A DUTCH REPUBLIC.
matters, their policy had been anti-British and hostile to the best interests of South Africa as a whole. The central idea of the Transvaal policy—certainly since that evil genius, that bête noire of South Africa (Dr. Leyds) came on the scene—had been to create a Dutch Republic which should first abolish the Orange Free State, then the Cape Colony and Natal, and which would in time become strong enough to exclude British influence from South Africa altogether. The discovery of gold provided funds for carrying out this policy for arming themselves and their neighbours to the teeth«this statement was no mere verbiage, for on his journey down to Buluwayo, Mauser rifles were carried in the same train, and he himself saw an Orange Free State farmer get out of the train at a roadside station with six or seven of the rifles and distribute them to men waiting on the station—and for procuring the assistance of the Government and the Raad of the Free State, whose conduct, in his mind, was otherwise inexplicable. The influx of Uitlanders, on the other hand, had made it impossible that this policy could ever be realised in the sense in which it was intended. The Uitlander population already outnumbered the Boers, and it would certainly, on a moderate estimate, treble its numbers, and might become ten times more numerous within the next ten years.
Difficulties of the situation.If it should prove to be true that the Boers had declared war, it was an absolute proof, to his mind, that the policy, to which he had alluded, had all along been the central idea of the Transvaal Government, and he thought the gratitude of every one was due to Sir A. Milner, for being the first High Commissioner who had really grasped the situation and had done247
