BRITAIN'S POLICY TO THE BOERS.

Evening Post, Volume LIX, Issue 128, 31 May 1900, Page 5

BRITAIN'S POLICY TO THE BOERS.

IMPORTANT SPEECH BY THE PRIME MINISTER. THE SPIRIT IN WHICH SETTLEMENT WILL BE SOUGHT. LONDON, 30th May. In the course of a speech last night at a dinner given by the Conservative Club Lord Salisbury paraphrased a speech delivered by him at- the end of last year in which he declared that "Great Britain sought no territory in South Africa." It was no good, remarked his Lordship, to say that a desire for territory led us into this war. that was one of the atrocious calumnies ,spread under the favouring influence of Dr. Leyds. The desire of the Imperial Government had been, he .proceeded to say, to stop oppression. The context of the words used in the | speech under review showed, said the j speaker, that he was unpledged to such terrible sacrifices ns had been implied. Continuing, the Prime Minister asserted that war would never Tecur in South Africa. No shred of the former independence of the Republics would remain. So far as the terms of settlement were concei'ned they largely depended on the I temper and attitude of the enemy in the future. They had so acted in the ; past that every severance of class and race had been intensified *by every measure they had taken. Reconciliation would, of course, bo difficult, and would require much time to secure, but Great Britain would endeavour to cause the recollections of the war to perish. The traditional policy of seeking the appeasement of bitterness and the attainment of affection and mutual cooperation would be followed, in the hope that before many years had elapsed the affection uniting the South African colonies would be equally as warm as that existing in Canada and Australia. [The speech of last year referred to above was that delivered by the Prime Minister at the Guildhall banquet in connection with tho installation of the Lord Mayor on 9th November. Lord Salisbury's words, as reported by The Times, were — "With respect to the future I shall not dare to say anything except to deprecate some very strange assertions which I see occasionally in the Continental press. I saw it stated the other day, not by a chance writer, but by a man who had been a member of a French Government, that this war had for its object the gratification of the lusts of the greedy lords who desire to share in the participation among themselves of the gold and the diamonds of the Transvaal. I beg to assure that gentleman that the Cabinet have not had one farthing from tfyc Transvaal or any other goldfield. ... I would go farther, and say that England, as a whole, would have no advantage from tho possession of gold mines, except so far as her Government conferred the blessings of good government upon those who had the prosecution of that industry But that is the limit of our interest. We seek no goldfields. We« seek no territory. What we desire is equal rights for all men of all races — and security foi % our fellow subjects and for the Empire. I will not ask by what means these results are to be obtained. The hour for asking that has not yet come." Some controversy ensued as to the actual words used, and Lord Salisbury took the unusual course of writing to the pres 11 endorsing the above version as correct.]