3rd Dragoon Guards, Staff officer to Colonel Russell. This officer displayed untiring energy and a singular tact in dealing with men such as formed the component parts of this heterogeneous force, which marked him out as a capable soldier. These qualities received even more conspicuous illustration in the Egyptian campaign.

On the 4th December Sir Garnet Wolseley, accompanied by an escort of Border Horse, and taking Secocoeni with him, set out for Pretoria, where his presence was urgently required to deal with the Boers. The 94th Regiment remained in the valley, garrisoning a post on the Lulu Mountains, until the submission of the remaining chiefs and adherents of the Basuto chief. Sir Garnet Wolseley arrived at Pretoria* on the 9th December, with his captive, who was the second great African potentate that he had captured within six months. The rival of Cetewayo and his companion in misfortune, the fate of Secocoeni was more tragic than that of the Zulu King. Released, like the latter, he returned to his native country and sought to revive his influence. But though he could rebuild his desolated kraal, his prestige had vanished, and he was murdered by Mampoer, an influential rival chief, who has since found an asylum with Mapoch, the chief who co-operated with us in the attack on Secocoeni's stronghold.

On his arrival at Pretoria, Sir Garnet Wolseley found that the Boers, though much impressed by the striking success

A more pleasant event in Sir Garnet Wolseley's administration of affairs in Natal and the Transvaal than wars and political troubles was the opening of telegraphic communication between England and South Africa by the completion of the line between Aden and Zanzibar. On the 25th December, 1879, the Queen telegraphed to him from Windsor Castle, congratulating him and the Colonies under his government on this happy event; and two days later he replied from Pretoria, expressing his 'sincere thanks to her Majesty for her gracious telegram of the 25th, received that afternoon.' Another incident that occurred during Sir Garnet Wolseley's administration was the visit of the ex-Empress Eugenie to South Africa for the purpose of making a mournful inspection of the scene of the death of Sir Garnet Wolseley received the unhappy consort of Napoleon 111. on her landing at Durban on the 23rd April.

her son.

WOLSELEY'S DEALINGS WITH THE BOERS. 391

achieved against the powerful chief who had so long defied their armies, were as irreconcilable as ever. For many reasons, they had hoped and anticipated that success would reward their efforts to obtain independence without having recourse to arms. Besides the encouragement given to them to persevere in passive resistance, by their friends in the British Parliament and Press, they had hopes of a reversal of the policy of annexation from the words of a covering despatch to the British Colonial Secretary of State, addressed by Sir Bartle Frere in the preceding April, when he received the Boer committee.* Sir Bartle Frere showed this covering despatch to five members of the Committee, who drew encouragement from the passage in which he said that in his opinion, 'their representations are worthy of our earnest consideration.' Whatever Sir Bartle Frere meant by these words, they were interpreted by the recalcitrant Boers to recommend the restitution of their independence, and greatly increased the difficulties under which Sir Garnet Wolseley now laboured, as showing that the annexation was not irreversible. Thus the people were in a state of passive rebellion already, and in June Mr. Piet Joubert, afterwards Commander-in-Chief at Laing's Nek, refused to take the

* This was after the third mass meeting held by the Boer leaders to lay their grievances before their rulers, On a previous occasion-in March and April, 1879, at the time Colonel Lanyon became Administrator-some 5,000 or 6,000 Boers assembled to receive and consider the answer brought by Kruger and Joubert, the delegates composing the two deputations to England. Colonel Lanyon's reply to the deputation was not conciliatory in form or substance. It was then proposed that they should take up arms; but as Sir Bartle Frere was coming to the Transvaal, it was decided to await his arrival. Sir Bartle was at first, and until his visit to the Transvaal, under the belief that the Boer agitation was partial, and thought to allay it by argument and the offer of a constitution similar to that at the Cape; but the Boer Committee would listen to no compromise, and finally, finding that the malcontents represented the very great majority of the Boer population of the Transvaal,' he consented to forward a memorial, and support it with a letter to Lord Carnarvon, giving it as his opinion that it 'demanded the most serious attention of her Majesty's Government.' Then followed the lull which Sir Garnet Wolseley, acting under instructions from the Home Government, dispelled by his uncompromising language.

oath of allegiance and pay arrears of taxes due from him; and other Boers of wealth and position followed his lead.

