Governor of the sale of arms and ammunition
throughout the Cape Colony. It was feared that the Africanders might buy
the goods and throw them across the border; it had been done. But
information in disproof of this was forthcoming when the story reached
us that a number of the Cape Dutch had risen in rebellion and needed the
weapons for themselves! Kimberley's voice at once favoured the extreme
penalty--death for high treason! Even moderate men, who allowed for
racial sympathies, held that neutrality was in the circumstances the
proper attitude to assume. But the local extremist--and he was the man
of the hour--argued that the object of the rebels was to sweep the
English into the sea, and to make Africa the exclusive privilege of the
Africander. In the evening, a terrific explosion was heard; a dynamite
magazine had been blown up at Dronfield. It was stated that some people
went up along with it; but that part of the story has yet to be
verified.

All this made Wednesday an interesting day, but the gallant Colonel had
yet to crown it with his quota. Having previously omitted to fix a
charge for meal and flour, he now brought back to their normal modesty
the prices of the two commodities. The two hardly provided sufficient
material for a proclamation, but with some stretching they were made to
do so. It was easy to discover a disparity in the relative quantities of
the two foodstuffs in Kimberley; we had a great deal of the one, and
comparatively little of the other. Thus when Kekewich in his wisdom
deemed it prudent to take precautions, the populace did not object. We
knew in _our_ wisdom that precautions were superfluous, but we approved,
in a general way, the principle of prudence. The proclamation
accordingly ordained that every loaf baked in future should be three
parts meal and one part flour. The bakers were given the recipe gratis,
with instructions to sell it (the bread, not the recipe) cheaply,
namely, at three pence per loaf. Theoretically, the new loaf was to
prove a palatable change; practically, the wry expression of
countenance it evoked in the process of mastication demonstrated the
contrary. The bread was light "khaki" in colour, and only in this
respect was it fashionable;--not too fashionable, because "Boer meal"
was its chief ingredient, and racial prejudice was strong. The sweetness
of the old-fashioned white loaf was wanting, and we soon clamoured for
its restoration. But the brazen baker would tal