’7.  We make known that when we shall have framed a code of laws for our guidance, copies shall be forwarded to this colony for general information; but we take the opportunity of stating that it is our firm resolve to make provision for the summary punishment, even with death, of all traitors, without exception, who may be found amongst us.

’8.  We purpose, in the course of our journey, and on arrival at the country in which we shall permanently reside, to make known to the native tribes our intentions, and our desire to live in peace and friendly intercourse with them.

’9.  We quit this colony under the full assurance that the English Government has nothing more to require of us, and will allow us to govern ourselves without its interference in future.

’10.  We are now leaving the fruitful land of our birth, in which we have suffered enormous losses and continual vexation, and are about to enter a strange and dangerous territory; but we go with a firm reliance on an all-seeing, just, and merciful God, whom we shall always fear, and humbly endeavour to obey.

’In the name of all who leave the colony with me,

  ‘P.  Retief.’

But formal declarations such as the above are not in all instances to be trusted.  It is much safer to compare numerous documents written at different times, by different persons, and under different circumstances.  For our subject this means of information is as complete as can be desired.  The correspondence of the emigrants with the Cape Government was the work of many individuals, and extended over many years.  The letters are usually of great length, badly constructed, and badly spelt—­the productions, in short, of uneducated men; but so uniform is the vein of thought running through them all, that there is not the slightest difficulty in condensing them into a dozen pages.  When analyzed, the statements contained in them are found to consist of two charges, one against the Imperial Government, the other against the agents in South Africa of the London Missionary Society.

The Imperial Government was charged with exposing the white inhabitants of the colony, without protection, to robbery and murder by the blacks; with giving credence in every dispute to statements made by interested persons in favour of savages, while refusing to credit the testimony, no matter how reliable, of colonists of European extraction; with liberating the slaves in an unjust manner; and generally with such undue partiality for persons with black skins and savage habits, as to make it preferable to seek a new home in the wilderness than remain under the English flag.

The missionaries of the London Society were charged with usurping authority that should properly belong to the civil magistrate; with misrepresenting facts; and with advocating schemes directly hostile to the progress of civilization, and to the observance of order.  And it was asserted that the influence of these missionaries was all powerful at the Colonial Office in London, by which the colony, without a voice in the management of its affairs, was then ruled absolutely.