108 



CAPE COLONY AND SOUTH AFRICA. 



tary or police or even private movements on the 

 borders <>f the Republic. As Mr. Chamberlain in 

 the beginning of i lie correspondence had precluded 

 from the discussion any modification of the clause 

 in the London convention requiring all treaties of 

 the South African Republic to be submitted to 

 Great Britain for approval. President Kriiger ex- 

 pressed his willingness to incorporate that clause in 

 a protocol to the new treaty. 31 r. Chamberlain re- 

 jected the proposals and. insisting that the British 

 Government as the paramount power in South 

 Africa is specially interested in the peace and pros- 

 perity of the Republic and can not be blind to the 

 danger that tli real ens its existence if legitimate 

 cause of discontent continue to be ignored, re- 

 peated his invitation on March 26, and endeavored 

 to extract from President Kriiger a promise that 

 he would seek permission from the Volksraad to go 

 to Kngland. saying that, if he failed to do that, the 

 invitation would be reluctantly withdrawn.. On 

 April 20 President Kriiger replied that his Govern- 

 ment, sensible of the necessity of allaying the ex- 

 cited feeling in South Africa and promoting a 

 friendly relation between the white races, was pre- 

 pared to postpone the question of the reconsidera- 

 tion of the convention of 1884, and would rest sat- 

 isfied with insisting on its right to a pecuniary 

 compensation for the violation of its territory and 

 an assurance from the British Government that no 

 such violation of territory shall be repeated out of 

 any of her Majesty's possessions. He suggested 

 that it would be wiser not to press the invitation, 

 and on April 27 Mr. Chamberlain withdrew it. 

 A dispatch, in which- the President asked for as- 

 surances, in order to allay excitement among the 

 Boers, that British troops massed at Maf eking 

 were not intended as a menace to the Transvaal, 

 was answered with an indignant denial by Mr. 

 Chamberlain and a statement from Sir Hercules 

 Robinson that the total force proceeding north- 

 ward was 1,490 men. In spite of the protests of 

 the High Commissioner, the military authorities in 

 England persisted in sending troops to South Africa. 

 In July, when there were already 5,230 imperial 

 troops there, an additional battalion was forwarded 

 from Malta, although Sir Frederick Carrington had 

 declined to receive re-enforcements in Rhodesia be- 

 cause he could not feed them. 



Mr. Leyds, the State Secretary who during all 

 the troubles had been in Europe, after he returned 

 to Pretoria called upon the British Government 

 with a view to the welfare and peace of South 

 Africa, to bring to trial Cecil Rhodes, Alfred Beit, 

 and Dr. Rutherfoord Harris, and to expedite the 



urging 



that the entire control and administration, civil as 

 well as military, should be taken out of the hands 

 of the Chartered Company and transferred to the 

 Imperial Government.. Mr. Chamberlain at length 

 moved in the House of Commons for a select com- 

 mittee to inquire into the administration of the 

 British Soul h Africa Company and into the origin 

 and circumstances of the incursion into t he South 

 African Republic, and further to report what alter- 

 ations are desirable in the government of the terri- 

 tories under the control of the comp nv. Sir 

 Jacobus de \Vet.theaged British agent in Pretoria, 

 was forced to resign, and an experienced Knglish 

 diplomatist, William Conyngham Green, was ap- 

 pointeil to the place, early in September. 



Trial oftlio Kefonn Committee. The arrested 

 members ,,f tli,- Reform Committee, all business 

 men -.f Johannesburg, were examined in Feb- 

 ruary. All 'Acre released on bail in <J 10.000. with 

 the exce] .f. Col. Rhodes, Hammond, Phillips, 



Farrar. and Filzpatrick. who were committed for 

 trial. In Kimberley Gardner Williams, an Ameri- 

 can, general manager of the De Beers mines, was 

 arrested and tried under the gunpowder ordinance 

 of Cape Colony for removing arms and ammunition 

 into a neighboring state without authority. The 

 discovery of cipher telegrams proving the existence 

 of a revolutionary plot engineered by C. J. Rhodes 

 and Alfred Beit, the principal directors of the Brit- 

 ish South Africa Company, and Rutherfoord Harris, 

 the secretary of the company in South Africa, who 

 furnished the money and arms, left the leaders, 

 Phillips, Col. Rhodes, and Farrar without a de- 

 fense. Hammond, who had stood out for the pres- 

 ervation of the republican form of government 

 and against the raising of the British flag, pleaded 

 not guilty, while the other three pleaded guilty of 

 the charge of high treason. They were sentenced 

 on April 28 under the Roman-Dutch law to death. 

 Monster petitions were signed in the Transvaal, 

 praying that the sentence would be commuted. 

 Mr. Chamberlain took upon himself to promise in 

 the British House of Commons that the death sen- 

 tence would not be executed. The other prisoners, 

 59 in number, many of whom pleaded guilty of 

 lese-majeste, but without hostile intent against the 

 independence of the Republic, were sentenced to 

 minor penalties. Among those sentenced to two 

 years' imprisonment, three years' banishment, and 

 2,000 fine were F. L. Lingham. J. S. Curtis, Capt. 

 Mein, Victor B. Clement, J. W. Leonard, H. J. 

 King, and Charles Butters, American citizens. The 

 justice before whom the prisoners were tried was 

 not one of the judges of the Transvaal, but Judge 

 R. Gregorowski of the Orange Free State Supreme 

 Court. On April 29 the President and Executive 

 Council commuted the death sentence to one of 

 fifteen years' imprisonment. On June 11 the sen- 

 tence was further reduced to a fine of 25,000 each. 

 Phillips, Farrar, and Hammond signed a document 

 pledging themselves to abstain from interference in 

 Transvaal politics. Col. Rhodes, who refused to sign, 

 was banished for life. The sentence of imprison- 

 ment imposed upon the others was remitted or re- 

 duced to three or five months or a year, and the 

 sentence of banishment also, on their undertaking 

 never again to interfere in the politics of the Re- 

 public. Later all who petitioned for clemency 

 were released, the sentence of banishment being 

 suspended on their giving their word of honor to 

 take no part, directly or indirectly, in the politics 

 of the Republic. 



Trial of Dr. Jameson. Dr. Jameson and his 

 associates were tried in London under a section of 

 the foreign enlistment act of 1870, which states 

 that " if any person within the limits of her 

 Majesty's dominion, without the license of her 

 Majesty, prepares or fits out a naval or military 

 expedition to proceed against the friendly dominion 

 of any friendly state," he shall be liable to a fine 

 and to imprisonment not exceeding two years. 

 Any person engaged or assisting or employed in 

 such an expedition is liable to the same penalties, 

 and any person who aids, abets, counsels, or pro- 

 cures the commission of any offense against the 

 statute may be tried and punished as a principal 

 offender. The subordinate officers, who had no 

 principal part in planning and organizing the ex- 

 pedition, but had simply obeyed the commands and 

 followed the lead of their superiors, were not in- 

 cluded in the indictment. Major J. B. Stracey, 

 Capt. C. II. Villiers, Lieut. Kenneth Kincaid-Smith, 

 Lieut, Harold M. Grenfell, Capt, C. F. Lindsell, 

 Lieut, C. L. D. Monro, Capt, A. V. Gosling, Capt. 

 C. P. Foley, and Capt. E. C. S. Holden thus escaped. 

 A true bill was found against Leander Starr Jame- 

 son, who was administrator of the British South 



