natives of the Transvaal to the Boers. An extract from his life was sent in February this year to the Spectator, with the following preface:—

"Sir,—I have been greatly impressed by the justice of much that has been said in the Spectator on the fact that the present war is a retribution for our indifference and apathy in 1881. We failed in our duty then. We have taken it up now, but at what a cost! In reading lately the life of Dr. Dale, of Birmingham, I was struck by his remarks (pp. 438 and 439) on the Convention of Pretoria. These remarks have such a bearing on the present situation that I beg you will allow me to quote them:"—

"In relation to South African affairs he (Dr. Dale) felt silence to be impossible. He had welcomed the policy initiated by the Convention of Pretoria (1881) conceding independence to the Transvaal, but imposing on the Imperial Government responsibility for the protection of native races within and beyond the frontiers. In correspondence with members of the House of Commons and in more than one public utterance, he expressed his satisfaction that the freedom of the Boers did not involve the slavery of the natives. At first the outlook was hopeful, but the Boers soon began to chafe against the restrictions to which they were subjected.... The Rev. John Mackenzie brought a lamentable record of outrage and cruelty.... Dr. Dale particularly urged that the Government should insist on carrying out the 18th article of the Convention of Pretoria. 'The policy of the Government seemed to me both righteous and expedient, singularly courageous and singularly Christian. But that policy included two distinct elements. It restored to the Boers internal independence, it reserved to the British Government powers for the protection of native races on the Transvaal frontier. It is not unreasonable for those who in the face of great obloquy supported the Government in recognising the independence of the Transvaal, to ask that it should also use its treaty powers, and use them effectively for the protection of the natives.' To this statement the Pall Mall (John Morley) replied that the suzerainty over the Transvaal maintained by us was a 'shadowy term,' and that those who demanded that our reserved rights should be enforced were bound to face the question whether they were willing to fight to enforce them. Was Dr. Dale ready to run the risk of a fresh war in South Africa? Dr. Dale replied, should the British Government and British people regard with indifference the outrages of the Boers against tribes that we had undertaken to protect?... 'If the Government of the Republic cannot prevent such crimes as are declared to have been committed in the Bechuana country, and if we are indifferent to them, we shall have the South African tribes in a blaze again before many years are over, and for the safety of our Colonists we shall be compelled to interfere.' In the ensuing Session the Ministerial policy was challenged in both Houses of Parliament, and in the Commons Mr. Forster indicted the Government for its impotence to hold the Transvaal Republic to its engagements. Dr. Dale wrote a long letter to Mr. Gladstone:—'If it had been said that power to protect the natives should be taken but not used, it is at least possible that a section of the party might have declined to approve the Ministerial policy.... The one point to which I venture to direct attention is the contrast, as it appears to me, between the declaration of Ministers in '81, in relation to the native races generally, and the position which has been taken in the present debate.' Mr. Gladstone's reply was courteous, but not reassuring."

* * * * *

Mr. Mackenzie, British Commissioner for Bechuanaland, came to England in 1882. In the following year the Delegates from the Transvaal came to London, and in 1884 the Convention was signed, which was called the "London Convention."

These years included events of great interest. Mr. Mackenzie wrote:—"On my way to England I met a friend who had just landed in South Africa from England. He warned me 'If you say a good word for South Africa, Mr. Mackenzie, you will get yourself insulted. They will not hear a word on its behalf in England; they are so disgusted with the mess that has been made.'

'They had good reason to be disgusted, but I want all the same to tell them a number of things about the true condition of the country.'

'They will not listen,' my friend declared, 'They will only swear at you.' This was not very encouraging, but it was not far from the truth as to the public feeling at that time.

Being in the——counties of England I was offered an introduction to the Editor of a well-known newspaper, who was also a pungent writer on social questions under a nom de plume which had got to be so well known as no longer to serve the purpose of the writer's concealment of identity.

'You come from South Africa, do you,' said the great man; 'a place where we have had much trouble, but mean to have no more.'

'Trouble, however,' I answered, 'is inseparable from Empire. Whoever governs South Africa must meet with some trouble and difficulty, although not much when honestly faced.'

'I assure you,' he broke in, 'we are not going to try it again after the one fashion or the other. We are out of it, and we mean to remain so.'

'You astonish me,' I answered; 'what about the Convention recently signed at Pretoria (1881)? What about the speeches still more recently made in this country in support of it?'

'As to the Convention, I know we signed something; people often do when they are getting out of a nasty business. We never meant to keep it, nor shall we.'

I believe I whistled a low whistle just to let off the steam, and then replied calmly, 'Will you allow me to say that by your own showing you are a bad lot, a very bad lot, as politicians.'

'That may be, but it does not alter the fact, which is as I state.'

'Well, I am an outsider, but I assure you that the English people, should they ever know the facts, will agree with me in saying that you are a bad lot. Such doctrines in commerce would ruin us in a day. You know that.'

'The people are with us. They are disgusted and heart-sore with the whole business.'

