138 TRAVELS IN 
ing of their complete redudlon, they now pretended to con- 
demn their condud. Whatever the real fenliments of the co- 
lonifts might be with regard to the Britifh government, this was 
not their laft attempt to effecSt their avaricious defigns on the cattle 
of the Kaffers, by commencing hoftilities againft the magiftrates 
and the fmall force left in Graaf Reynet for their protection. 
But thefe difturbances were merely local, and had plunder only 
for their objedl. All the other diflrids remained quiet ; and 
long before the intelligence of a general peace had reached this 
country, the people were fo much reconciled to the Britifh 
government, as neither to expedt nor wifn for a return of 
their own. 
In fa£t there is no natural tie between the Cape and the 
United Provinces. The greater part of the colonifts, being the 
defcendants of foldiers in German regiments, compofed of 
Pruffians, Hanoverians, Flemings, and Poles, and of French 
refugees who took fhelter here after the revocation of the edid: 
of Nantz, have neither knowledge of, nor family connexions in, 
the ftates of the Batavian republic ; nor have they any diftin£t 
idea of Vaderland^ a word, however, that is conftantly in their 
mouths. All they know is, that the Cape belonged to a com- 
pany of merchants ; that this company was their fovereign ; and 
that they ufed to fee a flag with three broad horizontal flripes, 
red, white, and blue, flying upon the caftle, inflead of the 
Sp'innekop^ or fpider legs, as they called the Britifh enfign. 
A few years more would therefore, in all probability, have 
rendered them, or the greateft part of them, very indifferent 
as to the government under which they were to remain. 
I Some 
