One of the Kaiser’s Many Mistakes
Louis Botha—we touch our hats to you!
You are supremely and triumphantly one of the Kaiser’s many mistakes. You have proved yourself once again a capable leader and a man among men. You have proved him once more incapable of apprehending the meaning of the word honour. You are an honourable man. Even as a foe you fought us fair and we honoured you. You have valiantly helped to dig the grave of his dishonour and have proved him a fool. We thank you! And we thank the memory of the clear-visioned men of those old days who, in spite of the clamour of the bats, persisted in tendering you and yours that right hand of friendship which you have so nobly justified.
You fought us fair. You have uprisen from the ashes of the past like the Phœnix of old. You are Briton with the best.
Fair fight breeds no ill-will. It is the man, and the nation, that fights foul and flings God and humanity overboard that lays up for itself stores of hatred and outcastry and scorn which the ages shall hardly efface.
And Germany once was great, and might have been greater.
Delenda est Germania!—so far as Germania represents the Devil and all his works.
The following lines were written fourteen years ago when we welcomed the end of the Boer War. We are all grateful that the hope therein expressed has been so amply fulfilled. That it has been so is largely due to the wisdom and statesmanship of Louis Botha.
No matter now the rights and wrongs of it;
You fought us bravely and we fought you fair.
The fight is done. Grip hands! No malice bear!
We greet you, brothers, to the nobler strife
Of building up the newer, larger life!
Join hands! Join hands! Ye nations of the stock!
And make henceforth a mighty Trust for Peace;—
A great enduring peace that shall withstand
The shocks of time and circumstance; and every land
Shall rise and bless you—and shall never cease
To bless you—for that glorious gift of Peace.
Germany, if she had so willed, could have come into that hoped-for Trust for Peace.
But Germany would not. She put her own selfish interests before all else and so digs her own grave.
JOHN OXENHAM
BOTHA TO BRITAIN
“I have carried out everything in accordance with our compact at Vereeniging.”