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I tell you I have had enough of Boers and their ways; the best day of my life was when old Shepstone ran up the Union Jack there in Pretoria and I could call myself an Englishman once more. Lord! and to think that there are men who are subjects of the Queen and want to be subjects of a Republic again Mad! Captain Niel, I tell you, quite mad! However, there's an end of it all now.
This is the origin of the lie that I helped Shepstone in drawing up this proclamation. Messrs. Kruger and Jorissen left within a month to protest in England against the annexation. Paul Kruger and his colleague, Dr. Jorissen, D.D., the Commission to Europe, leave to-day. I do not think that either of them wishes the Act of Annexation to be cancelled; Dr. Jorissen certainly does not. And Mr.
Anything may happen. They may shoot Shepstone and his staff and the twenty-five policemen, or they may just grumble and go home. Probably they have no fixed plan." "How about the English?" "Oh! we are all crazy with joy, but of course there is no organization and many have no arms. Also there are only a few of us."
Sir Theophilus Shepstone's despatches record his negotiations with President Burgers, and the arrangement which allowed him to make a formal protest against the annexation, so as to satisfy his Irreconcilables, whilst he in reality not only assented to the measure, but even assisted the completion of it, and discussed the details with Shepstone, who in turn had revised President Burgers' 'protest.
Now of course I did not see all of the terrible battle that followed and can only tell of that part of it in which I had a share. Colonel Durnford rode out about three and a half miles to the left front, I really don't quite know why, for already we were hearing firing on the top of the Nqutu Hills almost behind us, where Captain Shepstone was engaging the Zulus, or so I believe.
Sir T. Shepstone also wrote, concerning the reality of the danger, under date December 25: The Boers are still flying, and I think by this time there must be a belt of more than a hundred miles long and thirty broad, in which, with three insignificant exceptions, there is nothing but absolute desolation. This will give your Excellency some idea of the mischief which Cetewayo's conduct has caused.
Whilst these gentlemen were thus satisfactorily arranging matters with Lord Carnarvon, Sir T. Shepstone was making a tour round the country which resembled a triumphal progress more than anything else.
They would further have found that Sir T. Shepstone never represented that the majority of the Boers were in favour of Annexation. What he did say was that most thinking men in the country saw no other way out of the difficulty; but what proportion of the Boers can be called "thinking men?"
I proceeded to the west of Doornberg, and only halted when I reached the Zand River. What memories does the name of that river bring back to me! It was on its banks that in 1852 the English Government concluded a Convention with the Transvaal only to break it when Sir Theophilus Shepstone annexed that country on the 12th of April, 1877.
Had not the English interfered and taken over the Boer country, we should have wasted it from end to end; and they knew it well, and begged your Shepstone to hoist your flag and protect them. Ah, he should have stayed there then!
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