'I grant you that such is their frame of mind, but I think their attitude will be different when they come to consider the facts, and face the responsibilities of our position in South Africa. The only difficulty with me is to communicate the truth to the public mind.'

I was much impressed by this interview. Did this influential editor represent a large number of English people? Were they in their own minds out of South Africa, and resolved never to return?

... 'I do not know what you think, Mr. Mackenzie, but we are all saying here that Mr. Gladstone made a great mistake in not recalling Sir Bartle Frere at once. In fact, we are of opinion that Frere should have been tried and hanged.'

The speaker was a fine specimen of an Englishman, tall, with a good head, intelligent and able as well as strong in speech. He was a large manufacturer, and a local magnate. His wife was little and gentle, and yet quite fearless of her grim-looking lord. She begged that I would always make a deduction when her husband referred to South Africa. He could never keep his temper on that subject, My host abruptly demanded, 'But don't you think that Frere should have been hanged?'

'My dear, you will frighten Mr. Mackenzie with your vehemence, and you know you do not mean it a bit.'

'Mean it! Isn't it what everybody is saying here? At any rate I have given Mr. Mackenzie a text, and he must now give me his discourse.'

I then proceeded to sketch out the work which Sir Bartle Frere had had before him, its fatal element of haste, with its calamitous failures in no way chargeable to him. 'In short, I concluded, but for the grave blunders of others you would have canonized Sir Bartle Frere instead of speaking of him as you do. He is the ablest man you ever sent to South Africa. As to his personal character, I do not know a finer or manlier Christian.' ...

'I am quite bewildered,' said my host, at the end of a long conversation. 'I know more of South Africa than I knew before. But we shall not believe you unless you pitch into someone. You have not done that yet; you have only explained past history, and have had a good word for everybody.'

'Then, Sir,' I quickly answered, 'I pitch into you, and into your Governments, one after another, for not mastering the facts of South African life. Why do you now refuse to protect your own highway into the Interior, and at the same time conserve the work of the missionaries whom you have supported for two generations, and thus put an end to the freebooting of the Boers, and of our own people who joined them? At present there is a disarmed coloured population, disarmed by your own laws on account only of their colour; and there is an armed population, armed under your laws, because they are white; and you decline to interfere in any way for the protection of the former. You will neither protect the natives nor give them fair play and an open field, so that they may protect themselves.'

'Now, my dear,' said the little wife, 'I wonder who deserves to be hanged now? I am sure we are obliged to Mr. Mackenzie for giving us a clear view of things.'

'No, no, you are always too hasty,' said my host, quite gravely. 'The thing gets very serious. Do I rightly understand you, Mr. Mackenzie, that practically we Englishmen arm those freebooters (from the Transvaal,) and practically keep the blacks disarmed, and that when the blacks have called on us for protection and have offered themselves and their country to the Queen we have paid no heed? Is this true?'

'Every word true,' I replied.

'Then may I ask, did you not fight for these people? You had surely got a rifle,' said my host, turning right round on me.

'My dear, you forget Mr. Mackenzie has been a Missionary,' said his wife. 'You yourself, as a Director of the London Missionary Society, would have had him cashiered if he had done anything of the kind.'

'Nonsense, you don't see the thing. I assure you I could not have endured such meanness and injustice. I should have broken such confounded laws. I should have shouldered a rifle, I know,' said the indignant man as he paced his room.

'My dear, you would have got shot, you know,' said his wife.

'Shot! yes, certainty, why not?' said my host; and added gravely, 'A fellow would know why he was shot. Is it true, Mr. Mackenzie, that those blacks were kind to our people who fled to them from the Transvaal, and that they there protected them?'

'Quite true,' I rejoined.

'Then by heaven,' said Mr.——, raising his voice—

'Let us go to supper,' broke in the gentle wife, 'you are only wearying Mr. Mackenzie by your constant wishes to hang some one.'

"I trust my friends will forgive me for recalling this conversation, which vividly pictures the state of people's mind concerning South Africa in 1882. I found that most people were incredulous as to the facts being known at the Colonial Office, and there was a uniform persuasion that Mr. Gladstone was ignorant that such things were going on."

I have given these interviews (much abridged) because they illustrate in a rather humourous way a state of mind which unhappily has long existed and exists to some degree to this day in England—an impatience of responsibility for anything concerning interests lying beyond the shores of our own Island, a certain superciliousness, and a habit of expressing and adhering to suddenly formed and violent opinions without sufficient study of the matters in question,—such opinions being often influenced by the bias of party politics. Our countrymen are now waking up to a graver and deeper consideration of the tremendous interests at stake in our Colonies and Dependencies, and to a greater readiness to accept responsibilities which once undertaken it is cowardice to reject or even to complain of.

