THE STORY OF THE TRANSVAAL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVI, Issue 11200, 21 October 1899, Page 6 (Supplement)

THE STORY OF THE TRANSVAAL.

[BY AN' OLD SOUTH AFRICAN.] To turn from the nauseating sentiment in the letter of Mr. Aldis, in your issue- of today, to the healthy common sense of your own leader upon the all-absorbing Transvaal question, was to me a very refreshing experience. The more so when I recognised in your article what I have failed to find in hundreds of columns of writing on this subject, namely, the true causes of the present trouble, at least as I remember them, from my presence in South Africa at the time when their seeds were being sown, The simple facts of this history I will give in their chronological order. The Transvaal being in a state of practical anarchy, was threatened with annihilation by the Zulus. That the Boers would have been annihilated by Cetewayo, was not only the belief of everybody at the time, but was made manifest by the fact that in every preliminary brush that occurred the Zulus prevailed. Anyway, our firm belief in Natal was that the Boers would for certain be wiped out, and we were filled with anxiety regarding the consequences, not knowing what the then mighty Zulu army, flushed with success, would next direct its attentions to, the effects of that success upon other native peoples. This being our belief, we resolved to do our best to prevent the impending trouble. Our first- effort was to employ the services of Mr. Shepstone, in showing the Boers their danger, and urging them to mobolise an army. These efforts proved unsuccessful. The then Boer President told Mr. Shepstone that his mission was simply impracticable, for his people had so •- persistently refused to pay taxes that not only had lie never been able to repay a-shilling, either of principal or interest-, of the money borrowed from Holland, but he had absolutely no means whatever for meeting the trifling expenses of his own simple Government-. These efforts therefore failed, and only one alternative remained, namely, for England to annex the Transvaalthe general belief being that the Zulus would never throw themselves against British power. Thus we annexed the country, unfortunately for ourselves, but to the mighty relief and with the undoubted sanction of a large proportion of the Transvaal inhabitants, including their own President, who gave our representative, Mr. Shepstone, a public reception on the day the annexation was de-, clared. j This is the true story of how we came to annex the Transvaal. We did not then want the country, a statement which is supported : by the fact that not long before a better ; land, namely, the Orange Free State, being similarly, but not so seriously pressed by the natives, its people implored us to take them over, and wc refused. In the light of subsequent events it seems a thousand pities wc did not adopt the same policy in the case of the Transvaal, and in cold blood have quietly stood by and watch Cetewayo cut the Boers to pieces. In taking over the Transvaal, we also , took over this trouble with the Zulus, with - whom, up till then, we had been on friendly ' terms. British protection, however, did not stay them as we had anticipated. Cete- 1 wayo was resolved not- to be thus diverted from the great object of his life, namely, to bring retribution 011 the Boers for the gene- ! rations of tyranny which his people had , suffered at their hands. On the contrary, - he now set about making increased efforts • to meet the English too. Eventually the ! blow fell not on the tyrants who had pro- ; voked it, but upon the simpletons who had 1 taken them under their protection. Thus 1 it was that England was led into that terriblo Zulu war, the Boers watching us ; pull their chestnuts out of the fire. Eventually, after an appalling loss of British j lives, and the expenditure of British mil- 1 lions, we finally freed the Transvaal of all ' her enemies, paid all her debts, including ; £70,000 to Holland; and British enterprise, and that alone, has since raised he from the ] position of a doomed and bankrupt State, . to the high affluence she has now atteined. ; This was the price which England paid for the Transvaal, and I venture to stato that no portion of the British Empire has ■ been more honourably obtained possession ( of, or more honestly or dearly paid for. For . a long time after (he war, the mass of Boers acted as if such, at bottom, was indeed their own belief, for they recognised the annexation without a murmur; and never dreaming that England would easily surrender so : costly an acquisition, they ignored the agitators, treating them as hopeless visionaries. Such a state of things would in all pro- 1 liability have continued, and the Transvaal , would by this time have gradually settled j down into an Anglo-Dutch possession, like | Cape Colony, but for the event of the Mid- 1 Lothian campaign. In that historic agitu- : tion, Mr. Gladstone, inspired with the su- ; preme and all-consuming desire of destroy- . ing the political reputation of his great, rival, Beaconsfield, thundered anathema I against every act of the Beaconsfield ad- | ministration, including, of course, the annexation of the Transvaal. Ignoring the circumstances connected with that event, and which I have correctly stated, Mr. Glad- , stone denounced it as an act of national iniquity, and these declarations coming from a man who might be England's Premier in a few weeks, were despatched to the Transvaal, with the result that they instantly; changed the whole situation there. That resignation to the inevitable to which I have referred, became gradually changed into intense excitement, and people said, "If this Gladstone comes into power, he will be bound, as an honest- man, to undo that which lie has denounced as an act of wickedness," and from that moment the agitators who had been disregarded as hopeless visionaries were treated with the respect and deference ' which probable, as well as actual, rulers in most countries nearly always inspire. And '■ from that time onward, too, the Boor leaders, ' now enthusiastic with the hopes which Gladstone's words had aroused in their breasts, watched the progress of the British elections with the keenest interest. j These elections resulted in placing the ; Liberals in power with Mr. Gladstone at 1 their head, and at one of the first Cabinet. meetings it was decided not to undo this: "wicked" annexing policy of Beaconsfield, I but to confirm it. The position of Mr. \ Gladstone now, with the responsibilities of; office upon him, was very different from that of the mere irresponsible free lance which he had been, and, moreover, he now pro- > bably learned from Colonial Office records. that the facts connected with this annexation utterly excluded it from the list of those jingo performances of the previous Govern- j ment which he had so strongly denounced. j When this decision of the Gladstone Cabi-1 net became known in the Transvaal, its people were aroused to the utmost degree of j indignation. They found they had mistaken 1 the expressions of mere party rancour for • sympathy for their cause, and so the great Liberal statesman having thus aroused hopes which he afterwards refused to fulfil, gave them a real grievance. . This indignation eventually developed into open hostilities. The British flag was in- ' suited, so were Britishers, and ill-treated too. ' These events becoming known at Home, Mr. Gladstone, rising in the House, declared that it was his intention to maintain the honour of the British flag, and thereupon putting England to the expense of sending an army out to the Cape for that especial purpose, he gave the "Little Englanders" a truly magnificent opportunity. They read in the House quotations from his own speeches which denounced the policy he was now shedding innocent blood to carry out, and finally, finding himself in a tight corner, he yielded, as it was always his wont to yield, to pressure, and though'but yesterday he had, at great cost, sent an army out to the Cape, he turned about again and recalled it, ignoring Majuba, and scrambled out of the mess by playing the role of magnanimity, in giving the country back to the Boers. Comparatively few people seem to be aware of the above deplorable historic facts, but remembering them, it is well to remember too how we have been requited! England s blood and money only a few years before having saved those very Boers 'from utter annihilation,, we gratuitously return the country into their hands, without 'asking one penny compensation. Yet instead of resting satisfied as they certainly might have been, with this act of grace or weak- ' ness, they insult us; treat us as slaves; despoil us of the reward of our industry,' and first satiating themselves out of it,' they spend the rest in buying gunpowder • to shoot us with. For twenty years almost this abominable state of things has gone on, " we merely protesting, until finally, not only the position of our people in the' Transvaal, but the very existence of those of our race t

