cy dearest to the farmers of the
Afrikander Bond was the protective system for their agricultural
produce. If Rhodes would support this, he might induce the Dutch to give
him a free hand in his plans for expansion towards the North; and this
was needed, because the problem of the North was becoming urgent, and
Sprigg and his party were blind to its importance.

A glance at the nineteenth-century map will show that the territories of
the Dutch Republic, lying on the less barren side of the continent,
tended to block the extension of Cape Colony and Natal towards the
north, the more so as the Boers from time to time sent out fresh swarms
westward and encroached on native territory in Bechuanaland. The Germans
did not annex Namaqualand till 1885, but already their interest in this
district was becoming evident to close observers. Rhodes's most
cherished dream had been the development of the high-lying healthy
inland regions to the north by the British race under the British flag.
But in those days, when Whitehall was asleep and officials in Cape Town
were indifferent, Rhodes saw that his best chance was to convert the
Dutch in the Colony. He hoped to make them realize that, if they
supported him, the development of the interior might bring trade through
Cape Town, which otherwise would go eastward through Portuguese
channels. The building of railways, the settlement of new lands in which
Dutch and English would share alike, were practical questions which
might interest them, and Rhodes was quite genuine in his desire to see
both races going forward together. 'Equal rights for every civilized man
south of the Zambezi' was his motto, and to this he steadfastly clung.

To describe all the means by which Rhodes worked towards this end would
be impossible. He worked hard at Kimberley to furnish the sinews of war;
he used his personal influence and power of persuasion at Cape Town to
win support from Hofmeyr and others; and he was ready to go to the
frontier at any moment when there was work to be done. His first
commission of this sort had been in Basutoland in 1882, when he helped
the famous General Gordon to pacify native discontent; but the following
year saw him at work on another frontier more directly affecting his
programme. The Boers had again been raiding westwards and had started
two new republics, called Goshen and Stellaland, on the route from
Kimberley to the north. Rhodes travelled to the scene of action,
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