e manner in which
these questions were decided. The lesson of the retrocession was taken
to heart so earnestly that, fifteen years later, the majority of the
British residents in the Transvaal refused to support a movement for
reform which involved the re-establishment of Imperial authority, while
among those who were loyal to the British connection throughout South
Africa its effect was to make them think, as did Rhodes, that the
machinery of the various local British governments must be dissociated
as much as possible from the principles and methods of the Home
Government. Hence the necessity for what Rhodes called the "elimination
of the Imperial factor." The expression, as he afterwards explained,
was in no way inconsistent with attachment to the British connection. As
read in the context in which it was originally used, it meant merely
that the European population of Bechuanaland,[9] being mainly Boer
immigrants, could be administered more successfully by officers
responsible to a government which, like that of the Cape Colony, was
well versed in South African conditions, than by officers directly
responsible to the Imperial Government. The phrase was a criticism of
Downing Street, and still more of English party government. In short,
Rhodes was convinced that if a system of British administration, based
on South African conditions, was ever to be carried on successfully, the
local British authority, and not the Home Government, must be the
machine employed; and in order to allow it to work freely, its action
must be made as independent as possible of Downing Street. For Downing
Street was an authority which blew hot or cold, in accordance with the
views of the party for the time being in power.[10]

[Footnote 9: The Crown Colony--not the Protectorate--annexed
by the Cape Colony in 1895.]

[Footnote 10: Rhodes's words were: "If we do not settle this
[_i.e._ the question of Bechuanaland] ourselves, we shall see
it taken up in the House of Commons on one side or the other,
not from any real interest in the question, but simply
because of its consequences to those occupying the
Ministerial benches. We want to get rid of Downing Street in
this question, and to deal with it ourselves, as a
self-governing colony."]

[Sidenote: New forces.]

And, in point of fact, both parties in England acquiesced in this
judgment of the South