CHAPTER X.
FINANCIAL POLICY OF THE BOERS[14]
1.—Receipt of the Boer Exchequer.
Like every true aristocrat, the Boer has always had a horror of paying taxes; he only approves of taxes paid by others.
At the time of the annexation of the Transvaal by England in 1877, the Government was being crushed by debt, the burghers resolutely refusing to pay their taxes.
Some order was brought into the finances by England; but the Boer revolt in December, 1880, was caused by the determination of Colonel Owen Lanyon, the English Resident, to seize the bullocks and wagons of recalcitrant tax-payers.
The Transvaal Government obtained the Convention of 1881. In 1883, the budget showed £143,000 revenue, and £184,000 expenditure. From April 1st, 1884, to March 31st, 1885, the revenue rose to £161,000, the expenditure remained at £184,000.
In 1886, the gold mines were discovered, and in 1889, the revenue rose to £1,577,000. The crisis of 1890 caused it to drop below the million; in 1892 it rose again, reaching in:—
| 1894 | £2,247,728 |
| 1895 | 2,923,648 |
| 1896 | 3,912,095 |
| 1897 | 3,956,402 |
| 1898 | 3,329,958 |