uld be so small a minority, it would at least have
afforded the constitutional method of declaring the wishes of
Uitlanders, and have done away with the disquieting and less effective
practices of Press agitations, public demonstrations, and petitions. The
measure could also have been expected to open up the way towards
reconciling relations between the English and Boer races, beginning in
the Transvaal, where it was hoped that the burghers would be gained over
as friends, and so to stand aloof from the Afrikaner Bond. These were
the supreme objects for peaceful progress and not for annexation. Solemn
assurances from highest quarters were repeatedly given that no designs
existed against the integrity of the Republic, that nothing unfriendly
lurked behind the franchise demand, but that necessity dictated it for
general good and the preservation of peace. Nor were other diplomatic
means left unemployed to ensure the acceptance of the franchise reform.
In addition to firmness of attitude and a display of actual force, most
of the other Powers, including the United States of America, were
induced to add their weight of persuasion in urging upon the Transvaal
the adoption of the measures demanded by England for correcting the
existing trouble. It may be urged that the display of force in sending
the first batches of troops would have afforded grounds for
exasperation, and be construed by the Transvaal as a menace and actual
hostility, tending to precipitate a conflict which it was so earnestly
intended to avoid. To this may be replied that the 20,000 men sent in
August were readily viewed as placing the hitherto undermanned Colonial
garrisons upon an appropriate peace effective only; but not so with
respect to the army corps of 50,000 men despatched in September--this
was felt as an intended restraint against "Bond" projects, to enforce
the observance of any agreement which the Transvaal might for the nonce
assent to, and above all it was tending, unless at once opposed by the
Bond, to weaken its ranks by producing hesitation and ultimate defection
from that body; the die was thus to be cast, duplicity appeared to be
played out--the ultimatum of 9th October was the outcome; and England,
though unprepared, could not possibly accept it otherwise than as a
wilful challenge to war.

As the pursuit of our study will show, the success of Mr. Chamberlain's
diplomacy to avert war depended upon the very slender prospects that the
Tra