At the request of the London Missionary Society, Mr. Mackenzie drew up an extended account of the Bechuanaland question, which had a wide circulation. He did not enter into party politics, but merely gave evidence as to matters of fact. There was surprise and indignation expressed wherever the matter was carefully studied and understood. Many resolutions were transmitted to the Colonial Secretary from public meetings; one which came from a meeting in the Town Hall of Birmingham was as, follows:—

"This meeting earnestly trusts that the British Government will firmly discharge the responsibilities which they have undertaken in protection of the native races on the Transvaal border."

Among the people who took up warmly the cause of the South African natives were Dr. Conder, Mr. Baines, and Mr. Yates of Leeds (who addressed themselves directly to Mr. Gladstone), Dr. Campbell and Dr. Duff of Edinburgh, the Rev. Arnold Thomas and Mr. Chorlton of Bristol, Mr. Howard of Ashton-under-Lyne, Mr. Thomas Rigby of Chester, and others.

A Resolution was sent to the Colonial Office by the Secretary of the Congregational Union of England and Wales, which had been passed unanimously at a meeting of that body in Bristol:—

"That the Assembly of the Congregational Union, recognising with devout thankfulness the precious and substantial results of the labours of two generations of Congregational Christian Missionaries in Bechuanaland, learns with grief and alarm that the lawless incursions of certain Boers from the Transvaal threaten the utter ruin of peace, civilization, and Christianity in that land. This Assembly therefore respectfully and most urgently entreats Her Majesty's Government, in accordance with the express provision of the Convention by which Self-Government was granted to the Boers, to take such steps as shall eventually put a stop to a state of things as inconsistent with the pledged word of England as with the progress of the Bechuanaland nations." Signed at Bristol, Oct. 1882.

"These," says Mr. Mackenzie, "were not words of war, but of peace; they were not the words of enemies, but of friends of the Transvaal, many of whom had been prominent previously in agitating for the Boers getting back their independence. They felt that this was the just complement of that action; the Boers were to have freedom within the Transvaal, but not licence to turn Bechuanaland (and other neighbouring native states) into a pandemonium."

There was a closer contact in Edinburgh with South Africa than elsewhere, owing to the constant presence at that University of a large number of students from South Africa. A public meeting was held in Edinburgh, among the speakers whereat were Bishop Cotterill, who had lived many years in South Africa; Mr. Gifford, who had been a long time in Natal; Professor Calderwood, and Dr. Blaikie, biographer of Dr. Livingstone. The Venerable Mr. Cullen, the first missionary traveller in Bechuanaland, who had often entertained Dr. Moffat and Dr. Livingstone in his house, was present to express his interest in that country. There were the kindest expressions used towards our Dutch fellow-subjects; but grave condemnation was expressed of the Transvaal policy towards the coloured people in making it a fundamental law that they were not to be equal to the whites either in Church or State.

A South African Committee was formed in London from which a largely supported address was presented to Mr. Gladstone.

The High Commissioner for Bechuanaland gave his impressions at several different times during that and the preceding year on the subject of the constant illegal passing of the Western Boundary line of the Transvaal by the Boers. Readers will remember that the delimitation of the western boundary of the Transvaal was a fixed condition of the Convention of 1881, a Convention which was continually violated by the Boers. No rest was permitted for the poor natives of the different tribes on that side, the Boers' land-hunger continuing to be one of their strongest passions. The High Commissioner wrote, "If Montsioa and Mankoroane were now absorbed, Banokwani, Makobi and Bareki would soon share the same fate. Haseitsiwe and Sechele would come next. So long as there were native cattle to be stolen and native lands to be taken possession of, the absorbing process would be repeated. Tribe after tribe would be pushed back and back upon other tribes or would perish in the process until an uninhabitable desert or the sea were reached as the ultimate boundary of the Transvaal State."[16]

The Manifesto presented by the Transvaal delegates to the English people convinced no one, and its tone was calculated rather to beget suspicion. The following is an extract from that document:

"The horrible misdeeds committed by Spain in America, by the Dutch in the Indian Archipelago, by England in India, and by the Southern planters in the United States, constitute an humiliating portion of the history of mankind, over which we as Christians may well blush, confessing with a contrite heart our common guiltiness."

"The labours of the Anti-slavery and Protection of Aborigines Societies which have been the means of arousing the public conscience to the high importance of this matter cannot be, according to our opinion, sufficiently lauded and encouraged."

The manifesto then goes on to meet the charges concerning slavery and ill-treatment of natives brought against the Transvaal by a flat denial. "They may be true," they say, "as to actions done long ago, and they humbly pray to the Lord God to forgive them the sins that may have been committed in hidden corners. Believe us, therefore, Gentlemen, when we say that the opposition to our Government is caused by prejudice, and fed by misunderstanding. If you leave us untrammelled, we hope to God that before a new generation has passed, a considerable portion of our natives in the Transvaal will be converted to Christianity; at least our Government is preparing arrangements for a more thorough Christian mission among them."

A public Meeting was held at the Mansion House, called by the Lord Mayor, Sir R. Fowler, at which the Right Hon. W.E. Forster, referring to the Sand River and the other Conventions said: "can anything be more grossly unfair and unjust than on the one hand, to hand over these native people to the Transvaal Government, and on the other hand to do our utmost to prevent them from defending themselves when their rights are attacked? I cannot conceive any provision more contrary to that principle of which we are so proud—British fair play."

