It Was A Feasible
Device, Though It Must Seem To Us, Who Have Had Such An Experience
Of The Military Virtues Of The Burghers, A Very Desperate One.
But
it is conceivable that the rebels might have held Johannesburg
until the universal sympathy which their cause excited throughout
South Africa would have caused Great Britain to intervene.
Unfortunately they had complicated matters by asking for outside
help.
Mr. Cecil Rhodes was Premier of the Cape, a man of immense
energy, and one who had rendered great services to the empire. The
motives of his action are obscure - certainly, we may say that they
were not sordid, for he has always been a man whose thoughts were
large and whose habits were simple. But whatever they may have
been - whether an ill-regulated desire to consolidate South Africa
under British rule, or a burning sympathy with the Uitlanders in
their fight against injustice - it is certain that he allowed his
lieutenant, Dr. Jameson, to assemble the mounted police of the
Chartered Company, of which Rhodes was founder and director, for
the purpose of co-operating with the rebels at Johannesburg.
Moreover, when the revolt at Johannesburg was postponed, on account
of a disagreement as to which flag they were to rise under, it
appears that Jameson (with or without the orders of Rhodes) forced
the hand of the conspirators by invading the country with a force
absurdly inadequate to the work which he had taken in hand. Five
hundred policemen and three field guns made up the forlorn hope who
started from near Mafeking and crossed the Transvaal border upon
December 29th, 1895.
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