The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1900-11-04
KRUGER at SEVENTY-FIvE
SECRET OF THE BoER PRESIDENTS
DOWNFALL MADE PLAIN.
Once q True Patriot, Greed Finally
Corrupted Him and Blinded Him
to Real Public Interests.


The South African war began twelve
! months ago to-day.
Paul Kruger was born seventy-hve years
| ago yesterday.
| All of that three-quarters of century
has been for him and for his people a
| period of strife. of struggle. of vain wrest-
| ling with the irresistible forces of evolution
and development. Now. in his old age. he
stands an exile from his country, a fugitive
from the champion of progress. The fittest
| has survived, and President Kruger is now
but figure in history
| But his is a notable figure. All the coarse
| ness of his peasantism. all the meanness of
his actions, all the corruption of his gov
| eminent cannot remove from him the
| grandeur OF a great personality.
| Absolutely illiterate, unable to read a let
| ter, writing only that curious scrawl S. J.
| z. Kruger, he has invented and fought for
a policy that needed the largest army
Great Britain has ever dispatched from her
shores to crush and annihilate it. Kruger
ism is something actual and practical. the
| definite aspiration of statesman, the life's
| longing of man who at one time was a
| patriot.
senile greed. Paul Krugers dream of indie
pendence was as pure and praiseworthy as
| that Of William Wallace or of Werner
| Stauffacher. He yearned to keep in its pas
| toral simplicity the little sanctuary he had
| formed away from the restraints and the
| vices of civilization.
| To him the state was but an expansion
| OF the huis-houding, with all its cares and
worries, augmented, indeed, vet calling for
Justice he mo -
did the little homestead the veldt He
could not imagine any national problem
too complex to be settled over cup of
coffee upon his house stoep. With his mis-
read Bible for political handbook, and his
memory for constitutional history. he dared
rule nation and conduct diplomatic af-
fairs.
With the advent of revenues came the
need for steward and i'm his blindness
he invoked the aid Of the Holander. There
in lies the whole explanation of Kruger's
fall.
At no time We're the Hollanders affected
by the sentiment that made the Boer
gallant foe, worthy enemy. They merely
exploited the Transvaal for what of advan-
tage 1T might hold for them. They hated
the uitlander because he was mentally and
In education their equal. i'm probity their
superior. They sucked the blood of the
Boer indiscrimnately with that of the
Briton. and they intrigued against the
Transvaaler as they did against the Eng
lishman and Scotsman.
A DESPOTS REASONS.
Years ago 1 asked Paul Kruger why he
employed so many Hollanders in govern
ment offices when there was so fine crop
of youthful, educated Afrikanders ripe to
his hand. He said: 'Afrikanders I cannot
use. They would not be true TO me- Eng
lishmen l cannot USE They are honest, but
they bluntly tell me they are my enemies
The HollanderS fear me. If L growi at
them they tremble. I can use them"
And so, TO maintain his personal power
Paul Kruger surrounded himself with an
encourage OF Hollanders, a Gordon of cor
ruption. Meanly servile when seeking
work. the typical Transvaal Hollander is
tyrant wherever he is possessed of little
brief authority. From end to end of the
republic he was hated, and when the war
came, the old takhaar shouldered his
Mauser, muttering whichever way the
war goes now we shall get rid of the Hol-
lander"
There was throughout the campaign a
Hollander commando until feeling became
so strong between it's members and the
Beers IL had to be disbanded. The Hol-
landers, when matters had sufficiently de-
veloped met in conference i'm Pretoria,
and dispatched cable to their Queen. beg
ging for battleship to carry them safely
away from the country they had fattenei
upon so long.
Those were the men who made the war.
and who had repaid Paul Kruger's gen.
crosby by selling his presidency and his
country's independence.
The engineering of the debacle was easy
and congenal work to the Hollander in
triguants. Four or five years ago they
realized that Paul Kruger was nearing his
end, and that with his death would come
The jameson raid afforded them a text
| from which TO preach British covetous-
ness and British treachery.
When President Steyn. the vainest ami
| Africa. defeated Mr.. Fraser at the polls.
| he was approached and offered the dual
presidency if he would cast in his lot with
| the Transvaal in war with Great Brit
ain. AS he himself assured me at Kroon-
| stadt. he felt the independence of his re-
| public was menaced by Great Britain. and
| the struggle must come now or he wouid
| be submerged
| The Hollanders fancied there was a
| chance, by purchased sympathy on the
| continent. by judicious Utilization of in
| to the prejudices of the peace party in
| England, 10 make war without suffering
| permanent loss. In any event Transvaal
| Hollanders have always fshed successful
| ~ in troubled waters. and the subsequent
| loss would be To the Beers. not to them.
| Those of US who watched things in the
| Transvaal in the months preceding Lord
| Roberts's occupation Of Pretoria know best
what skilled anglers they proved them
| selves TO be.
| And so the intrigue developed. to become
| n national policy. Paul Kruger was blind.
| and Sir Alfred Miner stayed his hand at
| the beginning. Later no man might stay
GREAT BOERS FOR PEACE.
1t is well to remember. however, that in
] the last secret session of the Volksraad-the
| session that authorized, twelve months
| ago, the dispatch of its insolent ultimatum
| TO Great Britain--the best of the Beers
voted for peace. Those who voted then
| against the issue of the ultimatum in
| cluded Commandant General Joubert, Gen.
| eran Louis Botha, General De Ia Rey,
! General Lukas Meyer. General and Vice
/ President Schalk Burger and Mr. Barnard,
who was killed at Derdepoort.
Those were the patriots among the Beers
the men who were never under the Hol-
| lander influence, the men who fought the
/ hardest for peace and have since fought
| the stoutest for their country In the field.
| Paul Kruger was not OF that number. He
had determined on war.
/ ascribe his willingness to meet Great
Britain in battle TO religious rather than
| to political sentiments. A healthy belief
| has become with him a morbid fanaticism.
| To this moment he believes God will vet
/ grant him the victory even If 1t requires
! the scattering of all Lord Roberts's trans
| ports on their homeward journey. His
/ faith il as the faith of the Cromwellians
/! end the Cameronians. His religion does
| not AFFECT himself or his. conduct. but
( is strictly binding upon his interiors and
| his opponents.
| And yet he is sincere. In these late