Part 14 (1/2)

In all human probability it will take but a small lapse of time for the Transvaal to find itself in the identical position from which we relieved it by the Annexation.

What course events will then take it is impossible to say. It may be found desirable to re-annex the country, though, in my opinion, that would be, after all that has pa.s.sed, an unfortunate step; its inhabitants may be cut up piecemeal by a combined movement of native tribes, as they would have been, had they not been rescued by the English Government in 1877, or it is possible that the Orange Free State may consent to take the Transvaal under its wing: who can say? There is only one thing that our recently abandoned possession can count on for certain, and that is trouble, both from its white subjects, and the natives, who hate the Boers with a bitter and a well-earned hatred.

The whole question, can, so far as its moral aspect is concerned, be summed up in a few words.

Whether or no the Annexation was a necessity at the moment of its execution,--which I certainly maintain it was--it received the unreserved sanction of the Home Authorities, and the relations of Sovereign and subject, with all the many and mutual obligations involved in that connection, were established between the Queen of England and every individual of the motley population of the Transvaal. Nor was this change an empty form, for, to the largest proportion of that population, this transfer of allegiance brought with it a priceless and a vital boon. To them it meant--freedom and justice--for where, on any portion of this globe over which the British ensign floats, does the law even wink at cruelty or wrong?

A few years pa.s.sed away, and a small number of the Queen's subjects in the Transvaal rose in rebellion against Her authority, and inflicted some reverses on Her arms. Thereupon, in spite of the reiterated pledges given to the contrary--partly under stress of defeat, and partly in obedience to the pressure of ”advanced views”--the country was abandoned, and the vast majority who had remained faithful to the Crown, was handed to the cruel despotism of the minority who had rebelled against it.

Such an act of treachery to those to whom we were bound with double chains--by the strong ties of a common citizens.h.i.+p, and by those claims to England's protection from violence and wrong which have hitherto been wont to command it, even where there was no duty to fulfil, and no authority to vindicate--stands--I believe--without parallel on our records, and marks a new departure in our history.

I cannot end these pages without expressing my admiration of the extremely able way in which the Boers managed their revolt, when once they felt that, having undertaken the thing, it was a question of life and death with them. It shows that they have good stuff in them somewhere, which, under the firm but just rule of Her Majesty, might have been much developed, and it makes it the more sad that they should have been led to throw off that rule, and have been allowed to do so by an English Government.

In conclusion, there is one point that I must touch on, and that is the effect of the retrocession on the native mind, which I can only describe as most disastrous. The danger alluded to in the Report of the Royal Commission has been most amply realised, and the prevailing belief in the steadfastness of our policy, and the inviolability of our plighted word, which has. .h.i.therto been the great secret of our hold on the Kafirs, has been rudely shaken. The motives that influenced, or are said to have influenced, the Government in their act, are naturally quite unintelligible to savages, however clever, who do believe that force is a remedy, and who have seen the inhabitants of a country ruled by England, defeat English soldiers and take possession of it, whilst those who remained loyal to England were driven out of it. It will not be wonderful if some of them, say the natives of Natal, deduce therefrom conclusions unfavourable to loyalty, and evince a desire to try the same experiment.

It is, however, unprofitable to speculate on the future, which must be left to unfold itself.

The curtain is, so far as this country is concerned, down for the moment on the South African stage; when it rises again, there is but too much reason to fear that it will reveal a state of confusion, which, unless it is more wisely and consistently dealt with in the future than it has been in the past, may develop into chaos.

APPENDIX

I

THE POTCHEFSTROOM ATROCITIES, &C.

There were more murders and acts of cruelty committed during the war at Potchefstroom, where the behaviour of the Boers was throughout both deceitful and savage, than at any other place.

When the fighting commenced a number of ladies and children, the wives and children of English residents, took refuge in the fort. Shortly after it had been invested they applied to be allowed to return to their homes in the town till the war was over. The request was refused by the Boer commander, who said that as they had gone there, they might stop and ”perish” there. One poor lady, the wife of a gentleman well known in the Transvaal, was badly wounded by having the point of a stake, which had been cut in two by a bullet, driven into her side. She was at the time in a state of pregnancy, and died some days afterwards in great agony. Her little sister was shot through the throat, and several other women and children suffered from bullet wounds, and fever arising from their being obliged to live for months exposed to rain and heat, with insufficient food.

The moving spirit of all the Potchefstroom atrocities was a cruel wretch of the name of Buskes, a well-educated man, who, as an advocate of the High Court, had taken the oath of allegiance to the Queen.

One deponent swears that he saw this Buskes wearing Captain Fall's diamond ring, which he had taken from Sergeant Ritchie, to whom it was handed to be sent to England, and also that he had possessed himself of the carriages and other goods belonging to prisoners taken by the Boers.[*] Another deponent (whose name is omitted in the Blue Book for precautionary reasons) swears, ”That on the next night the patrol again came to my house accompanied by one Buskes, who was secretary of the Boer Committee, and again asked where my wife and daughter were. I replied, in bed; and Buskes then said, 'I must see for myself.' I refused to allow him, and he forced me, with a loaded gun held to my breast, to open the curtains of the bed, when he pulled the bedclothes half off my wife, and altogether off my daughter. I then told him if I had a gun I would shoot him. He placed a loaded gun at my breast, when my wife sprang out of bed and got between us.”

[*] Buskes was afterwards forced to deliver up the ring.

I remember hearing at the time that this Buskes (who is a good musician) took one of his victims, who was on the way to execution, into the chapel and played the ”Dead March in Saul,” or some such piece, over him on the organ.

After the capture of the Court House a good many Englishmen fell into the hands of the Boers. Most of these were sentenced to hard labour and deprivation of ”civil rights.” The sentence was enforced by making them work in the trenches under a heavy fire from the fort. One poor fellow, F. W. Finlay by name, got his head blown off by a sh.e.l.l from his own friends in the fort, and several loyal Kafirs suffered the same fate.

After these events the remaining prisoners refused to return to the trenches till they had been ”tamed” by being thrashed with the b.u.t.t end of guns, and by threats of receiving twenty-five lashes each.

But their fate, bad as it was, was not so awful as that suffered by Dr.

Woite and J. Van der Linden.

Dr. Woite had attended the Boer meeting which was held before the outbreak, and written a letter from thence to Major Clarke, in which he had described the talk of the Boers as silly bl.u.s.ter. He was not a paid spy. This letter was, unfortunately for him, found in Major Clarke's pocket-book, and because of it he was put through a form of trial, taken out and shot dead, all on the same day. He left a wife and large family, who afterwards found their way to Natal in a dest.i.tute condition.

The case of Van der Linden is somewhat similar. He was one of Raaf's Volunteers, and as such had taken the oath of allegiance to the Queen.

In the execution of his duty he made a report to his commanding officer about the Boer meeting, and which afterwards fell into the hands of the Boers. On this he was put through the form of trial, and, though in the service of the Queen, was found guilty of treason and condemned to death. One of his judges, a little less stony-hearted than the rest, pointed out that ”when the prisoner committed the crime martial law had not yet been proclaimed, nor the State,” but it availed him nothing. He was taken out and shot.