Speaking of the treatment of the Bechuanaland people by the Boers he said: "The story of these men is a very sad one; I would rather never allude to it again." He then referred to "the settlement of the western boundary of the Transvaal by Governor Keate, and the immediate repudiation of it by the Transvaal Rulers. Then came the Pretoria Convention only two years ago which added a large block of native land to the Transvaal. That was not enough. Freebooters came over, mostly from the Transvaal, and afterwards from other parts of the country. Representations and remonstrances were made to the Transvaal Government. There was a non possumus reply. 'We cannot stop them;' We seem to have good ground for believing that the freebooters were stimulated by the officers of the Transvaal Government. The result was that the native Chiefs of the people lost by far the larger portion of their land. They appealed to our Government, and we did nothing; there came again and again despairing appeals to England, and how were they met? I can only believe it was through ignorance of the question that it was possible to meet them as we did. It was proposed to meet them by a miserable compensation in money or in land, not to the people but to the few Chiefs, who to their credit, as a lesson to us, a great Christian Country said: 'We will not desert our people even if you desert us.' Then there followed utter disorder and disorganisation in Bechuanaland. Then came in the Transvaal Government and virtually said: 'Give us the country and we will maintain order; if owners of the land object we will put them down as rebels; we will take their land as we have taken Mapoch's, and apprentice their children. You have got tired of these quarrels, leave them to us; we will put a stop to them by protecting the robbers who have taken the land.'

"That practically is the demand. Are you prepared to grant it? I for my part say, that rather than grant it I would (a voice in the meeting—'fight!') yes, if necessary, fight; but I will do my utmost to persuade my fellow countrymen to make the declaration that, if necessary, force will be used, which, if it was believed in, would make it unnecessary to fight.

"The Transvaal Boers know our power, and the Delegates know our power. It is our will that they doubt. If I could not persuade my fellow countrymen that they meant to show that they would never grant such demands as these, I would rather do—what I should otherwise oppose with all my might,—withdraw from South Africa altogether. I am not so proud of our extended Empire as to wish to preserve it at the cost of England refusing to discharge her duties. If we have obligations we must meet them, and if we have duties we must fulfil them; and I have confidence in the English people that first or last they will make our Government fulfil its obligations. But there is much difference between first and last; last is much more difficult than first, and more costly than first. The cost increases with more than geometrical progression. There are people who say, (but the British nation will not say it;) 'leave us alone, let these Colonists and Boers and Natives whom we are tired of, fight it out as best they can; let us declare by our deeds, or rather by our non deeds that we will not keep our promise nor fulfil our duty.' Such a course as that would be as extravagantly costly as it would be shamefully wrong. This laissez faire policy tends to make things go from bad to worse until at last by a great and most costly effort, and perhaps by a really bloody and destructive war, we shall be obliged to do in the end at a greater cost, and in a worse way, that which we could do now. It is not impossible to do it now. A gentleman in the meeting said it was a question of fighting. I do not believe this; but though born a Quaker, I must admit that if there be no other way by which we can protect our allies and prevent the ungrateful desertion of those who helped us in the time of need, than by the exercise of force, I say force must be exercised."

Readers will remark how extraordinarily prophetic are these words of Mr. Forster, spoken in 1883.

The "venerable and beloved Lord Shaftesbury," as Mr. Mackenzie calls him, spoke as follows:—

"This morning has been put into my hands the reply of the Transvaal delegates to the Aborigines Protection Society. I read it with a certain amount of astonishment and of comfort too,—of astonishment that men should be found possessing such a depth of Christianity, such sentiments of religion, such love for veracity, and such regard for the human race as to put on record and to sign with their own hands such a denial of the atrocities and cruelties which have been recorded against them for so many years. It is most blessed to contemplate the depth of their religious sentiments; they express the love they bear to our Lord and Saviour, and their desire to walk in His steps. All this is very beautiful, and, if true, is the greatest comfort ever given us concerning the native races. I will take that document as a promise for the future that they will act upon these principles, that they are Christians, and that they will act on Christian principles, and respect the rights of the natives. That is perhaps the most generous view to take of the matter; but, nevertheless, we shall be inclined to doubt until we see that they have put these principles into practice.

