r allowed the Imperial military
authorities to take over the Cape Government railways, and he
consented to the proclamation of martial law in those districts of the
Colony in which the Dutch were in rebellion. But he was far from
yielding, even now, that full and complete assistance to the Governor
which would have been expected, as a matter of course, from the Prime
Minister of any other British colony. On one occasion, at least,
during this period the conflict between his views and those of Lord
Milner became so acute that his resignation seemed to be inevitable.
But this was not to be the end of the Afrikander Ministry. In
proportion as Mr. Schreiner approached gradually to agreement with
Lord Milner, so did he incur the displeasure of Mr. Hofmeyr and the
Dutch, until (in June, 1901) the Ministry perished of internal
dissension.

A week after Lord Roberts reached Capetown (January 10th, 1900), Lord
Milner sent home a despatch in which he tells the story of the
rebellion in the Cape Colony. The state of the districts on the
western border of the Republics, north of the Orange River, is
described in the words of a reliable and unbiassed witness who has
just arrived at Capetown from Vryburg, where he has been lately
resident:

"All the farmers in the Vryburg, Kuruman, and Taungs districts,"
says this witness, "have joined the Boers, and I do not believe
that you will find ten loyal British subjects among the Dutch
community in the whole of Bechuanaland. The Field Cornets and
Justices of the Peace on the Dutch side have all joined ... the
conduct of the rebels has been unbearable."

Of the position of that part of the Eastern Province of the Cape
Colony which, lying to the south of the Free State, formed the main
seat of the rebellion, Lord Milner himself writes:

[Sidenote: Treatment of loyalists.]

"Within a space of less than three weeks from the occupation of
Colesberg, no less than five great districts--those of Colesberg,
Albert, Aliwal North, Barkly East, and Wodehouse--had gone over
without hesitation, and, so to speak, bodily, to the enemy.
Throughout that region the Landdrosts of the Orange Free State
had established their authority, and everywhere, in the
expressive words of a magistrate, British loyalists were "being
hunted out of town after town like sheep." In the invaded
districts the method of occupation has always been more