13th Oct.
Ix the August issue of the Fortnightly Review there is an article by Mr. H. A. Bryden, headed " British and Dutch in South Africa," in which the prospects of the war on which we ing are discussed. Mr. evidently was to iand from going to wa jow for that, but it is well to study the article, that we may no illusions about the magnitude of the task that we are undertaking. Mr. Bryden does nov deny "the misgover..nent, corruption, and mala of the Transvaal authorities." "He owns that " Pr Jent Kriiger has ad his chances, which, chiefly from fear, suspicion, ignorance, and sheer dogged obstinacy, he has thrown away. On the other hand, great allowances were due and have been made to a people whose forefathers were not always fairly treated by former British Governments, whose ignorance is almost inconceivable to European people, and whose population is, compared with the millions of Great Britain, absurdly trifling." He points out that the British and Dutch in South Africa were rapidly coming together, and would have been shortly fused into one people but. for the unhappy Jameson Raid and the share in it of Mr. Rhodes. Mr. Bryden fears, and his fears are justified by facts, that the Orange Free State Dutch and a large number of Boers from the Cape Colony and other parts of South Africa will throw in their lot with those with whom they are allied by bonds of blood and sympathy in the Transvaal. He says: "'Len years ago such a thing would never have happened, but now, is the state of feeling in South Africa among the Dutch, partly owing to the mistakes of Mr. Rhodes, partly we the effects of mischievous agitators on either side in the Transvaal and Cape Colony, that many, well competent to judge, believe firmly that an armed attempt by the British to coerce the Transvaal into better government and less oppressive ways will result in a general conflagration."
Mr. Bryden does justice to the coolness, fairness, and moderation of Sir Alfred Milner, and believes that he has honestly convinced himself that a crisis has arrived in which only a display of great firmness is of any avail, while it_is allowed that, in' the case of President Kriiger, firmness unbacked by force is *hopeless. But events have brought us to the verge of a great Colonial struggle, and Mr. Bryden goes on to "{consider what the elements of that struggle will be. In Cape Colony there are roughly 230,000 Dutch Afrikanders against 146,000 British, germans, and other white races. "Te is more than probable that at least 50,000 able-bodied Dutch farmers, good vold-men and riders, and expert from their youth up with the rifle, could be raised in Cape Colony." Of the British rural population not more than 10,000 or 12,000 fighting men could be mustered. Since the Jameson Raid the tide of Cape Dutch sentiment has been running strongly in sympathy with thei kinsman beyond the Vaal River, and in the event of a racial they would form an army corps of 50,000 irregular horse, " capable of moving rapidly about the counuy, providing their own arms and comniissariat, and capable, until lange reinforcements arrive from England, of dominating a great portion, if not the whole, of Cape Colony, as well as of cutting off railway communication with the interior... The 12,000
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.