Chapter IV (2)

A Bond Congress was held at Kimberley in 1891, when Mr. Rhodes made a very bold but unsuccessful attempt to get the Dutch to join with the English of the Cape Colony against the iniquitous rule and anti-British policy of the South African Republic. Another Congress was held at Port Elizabeth, when there was an attempt made to capture the Bond by means of British friendship. Indeed the changed attitude of this Association deceived many people, as under the extremely able leadership of Mr. Hofmeyr it assumed the position of a great benevolent society, which desired all Colonists, both English and Dutch, to join it, in order to help forward the progress of South Africa. Nevertheless, it is very significant that the Rev. S. J. du Toit lost the high position he had previously held in consequence of his supposed anti-Transvaal sympathies, and at the same time the influence of the South African Republic greatly increased. "Blood is thicker than water." The close alliance of sympathy more and more knit together the Dutchmen of the States and of the Colonies.

But the Jameson Raid of 1895 removed every estrangement. Just before this event President Kruger showed his hand by venturing on a dangerous step, which really meant an open breach of the Convention. He closed the drifts, or fords, by which goods carried on the Cape and Natal railways entered the Transvaal, intending by this act to force traffic over his own Delagoa Bay line. He was informed by a joint ultimatum from the Imperial Government and the Cape Colony that his action could not be permitted, and he rescinded his declaration.

It is not necessary to give a history of the Jameson Raid. No event since Majuba had so much played into the hands of the party in favour of an "Africander Natie." Cromwell's words when General Leslie's army left its strong position, "The Lord has delivered them into our hands," clearly expressed the sentiment which on this occasion animated the minds of Bond members. The Transvaal enormously increased its armaments, preparations for war virtually commenced, and the entire sympathy of the Africander party in the Cape Colony went out to their brethren of the South African Republic.

Mr. Hofmeyr was a leader who thoroughly deserved the title of "the mole," as he metaphorically burrowed under the political platform, and concealed his methods and aims with great subtlety. He saw the danger of pursuing openly the programme expressed in the motto of his party, and clothed the ideas of Africanderism in a constitutional garb. However, when considering the real aim of the Bond, we shall prove that this association never abandoned its original programme.

It must be admitted that, in some respects, there is an analogy between Daniel O'Connell, as leader of the Irish National party, and J. H. Hofmeyr, the "Ons Jan" of Africanderism. Both ostensibly were in favour of working only on constitutional lines, and both were defeated by extremists, who saw no other way of obtaining success than by recourse to arms. In the case of the Young Ireland party, with such leaders as John Michell, Smith O'Brien, and Gavan Duffy, a very futile insurrection was quickly crushed; while, so far as J. H. Hofmeyr was concerned, a much greater conflagration resulted. The great fire was really lit by him--at least he constantly added fuel to it--and when too late made futile efforts to extinguish the flames. O'Connell was much more honest, as he openly opposed the Young Irelanders, and retired broken-hearted from the arena.

Hofmeyr undoubtedly did not raise a finger to stop the furious onward march of his party. _Ons Land_ indeed encouraged this movement, and the editor, Mr. Malun, was completely under the great leader's influence. Certainly at the end, as will be seen if the correspondence ever comes to light, Hofmeyr tried to stop the mad career of the Republics. No one saw more clearly than he did that it was absolute folly to fight the British nation, but his interference came too late.

O'Connell fought more straightforwardly. Never for a moment did he admit that the policy of force was justifiable; while, on the contrary, Hofmeyr had not the moral courage to step publicly into the arena and denounce it. He was always occult in his mode of fighting. Unfortunately, in posing as a friend, he became the most dangerous enemy of his own people.

The policy of the Africander Bond in the Cape Colony pandered to mean interests and base prejudices. The corn farmers and brandy producers were banded together in an unholy compact. Heavy duties of five shillings per hundred pounds on flour and half-a-crown on wheat were levied, while excise was abolished on spirits made from the grape, in order that members of the Bond who grew cereals and made very bad brandy might be benefited. The shameful result was that bread became dear and bad alcohol cheap. As a Nemesis the producers got into the hands of middlemen, and their condition was rather injured than improved. In the case of both wines and spirits, careless, unscientific methods were generally adopted, quantity was preferred to quality, and in many cases acetous fermentation resulted. Although spirit produced from the grape paid not a farthing of excise, and was carried at a non-paying rate on the railways, it was so miserably full of fusel oil and dangerous in character as to be discarded generally by the white population, and sent broadcast among the aboriginal natives for their degradation, demoralisation, and destruction. In a shameful manner Mr. Hofmeyr and the Bond politicians persistently resisted every proposed law for the restriction of the sale of bad alcohol among aboriginal natives, and indeed by insidious methods did all in their power to remove every barrier between the native and the deadly poison made carelessly in thousands of "pot stills" in the Dutch districts of the Western Province.

At the same time the true Phariseeism of this people was demonstrated by their fanatical observance of the Lord's Day, which they styled the Sabbath, and their absurd opposition to any Sunday trains, even when absolutely necessary in general public interests. Mr. Merriman, in one of his saner moments, reprobated this hypocrisy.

SIR H. J. GOOLD-ADAMS, C.B., C.M.G

Lieutenant-Governor of Orange River Colony.]

