President's Lager,
In the Veld,
March 28, 1902.
Your Honour,
I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of Your Honour's despatch of the 24th inst., enclosing correspondence between Your Honour and His Excellency Lord Kitchener.
As I have been suffering from my eyes for six or seven weeks, and since, as you know, almost all our doctors have been captured or have left us, I was obliged to proceed to General de la Rey in order to place myself here under the medical treatment of Dr. von Rennenkampff.
I am still under that treatment and am therefore obliged to meet Your Honour in the South African Republic.
I am prepared to meet Your Honour in the neighbourhood of Klerksdorp or Potchefstroom, on any farm in that neighbourhood which His Excellency Lord Kitchener may consider most suitable, or even in one of those towns, if desirable. When fixing the place of meeting, I wish to leave it to Your Honour to obtain a guarantee from His Excellency Lord Kitchener for me and my Government, with the necessary attendants, that we shall be allowed quietly and unhindered to continue our work there for a definite time, as well as a safe-conduct to proceed unhindered to the place of meeting and to return thence unhindered.
I have the honour to be,
Your Honour's obedient servant,
M. T. Steyn,
State President, O.F.S.
On receipt of the above letter the Government addressed the following communication to Lord Kitchener:—
To His Excellency Lord Kitchener, Commander-in-Chief of the British Troops, Pretoria.
Kroonstad,
March 31, 1902.