86 



CAPE COLONY AND BRITISH SOUTH AFRICA. 



the war, remonstrated in the following pathetic 

 terms: "Hitherto we have been known first 

 as the faithful friends and allies of the Queen, 

 and then as her faithful subjects. Up to the 

 Zambesi and down to Cape Town we are 

 known as such we are named the children of 

 the Queen. If we are disarmed, will not other 

 tribes say that we have offended against the 

 Government ? " 



The political position of the Basutos was 

 anomalous. When they swore allegiance to 

 the crown in 1869, it was with the stipulation 

 that they should not form part of Cape Colony, 

 and they were not, until 1879, when the act 

 conferring autonomy upon the colony heed- 

 lessly turned them over to the tender mercies 

 of the Cape Government. The Basutos were 

 a branch of the Bechuana tribe, one of the 

 most superior and intelligent races of the Bantu 

 family. After the formation of the tribe in 

 Basutoland they became involved in constant 

 disputes with the Orange Free State Boers on 

 one side and theZoolooson the other, and, when 

 these growing states menaced them with ex- 

 tinction, they appealed to the British authori- 

 ties for protection, and were accepted as Brit- 

 ish subjects. Their subsequent history is one 

 of peaceful prosperity and advancement unex- 

 ampled among African races. They grew rich 

 in cattle, horses, and grain ; built houses, schools, 

 and churches; and were tenderly loyal until 

 the offensive orders to deliver up their lawfully 

 acquired weapons. Letsie and his tribe com- 

 plied, but their arms were intercepted and 

 seized before their delivery by the indignant 

 majority. The invasion of Basutoland by the 

 Cape militia and the earlier stages of the war 

 of resistance are recounted in the " Annual 

 Cyclopaedia" for 1880. 



The Basutos made skirmishing assaults in 

 the beginning of January upon the towns of 

 Maseru and Leribe and the picket- line of Colo- 

 nel Carrington's advancing column. In a vig- 

 orous attack on the 10th the Burgher Guards 

 gave way, and the field was held only by a line 

 of dismounted cavalry. The burghers were 

 suspected of being actuated by sympathy for 

 the Transvaal rebels, and a large number of 

 them were sentenced to imprisonment. The 

 Basutos were becoming weary of fighting and 

 suffered for want of food. They sued for 

 peace, and an armistice of seven days was 

 granted on the 18th for them to consider the 

 Governor's answer. They did not accept the 

 proposals through distrust, and desired to set- 

 tle the terms with the imperial authorities. 

 Active hostilities were not resumed again, with 

 the exception of a few fitful attacks. The im- 

 perial authorities refused to intervene unless 

 the Colonial Government should resign the 

 control of Basutoland entirely. This a consid- 

 erable party in the colony desired to do. Sir 

 Hercules Robinson finally, at the request of the 

 Basuto chiefs and by desire of the Cape minis- 

 try, arranged the conditions for the cessation 

 of the ineffectual struggle. The Basutos were 



to pay a fine of 5,000 cattle to the Cape Gov- 

 ernment, to restore property taken from loyal 

 natives, and to pay 1 annual license fee for 

 the privilege of keeping a gun, and should en- 

 joy entire amnesty and suffer no confiscation 

 of territory. It was found impossible to thor- 

 oughly enforce the provisions of the agreement. 



The outbreak of the Transvaal rebellion is 

 noticed in the "Annual Cyclopedia" for 1880. 

 The Boers had reasons to dread the aggressions 

 of the British. Their ancestors were driven 

 by wrongs and indignities to abandon their 

 homes in the old colony and go into tlie un- 

 explored wilderness. The Republic of Na- 

 talia which they founded no sooner began to 

 prosper than it was invaded and conquered by 

 British troops. The Boers ag.iin abandoned 

 their fertile fields for the bleak desert. They 

 founded the independent South African re- 

 publics. In 1848 the land between the Vaal 

 and Orange Rivers was annexed by Great Brit- 

 ain, and then the land between the upper 

 Caledon and the Vaal. This act drove them 

 to rebel, and the British chased them into the 

 unknown wilderness beyond the Vaal. In 

 1852 a convention was signed, guaranteeing 

 to the Boers north of the Vnal River " the 

 right to manage their own affairs, and to gov- 

 ern themselves according to their own laws." 

 When the Transvaal was annexed after twenty- 

 five years of tranquillity, the population had in- 

 creased to between thirty and forty thousand 

 whites, and the revenue to about 70,000. 

 The annexation met the clamorous approval 

 of a class of British traders and land specula- 

 tors who had flocked into the Transvaal after 

 the gold discoveries, adventurers who sought 

 pecuniary profit in the disturbance of rights 

 which would ensue. The prospect that Presi- 

 dent Burgers's projected railroad to Delagoa 

 Bay would deprive Durban of the Transvaal 

 trade was a strong secret motive with Eng- 

 lish colonists for demanding the annexation. 

 A financial and political crisis of the Transvaal 

 Government furnished the occasion for the 

 usurpation. The tear that financial aid would 

 be furnished for Burgers's project of estab- 

 lishing a Transvaal port, which might be fol- 

 lowed by a German protectorate, was one of 

 the state reasons for the step. The Boers 

 themselves were undoubtedly almost unani- 

 mously opposed. The formal protest of Presi- 

 dent Burgers at the time, the two visits of the 

 delegates, Joubert and Kruger, to England, and 

 the mass-meetings of remonstrance, should have 

 left no doubt of the rooted aversion of the 

 Boers to British dominion. 



The arrogance and unfitness of the adminis- 

 trator set over the Transvaal, Sir Owen Lan- 

 yon, and the other British officials, was one of 

 the proximate causes of the outbreak. During 

 the agitation which lasted throughout the three 

 years of British administration, and during and 

 at the close of their desperate rebellion, the 

 Boer leaders and representative men iterated 

 and reiterated the conditions under which a 