In South Africa the Native Laws Commission, which comprised such men as Sir Thomas Upington, Sir Thomas Scanlen, and Sir Jacob Barry, took evidence in a very complete form in the early eighties, and as a result reported unanimously in favour of prohibiting the sale of intoxicants to the aboriginal natives. Accordingly by Act of Parliament this recommendation was given full effect to in the Transkeian Territories. Subsequently the Drink Commission reported in favour of this prohibition being extended to natives throughout the Colony. In Bechuanaland and Basutoland, as well as in Natal, the law was adopted long ago, and invariably worked well; nevertheless, to the shame of the Bond organisation, it persistently preferred Mammon to God, and in the strongest manner opposed any legislation whose result would be to save the black man from destruction. Eventually an Act introduced by Sir James Rose Innes was maimed before it was allowed to pass, so that licensing Boards were only empowered to pass restrictive regulations on the sale of alcohol to the coloured races "short of total prohibition."

During the entire term of Bond rule in the Cape Colony not a sixpence could be obtained for the encouragement of emigration from the United Kingdom to the Cape Colony--nor would any land be ever granted for the purpose. "Africa for the Africanders" has a very real and exact meaning, and this was shown to demonstration when even the petty vote for granting assisted passages to domestic servants and artisans was objected to and refused. These people might in many cases come from England, and therefore must be shut out.

The subtlety and diplomacy of the Bond were evinced in voting a grant for the British Navy, and Mr. Hofmeyr took many opportunities of posing as a loyal subject, but, as we shall prove in the context, the one great underlying principle of the organisation was to obtain the mastery in South Africa. All nationalities were invited to join. Africa must be made great by a union of all its people, but those who read between the lines and ascertained the real opinions of those who were guiding the movement knew perfectly well that although the Imperial power might be allowed at first to be a _faineant_ king, the Mayor of the Palace with real authority was to be the people of Dutch extraction--the Africanders--throughout Southern Africa.

We now come to the last days before the war, when Lord Milner could have been easily checkmated if Mr. Hofmeyr had been able to influence the Republican Governments. As every one knew, Mr. Kruger had positively promised equal franchise rights to British subjects at the retrocession of the Transvaal, and this promise was shamefully broken. In a constitutional manner the Uitlanders vainly endeavoured to obtain redress, and now appealed to the Imperial Government. The High Commissioner merely did his evident duty, when at the Bloemfontein Conference he insisted that at least a portion of the franchise rights promised should be given. No doubt Mr. Hofmeyr would have seen his opportunity here, and have consented in such a manner, and with such a purpose, as to really render British interference nugatory, but the Dutch Republicans had now the bit between their teeth. They were the Lord's people, they had made all their preparations, and were perfectly sure of victory. Mr. Kruger himself could not now stop the war, and the astounding ultimatum came forth from the little Republic to the great Empire: "Recall your troops and send no more, or we will punish you." If this gage had not been taken up the United Kingdom would have been forced to take a back seat as a third-class power among the nations of the world.

Having referred to the origin and growth of the Africander party, we must now consider its aims. It must be admitted that its originators were perfectly candid. We find them declaring in _De Patriot_ in 1882, when referring to Confederation, that "There is just one hindrance, and that is the British flag. Let them take that away, and within a year the confederation under the free Africander flag will be established. The British must just have Simon's Bay as a naval and military station on the road to India, and give over all the rest of Africa to the Africanders.... It is we on top or they on top. They must be under or we under.... Two things are wanted, artillery for the Transvaal ... to make their own ammunition and to be well supplied with cannon. Now that the war against the English Government is over (at Majuba Hill), the war against the English language must begin. By Anglifying the girls they infect the whole family life with the English speech."

We must now put into the box witnesses of a very important character whose testimony, so far as the aims of the Bond are concerned, is perfectly unexceptionable. These witnesses are Mr. Burgers, President of the South African Republic, Sir John Brand, President of the Orange Free State, Mr. Reitz, State Secretary of the South African Republic and previously President of the Orange Free State, and Mr. Steyn, Attorney-General and subsequently President of the Orange Free State. In 1875 President Burgers stated at a meeting held in Holland to consider the Delagoa Bay railway scheme, that he hoped to see a New Holland eight millions strong in South Africa, whence England shall have been expelled. It was President Brand who said, "Bartle Frere dreams of United South Africa under the British flag; and so do I, but not under the same flag." And when conducting a controversy with Kruger on the subject of a Customs Union, Sir John Brand, disgusted with treachery, cried aloud, "The Bond seeks to raise a Republican flag in a country with which we are at peace."[4]

Mr. Theo. Schreiner, whose honesty and truthfulness no man in South Africa will deny, furnishes us with a circumstantial account of an interview between himself and Mr. Reitz in the early eighties.[5] Then Mr. Reitz was a judge at Bloemfontein, and was one of that band of Africander patriots whose aspiration and conduct remind us naturally of the aims, objects, and aspirations of the Young Ireland party under Smith O'Brien. After in vain trying to enlist Mr. Schreiner as a recruit, Mr. Reitz asked him to state the reason of his refusal. The reply was, "Because the ultimate object aimed at was the overthrow of British power and the expulsion of the British flag from South Africa." "Well, what if it is so?" was the rejoinder, to which Mr. Schreiner replied, "You don't suppose, do you, that the flag is going to disappear without a tremendous struggle and fight?" "Well," said Mr. Reitz, "I suppose not, but what of that?"