inhabiting South Africa has been rendered intolerable, and England then, ahd still with great reluctance,, finally yields to the force of circumstances. Yet in the face of this exhibition of almost superhuman patience, Mr. Aldis writes that we' New Zealanders should have qualified our offer to help our brother colonists in their distress, with the condition that England should, in the first instance, submit the matter to arbitration. Had the British Government not already agreed to do so. on all points excepting suzerainty? And because we did not impose this condition, on the occasion of our contributing 200 men towards the 50,000 England is sending to the Cape to succour our brother colonists, we have missed, according to Mr. Aldis, the opportunity of " rendering a magnificent. service to the Empire." That we have also missed making magnificent- asses of ourselves, is at least some consolation. It is my firm conviction that no nation ever entered into a war with more compulsory or justifiable cause than England does into this, and every man of British blood, who is not misled by ignorance of the real facts, or the plausible twaddle of sentimental or philosophic simpletons, is a traitor if he does not wish her success. The real question is not confined to the Transvaal, but is this, Shall the British or the Dutch people prevail in South Africa? Taking the position of Mr. Sanford, who ignores Imperialism, and looking at this matter purely from a humanitarian point of view, which of these races should prevail, the British, who place the Dutch in their own Cape Colony 011 an equal footing with themselves, or the Boers, who treat our own people in their country like slaves? But let facts speak for themselves. Great Britain has for nearly twenty years now been trying to settle this matter by every means which a peaceful disposition, or even the spirit of Little England bunkum, could suggest. She has tried concession after concession, persuasion, every form of magnanimity, and has exercised an almost boundless patience, and all those efforts have failed. Stem necessity finally compels her to resort to the last and only remedy, when it is urged that she should place her last hope at the mercy of some rival power to arbitrate upon. If even this arbitrator decided against the Boers, they would never keep the compact, for they never have kept one yet, but the only sensible award such an arbitrator could give, would he that the Boers had shown themselves great rascals, and the British still greater fools, and that this submission to arbitration was only a final proof of her incapacity to govern South Africa.— Manurewa.