another, was certain to compel the British Government to
subdue and annex one Kafir tribe after another until either a desert or
the territory of some other civilised State was reached. But fifty years
ago this was not clearly perceived; so the process, which might have
inflicted less suffering if it had been steadily and swiftly carried
through, went on slowly and to the constant annoyance of statesmen at
home.

It was the same as regards the great plateau and the Boer emigrants who
dwelt there. Not from any sympathy with their love of independence, but
because she did not want the trouble of pursuing and governing them and
the wide lands they were spread over, England resolved to abandon the
interior to them. In 1852 and 1854 she made a supreme effort to check
her own onward career, first by recognizing the independence of the
Transvaal emigrants whose allegiance she had theretofore claimed, then
by actually renouncing her rights to the Orange River Sovereignty, and
to those within it who desired to continue her subjects. What more could
a thrifty and cautious and conscientious country do? Nevertheless, these
good resolutions had to be reconsidered, these self-denying principles
foregone. Circumstances were too strong for the Colonial Office. In 1869
it accepted the protectorate of Basutoland. In 1871 it yielded to the
temptation of the diamond-fields, and took Griqualand West. Soon after
it made a treaty with Khama, which gave the British a foothold in
Bechuanaland. In 1877 it annexed the Transvaal. By that time the old
ideas were beginning to pass away, and to be replaced by new views of
the mission and destiny of Britain. The wish of the British Government
to stand still had been combated all along by powerful inducements to
move on. The colonists always pressed for an advance of the frontier.
The Governor usually pressed for it. The home government was itself
haunted by a fear that if it abandoned positions of vantage its
successors might afterwards have reason to rue the abandonment. These
were the considerations that drove British statesmen to the most
momentous forward steps that were taken. Two things, and two only, were
really vital to British interests--the control of the coasts, and the
control of an open road to the north. Accordingly, the two decisive
steps were the occupation of Natal in 1842-3, which shut off the Boers
from the sea, and the taking of Griqualand West in 1871 (followed by the
taking of so