and the family of a son-in-law.  After the evening meal the service was led by the blind man, the daughter reading some chapters in the Bible indicated by him.  The two old men and I occupied separate cots in one small side room.  Happening to wake up at dawn the following morning, I saw those old men sit up facing each other, with their feet upon the floor, and begin their morning hymn of praise, after which the house resounded with younger voices from the other end with a similar song.  I do not call to mind any special untidiness at that poor blind man’s house to warrant his sobriquet; my recollections are, on the contrary, of the happiest, and I mentally called him clean Brits, clean every whit.  In another part of the country I was privileged to meet with a family, which included a grown-up blind daughter,’ who had St. John’s Gospel in raised letters.  While reading with her fingers her upturned face would shine with joy when repeating some of the salient, consoling, and sustaining verses.  And how common are the records among those simple Boers of happy and triumphant death-bed scenes of old and young, softening the grief of the bereaved believers.  Frivolous education and advanced surroundings are accountable for a certain waning of the original habits of serious piety; this is to some extent more the case among the Cape Colonial and Orange Free State Boers, the declension appearing greatest with those residing in or in close proximity to towns.  Among the men of exemplary and consistent piety in the Transvaal are conspicuous:  President Krueger, State Secretary Reitz, Commandant-General Joubert, General Piet Cronje, and others holding highest positions, and also many of the Volksraad members, including the late General Kock.

Upon the occasion when the Transvaal Executive, with the assembled Volksraads, finally determined upon war, and the momentous matter had been considered of handing over the passports to Mr. Greene, the British agent, just before signing them, President Krueger was observed occupied in silent prayer for a few moments, while many of the others bowed their heads similarly engaged, after which the documents were firmly completed.  When the first commandoes were about to depart for the field, the President addressed a farewell to the burghers, assuring them that God’s aid could confidently be implored for their just cause; he also quoted part of the Verse, “Whosoever shall seek to save his life shall lose it,” intending it as an exhortation for the timorous, warning them of the greater danger incurred by retreat or flight than when maintaining a manful stand. (The reader will know that the above quotation does not complete the verse, the rest being, “But whosoever shall lose his life for my sake or for the Gospel shall preserve it.”)

It points to the operation of most persevering and subtle agencies and potent illusions that could mislead and carry away the chief men and the most intelligent of the Boer nation so far as to engender the erroneous convictions which caused them to court the present war and to consider it just.  As to the bulk of the people, they are in turn led astray by their leaders’ example and opinions as victims of the general delusion.