"The country population will need a good deal of help, first to preserve it from starvation, and then, probably, to supply it with a certain amount of capital to make a fresh start. And the great industry of the country will need some little time before it is able to render any assistance. But, in a young country with great recuperative powers, it will not take many years before the economic ravages of the war are effaced."
He then turns to consider the "moral effect" of the recrudescence of the war, which is, in his opinion, more serious than the mere material destruction of the last six months. In the middle of 1900 the feeling in the Orange River Colony and the western districts of the Transvaal was "undoubtedly pacific."
"The inhabitants were sick of the war. They were greatly astonished, after all that had been dinned into them, by the fair and generous treatment they received on our first occupation, and it would have taken very little to make them acquiesce readily in the new régime. At that time, too, the feeling in the Colony was better than I have ever known it."
Recrudescence of the war.
If it had been possible to screen those portions of the conquered territories which were fast settling down to peaceful pursuits from the incursions of the enemy still in the field, the worst results of the guerilla war might have been avoided. But the "vast extent of the country, and the necessity of concentrating our forces for the long advance, first to Pretoria and then to Komati Poort," made this impossible. The Boer leaders raided the country already occupied, but now left exposed; and, encouraged by the small successes thus easily obtained, the commandos reappeared first in the south-east of the Orange River Colony, then in the south-west of the Transvaal, and finally in every portion of the conquered territory.
Those among the burgher population who desired to submit to British rule now found themselves in a position of great difficulty.
"Instead of being made prisoners of war, they had been allowed to remain on their farms on taking the oath of neutrality, and many of them were really anxious to keep it. But they had not the strength of mind, nor, from want of education, a sufficient appreciation of the sacredness of the obligation which they had undertaken, to resist the pressure of their old companions in arms when these reappeared among them appealing to their patriotism and to their fears. In a few weeks or months the very men whom we had spared and treated with exceptional leniency were up in arms again, justifying their breach of faith in many cases by the extraordinary argument that we had not preserved them from the temptation to commit it.
"The general rising at the back of our advanced forces naturally led to the return of a number of our troops, and to a straggling conflict not yet concluded, in which the conduct of our own troops, naturally enough, was not characterised by the same leniency to the enemy which marked our original conquest. We did not, indeed, treat the men who had broken parole with the same severity with which I believe any other nation would have treated them. Entitled as we were by the universally recognised rules of war to shoot the men who, having once been prisoners in our hands and having been released on a distinct pledge to abstain from further part in the war, had once more taken up arms against us, we never in a single instance availed ourselves of that right. But as our columns swept through the revolted country, meeting on every hand with hostility, and even with treachery, on the part of the people whom we had spared, no doubt in some cases the innocent suffered with the guilty. Men who had actually kept faith with us were, in some instances, made prisoners of war, or saw their property destroyed, simply because it was impossible to distinguish between them and the greater number who had broken faith. This, no doubt, resulted in further accessions to the ranks of the enemy. And this tendency was augmented by the evacuation, necessary for military reasons, of a number of places, such as Fauresmith, Jagersfontein, and Smithfield, which we had held for months, and in which we had actually established a reasonably satisfactory civil administration. Latterly, something has been done to check the general demoralisation, and to afford places of refuge for those willing to submit, by establishing camps along the railway lines to which burghers may take themselves, their families, and their stock for protection. No doubt this is a very inadequate substitute for the effectual defence of whole districts. Consequently the camps are mostly tenanted by women and children whose male relatives are, in many cases, in the field against us. But, as far as it goes, it is a good measure, and there can be no doubt that, whenever we succeed in striking a decisive blow at any of the numerous commandos roaming about the country, a good many of their less willing members will find their way to one or other of these camps in order to avoid further fighting."
As the guerilla warfare thus swept back over the new colonies, the Dutch in the Cape Colony, who at one time, about the middle of the preceding year (1900), had seemed disposed to acquiesce in the union of all South Africa under the British flag, became once more restless and embittered.
A carnival of mendacity.