telegram from President Steyn, in which the president repudiated all
contemplated aggressive action on the part of the Free State as absurd.
The speech created a great sensation in the British press. It was
probably forgotten at the time (though Lord Kimberley afterwards
publicly stated it) that one of the chief reasons why the Gladstone
government had granted the retrocession of the Transvaal after Majuba,
was the fear that the Cape Colonial Dutch would join their kinsmen if
the war continued. What was a danger in 1881, Mr Schreiner knew to be a
still greater danger in 1899. At the same time it is quite obvious, from
a review of Mr Schreiner's conduct through the latter half of 1899, that
he took an entirely mistaken view of the Transvaal situation. He
evinced, as premier of the Cape Colony, the same inability to understand
the Uitlanders' grievances, the same futile belief in the eventual
fairness of President Kruger, as he had shown when giving evidence
before the British South Africa Select Committee into the causes of the
Jameson Raid. Actual experience taught him that President Kruger was
beyond an appeal to reason, and that the protestations of President
Steyn were insincere. War had no sooner commenced with the ultimatum of
the Transvaal Republic on the 9th of October 1899, than Mr Schreiner
found himself called upon to deal with the conduct of Cape rebels. The
rebels joined the invading forces of President Steyn, whose false
assurances Mr Schreiner had offered to an indignant House of Assembly
only a few weeks before. The war on the part of the Republics was
evidently not to be merely one of self-defence. It was one of aggression
and aggrandisement. Mr Schreiner ultimately addressed, as prime
minister, a sharp remonstrance to President Steyn for allowing his
burghers to invade the colony. He also co-operated with Sir Alfred
Milner, and used his influence to restrain the Bond.

_The War of 1899-1902._[7]--The first shot actually fired in the war
was at Kraipan, a small railway station within the colony, 40 m. south
of Mafeking, a train being derailed, and ammunition intended for Colonel
Baden-Powell seized. The effect of this was entirely to cut off
Mafeking, the northernmost town in Cape Colony, and it remained in a
state of siege for over seven months. On the 16th of October Kimberley
was also isolated. Proclamations by the Transvaal and Free State
annexing portions of Cape Colony were actually issued on the 18