Mr. Steyn, of the Orange Free State, made the following statement to the Rev. W. Tees, Presbyterian Minister in Durban:--

"Great Britain has been completely taken by surprise."

"Sir, this has been preparing since the year 1884."[6]

"In both States?" asked the clergyman.

"Yes," was the reply, "in both, and in the Colony also. The Transvaal has been the arsenal, but those in the know in the Free State and in the Colony have worked in unison with Kruger. The object was to oust the British from South Africa, but it was not intended to do it all at once. The first step was the consolidation of the two Republics as a Sovereign International State, and later on an Africander rising at the right moment."

Mr. Tees then asked a very pertinent question. "Then do you mean to say that when President Kruger attended the Bloemfontein Conference he knew perfectly well that the proceedings were a farce, and that he really meant to fight?"

Mr. Steyn's reply was "Yes."

At a conference between the Governments of the South African Republic and Orange Free States held in 1887[7] relative to railways, we find Mr. Kruger declaring: "If you hook on to the Colony you cut our throat.... Let us speak frankly; we are not going to be dependent on England." Mr. Wolmarans, following, declared: "We have had much experience of her Majesty's Government, and we will and must shake ourselves free. We are still insufficiently prepared. We wish to get to the sea, especially with an eye to future complications--you know our secret policy." Subsequently the blunt soldier, General Joubert, said on the occasion of an Uitlander complaining to him of the constant breach of Article 14 of the 1884 Convention providing equality of treatment for the Uitlanders: "Equality! We don't want equality! We want to see who is to be boss in South Africa."

Apropos to this subject it is not uninteresting to note from the debates in the Volksraad of the South African Republic (see the _Johannesburg Star_ of August 17, 1895) that the laws of the Transvaal were intended to make the acquisition of the franchise by Uitlanders morally impossible, and that at the end of one debate Mr. Otto merely became the mouthpiece of the Burghers when he said, without any rebuke from the chairman, "Come on and fight. I say, come on and have it out; and the sooner the better."

We must now put in documentary evidence to prove the real aims and objects of the Africander Bond. The declaration of the Rev. S. J. Du Toit, Judge Reitz, and Carl Borckenhagen is perfectly explicit. They declare that "The object of the Africander Bond is the establishment of a South African Nationality through the cultivation of a true love of this our fatherland. This object must be attained by the promotion and defence of the national language, and by Africanders, both politically and socially, making their power to be felt as a nation."

After the retrocession of the Transvaal the "Africander Natie" took a very definite shape, as we find the _Patriot_ newspaper declaring that "God's hand has been visible in a more marked manner than ever before seen since the days of the children of Israel. Proud England is compelled to give the Boers back their land after they had been defeated by a mere handful." The little respect which Africanders entertained for British troops had entirely departed.

One of the articles of the Bond programme of principles contained the following words: "In itself acknowledging no single form of Government as the only suitable form, and whilst acknowledging the form of Government existing at present, it (the Bond) means that the aim of our national development must be a United South Africa under its own flag." With the subtlety which always distinguished the party, a change was made in this some years afterwards.

The language of the Bond organ, _De Patriot_, is perfectly explicit, and shows very clearly the spirit and intentions of the party. The English must be boycotted. There must be no English shops, signboards, advertisements, or bookkeepers. Manufacture of munitions of war must be started in the two Republics. "At Heidelberg there are already 4000 cartridges made daily, and a few skilful Africanders have begun to make shells too. That is right; so we must become a nation." It must be considered a disgrace to speak English, and war must be waged in the Church against that language. "It is the Dutch Reformed Church. What has England to do with it?" In family life no quarter was to be given.

Photo by Wilson, Aberdeen]

As we have already said, the junction of the Farmers' Protection Society with the Bond exercised a moderating influence, but the spirit, intentions, and object of the party remained the same, although Mr. J. H. Hofmeyr attempted, in a manner as astute as it was dangerous, to unite the Dutch and English people in South Africa in a common antagonism to Great Britain's power, influence, and presence. Even Mr. Merriman saw through this trick, as he declared in a speech delivered at Grahamstown in 1885. "It is now the cue of the Bond to pretend to be loyal, and if it were not painful it would be ridiculous to hear the editor of _De Zuid Afrikaan_ cheering the Queen, and to hear Du Toit praying for her while resolutions are passed round to the branches in direct opposition to the honour of England.... Each one of you will have to make up his mind whether he is prepared to see the colony remain a part of the British Empire, which carries with it obligations as well as privileges, or whether he is prepared to obey the dictates of the Bond. From the very first time, some years ago, when first the poison began to be distilled in this country, I felt that it must come to this: Was England or the Transvaal to be the paramount force in South Africa?... What could they think of the objects of the Bond when they found Judge Reitz advocating a Republic of South Africa under one flag?... No one who wishes well to the British Government could have read the leading articles of the _Zuid Afrikaan_ and _Express_ and _De Patriot_, in expounding the Bond principles, without seeing that the maintenance of law and order under the British Crown and the object they have in view are absolutely different things.... My quarrel with the Bond is that it stirs up race difference. Its main object is to make the South African Republic the paramount power in South Africa."

