akened by the very power which
had every interest in preserving them.

It cannot be too often pointed out that in this annexation, the
starting-point of our troubles, Great Britain, however mistaken she may
have been, had no obvious selfish interest in view. There were no Rand
mines in those days, nor was there anything in the country to tempt the
most covetous. An empty treasury and two native wars were the reversion
which we took over. It was honestly considered that the country was
in too distracted a state to govern itself, and had, by its weakness,
become a scandal and a danger to its neighbours. There was nothing
sordid in our action, though it may have been both injudicious and
high-handed.

In December 1880 the Boers rose. Every farmhouse sent out its riflemen,
and the trysting-place was the outside of the nearest British fort. All
through the country small detachments were surrounded and besieged
by the farmers. Standerton, Pretoria, Potchefstroom, Lydenburg,
Wakkerstroom, Rustenberg, and Marabastad were all invested and all
held out until the end of the war. In the open country we were less
fortunate. At Bronkhorst Spruit a small British force was taken by
surprise and shot down without harm to their antagonists. The surgeon
who treated them has left it on record that the average number of
wounds was five per man. At Laing's Nek an inferior force of British
endeavoured to rush a hill which was held by Boer riflemen. Half of our
men were killed and wounded. Ingogo may be called a drawn battle, though
our loss was more heavy than that of the enemy. Finally came the
defeat of Majuba Hill, where four hundred infantry upon a mountain were
defeated and driven off by a swarm of sharpshooters who advanced under
the cover of boulders. Of all these actions there was not one which
was more than a skirmish, and had they been followed by a final British
victory they would now be hardly remembered. It is the fact that they
were skirmishes which succeeded in their object which has given them
an importance which is exaggerated. At the same time they may mark the
beginning of a new military era, for they drove home the fact--only too
badly learned by us--that it is the rifle and not the drill which makes
the soldier. It is bewildering that after such an experience the
British military authorities continued to serve out only three hundred
cartridges a year for rifle practice, and that they still encouraged
that mechanical vol