d, some members of the Reform Party were
very emphatic in their objections to proceeding any further until
they should be satisfied that the undertakings upon the strength of
which they had entered upon the arrangement would be faithfully
adhered to. On the occasion of Dr. Jameson's last visit it had been
extracted from him that instead of 1,500 men he would probably start
with from 800 to 1,000. These discrepancies and alterations caused
the liveliest dissatisfaction in the minds of those who realized
that they were entering upon a very serious undertaking; but although
the equipment seemed poor, reliance was always placed on the taking
of Pretoria Fort. That at any rate was a certainty, and it would
settle the whole thing without a blow; for Johannesburg would have
everything, and the Boers would have rifles, but neither ammunition
nor field-guns. Without doubt the Pretoria arsenal was the key of the
position, and it is admitted by Boer and alien alike that it lay
there unguarded, ready to be picked up, and that nothing in the world
could have saved it--except what did!

On or about December 19, Messrs. Woolls-Sampson and A. Bailey, two
Johannesburg men concerned in the movement, who had been in
communication with Mr. Rhodes and others in Cape Town, arrived in
Johannesburg, and indicated clearly that the question as to which
flag was to be raised was either deemed to be a relatively
unimportant one or one concerning which some of the parties had not
clearly and honestly expressed their intentions. In simple truth, it
appeared to be the case that Dr. Jameson either thought that the
Johannesburg reformers were quite indifferent on the subject of the
flag, or assumed that the provisions for the maintenance of the
Transvaal flag were merely talk, and that the Union Jack would be
hoisted at once. Nothing was further from the truth. The Reform Party
in Johannesburg included men to whom the Union Jack is as dear as
their own heart's blood, but it also included many others to whom
that flag does not appeal--men of other nationalities and other
associations and other sympathies. It included--perhaps the strongest
element of all--those men whose sympathies were naturally and most
strongly all for British rule, which they believed to be the best in
the world, but whose judgment showed them that to proclaim that rule
would be to defeat the very objects they honestly had in view, and
who would have regarded the change of flag at