Chapter Eleven.
The Boer Paramount.
The life which our heroes led for the next few weeks in Johannesburg, although excessively useful, was not momentous. They learned to be sure of hitting the centre of the bull’s-eye with every shot. Also, what would be of more service in actual Boer warfare, they mastered the science of taking a bead swiftly and hitting a rapidly moving object. Sword and bayonet exercises were not neglected, nor horse and foot drill.
They saw the miners at work on the tunnel that was slowly crawling towards the German-filled fort, and helped to carry the débris through one of the several exits. This was the most delicate part of the work, yet it was managed without much difficulty by the numerous members who composed the league.
During the daytime they walked about the city or rode over the veldt, getting gradually acquainted with most of their brothers, and learning whom to avoid amongst the inhabitants.
They no longer wondered why the former rising had ended in disaster. Amongst all the crowds who were called Uitlanders not a sixth portion were, even at this time, bona fide Britishers. At the time of Dr Jim’s gallant raid they were not a twelfth part. The rest of the population was made up of Russians, French, and German Jews, with a large sprinkling of other nationalities. Germans mostly, however, predominated, and they made no secret of their deep and violent hatred of everything British. Not a single Englishman was employed in any public department either in Johannesburg or anywhere else throughout the Transvaal. The labourers even, who were employed by Government were either Germans or Hollanders when they were not Kaffirs. In the highest posts were placed Boers, Hollanders, and Germans exclusively. It was a clear case of “no English need apply” to any burgher employer.
The president, Paul Kruger, and his bigoted and ignorant Executive Council had got every concession which crafty greed and tyranny could get from cowardice and treason. They had introduced German soldiers wholesale into their country, and purchased nearly all the arms and ammunition which had entered Africa for the past two years. This, with blind and misplaced confidence, they had been allowed to do by the other colonists. Indeed, throughout Cape Colony and Natal, the Dutch Africanders had been openly spending all their spare money in arming themselves, while the colonials, as a majority, had been watching them doing this, and neglecting to take the same precautions. At the present moment, to all appearance, the Boers and their friends were the only effectively armed people throughout South Africa. We must except, of course, those who were under the influence of Cecil Rhodes—the men of Rhodesia and the Three Ace Club league. Affairs were in a fairly quiescent condition at present. The citizens of Johannesburg had given over asking for their rights, and accepted each fresh insult and oppression quietly, and without outward remonstrance. They knew such were utterly futile with that obstinate bigot, who regarded himself as an avenging instrument in the hands of the Lord.
Neither was it any secret what all these warlike preparations were aiming at. If the Home Government shut its eyes, not a man, woman, or child in Africa but knew that the old man of Pretoria intended nothing less than the subjugating of Africa to the Boers, as soon as matters were ripe enough. They would soon find excuses for their violence and treason when they were ready to begin. As for the anarchy and massacres that would follow, they were satisfied that they would find plenty of defenders amongst the reptile gangs of Little Englanders, who were at present doing their utmost to help them in their work of destruction. It was an open secret that the hated English were to be driven out of Africa, and the country torn from the empire.
This was to be the result of our clemency and weak indulgence to a race who understood only revenge and oppression. The remorseless principles and inhuman tenets of the Boer religion belonged to those dark ages which civilisation and the true knowledge of Christianity has swept from the other portions of the globe where the Bible is known and honoured. Their colonial history is a long record of steadfast atrocity and abuse of power. Wherever they have trekked they have left a broad trail of blood and disaster. Wherever they have settled, progress has ceased to exist. They are, as a race, the most ignorant, the most remorseless, and the rudest of barbarians.