the reader may learn from the analysis of the
scheme which was published in _The Cape Times_ of June 10th, 1899.
When the Franchise Bill was before the Volksraad this complicated
scheme, as we have seen, was amended and re-amended; and each new
provision was as intricate in its working as the parent scheme. It is
obvious that nothing short of a commission of inquiry could have
determined with certainty the manner in which the representation of
the Uitlanders was affected by each successive amendment. While these
changes were in progress in the Raadzaal at Pretoria--changes so
"numerous and so rapid," as Lord Milner said,[113] that it was
"absolutely impossible at any given moment to know what the effect of
the scheme, as existing at that moment, was likely to be"--Lord Milner
himself at Capetown was at one and the same time overwhelmed with
detailed criticisms from Uitlanders, anxious that no legal pitfall or
administrative obstacle should remain undetected, and besieged with
cables from the Colonial Office requesting precise information upon
any point upon which an energetic member of the House of Commons might
have chosen to interrogate the Secretary of State. And, in addition to
this rain of telegrams, people on the spot were constantly calling at
Government House to ask if the High Commissioner had observed this or
that defect or trap in clauses, the text of which he had not yet had
time to receive, still less to read or comprehend. All this, too, was
over and above the heavy administrative and official duties of the
Governor and High Commissioner--duties which Lord Milner was called
upon to perform with more than usual care, in view of the political
ascendancy of the Dutch party in the Cape Colony.

[Footnote 113: August 23rd, C. 9,521.]

[Sidenote: Mr. Chamberlain's assumption.]

On July 13th, Lord Milner sent warning telegrams to Mr.
Chamberlain,[114] pointing out specific defects in the Franchise Bill,
and showing how seriously President Krueger's proposals fell short of
the Bloemfontein minimum. Five days later the Volksraad accepted the
final amendments. The face value of the Bill, as it now stood to be
converted into law, was a seven years' franchise, prospective and
retrospective. When, therefore, Mr. Chamberlain heard this same day
(July 18th) that the Volksraad had accepted the bill in this form with
only five dissentients, he seems to have assumed that a really
considerable concession had bee