The principle on which the Customs officials conducted the business of their office was observed by other officials of the Republic, and in one department, at least, the abuses have had a very far-reaching and serious effect.  The Field-cornets—­district officials who act as petty justices, registering, and pass officers, collectors of personal taxes, captains of the burgher forces, etc., etc.—­are the officers with whom each newcomer has to register.  This is an important matter, because the period of residence for the purpose of naturalization and enfranchisement is reckoned from the date of registration in the Field-cornet’s books.  As these officials were practically turned loose on the public to make a living the best way they could, many of them, notwithstanding that they collected the taxes imposed by law, omitted to enter the names of new arrivals in their books, thus securing themselves against having to make good these amounts in event of an inspection of the books.  Many of the Field-cornets were barely able to write; they had no ‘offices,’ and would accept taxes and registrations at any time and in any place.  The chances of correct entry were therefore remote.  The result of this is very serious.  The records are either ‘lost’ when they might prove embarrassing, or so incorrectly or imperfectly kept as to be of no use whatever; and settlers in the Transvaal from 1882 to 1890 are in most cases unable to prove their registration as the law requires, and this through no fault of their own.

In the country districts justice was not a commodity intended for the Britisher.  Many cases of gross abuse, and several of actual murder occurred; and in 1885 the case of Mr. Jas. Donaldson, then residing on a farm in Lydenburg—­lately one of the Reform prisoners—­was mentioned in the House of Commons, and became the subject of a demand by the Imperial Government for reparation and punishment.  He had been ordered by two Boers (one of whom was in the habit of boasting that he had shot an unarmed Englishman in Lydenburg since the war, and would shoot others) to abstain from collecting hut taxes on his own farm; and on refusing had been attacked by them.  After beating them off single-handed, he was later on again attacked by his former assailants, reinforced by three others.  They bound him with reims (thongs), kicked and beat him with sjamboks (raw-hide whips) and clubs, stoned him, and left him unconscious and so disfigured that he was thought to be dead when found some hours later.  On receipt of the Imperial Government’s representations, the men were arrested, tried and fined.  The fines were stated to have been remitted at once by Government, but in the civil action which followed Mr. Donaldson obtained L500 damages.  The incident had a distinctly beneficial effect, and nothing more was heard of the maltreatment of defenceless men simply because they were Britishers.  Moreover, with the improvement in trade which followed the gold discoveries of 1885 and 1886 at Moodies and Barberton, the relations between the two races also improved.  Frequent intercourse and commercial relations begot a better knowledge of each other, and the fierce hatred of the Britisher began to disappear in the neighbourhood of the towns and the goldfields.