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CAPE COLONY AND BKITISH SOUTH AFEICA. 



colonists and the exertions of the Government. 

 The destruction of a great part of this mis- 

 guided trite induced Sir George Grey to settle 

 the Trans-Kei territory with Fingoes and other 

 friendly tribes, while the Caff res were pushed 

 back-into a narrow strip of territory along the 

 coast. As the latter have increased in num- 

 bers, and become once more prosperous in 

 recent years, they have raised clamors from 

 time to time against the interloping Fingoes, 

 and, in spite of the influence of their patriarchal 

 chief, which for a long period is said to have 

 been exercised in the cause of peace, the ex- 

 plosion was at last precipitated by an acciden- 

 tal squabble. An invasion of Fingoland by 

 the Caffres ensued, and many cattle were 

 " lifted" by the invaders. But up to this- time 

 there had been no breach with, and no defiance 

 of, the British authorities. The Colonial Gov- 

 ernment, however unwilling to make a casus 

 belli, could not decline to interfere, especially 

 as the Fingoes had, in the interests of peace, 

 been prevented from obtaining weapons, and 

 from practising warlike arts. An inquiry was 

 ordered by Sir Bartle Frere, in which both 

 sides were admonished that only the guilty 

 would be punished, while compensation would 

 be rigorously exacted and fairly distributed, 

 according to the justice of the case. The Caffre 

 chief, it seems, was himself willing to submit, 

 or pretended to be so, but he professed his 

 inability to control the men of the younger 

 generation. When the British resident warned 

 the raiders back from the Fingo borders, they 



finally appealing to arms, the Caffres sent the 

 officials and missionaries over the frontier, out 

 of harm's way conduct singularly unlike their 

 savage treatment of the white men upon the 

 outbreak of the last native war. The Govern- 



BUSHMEN. 



at first-obeyed ; but after a council of war 

 they resolved to go on with their enterprise, 

 in spite of the intimation that the Government 

 would resist the attack on the Fingoes to the 

 utmost. It is remarkable, however, that, before 



ZOOLOO YOUTHS IN DANCING COSTUME. 



ment had, in the mean time, reenforced the 

 Fingoes with a strong body of police, and had 

 called out the volunteers and the burgher 

 militia of the colony. A hasty attempt was 

 made to arm and organize the Fingoes for 

 resistance ; but the insurgents were too prompt 

 in their onslaught. The first engagement was 

 on September 26th, between 200 frontier po- 

 lice with 2,000 Fingoes on one side, and some 

 3,000 Caffres on the other. The Fingoes, un- 

 used to fighting, showed some confusion, but 

 many of them fought well. The police, aided 

 by a single field-piece, administered a sharp 

 chastisement to the enemy, and drove them 

 away in flight for several miles. If the gun 

 had not been damaged in its transit through 

 a rough country, this success would have been 

 more decisive. There were two or three sub- 

 sequent conflicts, in each of which the Caffres 

 were severely handled and driven back. In 

 fact, the insurgents, while often showing great 

 bravery, nowhere made a stand against the 

 Europeans and Fingoes combined, though the 

 latter were badly armed and untrained in war- 

 fare. These successes were achieved in the 

 absence of the troops, which, on September 

 29th, were sent to Mazeppa Bay, in Krelis 

 country, and of the volunteers and burghers 

 who were hurrying to the front. Sir Bartle 

 Frere's presence near the theatre of war, as 

 well as the fact that he was accompanied by 

 a member of the Cape ministry, saved much 

 valuable time, and imparted a rapidity and 

 energy to the conduct of the campaign which 



