The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1899-12-23

perlal cable to Paul Kruger, there was
much military stir, and speculation
was already then rife regarding a posi-
bic conflict between Boer and Briton.
President Kruger received me in
house protected by an encampment of
mounted police, and when 1 called
upon General JouSert, his office re-
sembled a museum of modern rifles,
for he was discussing with his col
leagues the relative merits OF Mauser,
Krag JOrgensen, Martini Henry, Lebel,
and other makes. Above the town
German engineers were constructing
artillery positions which 1 was not
allowed to inspect, or even approach.
from a distance l was reminded OF
some of the forts about Metz. The
commander of the National artillery, q
broad-faced, gOOd-ratured BOer, and
who locked to me somewhat odd in the
Austrian uniform, showed me over his
camp and dwelt with pride upon the
new barracks and stables in course or
erection. His artillerlsts were physi-
cally a good-looking lot of young men;
the equipment appeared to be of the
best quality; the Krupp guns were
we'll cared for, and there svas besides
an anomalous battery made up of what
was captured from jameson. The Cape
cart in which that invader had made
his progress was treasured as carefully
as is the coach in which Napoleon l
fled from the field of Waterloo.
But of all the military things in anG
about Pretoria none was so significant
to me as a piece Of artillery which had
seem service in the war OF 1881. The
Whole of this machine. might have been
constructed by an average village
blacksmith. The tires of oX-wagOns
had been heated and then wound round
and round something cylindrical, and
so hammered together as to pass for a
cannon by those of US who have seen
specimens constructed in the Middle
Ages This strange instrument was
mounted on the forward end of bull
lock wagon, and the training of it
must have been done by gunners who
believed in a special providence in lieu
of range-fnders.
The Beers love this crazy old gun,
for it symbolizes to them a capacity
TO improvise weapons, and WELD them
successfully when their cause seems
desperate to the rest of the world.
The history of British rule in South
Africa offers many instances of Eng
lish and Dutch fighting side by side
against the common enemy but, we re
has regarded his resistance to the red
coats his highest duty. The bitter feel
ing which today arrays white men
against white men, in the midst of
wilderness where united they are barely
a match for the blacks, springs from
a long chain of events, most of them
highly creditable to the moral sense
of the British parliament, but so far as
political sense is concerned, most I'M
fortunate.
The battle of Waterloo not only re-
suited in populating ST. Helena with
Napoleon 1, but made the Cape Colony
the permanent home of a strong Brit
iSh administration. The year 1915 had
not closed before this administration
came into conflict on the borders of the
Cape Colony with a certain Boer named
BezuidenhOodt, who declined to recog-
nize the authority of a court messen-
ger hailing him for trial. The Boer was
q rough frontiersman, who had as hazy
a notion Of government as some of
Mark Twain's heroes who settled Ne
vada and California half a century ago.
BezuidenEoodt was suspected of car
rying on q, contraband trade with the
natives and likewise of having i'll treat
ed one Of them. The charge may or
not have been well founded, but in any
case the Beers themselves were divided
as to how far England had right 20
stretch her arm into the Black Cont
nent. Soldiers were sent out; Bezuid-
enhoodt resisted and was shot; his
family and neighbors clamored for ven
geance; more soldiers and more Beers
came into conflict, and finally, in 1916,
six of the ringleaderS were tried for
treason and hung at a place called
Slaagter's Mex.
The Great Trek, a wholesale emf
grafton of Beers from the Cape Colony
to the uplands of the interior, did not
commence until 1885, twenty years
later. From Slaagters Mex there went
forth a band of irreconcilable farmers
or cowboys who had so long lived be-
yond the restraint of the law that they
could not reconcile themselves to any
government They had their counter
part in the American frontiersman, who
in these same years was fighting his
way, over the Allegheny mountains,
down the Ohio river, and toward the
Texas border.
While small parties of Beers were, in
these early years, Joining their breth-
rem of rowing, if not lawless tastes, on
the fringes of the then civilized South
Africa, the great body of the people
recognized the good intentions Of the
British government and remained loyal.
Things might have gone on smoothly
enough but for an agitation in Eng
land whose object was the immediate
abolition of slavery. This movement
originated with men full of philanthro-
pic zeal, but empty of political sagac-
ity The Boer farmers had for many
generations worked, their estates by
means of slaves, as was then unives.-
sally the custom in all parts of the
world where black men were to be
found. The Boer recognized the desir-
ability of treating slaves humanely-
he was even prepared to abolish the in
stitution by slow degrees. But he did
resent the injustice and arrogance of
London politicians and missionaries,
who charged him with cruelty and de-
nounced him as a semi-savage. Par
lament, as we all know, voted a large
sum for the purchase of slaves, but
this sum, in the Cape Colony at least,
proved to be so ridiculously inadequate.
that the farmers found themselves
bankrupt as a result of this alleged
generosity. Beers who owned slaves
for whom they had paid $500 apiece
were Unidentified by an offer of $50,
when at the same time each slave was
mortgaged for several times that
amount When the day of esnancipa-
ton arrived 1888, nothing could per-
suade the blacks to remain at
work, and lonely farms were
left valueless by this one stroke
of philanthropic pen. A large
and abiding population of Chris
tian white men were thus forced to
choose between remaining on value
less farm or trekking into the wilder
ness and conquering new territory
from the warlike natives. This Great
Trek took them to the Orange Free
state. to Natal, and to the Transvaal.
There was fighting at every stage OF
their Journey, and the women loaded
the mlrskets for their husbands and
sons. This Great Trek was the scnool
in which Paul Kruger was educated
q school in which there were no books
1.4 The Rih1e and no mechanical arts