The Sand River Convention.
Though Great Britain is supposed to suffer from insatiable land hunger it is a notable truth that she has voluntarily surrendered more oversea territory than some important kingdoms ever possessed; but not one of these many surrenders proved half so disastrous to all concerned as that on which the Sand River Convention set its seal in 1852. At that time our colonial possessions were accounted by many overtaxed statesmen to be all plague and no profit, involving the motherland in incessant native wars out of which she won for herself neither credit nor cash. That had proved specially true in South Africa. When, therefore, the Crimean war hove in sight with its manifold risks and its drain on our national resources, it was resolved to lessen our liabilities in that then unattractive quarter of the globe. The Transvaal was at that time a barren land, given over to wild beasts, and to Boers who seemed equally uncontrollable. An Ishmael life was theirs, their hand against every man's and every man's hand against them. Every little township was a law unto itself and almost every homestead; so the British Government threw up the thankless task of governing the ungovernable, as soon as a life and death struggle with Russia appeared inevitable. The Sand River Convention gave to the Transvaal absolute independence save only in what related to the treatment of the natives. There was to be no slavery in the Transvaal; but no Convention ever yet framed could apparently bind a Boer when his financial interests bade him break it. So set he his face to evade the conditions both of the Pretoria and the London Conventions of later date; and the one requirement of this first Convention he set at nought. During several following years he still hunted for slaves whom he took captive in native wars; sjamboked them into serving him without pay; bought them, sold them, but never called them slaves. They were "apprentices," which was a fine word for a foul thing. So was the Convention kept in the letter of it and broken in the spirit of it. For five-and-twenty years of widening and deepening anarchy that Convention remained in force, the Transvaal fighting with the Orange Free State, and Boer bidding defiance to Boer with bullets for his arguments. When little Lydenberg claimed the right to set up as an independent republic, Kruger himself reasoned with it at the muzzle of his rifle, as we have since been compelled to reason with him. So at last Shepstone appeared upon the scene to evolve order out of chaos; and though he knew it not, he was the true herald of the Guards' Brigade, and sundry others, that after many days crossed the Sand River to make an end for ever of all that the Sand River Convention involved.
The year following that in which the Convention was signed, another step was taken in the same direction and independence was forced on the Orange Free State. The people protested, and pleaded for permission to still live under the protection of the British flag; but their prayers were as unavailing as "the groans of the Britons," which, as recorded in the early pages of our own island story, followed the retiring swords of Rome. Now, after nearly forty years of uttermost neighbourliness, the Orange Free State, with machine gun and mauser hurls back the gift once so reluctantly accepted, and forces us to recall what now they still more reluctantly surrender. How bewildering are the ways of Fate!
From a photograph by Mr Westerman
Broken Bridge at Modder River.
Railway wrecking and repairing.
The crossing of the drifts at the two rivers was almost as difficult a task as the overtaking of our ever retreating foes. The railway bridges over both these streams had been blown up by dynamite: some of the stone piers were shattered, and some of the iron girders hurled all atwist into the watery depths beneath; here and there culverts had similarly been destroyed, and at many a point the very rails had been torn by explosives till they looked like a pair of upturned arms imploring help from heaven. We noticed, however, when we got into the Transvaal that the Transvaalers took pity on their own portion of the line, and studiously refrained from shattering it. Some of them were probably shareholders. The less serious damages the Railway Pioneers and the Royal Engineers repaired with a speed that amazed us; and our supply trains never seemed to linger long in the rear of us, except when a massive river bridge was broken. Then a deviation line and a low level trestle bridge had to be constructed. At that fatigue work I have seen whole companies of once smart-looking Guardsmen toiling with spade and pick like Kaffirs, whilst some of their aristocratic officers, bearing lordly titles, played the part of gangers over these soldier-navvies. It was a new version and a more useful one of Ruskin and his collegiate road-makers.
The tale, and tails, of a singed overcoat.