To do justice to the Bond, we must quote Mr. Theron, their secretary, who is reported by the _South African News_ of May 5, 1900, to have said:--

"One other question may be asked, 'What is the object of the Bond?' My reply is, its object, its only object, is expressed in sec. 2 of the General Constitution, which is worded as follows: 'The nearest object of the Bond is the formation of a South African Nationality by means of union and co-operation, as a preparation for the ultimate object, a united South Africa. The Bond tries to attain this object by constitutional means, giving to respective governments and legislatures all the support they are entitled to, and respecting everybody's rights.'" This was perfectly understood. It was a Dutch Nationality and a Dutch Republican South Africa that was aimed at, and the context fully proved this assertion when the vast majority of the Bond party fought against England, either as belligerents in the Republics or as rebels--active and passive--within the Cape Colony. Nine out of every ten ministers of the Dutch Reformed Church were rebels, according to the testimony of one of their own number--the Rev. Mr. Vlok of Piquetberg. In such circumstances it is impossible to come to any other conclusion than that the departure from the original, straightforward declaration of the aims of the Bond was nothing but a diplomatic effort to throw dust in the eyes of the enemy.

Certainly such a man as Mr. Cronwright Schreiner was in no way deceived by this attitude, as we find him saying in 1893[8] that the Africander Bond is anti-English in its aims; its officers and its language are Dutch, and it is striving to gain such power as absolutely to control the Cape Parliament. It had "paralysed our political life." "In fact," he goes on to say, "the Bond has sacrificed the welfare of the country for years to the selfish attainment of one object, namely, the supremacy of the Dutch-speaking inhabitants of the Cape Colony, regardless of the rights of others; the imagined good of an ignorant clique of the Dutch has been preferred to the good of the country. These men must not have power; they are wholly unfit to have it. The Bond is a body striving solely for its own benighted ends, and founded and conducted on race lines." This was a correct judgment passed from the English Cape Colony farmer's point of view; men who, quite unlike the pro-Boers in England, perfectly understood their subject by means of adequate evidence obtained on the spot, as well as by bitter personal experience.

Can anything be more significant than the following facts. The Hon. Mr. Bellingan, a Dutch member of the Legislative Council, in the session immediately previous to the war is reported by the _Cape Times_ to have said: "If the policy of annexation were adhered to, they (the Africanders) would take advantage of England's calamity;" while the Bond paper, _Ons Land_, reports the honourable member as saying that when the Queen came to die and storms burst over the empire the Africanders would not side with England if the Republics were annexed. Then the member himself, in a letter to the _Cape Times_, declared that what he said was: "He saw difficulty for the British Empire after the death of our beloved Queen. By giving the Republicans their independence England could reckon upon them as friends, but if the Republics were annexed she could not do so."

The Bond undoubtedly during many years prepared the materials for a conflagration. The great never-dying, ever-present aspiration was fully expressed in its motto, "Africa for the Africanders." It was nothing if not diplomatic, and professed very loudly a loyalty which showed itself in its true colours when the Bond party was in power just prior to the war. Then we find its aims exhibited by the Bond party in Parliament, backed up by the Bond Congress, fighting most strenuously against the absurdly lenient provisions of the Treason Bill.

As Mr. Theo. Schreiner aptly says, "Rebellion in fact is no rebellion in the eyes of the Bond so long as it be in accord with the Africander national ideal." The ministers of their political party allowed ammunition and guns to be carried to the Republics over the railways of the Colony in immense quantities, and the W. P. Schreiner ministry was split up rather than consent to the very mild punishment of deprivation of the franchise being inflicted on rebels. Then came the war, when a large majority of the Bond party were either active or passive rebels.

But no one more clearly points out the real objects of the Bond than Mr. Reitz, one of its original founders, and to the end one of its principal leaders. He does not hesitate to say in his brochure entitled "A Century of Wrong," largely circulated in more than one language over the continent of Europe:--

"May the hope which glowed in our hearts during 1880, and which buoyed us up during that struggle, burn on steadily. May it prove a beacon of light in our path, invincibly moving onwards through blood and through tears until it leads us to a real union of South Africa.... Whether the result be victory or death, liberty will assuredly rise in South Africa ... just as freedom dawned over the United States of America a little more than a century ago. Then from Zambesi to Simonstown it will be 'AFRICA FOR THE AFRICANDER.'"

A Bond object-lesson was really to be seen in a practical manner in the South African Republic under the rule of Dutch Africanders. There indeed the Transvaal portion of Africa was clearly ruled for one section of the population--the Africander--to the utter exclusion of the rights of the English population largely in a majority within Johannesburg. There was an election system leading to the corrupt and unjust rule of Boer Raads and a Boer oligarchy. Protection, Concessions, the Master and Servants Acts were all managed in accordance with Africander ideas. Bond views of native policy were carried out in such a way that no coloured person however civilised could vote, nor hold title to fixed property nor trade freely, nor even marry as white people might. All this found encouragement in the Cape Colony, and eventually the absurd fiction of Boers fighting for liberty in the Transvaal was proclaimed as a fact over all Europe, although literally they commenced a war in which they felt sure of success for the purpose of subverting liberty and obtaining complete freedom to carry on government by a section of the people purely for the interests of a section--the Africanders--ignoring altogether equal rights for all other men.

When we consider clearly and definitely all the facts, remember that history repeats itself and that the Africanders are profoundly tenacious of their political opinions and have proved themselves to be a people who are able to wait, can we not see at once how desirable it is to suspend temporarily the constitution of the Cape Colony? The body politic requires a physician. No one better understands the subject or is more competent to prescribe than Lord Milner. Why do we not take his advice? Nothing is more significant than the fact that in the Cape Colony two years ago heated parliamentary debates and a violent political agitation, following immediately upon the suppression of the first rebellion, were in their turn succeeded by a second rebellion more ruinous than the former one.

