The Boer section in the Cape Colonies represents nearly one-half of the
white population there. Their representatives in the administration were
ever profuse and assertive in professions of loyalty to the Queen and to the
English Government, and any aspersions to the contrary were always
indignantly and stoutly repelled. The Afrikaner Bond was averred to include
nothing to clash with loyal sentiments, no severance from England, but, on
the contrary, that its principal objects were to strengthen the lines of
amity and joint solidarity in view of a general federation of South Africa
upon Imperial bases. In support of such sentiments one of the first acts of
the Bond party when recently come into power was a vote of £30,000 per year
towards British naval outlays, and in grateful recognition of naval
protection; it was at the same time mooted, in fact almost pledged, that the
Transvaal would similarly offer £12,000 as well.
The sequel has proven these to be Athenian gifts, for no sooner had the
Republican commandoes invaded the Cape Colonies in November last than those
identical men enthusiastically welcomed the Queen's enemies as their friends
and deliverers from hateful English dominion. There they stood—self-avowed
and unmasked traitors. Members of the Legislative Assembly met those Boer
invaders with addresses and speeches, assuring them of their own and of
every other true Afrikaner's aid and fidelity in their common cause. "The
star of liberty," they said, "had arisen at last—it had been the nation's
desire and prayers during the past fifteen years." "He could thank God with
tears of joy for having granted those prayers." Such were the words of Mr.
van der Walt, M.L.A., uttered at Colesberg. Mr. de Wet, M.L.A., Mr. van den
Heever, M.L.A., and other colonial notables were spokesmen in similar terms
of enthusiasm on other occasions as the invasion advanced. All this is sadly
notorious, but still it seems a hard task to convince people who prefer to
remain blind or only see a presumptuous adversary in any one who seeks to
enlighten them upon this glaring and premeditated treachery.
October and November were months of unrestrained exultation to the Boer
party, to judge from letters and articles which appeared in the Standard and
Diggers' News, Johannesburg, dated 22nd November, 1899, and in the Pretoria
Volksstem, dated 20th November, 1899.[10] There one sees the mask off, in
language of defiant insult and of scurrilous mendacity against all that is
English, avowing that the present Anglo-Boer War has been the outcome of
preparations during the past thirty years. That letter is not all suitable
reading for the tender sex, but should serve as evidence to the still
unconvinced sceptic that the Boers are fighting for something more than
their mere independence and liberty, viz., for conquest and the domination
of Afrikanerdom. His Excellency Dr. Leyds may deny all those too previous
intentions with his placid effrontery of assumed innocent calm. He may
denounce Mr. Chamberlain, Rhodes, Jameson, and even the Prince of Wales, and
he may use the old device of posing as innocent by accusing others. The
detected robber, however, does not always escape with his booty by running
off himself, whilst shouting "Stop, thief!"
Something refreshingly analogous to such attempts of screening and
exculpation has been extemporized in Cape journals of late. There, in an
ingeniously pretended dissertation, it is invented how ill founded the
aspersions are against Mr. Premier Schreiner, and that the acts, upon which
he was so wrongly suspected as an amphibious helmsman, are really
attributable to another person—by the way, to one at a safe distance, viz.,
to Mr. F.W. Reitz, the Transvaal State Secretary; whilst this gentleman
again, when lecturing at Johannesburg in July last, naively deplored the
confusion of people's ideas who see anything wrong in the Afrikaner Bond,
adding: "Lord, forgive them, for they know not what they do or talk about."
"The peace of South Africa is only possible under Boer supremacy," is the
Bond shibboleth. The end justifies the means, even to sedition, to a war of
conquest and the wholesale plunder of investors.
Many of the younger Boers in the Cape Colony and Natal had shown a singular
ardour in joining the several volunteer corps. They were equipped with
uniforms and best weapons, were drilled into efficiency, received pay, and
all went on well until the oath of allegiance was to be tendered. This they
refused, preferring to resign and to provide arms from other sources—Mauser
rifles by preference. This happened some considerable time before the
outbreak of the war.
Boer Arguments Denying Uitlanders' Complaints
Many plausible arguments are proffered to prove that Uitlanders' grievances
and irritations are purely fictitious, but few, I venture to say, will bear
examination. Taxation, for example, is stoutly averred to fall alike upon
burgher and Uitlander, but a glance at the long rubric of articles specially
taxed will show that the selection is contrived to hit the latter and to
spare, or even to protect and benefit, the burgher section.
The gold industry is not charged with a royalty as is customary in other
gold-producing countries, but with 5 per cent. only upon the net profits;
but here an intolerant and corrupt domination proves much more prejudicial
than a heavy royalty would be.
Proper representation would be the remedy and afford contentment, even with
higher taxation, but that is refused upon Bond principles.
The Anglo-Boer War is attributed to base motives on the part of the British
Government, operating in collusion with capitalism—to England's passion for
annexation, her rapacious greed for the Transvaal gold, her inordinate
ambition to universal commercial supremacy, etc. What a confusion of
assertions and of self-refuting contradictions!
Would England really acquire the Transvaal gold by the annexation of that
State, seeing that its mines are already capitalized and as good as
expropriated in favour of the host of shareholders, some of whom are
English, but the greater portion German, French, and of other nations?
What advantage would accrue to shareholders? Would England, in case of
forcible annexation, not be under the necessity of incurring a heavy charge
in the increase of her South African garrisons, and so be justified in
levying a considerable royalty upon the output, which would materially
reduce the dividends? What advantage would arise to England by substituting
an unproductive and costly war in South Africa for conditions of peace and
prosperity, which alone can yield her commerce profit? England can only
derive profit from wars waged between other peoples. And as to the incentive
of commercial supremacy, England, while possessing that to a large extent
already, freely and voluntarily allows all comers from other nationalities
to share the benefits with her by her principle of free trade.
FOOTNOTES:
10. Extract from Pretoria Volksstem, 20th November, 1899, from a long
letter averred to have appeared in the London Times, dated 12th October,
1899, said to have been signed by a well-known Cape Boer, then in England:—
"We have desired delay, and we have had it, and we are now practically
masters of South Africa from the Zambesi to the Cape. All the Afrikaners in
the Cape Colony have been working for years past for this end.
"For thirty years the Cape Dutch have been waiting their chance, and now
their day has come; they will throw off their mask and their yoke at the
same instant, and 200,000 Dutch heroes will trample you tinder foot. We can
afford to tell you the truth now, and in this letter you have got it."
