SOUTH AFRICA. 



613 



time. A peace committee of burghers went out 

 to see Botha. Ex-President Pretorius also went 

 out in the hope of inducing the Boer commanders 

 to give up the struggle, but he found Louis Botha 

 and Schalk Burger both determined to fight on 

 to the end. The Orange River Colony had been 

 so far pacified that farmers settled down to 

 plowing and sowing. District commissioners un- 

 der the protection of a provisional mounted police 

 collected as much as 40 per cent, of the regular 

 taxes, when bodies of armed Boers reappeared 

 and, receiving no check, soon had the whole coun- 

 try in revolt. In the beginning of February, Sir 

 Alfred Milner had to report that there had been 

 retrogression since the middle of 1900, when the 

 southwestern Transvaal, the southern half of the 

 Orange River Colony, and all of Cape Colony 

 seemed to be completely pacified. . The end of the 

 war and the beginning of administrative recon- 

 struction could not be predicted, and it could only 

 be foreseen that the task of conquering the Boers 

 was to be far slower, more difficult and harassing, 

 and more expensive than had been anticipated. 

 The Boers, broken up into a great number of small 

 forces, were raiding in every direction, and the 

 British, similarly broken up, were pursuing them, 

 which made the area of fighting much larger 

 than if large masses were operating against each 

 other and consequently the destruction was more 

 wide-spread. The fighting was mainly over sup- 

 plies. The Boers, living on the country, took all 

 the horses, cattle, grain, and fodder from the 

 farms, and clothes, boots, sugar, and coffee from 

 the village stores, and in order to deprive them of 

 these supplies the British destroyed everything 

 wherever they passed or removed the stores and 

 live stock that they seized to the refugee camps. 

 The policy of burning farm-buildings which had 

 been resorted to early in the campaign had mostly 

 been given up as a measure which exasperated 

 the Boers instead of intimidating them, increased 

 the number of their sympathizers, and shocked 

 public opinion in Great Britain as well as in other 

 countries. The Boers or their sympathizers among 

 the Johannesburg rabble wantonly destroyed the 

 works in one of the mines, which were difficult 

 to guard, as they stretch out over many miles 

 of country. The vast extent of the republics and 

 the necessity of concentrating the British forces 

 for the long advance, first to Pretoria, and then 

 on the Netherlands Railroad to Komatipoort, re- 

 sulted in the country that had been occupied be- 

 ing left open to raids begun by a few bold and 

 skilful leaders, constantly growing in audacity 

 and encouraged by their successes. These dis- 

 turbers appeared first in the southeast of the 

 Orange River Colony, then in the southwest of the 

 Transvaal, and finally in every part of the con- 

 quered territory. The burghers who had taken 

 the oath of neutrality were unable to resist the 

 pressure of their old companions who appealed to 

 their patriotism and to their fears, and justified 

 their taking up arms again by the failure of the 

 British to protect them. A general rising at the 

 back of the British advanced forces led to a 

 straggling conflict. As the British columns swept 

 through the revolted country, meeting with hos- 

 tility and sometimes treachery on the part of 

 the people, they destroyed the property and made 

 prisoners of many who had been faithful to their 

 oaths of neutrality, not being able to distinguish 

 them from the greater number who had broken 

 faith. This resulted in further accessions to the 

 ranks of the Boers, and the evacuation of Faure- 

 smith, Jagersfontein, Smithfield, and other places 

 where civil administration had already been in- 

 troduced augmented the general revolt. Refuge 



camps were then established alon^ the railroad 

 lines, and the British attempted to cripple the 

 Boers by driving into these fenced enclosures the 

 whole non-combatant population women, chil- 

 dren, the aged, and the peaceful burghers though 

 none were friendly now. Wherever the British 

 columns went the country was thus stripped of 

 its population and was laid waste so 11ml, the 

 Boers could find no subsistence there. Osi.crj.--i My 

 they were intended for refuges for the pacifically 

 disposed. The Boers who could no longer fight 

 did resort to them, but they were mostly tenanted 

 by the wives and children of Boers who were still 

 in the field. As the guerrilla warfare swept back 

 over the western Transvaal where British rule had 

 been accepted peaceably, and soon involved the 

 whole of the Orange River Colony, its effect be- 

 came marked in Cape Colony, where the bulk of 

 the Dutch population seemed at one time dis- 

 posed to accept accomplished facts and acquiesce 

 in the union of all South Africa under the British 

 flag. After the occupation by the British of the 

 two Boer capitals, instead of being able to hold 

 and defend whole districts, as was attempted at 

 first, they were not even able to hold the line of 

 the railroad with their army of 200,000 men, 

 which was constantly being reenforced by fresh 

 troops. Away from the railroad they could only 

 make futile raids in pursuit of the active com- 

 mandoes of De Wet, Delarey, Botha, and other 

 Boer leaders, who captured trains of ammunition 

 and commissary supplies and inflicted severe 

 losses on British columns. The reprisals to which 

 Lord Roberts resorted with the approval of Sir 

 Alfred Milner and Mr. Chamberlain, such as the 

 burning of farms and the harsh treatment of the 

 families of the Boer commanders and other non- 

 combatants, stirred the indignation of the Dutch 

 colonists, who were incensed also by the deter- 

 mination of the British Government to annex the 

 republics, and by the severe penalties inflicted 

 upon colonists who had been commandeered or 

 had aided the Boer cause. After a congress of 

 Boer sympathizers had been held in Worcester, 

 Boer commandoes, on Dec. 16, 1900, reinvaded 

 Cape Colony and were received with open arms. 

 The feeling among the Cape Dutch was as hostile 

 as among the Boers in the field, excited as it was 

 by exaggerated reports of British outrages and 

 cruelty. But the Dutch farmers would not ex- 

 pose their property to destruction or lightly risk 

 their lives or liberty by incurring the penalty of 

 treason. The Boer commandoes which invaded 

 the colony received secret aid wherever they went, 

 and with fresh supplies of horses and food were 

 able to evade the forces that were sent against 

 them, but they did not at first gain many re- 

 cruits such as flocked to their ranks during the 

 previous invasion and still formed a large part 

 of their force. The open agitation by speech and 

 writing was suppressed by the rigorous applica- 

 tion of martial law. This rendered the anti-Brit- 

 ish feeling still more intense and general, but 

 military repression and a large augmentation of 

 troops in the colony made a rising seem more 

 hopeless to this cautious and practical people. 

 The outside world was kept in ignorance of what 

 was actually passing in Cape Colony. The Boer 

 commandoes penetrated to within a few miles of 

 Cape Town, and such was the feeling of the in- 

 habitants against the English that British resi- 

 dents of villages near by were obliged to flee for 

 safety into the capital, which, as well as the rest 

 of the colony, was placed under martial law. 

 The Boers meanwhile were very active in the two 

 republics and raided various places in Natal. On 

 Jan. 7 attacks were made simultaneously on five 