In asking for suspension there is no idea of defection from the principle of responsible government. The Imperial system requires local independence, and in due course this will be extended to all parts of South Africa. A necessary interregnum is required for purposes of true liberty and sound rule, in order that breakdown may be prevented and true constitutionalism take the place of the tyranny of any section of the population. The Imperial Government is no step-mother, and the federation of Southern Africa will doubtless be on similar lines to those of the Canadian Dominion. Certainly no system will be forced upon the people contrary to their wishes, but the resurrection of Bond power in the Cape Colony would absolutely prevent any well-considered and statesmanlike plan, in which all men would receive fair play utterly regardless of race extraction. In fact the British and the Africander Bond theories are diametrically opposed. The first makes every civilised man equal from the Zambesi to Cape Town, the other specially and always means "Africa for the Africanders."

Heated discussions in Parliament, and the intense excitement connected with contested elections, cannot but accentuate race hatred in the Cape Colony. Surely South Africa should have a rest. As in the Transvaal and in the Orange Colony, so at the Cape, the great healer, time, ought to be allowed to do its work.

But perhaps the strongest, because the most practical, argument in favour of "suspension" is based upon the fact that a re-distribution Act is absolutely necessary if fair play is to be bestowed on all nationalities, and the reign of the Bond be not allowed to again become supreme. The suspensionists are really fighting for liberty against the rule of a section. Their motto is that of the Union Jack--"Equal rights for all"--whereas, as we know, the Africanders will in the future, as in the past, demand "Africa for the Africanders." No delusion is greater than to imagine that they will change their purpose. Their plan is to adhere to their principles, consolidate their party, and wait for an opportunity. After spending more than two hundred millions of money, and much more than this--40,000 noble lives--for the sake of upholding British supremacy in Southern Africa, nothing should be done even to risk a recurrence of the trouble. This certainly was the opinion of Lord Milner, and of the great majority of the British people in the Cape Colony. The advice now referred to was not taken, and history must record the result.

The real aims and objects of the Bond are as decipherable to-day as they were three years or ten years ago. The people who belong to it are thoroughly tenacious of these opinions, and to do them justice, make no pretence of having changed them. At the Paarl the popular General Botha has just declared that they are not vanquished, retain their traditions, and will yet conquer. They look with unutterable scorn on the men who joined the National Scouts, and entertain feelings of coldness and dislike for those who did not join the enemy either actively or passively. In the great Dutch Church of Cape Town, the Republican Generals received an unanimous ovation, and were carried shoulder high, in triumph, from the edifice. The truth is that the Bond exists, remains extremely powerful, and is only waiting and watching for an opportunity.

British rule is now comparatively easy both in the Transvaal and Orange Colonies. Effective progress is being made under the rule of wise and firm Governments; but it is in the Cape Colony, where a treacherous and powerful enemy is allowed to plot with impunity, that the real danger to British Imperial interests lies.

How history repeats itself! When the fatuous policy of abandoning 35,000 square miles of excellent territory styled the Orange River Sovereignty was pursued in 1853, there was only one man in the House of Commons who opposed it,[9] and subsequent circumstances amply justified his judgment. In 1902, Mr. Chamberlain would have found it absolutely impossible to obtain a majority in the House of Commons favourable to suspension of the Cape Colony Constitution. What is now to be done? Our answer is, "Accept with loyalty the decision of the Government, and show by wise moderation that we are most desirous to be friends with our fellow-subjects of Dutch extraction. No recriminations nor abuse should proceed from our side. Nothing will please us better than to find the Bond abandoned and all men cordially uniting as one free people under the British flag. If this be not done--and masses of the people have already declared that it will not--we will have to fight the Bond again at elections, on public platforms, and in the press, as well as in Parliament. It would have been well for both nationalities if this could have been avoided, but this is now impossible."

LET GOD DEFEND THE RIGHT.

FOOTNOTES:

[3] See "From Boer to Boer and Englishman," by Paul M. Botha. London: Hugh Rees, 1901.

[4] See _Macmillan's Magazine_, May 1900.

[5] This is published in full in the _Weekly Times_ of December 1, 1899, and is fully referred to in Wilmot's "History of Our Own Times in South Africa." See also "The Truth about the Transvaal" and various other publications.

[6] See _Daily News_ of May 10, 1900.

[7] Reported in the _Times_ of May 24, 1900.

[8] Paper read at the Cradock Farmers' Association in October 1893.

[9] This was Mr. Norton. See the dramatic manner in which this is referred to in the second volume of "The Life of Sir Harry Smith."

RHODESIA

SOME PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS

BY E. F. KNIGHT

_Author of "Where Three Empires Meet"; "The Cruise of the 'Falcon,'" &c._

In all the long romantic story of the making of the British Empire, no episode more strongly appeals to the imagination than the foundation of Rhodesia. Well is it named Rhodesia; for the history of Great Britain's acquisitions on either side of the Zambesi, the 750,000 square miles of magnificent territories which lie under the sway of the British South Africa Company, is the history of the Englishman, Cecil John Rhodes: had it not been for whose foresight, statesmanship, untiring vigilance, determined but patient endeavour for years towards the accomplishment of his mighty schemes, the South African Plateau, with its gold-bearing reefs, its vast tracts of rich arable and pastoral lands, would have fallen into the hands of one or other of the foreign Powers which keenly contested with him its possession.

