If It Had Been Necessary To Prevent Supplies Of Ammunition
From Finding Their Way Into The Country, As It Probably
Was,
one might imagine that the exception should not have been made
in favor of either Boers or Caffres, our
Openly-avowed enemies;
but, nevertheless, the exception was made, and is still continued
in favor of the Boers, while the Bechuanas and Griquas,
our constant friends, are debarred from obtaining a single ounce
for either defense or trade; indeed, such was the state of ignorance
as to the relation of the border tribes with the English, even at Cape Town,
that the magistrates, though willing to aid my researches,
were sorely afraid to allow me to purchase more than ten pounds of gunpowder,
lest the Bechuanas should take it from me by force. As it turned out,
I actually left more than that quantity for upward of two years
in an open box in my wagon at Linyanti.
The lamented Sir George Cathcart, apparently unconscious of what he was doing,
entered into a treaty with the Transvaal Boers, in which articles
were introduced for the free passage of English traders to the north,
and for the entire prohibition of slavery in the free state.
Then passed the "gunpowder ordinance", by which the Bechuanas,
whom alone the Boers dare attempt to enslave, were rendered quite defenseless.
The Boers never attempt to fight with Caffres, nor to settle in Caffreland.
We still continue to observe the treaty. The Boers never did,
and never intended to abide by its provisions; for, immediately on
the proclamation of their independence, a slave-hunt was undertaken
against the Bechuanas of Sechele by four hundred Boers, under Mr. Peit Scholz,
and the plan was adopted which had been cherished in their hearts
ever since the emancipation of the Hottentots. Thus, from unfortunate
ignorance of the country he had to govern, an able and sagacious governor
adopted a policy proper and wise had it been in front of our enemies,
but altogether inappropriate for our friends against whom
it has been applied. Such an error could not have been committed by
a man of local knowledge and experience, such as that noble of colonial birth,
Sir Andries Stockenstrom; and such instances of confounding friend and foe,
in the innocent belief of thereby promoting colonial interests,
will probably lead the Cape community, the chief part of which
by no means feels its interest to lie in the degradation of the native tribes,
to assert the right of choosing their own governors.
This, with colonial representation in the Imperial Parliament,
in addition to the local self-government already so liberally conceded,
would undoubtedly secure the perpetual union of the colony
to the English crown.
Many hundreds of both Griquas and Bechuanas have become Christians
and partially civilized through the teaching of English missionaries.
My first impressions of the progress made were that the accounts
of the effects of the Gospel among them had been too highly colored.
I expected a higher degree of Christian simplicity and purity
than exists either among them or among ourselves.
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