The past history of the Boers in Africa has proved this beyond dispute. They have slaughtered mercilessly, and oppressed their neighbours wherever they have settled. It is only by the strong hand that they have been kept so far within bounds.
Their principal grievance against us is that we freed their slaves, and they nurse this grievance with undying hatred. They have murdered our settlers ruthlessly, betrayed our statesmen, and mocked us for our weaknesses. They remember their supposed wrongs, and lose no chance of repaying them by brutality and treachery, and mock at our generosity in forgetting what they have done.
Ah! the gallant sons we have lost through trusting those ruthless murderers! England may forget, but what of the mothers, wives, sisters, fathers, and brothers of those who lie buried, and yet unavenged?
It is possible to pardon a brave enemy who has fought fairly. As Englishmen, we do this always—but only after we have wiped out the blot. But what true Englishman could forgive the bloody assassin who walks about boasting over his crime? What true Englishman could sit down tamely, and swallow insult and slavery, as well as murder?
These were the inhuman, hating, and ferocious enemies which some Englishmen delighted to honour, sympathise with, and admire, for their treatment of those Englishmen who had saved their Republic from ruin, and poured wealth into their rapacious pockets. The tactics of their obstinate and superstitious president is world known. His shamelessness, greed, craft, and unblushing falsehood, his open enmity, his avarice, and dense stupidity, all these qualities are representative of his people, and what we are asked to admire and sympathise with. Standing as we do afar off, we are apt to forget the atrocious side of the Boer, and regard the ridiculous side with good-natured contempt.
But to those in the midst of it all, it was by no means a matter to laugh at. The constant reminders of those atrocities and disgraces, the wanton insults, the brutal treatment, the persistent turning round of the screw, without a moment of relaxation, were maddening even to the meekest and most long-suffering.
As we have already shown, our heroes did not come of a mute and lowly race. They had British blood in their veins—young English blood that was quickly heated. Since their coming to the Transvaal this blood had been at boiling pitch.
They tried to hearken to the words of prudence as preached by Philip Martin and Mr Raybold. They tried to obey their leaders, and shut their eyes to the daily outrages of justice which they beheld, and act in away which their hearts told them was base cowardice.
They saw ladies hustled rudely by rough and armed clowns from the footpath amongst the mud. They listened to coarse epithets shouted at their countrywomen if they looked indignant at this usage, and did their best to keep their hands in their pockets and their eyes on the ground.
They saw the German mercenaries knock down, kick, and baton the citizens without the slightest provocation, and the citizens take their unmerited punishment without remonstrance, knowing full well there was no possible redress from the Boer authorities. They saw Boers spit on the beards of Englishmen, and they only take out and use their handkerchiefs to wipe the hateful stains away. They saw children ill-treated because their parents were English, and the parents lift up their children and soothe them, without attempting to punish the wretches who had made those innocents weep.