On
June 21st he received a War Office telegram informing him that it had
been decided to "increase the efficiency of the existing force" in
South Africa. And to this communication was added the question: "Do
you desire to make any observations?"

[Footnote 79: Cd. 1,789 (War Commission).]

[Footnote 80: These were the figures of the D. M. I.
"Military Notes" of June, 1898; in the revised "Military
Notes" of June, 1899, the estimated total of the Boer force
was considerably greater--some 50,000 exclusive of colonial
rebels.]

[Sidenote: "Ringing the War Office bell".]

The sequel can be given in General Butler's words: "I looked on the
one side," he said, in giving evidence before the War Commission, "and
I saw what seemed to me a very serious political agitation going on
with a Party that I had not alluded to yet, whom I had always looked
upon as a Third Party; they were pressing on all they knew. The
Government did not seem to be aware of that, and this telegram
brought matters to such a point that I thought it gave me the
opportunity to speak. So I took these words 'any observations,' and
answered in a way which I thought would at least ring the War Office
bell."

The telegram with which General Butler "rang the War Office bell" was
this:

"You ask for my observations: present condition of opinion here
is highly excited, and doubtless the news _quoting_ preparations
referred to in your telegram, if it transpires, will add largely
to the ferment which I am endeavouring to reduce by every means.
Persistent effort of a party to produce war forms, in my
estimation, gravest elements in situation here. Believe war
between white races, coming as sequel to Jameson Raid, and
subsequent events of last three years, would be greatest calamity
that ever occurred in South Africa."

This telegram elicited the following reply from the Home Government:

"You cannot understand too clearly that, whatever your private
opinions, it is your duty to be guided in all questions of policy
by the High Commissioner, who is fully aware of our views, and
whom you will, of course, loyally support."

In the course of his evidence before the War Commission General Butler
gave some further explanation of the motives which had prompted his
reply to the telegram of June 21st. In response to the question, "It
was never in y