municipal and industrial life at a
reasonable charge, the narrow electoral basis on which it rested would
have remained little more than a theoretic grievance, and the bulk of
the people would have cared nothing for political rights. An exclusive
government may be pardoned if it is efficient, an inefficient government
if it rests upon the people. But a government which is both inefficient
and exclusive incurs a weight of odium under which it must ultimately
sink; and this was the kind of government which the Transvaal attempted
to maintain. They ought, therefore, to have either extended their
franchise or reformed their administration. They would not do the
former, lest the new burghers should swamp the old ones, and take the
control out of Boer hands. They were unfit to do the latter, because
they had neither knowledge nor skill, so that even had private interests
not stood in the way, they would have failed to create a proper
administration. It was the ignorance, as well as the exclusive spirit
of the Transvaal authorities, which made them unwilling to yield any
more than they might be forced to yield to the demand for reform.

The position in which Britain stood needs to be examined from two sides,
its legal right of interference, and the practical considerations which
justified interference in this particular case.

Her legal right rested on three grounds. The first was the Convention of
1884 (printed in the Appendix to this volume), which entitled her to
complain of any infraction of the privileges thereby guaranteed to her
subjects.

The second was the ordinary right, which every State possesses, to
complain, and (if necessary) intervene when its subjects are wronged,
and especially when they suffer any disabilities not imposed upon the
subjects of other States.

The third right was more difficult to formulate. It rested on the fact
that as Britain was the greatest power in South Africa, owning the whole
country south of the Zambesi except the two Dutch Republics (for the
deserts of German Damaraland and the Portuguese East-coast territories
may be practically left out of account), she was interested in
preventing any causes of disturbance within the Transvaal which might
spread beyond its borders, and become sources of trouble either among
natives or among white men. This right was of a vague and indeterminate
nature, and could be legitimately used only when it was plain that the
sources of trouble did reall