"Let me come to the laws of the Transvaal. It is a fundamental law of that State that there can be no equality either in Church or in State between white and coloured men. No native is allowed to hold land in the Transvaal with such a fundamental law. It is nothing more than a necessary transition to the conclusion that the coloured people should be contemned as being of an inferior order, and only fit for slavery. That is a necessary transition, and it is for Englishmen to protest against it, and to say that all men, of whatever creed, or race, or colour, are equal in Church and State, and in the sight of God, and to assert the principle of Civil and Religious Liberty whenever they have the opportunity. I have my fears at times of the consequences of democratic action; but I shall never feel afraid of appealing to the British democracy on a question of Civil and Religious liberty. That strikes a chord that is very deep and dear to every Briton everywhere. They believe,—and their history shows that they act upon the belief,—that the greatest blessing here below that can be given to intellectual and moral beings is the gift of Civil and Religious liberty. Sensible of the responsibility we have assumed, we appeal to the British public, and I have no doubt what the answer will be. It will be that by God's blessing, and so far as in us lies, Civil and Religious liberty shall prevail among all the tribes of South Africa, to the end that they may become civilized nations, vying with us in the exercise of the gifts that God has bestowed upon us."

Sir Henry Barkly, who had held the office of Governor of the Cape Colony, and of High Commissioner for a number of years, said:—

"Apart from other considerations, it is essential in the interests of civilization and of commerce that the route to the interior of the Dark Continent should be kept in our hands. It has been through the stations planted by our missionaries all along it, as far as Matabeleland, that the influence of the Gospel has been spread among the natives, and that the way has been made safe and easy for the traveller and the trader. Can we suppose that these stations can be maintained if we suffer the road to fall within the limits of the Transvaal? We need not recall our melancholy experience of the past in this region. I would rather refer to the case of the Paris Evangelical Society, whose missionaries were refused leave only a short time ago to teach or preach to the Basuto-speaking population within the Transvaal territory."

The Hon. K. Southey said:—

"I concur entirely with what has been said by the Right Hon. Mr. Forster with regard to slavery. It must be admitted that the institution does not exist in name; but in reality something very closely allied to it exists, for in that country there is no freedom for the coloured races. The road to the interior must be kept open, not only for the purposes of trade, but also as a way by which the Gospel may be carried from here to the vast regions beyond Her Majesty's possessions in that part of the world. If we allow the Transvaal State to annex a territory through which the roads to the interior pass, not only will there be difficulties put in the way of our traders, but the missionary also will find it no easy task to obey the injunction to carry the Gospel into all lands, and to preach it to all peoples."

Sir Fowell Buxton presented the following thought, which might with advantage be taken to heart at the present time:—

"We know how in the United States they have lately been celebrating the events that recall the time a century ago of the declaration of their independence. I will ask you to consider what would have been the best advice that we could have given at that time to the Government at Washington? Do we not know that in regard to all that relates to the well-being of the country, to mere matters of wealth and property, the best advice to have given them would have been, to deliver their country at once from all connection with slavery in the days when they formed her constitution."

* * * * *

Sir William M'Arthur, M.P., said:—

"I have never seen in the Mansion House a larger or more enthusiastic meeting, and I believe that the feeling which animates this meeting is animating the whole country. Any course of action taken by Her Majesty's Ministers towards the Transvaal will be very closely watched. I myself am for peace, but I am also for that which maintains peace, viz., a firm and decided policy."

* * * * *

The poor Chief, Mankoroane, having heard that the Transvaal Delegates would discuss questions of vital importance to his people, left Bechuanaland and went as far as Cape Town on his way to England to represent his case there. Lord Derby, however, sent him word that he could not be admitted to the Conference in London, where the ownership of his own country was to be discussed. Mankoroane then begged Mr. Mackenzie to be his representative, but was again told that neither personally nor by representative could he be recognised at the Conference in Downing Street, but that any remarks which Mr. Mackenzie might make on his behalf would receive the attention of Government. (Blue Book 3841, 92.)

The first and great question which the Transvaal Delegates desired to settle in their own interests was that of the Western boundary line, amended by themselves, which was represented on a map. They were informed that their amended treaty was "neither in form nor in substance such as Her Majesty's Government could adopt," there being "certain Chiefs who had objected, on behalf of their people, to be included in the Transvaal, and there being a strong feeling in London in favour of the independence of these natives, or (if they, the natives, desired it) of their coming under British rule." There was now brought before the delegates a map showing the addition of land which was eventually granted to the Transvaal, but the delegates would not agree to any such arrangement. Her Majesty's Government were giving away to them some 2,600 square miles of native territory, concerning which there was no clear evidence that its owners wished to be joined to the Transvaal. But this was nothing to the Transvaal demand, as shown by a map which they put in, and which included an additional block of 4,000 square miles. Not finding agreement with the Government possible, the delegates then turned from that position, and took up the question of the remission of the debt which the Transvaal owed to England, saying that the wishes of the native chiefs should be consulted first about the boundary line. This was a bold stroke; they were professing to be representing the interests of certain chiefs, which was not the case.

Lord Derby telegraphed to the Cape on the 27th of Feb. 1884, the result of the protracted labours of the Conference at Downing Street, mentioning:—"British Protectorate established outside the Transvaal, with Delegates' consent. Debt reduced to quarter of a million."[17] To many persons it seems that the Convention of 1884, rather than the Convention of 1881, was the real blunder. It is remarkable, however, as illustrating the small attention which South African affairs then received, that no party controversy was aroused over this later instrument. Very soon afterwards, however, the question became acute, owing to the action of Mr. Kruger; and then, it must be remembered, that Mr. Gladstone did not hesitate to appeal to the armed strength of the Empire in order to defend British interests and prevent the extension of Boer rule. That there was not war in 1884 was due only to the fact that Mr. Kruger at that time did not choose to fight. The raiders and filibusters were put down before by Sir Charles Warren's force, but Mr. Gladstone had taken every precaution in view of the contingency of a collision.

