"These were also attacked, but beat off the Boers, and, maintaining
perfect order, fought their way back to camp. You can imagine the
consternation there was when the hideous business became known. We fell
back at once to Newcastle, and mightily lucky we thought ourselves to
get there safely. Fresh troops came up, and we were on the point of
advancing again, confident that, after the lesson the Boers had given
us, things could be managed better. Suddenly, like a thunderclap, the
news came that the British Government had surrendered to the Boers,
given up everything, abandoned the colonists, who had so bravely
defended their towns, to their fate; and, with the exception of making a
proviso that the natives should be well treated--but which, as nothing
was ever done to enforce it, meant allowing the Boers to enslave and
ill-treat them as they had done before--and another proviso, maintaining
the purely nominal supremacy of the Queen, the treaty was simply an
entire and abject surrender.
"There is not a colonist who, since that time, has not known what must
come of it, and that sooner or later the question whether the Dutch or
the British were to be masters of the Cape would have to be fought out.
But none of us dreamt that the British Government would allow the Boers
to import hundreds of thousands of rifles, two or three hundred cannon,
and enormous stores of ammunition in readiness for the encounter.
Pages:
453
454
455
456
457
458
459
460
461
462
463
464
465
466
467
468
469
470
471
472
473
474
475
476
477