Sir Garnet Wolseley clearly perceived the storm that was brewing, and, on the 29th October, addressed the following words to Sir Michael Hicks-Beach, the Colonial Secretary: 'I am compelled to recognise the continuance of grave discontent. I am informed on all sides that it is the intention of the Boers to fight for independence. . . . There is no doubt, I think, that the people are incited to discontent and rebellion by ambitious agitators; but I am compelled also to allow that the timid and wavering, who are awed into taking sides against us, are comparatively a small party, and that the main body of the Dutch population are disaffected to our rule.' The result amply vindicated Sir Garnet Wolseley's judgment, but his views were not shared by experienced politicians and Press writers,* who were of opinion that the protests and threats of the Boers would end in their doing nothing.

On the 10th December, the day after Sir Garnet Wolseley's return to Pretoria, the Boers, openly displaying the flag of the South African Republic, assembled in camp at Dornfontein, a place on the main road from Pretoria to Potchefstroom, and about equidistant between those places and Heidelberg. Here were gathered 3,000 men, and 510 waggons-the adult male population of the country being about 8,000-and resolutions were adopted, demanding that the Vice-President, Mr. Paul Kruger, should, in the absence of Mr. Burgers, the President at the time of the annexation in 1877, convoke the Volksraad, asserting their independence and their determination to 'sacrifice their lives and shed their blood for it;' and requiring the National Committee,

The Times correspondent at Pretoria, writing on the 15th December. after the great Boer demonstration held in that month at Heidelberg, says: The party which professes to desire fighting is very small, and if any fighting was probable, would grow smaller still."

WOLSELEY'S DEALINGS WITH THE BOERS. 393

as soon as possible, to take the necessary steps for the recovery of independence. Mr. Pretorius, an ex-president and chairman of the meeting, sent a copy of these resolutions under his own signature to Sir Garnet Wolseley, with a request that they might be communicated to the Home Government. To this demand Sir Garnet made reply by causing the arrest of Pretorius and Bok, the secretary, on a charge of high treason. The former was brought to trial, but the proceedings were discontinued after lasting three days.

Sir Garnet had taken ample military precaution to guard against a rising. As early as the middle of November he had constructed redoubts at Wakkerstroom and Standerton, each for defence by two companies; and at Heidelberg and Middelburg for one company; three months' supplies of everything for their garrisons being kept in each fort. In readiness for the Boers resorting to arms, after their meeting on the 10th December, he concentrated at Pretoria a force, consisting of the 80th Regiment, seven companies of the 4th Regiment, six companies of the 58th Regiment, and a squadron of the King's Dragoon Guards. Thus overawed, the Volkstein, the Boer organ in Pretoria, strongly urged on the farmers not to give Sir Garnet Wolseley any excuse to attack them, but quietly to disperse and await the departure of his Excellency and the troops, meanwhile persisting in the attitude of passive resistance and refusal to pay taxes. This advice the Boers followed, with what success is well known.

Early in 1880 Sir Garnet Wolseley promulgated the new constitution, which had been promised three years before. By it, besides the Executive Council he had already announced,-which was to consist of the Governor, or Administrator, and four leading members of the Government, with three non-official members nominated by the Governor,

-the Legislative Council was constituted, to consist of the Executive Council, the Chief Justice, and six nominated members. This constitution, which was framed by Sir Michael Hicks-Beach upon lines recommended by Sir Bartle Frere, was a sham; as not only were the members of both the Executive and Legislative Councils removable at the Governor's pleasure, but power was reserved to the Governor to act without consulting, or in opposition to, the Council, if he judged it expedient; and questions affecting the revenue could only be proposed in the Legislative Assembly with the Governor's permission. Moreover, any legislation the Council might pass could always be disallowed or repealed by the Queen's authority. The only apology for this constitution is that it was temporary; but much of the odium attaching to it fell upon Sir Garnet Wolseley, though it will be seen he was not responsible for its conditions.

At this time Mr. Pretorius was in frequent correspondence with Sir Garnet, and promised to join his Government a little later on, when the country had quieted down, as Mr. Pretorius then thought it would in a short time.

That the hostilities which broke out in December, 1880, did not occur at this time, was due to the fact of the presence of Sir Garnet Wolseley and the large force of troops still remaining in the country, and also to the apprehended change of Ministry in England, which actually took place in the following spring. The Boers had sympathizers in the Radical Press and Parliament, among the most able and consistent being Mr. Leonard Courtney, now Under-Secretary for the Colonies. Mr. Gladstone also, in his Midlothian addresses, expressed his disapproval of the policy of annexation, thereby encouraging the Boers to hope, if he came into power, that the question of their independence might be reconsidered. In this hope it was