The conditions laid down in the Convention did not satisfy the Delegates, although they formally assented to them. Their disappointment began to be strongly manifested. They had stoutly denied that slavery existed in their country. This denial was challenged by the Secretary of the Aborigines Protection Society, who brought forward some very awkward testimonies and facts of recent date. It was suggested that President Kruger should for ever silence the calumniators by demanding a Commission of enquiry on this subject which would take evidence within and round the Transvaal as they might see fit. The Delegates took good care not to accept this challenge. The firmness of the British Government at that moment was fully justified by the actual facts of the case which came so strikingly before them, and their attitude was supported by public opinion, so far as this public opinion in England then existed. It was the Transvaal deputation itself which had most effectually developed it when they first arrived in London, though it was known they had many friends, and that numbers of the public were generally quite willing to consider their claims.[18] They sat for three months in conference with members of Her Majesty's Government before coming to any decision. That decision was known as the London Convention of 1884.

The displeasure of the Boer Delegates matured after their return to the Transvaal, and was expressed in a message sent by the Volksraad to our Government not many months after the signing of the Convention in London.

In this document the Boers seem to regard themselves as a victorious people making terms with those they had conquered. It is interesting to note the articles of the Convention to which they particularly object. In the telegram which was sent to "His Excellency, W.E. Gladstone," the Volksraad stated that the London Convention was not acceptable to them. They declared that "modifications were desirable, and that certain articles must be altered." They attached importance to the Native question, declaring that "the Suzerain (Great Britain) has not the right to interfere with their Legislature, and that they cannot agree to article 3, which gives the Suzerain a voice concerning Native affairs, nor to article 13, by virtue of which Natives are to be allowed to acquire land, nor to that part of Article 26, by which it is provided that white men of a foreign race living in the Transvaal shall not be taxed in excess of the taxes imposed on Transvaal citizens."

It should be observed here that this reference to unequal and excessive taxation of foreigners in the Transvaal, pointing to a tendency on the part of the Boers to load foreigners with unjust taxation, was made before the development of the goldfields and the great influx of Uitlanders.

The Message of the Volksraad was finally summed up in the following words: "we object to the following articles, 15, 16, 26, and 27, because to insist on them is hurtful to our sense of honour." (sic.)

Now what are the articles to which the Boer Government here objects, and has continued to object?

Article 15 enacts that no slavery or apprenticeship shall be tolerated.

Article 16 provides for religious toleration (for Natives and all alike.)

Article 26 provides for the free movement, trading, and residence of all persons, other than natives, conforming themselves to the laws of the Transvaal.

Article 27 gives to all, (Natives included,) the right of free access to the Courts of Justice.

Putting the "sense of honour" of the Transvaal Volksraad out of the question, past experience had but too plainly proved that these Articles were by no means superfluous.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 16: "Austral Africa, Ruling it or Losing it," p. 157.]

[Footnote 17: When the Transvaal was annexed, in 1877, the public debt of that country amounted to L301,727. "Under British rule this debt was liquidated to the extent of L150,000, but the total was brought up by a Parliamentary grant, a loan from the Standard Bank, and sundries to L390,404, which represented the public debt of the Transvaal on the 31st December, 1880. This was further increased by monies advanced by the Standard Bank and English Exchequer during the war, and till the 8th August, 1881, (during which time the country yielded no revenue,) to L457,393. To this must be added an estimated sum of L200,000 for compensation charges, pension allowances, &c., and a further sum of L383,000, the cost of the successful expedition against Secocoemi, that of the unsuccessful one being left out of account, bringing up the total public debt to over a million, of which about L800,000 was owing to this country. This sum the Commissioners (Sir Evelyn Wood dissenting) reduced by a stroke of the pen to L265,000, thus entirely remitting an approximate sum of L500,000 or L600,000. To the sum of L265,000 still owing must be added say another L150,000 for sums lately advanced to pay the compensation claims, bringing up the actual amount owing to England to about a quarter of a million."—Report of Assistant Secretary to the British Agent for Native Affairs. (Blue Book 3917, 46.)]

[Footnote 18: "Austral Africa." Mackenzie.]



VI.

THE CAREER AND RECALL OF SIR BARTLE FRERE. UNFORTUNATE EFFECT IN SOUTH AFRICA OF PARTY SPIRIT IN POLITICS AT HOME. DEATH OF SIR BARTLE FRERE. THE GREAT PRINCIPLES OF BRITISH GOVERNMENT AND LAW. HOPE FOR SOUTH AFRICA IF THESE ARE MAINTAINED AND OBSERVED. WORDS OF MR. GLADSTONE ON THE COLONIZING SPIRIT OF ENGLISHMEN.

