It is unnecessary to dwell at length on the Jameson Raid; the world has not yet forgotten how the Administrators of a British province, carrying out a conspiracy headed by the Prime Minister of the Cape Colony, attacked the South African Republic with an armed band in order to assist the Capitalist revolution of Johannesburg in overthrowing the Boer Government; how this raid and this revolution were upset by the vigilance of the Boers; how Jameson and his filibusters were handed over to England to stand their trial—­although the Boers had the power and the right to shoot them down as robbers; how the whole gang of Johannesburg Capitalists pleaded guilty to treason and sedition; how, instead of confiscating all their property, and thus dealing a death blow to Capitalistic influence in South Africa, the Government dealt most leniently with them (an act of magnanimity which was rewarded by their aiding and abetting a still more dangerous agitation three years later).

[Sidenote:  The Parliamentary Commission.]

Nor has the world forgotten how, at the urgent instance of the Africander party in the Cape Colony, an investigation into the causes of the conflict was held in Westminster; how that investigation degenerated into a low attack upon the Government of the sorely maligned and deeply injured South African Republic, and how at the last moment, when the truth was on the point of being revealed, and the conspiracy traced to its fountain head in the British Cabinet, the Commission decided all of a sudden not to make certain compromising documents public.

[Sidenote:  “Constitutional means.”]

Here we see to what a depth the old great traditions of British Constitutionalism had sunk under the influence of the ever-increasing and all-absorbing lust of gold, and in the hands of a sharp-witted wholesale dealer, who, like Cleon of old, has constituted himself a statesman.  Treachery and violence not having been able to attain their objects, “Constitutional means” were to be invoked (as Mr. Rhodes openly boasted before the aforesaid Commission), so as to make Capitalistic Jingoism master of the situation in South Africa.

FOOTNOTES: 

[Footnote 29:  Olive Schreiner, Words in Season, page 62.]

[Footnote 30:  Transvaal Green Book No. 1 of 1896.]

[Footnote 31:  Transvaal Green Book No. 1 of 1896.]

[Footnote 32:  Transvaal Green Book No. 1 of 1896.]

CAPITALISTIC JINGOISM.

SECOND PERIOD.

[Sidenote:  National sentiment in South Africa kindled by the Jameson Raid.]

The foregoing sketch has shown how deeply our people felt and resented the wrong that was done to them.  It was to be expected that such a treacherous attack on the Republics, emanating from their own leader, would awaken the Africanders even in the remotest districts, and would bring fresh energy into the arena of politics.  To give an instance of the measure of the feeling which had been quickened by the raid, a short extract is given below from an article published in the organ of the Africander party, Our Land, a few months after the Raid, an article which undoubtedly expressed the feeling of Africanders:—­