SOUTH AFRICA—A HISTORICAL PEEP.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18009, 20 November 1926, Page 1

SOUTH AFRICA—A HISTORICAL PEEP.

BOER WAR REVIEWED; HOW IT CAME TO PAS. (By E. J. HOWARD, M.P.) "We’ve fought with many men acrost the seas. •*An’ some of ’em was brave an’ some was not.” The boy of twelve to fourteen loves Kipling tales of adventure. And so some of our American friends serve up hot and strong stuff of the Western Plains. Generally speaking, the fellow who gets all the kicks ends up in the filial chapter by getting the farm and marrying the beautiful maiden with the sun-kissed cheeks who could ride like—“ well, she could ride some.”

Some day someone with imagination will write up the early history of South Africa, and the American story will be a back number. The story of that

“ trek ” of Boer farmers would give an able writer a thousand stories to tell. Their fights with the Zulus and the Basutos, and even with the British — not to count the wild animals—would make a book that the small boy or grown man would simply marvel over. And only the truth need be told.

At this time South Africa was becoming a nuisance to Great Britain. The missionaries were writing home tales of what was happening. The natives were troublesome, and so, generally speaking, this part of the world was becoming a burden to the taxpayers of the Old Land when in 1885 gold was discovered. We can all remember those days—the stories that were coming to England of mountains of gold having been discovered —from a poor, miserable, almost desert land, that offered no hope to the ordinary individual, suddenly she began to boom.

Young blood and new blood began to pour into the new land. The Boer farmer became bewildered. He was in charge of this vast country. He had won the country from the natives and even from Great Britain. He had fought every inch of the way. The track from the Cape to the Vaal River was one long line of his graves. He had driven back the wild men and wild beasts. So when he saw the crowds pouring into this—his land—he became afraid and lost his head. Added to this, men with money began to exploit South Africa’s goldfield. They were impatient of all restraints placed upon them. The Boers had fought and beaten the British at Majuba Hill simply because the British taxpayer was sick of sending men and money to a country that seemed hopeless. But the Boers would not recognise this and became very cocky, believing they had beaten this large nation. Anyone who remembers the " Who the war ” stunt of some of tho American and British jingos recently will fee able to appreciate the psychology of those days in South Africa.

Newspapers sprang into being advocating that the British should wipe out the stain of Majuba, and complaints went rolling away to Downing Street, largely manufactured by newspapers being run by the goldfield speculators. The immigrants pouring into the country were 90 per cent males. That in itself creates a peculiar psychology, as anyone who has been on a new rush will admit. The Boers had taken charge of a stretch of country almost as large as New Zealand. Britain had never acknowledged that they were arty tiling but British subjects, she had practically never disputed their right to form a new nation. The Boer loved loneliness and had little or no form of government except a kind of municipal government called the Yolksraad or Council of the People. But they found themselves now faced with the task of making laws.

No one really loves laws, and all laws are made for the other fellow. Laws are never written as “we shall not; laws are written as “ Thou shalt not”; and if we have not a kindly feeling for the fellow whom we are bringing under the law, so much the worse for the other fellow Amongst these adventurous spirits that had rushed to the new land was one called Dr Jameson. He practically became general manager for another man whose name lives in history by the money he made and left to endow scholarships . known as the Rhodes scholarships. Other countries began to be attracted by the possibilities of Africa. France, Germany, Italv, and even Belgium, began to grab chunks of this land, and so Cecil John Rhodes pushed on north of the land occupied by the Boers and took over this country, now known as Rhodesia, in the name of Britain. He had to contest every inch of the way with the natives. In making his roads, he had to have every man a soldier, some standing to arms and some cutting the road. Dr Starr Jameson drew from the group a band of men, and organised a raid to take the new goldfields awav from the Boers. This raid failed, and various stories are told why it failed. Amongst the stories is one that the men got drunk, and in their drunkenness put the Boers wise to what was in the wind. However, it failed, but made the Boers more suspicious and frightened. But the day gold was discovered on the Rand—pronounced over there “Ront”—that day the Boers were doomed as a self-governing people.

The story of what followed—the Boer war—is too new to need retelling. Where previously Great Britain had been sending out handfuls of men in her native wars, and even with the Boers, she now decided to make it a good go and end up what had previously been a series of nagging quarrels. At this time other parts of the Empire had become somewhat restless—Australia, Canada and Ireland—so England made it appear that she was in great trouble, and called on her colonies to come in and help. The Boers put up a great fight, and I do not suppose there is a single individual who fought against the Boers but what will acknowledge to-day that they were a brave enemy. The Boers were beaten, as they were bound to be by such a strong nation as the British nation. Looking back over those times, viewing history as impartially as it is possible to view it, one is bound to admit to-day that it could not have been avoided. The years had led up to it, had set the stage for it, and it could not have been held back. True, had gold not been found there, there may not have been a Boer war. From an agricultural point of view, it is a poor country. One-third of its revenue today comes from the gold. Over £800,000,000 of gold has been produced since ISBS. It is the most consistent gold-producing field in the world. Fifty per cent of the world’s supply of the previous metal comes from this field. She has spent £120,000,000 on railways. She has 12,000 miles of railways, and all this could only have been done from the gold. Her white population is only a few more than New Zealand. The natives do not contribute to general taxation. All the natives contribute is spent on the natives. Such is a brief outline of the history of this most fascinating country. She is yet in the picture—still a point of trouble to this we call the British Empire. The future?—no one knows.