tragic times and trained in that stern school, became like Brand
and Burgers a dreamer of dreams. He lived to baffle by his superior
shrewdness, or slimness, all the arts of English diplomacy. In his
later years this President manifestly deemed himself chosen of Heaven
to make an end of British rule from the Zambesi to the sea. "The
Transvaal shall never be shut up in a kraal," said he. A Sovereign
International State he declared it was, or should be, with free access
to the ocean; and how astonishingly near he came to the accomplishment
of these bold aims we now know to our exceeding cost. Nevertheless, to
this persistent dreamer of dreams the two South African Republics owe
their extinction; while the British Empire owes to him more than to
any other living man its fast approaching Federation.

With surprising secrecy and success the Transvaal officials prepared
for the inevitable conflict which the attempted fulfilment of such
bold dreams involved, and in that preparation were rendered essential
aid, first by the discovery, not far from Pretoria, of the richest
goldfield in the whole world, which soon provided them with the
necessary means; and next by the Jameson Raid, which provided them
with the necessary excuse.

To Steevens, the lamented correspondent of _The Daily Mail_, a Dopper
editor and predikant said, "I do not think the Transvaal Government
has been wise, and I told them they made a great mistake when they let
people come in to the mines. _This gold will ruin you; to remain
independent you must remain poor_"! Perhaps so! but the modern world
is not built that way. No trekkers nowadays may take possession of
half a continent, forbid all others to come in, and right round the
frontier post up notices "Trespassers will be prosecuted." Even
Robinson Crusoe had not long landed on his desolate isle when he was
startled by the sight of a strange footprint on the seashore sand.
Welcome or unwelcome, somebody else had come! Crusoe and his man
Friday might set up no exclusive rights in a heritage that for a brief
while seemed all their own. The Boer with his Kaffir bondsman has been
compelled to learn the same distasteful lesson. The wealth of the
Witwaters Rand was for those who could win it; and for that stupendous
task the Boer had neither the necessary aptitude nor the necessary
capital. It was not, therefore, for him to echo the cry of Edie
Ochiltree when he found hid treasure amid the ruins of St Roth's
Ab