It is a trite saying that when the time is ripe for great doings on the part of a nation the necessary man invariably appears. It is a saying hardly warranted by fact, for many a golden opportunity have nations, Great Britain as often as others, lost because the right man was not forthcoming. Happily it has not been so in South Africa. It is almost certain that, had it not been for the accident of Mr. Rhodes seeking the South African shores for his health when a lad, the Germans and the Boers would have cut off the Cape Colony from all possibility of expansion to the north. Those Powers had even found their right men. The Transvaal had her stubborn Kruger; Germany had her shrewd and energetic agents and explorers preparing the way to annexation in different portions of the Dark Continent; while even Portugal had her D'Andrade, a man who displayed much of the spirit and enterprise of the Portuguese discoverers and conquerors of olden days. Cecil Rhodes took his place in South African affairs but just in time. The Transvaal War had been followed by a period of extraordinary apathy both in England and in the Cape Colony. No one seemed to care in the least what became of the territory lying beyond our then limits. At home men were sick of the very name of South Africa. Many would have gladly abandoned all our possessions about the Cape of Storms, and abdicated an Empire which seemed to bring us nothing but futile wars, disaster, and disgrace. It was at this critical period that Mr. Rhodes came to the front to save our supremacy in South Africa--too late, indeed, to save for us much that should have been ours; too late, for example, to secure our sovereignty over Namaqualand and Damaraland, territories which had been long recognised as being within Britain's sphere of influence, which formerly had been annexed to the Cape, but which latterly had been totally neglected both by the Imperial and Cape Governments, so that the watchful Germans were left at liberty, first to establish their trading missions, and finally to assert their sovereignty over those extensive regions.

The richness and beauty of the highlands, extending over an immense area both north and south of the Zambesi, had for many years been known to both English and Boer travellers. Mr. Rhodes, in his early days at Kimberley, met many an adventurous wanderer who had come from that wonderful region, and their glowing tales perhaps first inspired in him that ambitious dream of the creation of a great new British colony that should include all the finest country in South and Central Africa. As far back as 1882, having commenced to take an active part in Cape politics, Mr. Rhodes took the initial steps towards the attainment of the one absorbing purpose of his life.

Photo by Wilson, Aberdeen]

Of fascinating interest is the story--a story for the most part yet untold to the world--of Cecil Rhodes' long struggle with the Boers and Portuguese who attempted to keep the Empire-builder out of the Promised Land, and of his frequent forestallings of further German expansion at our expense. The first, the most critical and anxious period of all, was occupied with the contest for the very gate of the country, the right-of-way to the north, which we were so nearly losing, and without which our advance would have been hopelessly barred. The only outlet to the north from the Cape Colony lay through Bechuanaland, a vast region that was divided into several independent native kingdoms, and hemmed in between the Germans, then advancing from the west, and the Transvaal Boers on the east. This gateway to the north has been likened to the neck of a bottle; the narrow neck which, once passed, opens out into the broad and precious Zambesia. Kruger, clever and obstinate, commenced his career of attempted expansion by seizing this neck with the intention of thus cutting us off completely from the north. It was his ambition to extend the Boer rule westward to the German line, eastward to Delagoa Bay and the Indian Ocean, and northwards over the steppes of Zambesia. Pretorius had declared that the Transvaal had no boundary on the west, unless it were the Atlantic Ocean. The first struggle therefore between Rhodes and Kruger was for this vital point of vantage, the neck. Had Kruger grasped it the British flag would never have floated on the northern plateau, the Boers and Germans would have joined hands--there had been a talk of a German Protectorate over the Transvaal--and theirs, not ours, would have been the splendid prize. And what is more, seeing what a vast conspiracy had been organised against us, we should probably have lost the Cape Colony itself: the foundations of our Empire would have been shaken. Immense was the threatening peril to which we shut our eyes. The Transvaal War had left the Cape Colonists in a distinctly anti-British frame of mind. Disgusted at the follies of the Imperial Government, even those of British blood sympathised with the Transvaal Boers, and had no objection to the north falling into the hands of the Dutch Republicans. Indeed, the general feeling at the Cape at that time appears to have been republican. Cecil Rhodes had not only to out-manoeuvre Germany, the Transvaal, and Portugal, but had also to overcome the opposition of colonial prejudice, and the complete indifference of the English to all affairs South African. He stood almost alone, and had to create a party for himself. Not only man of action, but diplomatist and opportunist in the best sense of the word, he played his game with wondrous skill, and succeeded at last in winning over the reluctant colonists to his views. The very Africander Bond became his ally for a time.

