both mine and the Government protest. This I promised, on condition
he showed me his proclamation before publication: to which he agreed.
To one clause I greatly objected, and protested--namely, the threat
of confiscation of property for disobeying the proclamation. I
pointed out that this was barbarous, and would be punishing a man's
innocent family for his actions. The clause was omitted. This is
the origin of the lie that I helped Shepstone in drawing up this
proclamation. In justice to Shepstone, I must say that I would not
consider an officer of my Government to have acted faithfully if he
had not done what Shepstone did; and if the act was wrong (which
undoubtedly it was), not he, but his Government, is to blame for it.

Messrs. Kruger and Jorissen left within a month to protest in England
against the annexation.

Sir T. Shepstone wrote (May 9): 'Mr. Paul Kruger and his colleague,
Dr. Jorissen, D.D., the Commission to Europe, leave to-day. I do not
think that either of them wishes the Act of Annexation to be
cancelled; Dr. Jorissen certainly does not.' And Mr. J.D. Barry,
Recorder of Kimberley, wrote to Frere (May 15): 'The delegates, Paul
Kruger and Dr. Jorissen, left Pretoria on the 8th, and even they do
not seem to have much faith in their mission. Dr. Jorissen thinks
that the reversal of Sir Theophilus's Act would not only be
impossible, but a great injury to the country.'

It is not necessary to seek hostile testimony to establish the fact
that the Boers as a whole acquiesced in the annexation; the
foregoing quotation from Aylward's book supplies all that is
needed--unintentionally, perhaps. The Zulu menace, which Aylward so
lightly dismisses, was a very serious matter; the danger a very real
one. It has frequently been asserted by the Boers and their friends
that the Zulu trouble was fomented by a section of the Natal people,
and that Sir Theophilus Shepstone himself, if he did not openly
encourage the Zulu King in his threats and encroachments on the
Transvaal, at any rate refrained from using his unique influence and
power with the Zulus in the direction of peace, and that he made a
none too scrupulous use of the Zulu question when he forced the
annexation of the Transvaal. It is stated that, in the first place,
there was no real danger, and in the next place, if there were, such
was Sir Theophilus's power with the Zulus that he could have averted
it; and in support of the first point, and in demolitio