“What do they call fair means?” asked Redgy.
“Buying them of their parents,” answered Baylen. “They will go to a village and demand the help of a number of women to work in their fields or gardens. These women, who dare not refuse, take their children with them, and then they will try to bargain for these, in order to make slaves of them. But the Bechuanas are a very affectionate people, and can very seldom be induced to sell their children. Therefore, as the Boers would tell you, they are obliged to take them by force.”
“You are joking with us, sir, are you not?” said George.
“Indeed I am not. They think that not only is it fair and right that the natives should work without pay for them, but that it is their duty to oblige them so to work.”
“On what possible grounds, Mr Baylen?”
“Because they are an inferior race, over whom the Boers have a natural right. This is no pretence. They really think so. The Boers are, after their fashion, a very religious people. They believe Almighty God has given the black races to be their servants, and that they are only carrying out His will when they reduce them to slavery. Some of them even believe that it is their mission to kill all except those who are thus kept in bondage. They liken themselves to the Israelites when they entered the Promised Land, and the natives to the Canaanites, whom they were to exterminate.”
“And their quarrel with us really is that we won’t allow them to carry out this idea?” asked Margetts.
“At the bottom I am not sure it is not,” replied Baylen. “It is certain that they would carry it out, if it were not for the English. Their usual practice is to do what they did on the occasion I have been telling you about. They circulate a rumour that an attack is going to be made upon them by some tribe. The rumour is almost certain to be false, for the Bechuanas are a very peaceable people. But as soon as the report has taken wind, they march out in force, generally taking with them a number of native allies. These surround the village, keeping the men back with their assegays, while the Boers fire in safety over their heads, until all the males have been destroyed. They then carry off the women, children, and cattle.”
“Horrible!” exclaimed Redgy. “I shall hate these Boers like poison. Why, they must be the most awful cowards, as well as hypocrites!”
“I don’t know about that, Redgy,” remarked George. “They don’t want to encounter danger, if they can help it, no doubt. But it doesn’t follow that they wouldn’t fight, if there was the necessity for doing so. They are like Wilkin Flammock in The Betrothed; you remember what he says. He was ‘ready to fight for life or property, if it was needed; but a sound skin was better than a slashed one, for all that.’ But I thought you told us, sir, that the Boers in your story attacked the Bechuana village without allies.”