She had a married daughter in the Transvaal, and a brother also, whose
sons, as well as daughters' husbands, would, she sorely feared, be
commandeered to fight, in which case they might unknowingly be shooting
their own relations over the border. It was the same tale of misery,
anxiety, and wretchedness, everywhere, and the war was but a few weeks
old. The population in that colony, whether Dutch or English, were so
closely mixed together--their real interests so parallel--that it
resolved itself locally into a veritable civil war. It was all the more
dreadful that these poor farmers, after having lost all their cattle by
rinderpest, had just succeeded in getting together fresh herds, and were
hoping for renewed prosperity. Then came the almost certain chance of
their beasts being raided, of their stores being looted, and of their
women and children having to seek shelter to avoid rough treatment and
incivility. Often during the long evenings, especially when I was
suffering from depression of spirits, I used to argue with Mr. Keeley
about the war and whether it was necessary. It seemed to me then we were
not justified in letting loose such a millstream of wretchedness and of
destruction, and that the alleged wrongs of a large white
population--who, in spite of everything, seemed to prosper and grow rich
apace--scarcely justified the sufferings of thousands of innocent
individuals. Mr. Keeley was a typical old colonist, one who knew the
Boers and their character well, and I merely quote what he said, as no
doubt it was, and is, the opinion of many other such men. He opined that
this struggle was bound to come, declaring that all the thinking men of
the country had foreseen it. The intolerance of the Boers, their
arrogance, their ignorance, on which they prided themselves, all
proclaimed them as unfit to rule over white or black people. Of late
years had crept in an element of treachery and disloyalty, emanating
from their jealousy of the English, which by degrees was bound to
permeate the whole country, spreading southward to Cape Colony itself,
till the idea of "Africa for the Dutch, and the English in the sea,"
would have been a war-cry that might have dazzled hundreds of to-day's
so-called loyal colonists. He even asserted that those at the head of
affairs in England had shown great perspicacity and a clear insight into
the future. If at the Bloemfontein Conference, or after, Kruger had
given the five years' franchise,