That struggle for the neck of Bechuanaland is an interesting story that cannot be told here. First Kruger attempted to establish himself in Mankoroane's territory. Mankoroane, to protect himself, offered to cede his country to the Cape Colony, which point-blank refused it. Rhodes, in 1882, went himself to the chieftain, and so arranged matters that the Imperial Government found itself compelled to take over the district. Thwarted at this point, Kruger attempted to cut us off further to the north, and sent his agents to establish the freebooting republics of Goshen and Stellaland. Again Rhodes checked him. Going himself to Stellaland, he persuaded the Boers in possession to accept the British flag on the condition that our Government ratified their titles to the land they had occupied. The Warren expedition, despatched at last in consequence of the strong representations of Rhodes and his far-seeing ally, Sir Hercules Robinson, the then High Commissioner, resulted in the expulsion of the Boer freebooters from Montsioa's country, where Mafeking now stands, and the extension of our protectorate over the whole of Bechuanaland. Then Rhodes arranged for the taking over of Khama's land, and the gateway to the north was won. Foiled again, and thus hemmed in on the west, the stubborn Kruger sent his very able agent Grobler to Lobengula to obtain from him a Matabele concession to the Transvaal. Rhodes found that it was hopeless to attempt to bring the Imperial Government to a sense of the danger of the position, so now, before it was too late, he had to act promptly for himself. He sent Maguire Thomson and Rudd to Lobengula to obtain a concession from him before Grobler had carried out his mission. They were successful; the Governor ratified the concession. Dr. Jameson and Dr. Harris went to Matabeleland to deliver to the king the stipulated arms and ammunition; and despite the bitter opposition of the Cape statesman and consistently anti-British Englishman, Mr. Merriman, the deed of concession was sealed, and its validity was recognised by the Government. And thus in 1888, after years of patient endeavour, Cecil Rhodes at last had made the way clear for the realisation of his mighty scheme.

The sinews of war had now to be found; and Rhodes, in anticipation, before the granting of the concession, had made his provisions. First he had brought about the amalgamation of the diamond-mining companies, and then, as head of the great De Beers Corporation with its rent-roll of four millions sterling a year, he, in 1887, effected the alteration of the De Beers Trust Deed by a liquidation of the Company, so as to give the De Beers directors power to apply the Company's funds to outside objects, that is, to the development of the North. Messrs. Barnato and Beit agreed to this on the condition of being made life governors, and ever since loyally co-operated with Rhodes in the execution of his scheme.

The next step was the granting of the charter by the British Government in 1889, and the creation of the British South Africa Company. Then Rhodes sent out the famous Pioneer Expedition to Mashonaland, and the white men established themselves in Rhodesia. It must be borne in mind that at that time and for years afterwards Rhodes had to be ever closely watching and cunningly circumventing the German Boers and Portuguese, who spared no effort to keep us from the north. Bismarck's agent, Count Pffeil, was sent on a secret mission to South Africa and all but succeeded in anticipating Rhodes, and in winning for Germany a broad strip of territory that would have connected her eastern and western possessions, so forming a bar across Africa from ocean to ocean that would have effectually shut us out. Then there was the Boer trek into Mashonaland in 1891, when the Rhodesians guarded the drifts against the invaders--a scheme of Kruger's that was frustrated without the shedding of blood. Even when the Pioneer Expedition was on its way, the energetic Portuguese D'Andrade was distributing the flags of his country among the chiefs, and attempting to get concessions that would cut Mashonaland off from Matabeleland. To defeat his plans Rhodes entered into a treaty with Umtassa, and obtained the Gazaland concession from Gungunyana, a concession which would have extended the Chartered Company's possessions to the shores of the Indian Ocean had not Lord Salisbury refused to ratify it and acknowledged the claims of Portugal. Then again in 1889 Rhodes, whose Intelligence Department always supplied him in good time with information as to the doings of his rivals, hearing that Germany intended to cut us off at the head of Lake Nyassa, secretly sent Mr. H. H. Johnson to hoist British flags at Port Abercorn on Lake Tanganyika and other places, as proof of our occupation. The Portuguese also hoped to erect a wall against our expansion by connecting her eastern and western territories, and for this purpose an expedition set out from Angola to seize the Barotse country, but here Rhodes again forestalled them; his mission was the first to arrive in the country, and Barotseland was placed under our protection. The way these things were done by Rhodes' agents, the hardships endured, the perils incurred by these adventurous men who--unlike the Portuguese agents who were always accompanied by large bands of armed men--plunged alone into these savage regions to carry out their hazardous missions, makes a wonderful story indeed of British pluck and enterprise.

The Pioneer Expedition set out in June 1890. The Pioneer Column, which had been enrolled by Major Frank Johnson, consisted of 187 men who had decided to try their fortunes in the new country, and it was accompanied by 650 mounted police, under the command of Lieut.-Colonel Pennefather. The famous hunter, Selous, acted as guide. The ox-waggons carried provisions and other stores sufficient to supply the whole force for six months. For four hundred miles the Pioneers marched into Mashonaland, constructing a road as they went, and making drifts at the many rivers to enable the waggons to cross. Forts were built at intervals, and small garrisons were left in them. At last they came to their objective point, Mount Hampden; and hard by it they built Fort Salisbury, now the capital of all Rhodesia. The Pioneer Force was now disbanded, each man receiving, in addition to his pay, the right to peg out fifteen gold claims and 3000 acres of land. The men scattered over the country, prospecting for gold and pegging out their claims and farms. The first rainy season was a terrible one for them; it was an exceptionally bad year; all transport was interrupted, supplies fell short; the men had to live on native foodstuffs; great privations were endured; many died; and, as in every other part of our Empire, the ways of Rhodesia are strewn with the bones of the men who won the land for their country.

