In 1881, the Transvaal (under Mr. Gladstone’s administration) was liberated from British control.  It was given back to its own leaders, under certain conditions, agreed to and solemnly signed by the President.  These are the much-discussed conditions of the Convention of 1881, one of these conditions being that Slavery should be abolished.  This condition was indeed, insisted on in every agreement or convention made between the British Government and the Boers; the first being that of 1852, called the Sand River Convention; the second, a convention entered into two years later called the Bloemfontein Convention (which created the Orange Free State); a third agreement as to the cessation of Slavery was entered into at the period of the Annexation, 1877; a fourth was the Convention of 1881; a fifth the Convention of 1884.  I do not here speak of the other terms of these Conventions, I only remark that in each a just treatment of the native races was demanded and agreed to.

The retrocession of the Transvaal in 1881 has been much lauded as an act of magnanimity and justice.  There is no doubt that the motive which prompted it was a noble and generous one; yet neither is there any doubt, that in certain respects, the results of that act were unhappy, and were no doubt unanticipated.  It was on the natives, whose interests appeared to have had no place in the generous impulses of Mr. Gladstone, that the action of the British Government fell most heavily, most mournfully.  In this matter, it must be confessed that the English Government broke faith with the unhappy natives, to whom it had promised protection, and who so much needed it.  In this, as in many other matters, our country, under successive Governments, has greatly erred; at times neglecting responsibilities to her loyal Colonial subjects, and at other times interfering unwisely.

In one matter, England has, however, been consistent, namely, in the repeated proclamations that Slavery should never be permitted under her rule and authority.

The formal document of agreement between Her Majesty’s Government and the Boer leaders, known as the Convention of 1881, was signed by both parties at Pretoria on the afternoon of the 3rd August, in the same room in which, nearly four years before, the Annexation Proclamation was signed by Sir T. Shepstone.

This formality was followed by a more unpleasant duty for the Commissioners appointed to settle this business, namely, the necessity of conveying their message to the natives, and informing them that they had been handed back by Great Britain, “poor Canaanites,” to the tender mercies of their masters, the “Chosen people,” in spite of the despairing appeals which many of them had made to her.