The case of Sir Bartle Frere illustrates forcibly the inexpediency of allowing our party differences at home to sow the seeds of discord in a distant Colony, and the apparent injustices to which such action may give rise.

While in England Sir Bartle Frere was being censured and vilified, in South Africa an overwhelming majority of the colonists, of whatever race or origin, were declaring, in unmistakable terms, that he had gained their warmest approbation and admiration. Town after town and village after village poured in addresses and resolutions in different forms, agreeing in enthusiastic commendation of him as the one man who had grasped the many threads of the South African tangle, and was handling them so as to promise a solution in accordance with the interests of all the many and various races which inhabited it.

"In our opinion," one of these resolutions (from Cradock) says, "his Excellency, Sir Bartle Frere, is one of the best Governors, if not the best Governor, this Colony has ever had, and the disasters which have taken place since he has held office, are not due to any fault of his, but to a shameful mismanagement of public affairs before he came to the Colony, and the state of chaos and utter confusion in which he had the misfortune to find everything on his arrival; and we are therefore of opinion that the thanks of every loyal colonist are due to his Excellency for the herculean efforts he has since made under the most trying circumstances to South Africa...."[19]

Another, from Kimberley says:—"It has been a source of much pain to us that your Excellency's policy and proceedings should have been so misunderstood and misrepresented.... The time, we hope, is not far distant when the wisdom of your Excellency's native policy and action will be as fully recognized and appreciated by the whole British nation as it is by the colonists of South Africa."[20]

At Pretoria, the capital of the Transvaal, a public meeting was held (April 24th), which resolved that:—

"This meeting reprobates most strongly the action of a certain section of the English and Colonial Press for censuring, without sufficient knowledge of local affairs, the policy and conduct of Sir B. Frere; and it desires not only to express its sympathy with Sir B. Frere and its confidence in his policy, but also to go so far as to congratulate most heartily Her Majesty the Queen, the Home Government, and ourselves, on possessing such a true, considerate, and faithful servant as his Excellency the High Commissioner."

A public dinner also was given to Sir B. Frere at Pretoria, at which his health was drunk with the greatest enthusiasm; there was a public holiday, and other rejoicings.

Sir Bartle Frere was intending to go to Bloemfontein, in the

Orange Free State, to visit President Brand, with whom he was on cordial terms, and with whom he wished to talk over his plans for the Transvaal; but instructions came from Sir Michael Hicks-Beach to proceed to Cape Town. He therefore left Pretoria on May 1st. He was welcomed everywhere with the utmost cordiality and enthusiasm. At Potchefstroom there was a public dinner and a reception. On approaching Bloemhof he was met by a large cavalcade, and escorted into the township, where a triumphal arch had been erected, and an address was presented.

"At Kimberley he had been sworn in as Governor of Griqualand West. Fifteen thousand people, it was estimated, turned out to meet and welcome him. From thence to Cape Town his journey was like a triumphal progress, the population at each place he passed through receiving him in flag-decorated streets, with escorts, triumphal arches, illuminations, and addresses. At Worcester, where he reached the railway, there was a banquet, at which Sir Gordon Sprigg was also present. At Paarl, which was the head-quarters of the Dutch Afrikander league, and where some of the most influential Dutch families live, a similar reception was given him. Finally, at Cape Town, where, if anywhere, his policy was likely to find opponents among those who regarded it from a provincial point of view, the inhabitants of all classes and sections and of whatever origin, gave themselves up to according him a reception such as had never been surpassed in Capetown.

"In England, complimentary local receptions and addresses to men in high office or of exalted rank do not ordinarily carry much meaning. Party tactics and organization account for a proportion of such manifestations. But the demonstration on this occasion cannot be so explained. There was no party organization to stimulate it. It was too general to confer notoriety on any of its promoters, and Sir B. Frere had not personally the power, even if he had had the will, to return compliments. And what made it the more remarkable was that there was no special victory or success or event of any kind to celebrate."[21]

On reaching Cape Town, a telegraphic message was handed to him, preparing him for his recall, by the statement that Sir H. Bulwer was to replace him as High Commissioner of the Transvaal, Natal, and all the adjoining eastern portion of South Africa, and that he was to confine his attention for the present to the Cape Colony.

To deprive him of his authority as regarded Natal, Zululand, the Transvaal—the Transvaal, which almost by his single hand and voice he had just saved from civil war—and expressly to direct Colonel Lanyon to cease to correspond with him, was to discredit a public servant before all the world at the crisis of his work.

Sir Bartle Frere's great object had been to bring about a Confederation of all the different States and portions of South Africa, an object with which the Home Government was in sympathy.

