Page:The truth about the Transvaal.djvu/18

 territory to interpose a barrier between the Boers and the Zulus and Swazis. Does anybody believe that this, which would deprive the Boers of some of the most fertile portions of the country and of access to the sea, will be permitted by them? And if objected to, does anyone believe that Government will insist upon it? There will be more "moral courage" evinced by further yielding to the Boers. But what of the native tribes? Already comes the news of great irritation amongst them, and threats that they, who were unanimously in favour of annexation to England, will never again submit to the dominion of the hated Boers. If there should be a native uprising, and a war of races should come, who will be responsible but Her Majesty's Government? and what will the interests of South Africa have gained? It was for the sake of those interests that the Transvaal was annexed to England; it was for the sake of those interests that Cetewayo was dethroned and imprisoned. If it be "justice." to give back the Transvaal to the Boers, why not give back Zululand to Cetewayo? Nay, if the "majority of the people" at any given moment ought in justice to possess the country they live in, how can Mr. Gladstone shrink from evincing his "moral courage" by giving up Ireland to the Home Rulers and Land League, who claim, at least, to constitute the "majority" in a country which has been declared to have been recently "within a measureable distance" of a state of things similar to that which has occurred in the Transvaal? For the sake of pleasing the Democratic section of their party, the Government must stand convicted of having, in this matter of the Transvaal, imperilled British honour and British interests: they have no more information now of the real feeling in the Transvaal than they had when they declared that the Queen's authority should be re-established; they only know that a force of Boers, whose number has never yet been ascertained (but who were undoubtedly aided by other Boers than those of the Transvaal proper), occupied strong positions and thrice defeated small detachments of British troops; they do not know how many loyal Boers were forced either to join the ranks of the rebels or to remain quiet; they know that the loyalists in the towns held their own, and could have done so for weeks longer; but they have taken for granted all that could lead them to agree with the doctrines propounded in Mr. Gladstone's Mid-Lothian speeches, and in the pursuit of peace they have forgotten the faith pledged to the loyal inhabitants, upon whom they have committed a cruel injustice in the name of justice, and by again leaving the native tribes face to face with the slave-loving Boers, have in all probability done that which will once more plunge the Transvaal into anarchy and confusion, and is but too likely to lead to an effusion of blood and a conflict of races which the firm hand of a patriotic Government might happily have averted.

Having written the above statement, every word of which I conscientiously believe to be true, I cannot refuse to subscribe my