Lord Milner: I think that that is quite understood. I do not understand that this binds the members of the Commission with reference to the opinion which they may express before the Burghers. It only binds them to lay this document before the people, if the British Government approves of it. The telegram which I have just read, and propose to send, makes this clear. I further wish to say that we have departed very much from the Middelburg proposals, and I believe it is fully understood that the Middelburg proposals are absolutely dead, and if this document is agreed to and signed, there can then be no attempt to explain this document or the terms thereof by anything in the Middelburg proposals.
The meeting then adjourned.
Wednesday, May 28, 1902.
The Commission again met Lord Milner and Lord Kitchener at 11 a.m. to hear the reply of the British Government to the draft proposal submitted to them by their Lordships.
Lord Milner read the following Memorandum: "In reply to our last telegram drafted at our last meeting with the consent of the Commission, and of which they have received a copy, the following message has been received from His Majesty's Government: 'His Majesty's Government approves of submitting to the Meeting for a "yes" or "no" vote the document drafted by the Committee, and transmitted to the Secretary of State for War by Lord Kitchener on May 21, with the following alterations[4]:
General Lord Kitchener of Khartoum,
Commanding-in-Chief,
and
His Excellency Lord Milner,
High Commissioner,
on behalf of the British Government,
and
Messrs. S. W. Burger, F. W. Reitz, Louis Botha, J. H. de La Rey, L. J. Meyer, and J. C. Krogh,
acting as the Government of the South African Republic,