But the men who go out as the pioneers of the Empire are not easily discouraged. The settlement and development of the country was at once undertaken with energy. Arrangements were made for the administration of the new State; a legal system was created; roads were constructed; mining plant was brought up; mining operations commenced; land was brought under cultivation; stores were opened; townships were surveyed, and rose rapidly from the wilderness, handsome brick buildings taking the place of the huts in which the pioneers roughed it at first. But the development of the country was much retarded by the difficulty of communication and the enormous cost of transport. Little could be done until Rhodesia was afforded railway communication with the coast; so Mr. Rhodes made arrangements for the extension of the Cape railway from its then terminus at Kimberley, and for the construction of a line to Beira on the east coast.

The Chartered Company had not long effected its active occupation of Mashonaland before the Matabele impis resumed their murderous raids on the Mashonas, and in 1893 the Matabele war broke out, leading to the overthrow of Lobengula and the absorption of Matabeleland by the Chartered Company. Nearly every able-bodied white man in Mashonaland volunteered his services. Three columns, numbering nine hundred men in all, marched through the country, defeating the Matabele impis on the Shangani and Zambesi; Bulawayo was occupied, and with the gallant stand of Wilson and his little force, the war was brought to a conclusion.

Then the white man's city began to rise from the veldt, hard by the burnt kraal of Lobengula. Towards the close of the war I travelled in an ox-waggon with some Boer transport riders from the Marico Valley in the Transvaal--about thirty miles from Mafeking--to Bulawayo. This beautiful valley ("the Granary of the Transvaal") was the old home of Moselekatse, Lobengula's father. It was a fat land; there is none so rich for a hundred leagues around; for tribes of Zulu blood will establish themselves in none but the best country, and they will trek far to find it. The rolling land of Marico is as fertile as it is beautiful. It is as green as Devon, and the pretty farmhouses of the prosperous people are scattered among rich pastures, great fields of corn, and fruit orchards. Fifty years ago the Boers and their Baralong allies drove Moselekatse and his raiding warriors out of Marico, and sent them trekking north to seek a new home. So northward they travelled, murdering and cattle-lifting as they went, traversing good country, but not such as would satisfy the Zulu, until at last, nearly five hundred miles from Marico, they came to a land even more favoured than that they had left, and settled down in what is now called Matabeleland. I followed their route, and could then understand their choice. Fair indeed to the eye appears the green, well-watered high veldt of Matabeleland as the traveller from the south opens it out on reaching the watershed between the Crocodile and the Zambesi rivers. Lieutenant Maund, who some years before had been sent to spy out Matabeleland, with justice reported that, "when compared to the country south of it, it was as Canaan after the wilderness." When I reached the place where Bulawayo, with its stately buildings, now stands, I found a few hundred white men occupying a little temporary settlement of native huts and tattered tents that had sprung up round the newly-constructed fort; the building of the modern city had not commenced. A little later I was present at the first auction of township stands. The alternate land lots bearing even numbers, lining one side of what was to be the chief street, were sold. They fetched about £50 apiece. A few months afterwards the alternate stands bearing odd numbers were sold by auction; they all fetched over £400 apiece, the highest price realised being £900. Some of the stands, that could have been purchased for £50 each in 1893, are at the present time worth six or seven thousand pounds apiece, and realise that price when put on the market. I quote these figures to show that whatever critics at home may think of the future of Rhodesia, those on the spot have confidence in it. The Matabele War was scarcely over before the volunteers, having received their mining, farm, and loot rights, scattered over the country to prospect and peg out their claims. It was wonderful to observe how quickly, under Dr. Jameson's able administration, everything was put in order, and Matabeleland began to assume the aspect of a settled country. Bulawayo was soon a fine city, having its water-works, electric lighting, hospitals, public schools, its imposing court-house and other handsome public buildings. Townships sprang up like mushrooms all over the high veldt in the vicinity of the gold-bearing reefs. The population rapidly increased. The Chartered Company, in the meanwhile, pushed on the railway from Mafeking towards Bulawayo, proceeded to construct the line from Umtali to Beira, and quickly placed Bulawayo into telegraphic communication with the outer world. And now there was every sign of prosperity; the development of the gold mines gave encouraging results; trade was good; the value of the land for farming was proved, and excellent crops were raised; Rhodesia's future seemed assured. But it was fated that its progress should be retarded by an extraordinary succession of disasters; surely no new country was ever so sorely tried.

All was going well until the early part of 1896, when the first of its many scourges swept down on the unhappy land--the dreaded rinderpest came from the North, and despite every precaution that could be taken to prevent its spreading, it destroyed over 90 per cent. of the cattle in the country, and played like havoc among the wild game. It is difficult for one who was not in Rhodesia at the time to realise the magnitude of this misfortune. As this was a land then entirely dependent upon oxen for transport, a stoppage was put to agricultural and mining operations; and the cattle-owning native population suffered greatly. Before the rinderpest broke out the average price of an ox in Rhodesia was £6, and now, though it is over five years since the rinderpest was stamped out, the price is about £28. Transport rates rose from 10s. to £5 per 100 lbs., and all the necessaries of life went up to famine prices. These figures, which will be found in an interesting pamphlet written by Mr. P. S. Inskip of the British South Africa Company's service, will convey some idea of the situation. Absolute ruin faced the settlers; it is wonderful that the bulk of them did not abandon the country in despair, but pioneers are not easily disheartened, and they stubbornly struggled on, taking every possible measure to mitigate the effect of the plague.