portion of
the costs of Government in the Cape Colony, Orange States, Natal as
well as Pretoria. And yet the working bees--the white British
community of Johannesburg--who have helped to enrich the hive
containing the whole of South African interests, have been
neglected, if not betrayed, by the Mother Country. They have been
deprived of arms, of liberties,--they have suffered insult and
disdain, and Great Britain, until forced to do so, has moved not a
finger in their defence. The Transvaal, one of the richest districts
of the world, merely wants good and sustained government--a
government that will grant to all respectable white men free and
equal rights. When this shall come to pass, its splendid resources
will be developed. The Indian Ocean trade will be supplied with
steam coal. The country will sustain itself, and will also export
food stuffs, and trade in iron, hide, wool, tin, and quantities of
other things, whose value has hitherto been ignored. All that is
needed is a dignified acceptance of British responsibilities. South
Africa was bought by the paramount Power nearly an hundred years
ago, and has since then been administered--if not entirely wisely
and well--at least administered, by that Power. British sweat has
rained on the country, British muscle has toiled in the country,
British blood has flowed in streams over its face, and British bones
are mixed with the shifting grains of its sand. It now remains for
British sovereignty to wield its sceptre and make its presence felt.

[Illustration: PRETORIA FROM THE EAST.

Photo by Wilson, Aberdeen.]

ACCUMULATED AGGRAVATIONS

Since it is impossible to enter into all the intricacies of foreign
political relations with the Transvaal, we will return to the
Uitlanders. They became more and more unwelcome as their numbers
increased. Many Acts were passed, each serving to render more
impossible their chances of obtaining the franchise. The fact was
that Mr. Kruger, having brought his State to a condition of
bankruptcy almost identical with that which existed when Sir T.
Shepstone annexed the Transvaal, was struggling to carry on a
divided scheme, that of grabbing with both hands from the Uitlander
financialists, while endeavouring to maintain with close-fisted
obstinacy the exclusiveness, irresponsibility, and bigotry of the
primitive trekker. He knew that if he granted full political rights
to the outsiders he would no longer be master of his own misguided