Page:The Annual Register 1899.djvu/156

 148] ENGLISH HISTORY. [july

reduce the amount to be paid, the bill was reported without amendment, and finally passed (July 27) by 181 to 81 votes, the chief criticism being from the " Stalwarts " and the "little Englanders," supported by the Irish Nationalists. As a " money " bill the Peers had but little concern with the details of the proposed purchase; but, on the order for its second reading, the Marquess of Salisbury took occasion to bear testi- mony to the aims and methods of the Royal Niger Company. Its main object, he declared, had been philanthropic as well as political, and it was not merely a financial speculation. There was an enormous risk attendant on the undertaking on which the promoters had advanced their money, and at any moment an accident might have destroyed the company. It was, there- fore, only fair that they should receive such a handsome and sufficient price as Parliament was paying for their rights. They had succeeded in reserving for Great Britain influence over vast territories which, in the future, might be expected to yield a rich harvest to the empire. The Earl of Kimberley, on behalf of the Opposition, expressed his concurrence with Lord Salisbury, admitting that the empire owed a deep debt of gratitude to those who had directed the affairs of the Niger Company.

It was, however, with South Africa rather than with West Africa that the public was at the moment most interested. Since Mr. Chamberlain's speech at Birmingham, matters had progressed rapidly, but scarcely in the direction he had hoped. Mr. Fischer, a member of the Orange Free State Executive, and a prominent member of the Afrikander Bond, undertook the task of attempting to bring about an understanding between Sir A. Milner and President Kruger. Several interviews took place between the representatives of the Transvaal, the Free State, and the Afrikander Bond, at which it may be presumed the interests of the Dutch colonists throughout South Africa were thoroughly discussed, and from the steps taken by President Kruger, and from the readiness with which his successive so-called " concessions " were accepted or ratified by the Raad, it might be fairly surmised that nothing was intended to be granted which would put the British and Dutch dwellers in the Transvaal on an equality. The actually avowed point of dif- ference between the two Governments was stated by Mr. Chamberlain in the House of Commons (July 3) to be that under Sir. A. Milner's scheme the franchise could be obtained on naturalisation. In the scheme of the Transvaal Government, an interval of five years — or in the case of Outlanders who had arrived before 1890 two years — would elapse after naturalisation during which the Outlander would have relinquished his rights as a citizen of his own country, and not have acquired those of the South African Republic. The Transvaal Government, anxious to justify their proceedings before the world, issued (July 6) their version of what had been going on, basing the