What was wanting to bring about confederation was confidence, founded on the permanent pacification and settlement of Zululand, the Transvaal, the Transkei, Pondoland, Basutoland, West Griqualand, and the border generally. How could there, under these circumstances, be confidence any longer? There was no doubt what he had meant to do. By many a weary journey he had made himself personally known throughout South Africa. His aims and intentions were never concealed, never changed. In confederating under his superintendence all men knew what they were doing. But he was now to be superseded. Was his policy to be changed, and how?[22]

It was expected by the political majority in England that as soon as Mr. Gladstone came into power, Sir Bartle Frere, whose policy had been so strongly denounced, would be at once recalled. When the new Parliament met in May, the Government found many of their supporters greatly dissatisfied that this had not been done. Notice of motion was given of an address to the Crown, praying for Sir B. Frere's removal. Certain members of parliament met together several times at the end of May, and a memorial to Mr. Gladstone was drawn up, which was signed by about ninety of them, and sent to him on June 3rd, to the following effect:—

"To the Right Hon. W.E. Gladstone, M.P., First Lord of the Treasury."

"We the undersigned, members of the Liberal party, respectfully submit that as there is a strong feeling throughout the country in favour of the recall of Sir Bartle Frere, it would greatly conduce to the unity of the party and relieve many members from the charge of breaking their pledges to their constituents if that step were taken."[23]

The first three signatures to this document were those of L.L. Dillwyn, Wilfrid Lawson, and Leonard Courtney.

This has been called not unjustly, "a cynically candid document." The "unity of the Party," and "pledges to constituents" are the only considerations alluded to in favour of the recall of a man to whose worth almost the whole of South Africa had witnessed, in spite of divided opinions concerning the Zulu War, for which he was only in a very minor degree responsible.

The Memorial to the Government had its effect; the successor of Sir Bartle Frere was to be Sir Hercules Robinson. He was in New Zealand, and could not reach the Cape at once; therefore Sir George Strahan was appointed ad interim governor, Sir Bartle being directed not even to await the arrival of the latter, but to leave by the earliest mail steamer.

At the news of his recall there arose for the second time a burst of sympathy from every town, village, and farm throughout the country, in terms of mingled indignation and sorrow.[24] The addresses and resolutions, being spontaneous at each place, varied much, and laid stress on different points, but in all there was a tone of deep regret, of conviction that Sir B. Frere's policy and his actions had been wise, just, and merciful towards all men, and of hope that the British Government and people would in time learn the truth.[25]

One from farmers of East London concludes: "May God Almighty bless you and grant you and yours a safe passage to the Mother Country, give you grace before our Sovereign Lady the Queen, and eloquence to vindicate your righteous cause before the British nation."[26]

The address of the Natives of Mount Cake is pathetic in its simplicity of language.

"Our hearts are very bitter this day. We hear that the Queen calls you to England. We have not heard that you are sick; then why have you to leave us? By you we have now peace. We sleep now without fear. Old men tell us of a good Governor Durban (Sir Benjamin Durban) who had to leave before his good works became law; but red coals were under the ashes which he left. Words of wicked men, when he left, like the wind blew up the fire, and the country was again in war. So also Sir George Grey, a good Governor, good to tie up the hands of bad men, good to plant schools, good to feed the hungry, good to have mercy and feed the heathen when dying from hunger, He also had to leave us. We do not understand this. But your Excellency is not to leave us. Natal has now peace by you; we have peace by you because God and the Queen sent you. Do not leave us. Surely it is not the way of the Queen to leave her children here unprotected until peace is everywhere. We shall ever pray for you as well as for the Queen. These are our words to our good Governor, though he turns his back on us."

The Malays and other Orientals, of whom there is a considerable population at Capetown, looked upon Frere, a former Indian Statesman, as their special property. The address from the Mahommedan subjects of the Queen says:—

"We regret that our gracious Queen has seen fit to recall your Excellency. We cannot help thinking it is through a mistake. The white subjects of Her Majesty have had good friends and good rulers in former Governors, but your Excellency has been the friend of white and coloured alike."[27]

* * * * *

The following letter is from Sir John Akerman, a member of the Legislative Council of Natal:—

"August 9th, 1880.

"Having become aware of your recall to England from the office of Governor of the Cape of Good Hope, etc., etc., I cannot allow your departure to take place without conveying to you, which I hereby do, the profound sense I have of the faithful and conscientious manner in which you have endeavoured to fulfil those engagements which, at the solicitation of Great Britain, you entered upon in 1877. The policy was not your own, but was thrust upon you. Having given in London, in 1876, advice to pursue a different course in South Africa from the one then all the fashion and ultimately confided to yourself, it affords me the greatest pleasure to testify to the consistency of the efforts put forth by you to carry out the (then) plan of those who commissioned you, and availed themselves of your acknowledged skill and experience. As a public man of long standing in South Africa, I would likewise add that since the days of Sir G. Grey, no Governor but yourself has grasped the native question here at all, and I feel confident that had your full authority been retained, and not harshly wrested from you, even at the eleventh hour initiatory steps of a reformatory nature with respect to the natives would have been taken, which it is the duty of Britain to follow while she holds her sovereignty over these parts."