Should this unfortunately happen you must understand that at whatever sacrifice it is imperatively necessary that Her Majesty's forces in Natal and the Transvaal must be reinforced by the immediate despatch of the military and naval contingents now operating in the Cape, or such portion of them as may be required. This is necessary not only for the safety of the Transvaal, for the defence of which Her Majesty's Government are immediately concerned, but also in the interest of the Cape, since a defeat of the Zulu King would act more powerfully than any other means in disheartening the native races of South Africa."

- FEB. Lord Carnarvon resigns.-Lord Carnarvon resigns office owing to a difference of views between himself and his colleagues on the Eastern Question. [His confederation scheme accordingly fell to the ground.]

The Zululand boundary question.-Sir Henry Bulwer, Lieutenant-Governor of Natal, arranges that the Zululand boundary question shall be submitted to the arbitration of three Commissioners, the final award to be given by Sir Bartle Frere. [This dispute between the Zulus and the Boers dated from 1861. In accordance with their usual tactics the Boers had overflowed their boundaries, and had by this time established 75 farms of the usual dimensions-about 6,000 acres each-and a number of homesteads on land which the Zulus claimed to be theirs. The Zulus made reprisals, repeatedly attacking the Boers, burning their farmhouses, seizing or destroying their crops, and causing the settlers and their families to run for their lives. At the beginning of 1878 a still more serious collision appeared to be imminent, and it was only averted by Sir Henry Bulwer's action. See July (6).]

- MARCH 12. Great Britain takes over Walfisch Bay.-Influenced by the activity of German missionaries and traders in Damaraland and Namaqualand, by the report of Mr. Coates Palgrave [see 1876 (b)], and by the disordered condition of the country, Sir Bartle Frere urges the British Government to annex. [His fears as to German designs were regarded as groundless; but the Government consented to annex Walfisch Bay, with a strip of territory 40 miles long, north and south, and extending 20 miles inland.]

18. A general rising of Kaffirdom feared.-Sir Bartle Frere writes to Mr. R. W. Herbert :

"I do not think I ever expressed to you my conviction, which has been gradually and unwillingly growing, that Shepstone and others of experience in the country were right as to the existence of a wish among the great chiefs to make this (Kaffir) war a general and simultaneous rising of Kaffirdom against white civilisation.”

[On this point, see also Dec. 12.]

APRIL 4. Another Boer deputation to England.A meeting of "the people" at Doornfontein [now a suburb of Johannesburg] resolves to send a second deputation to London. [Mr. Kruger and Mr. Piet Joubert were sent, with Mr. Bok as secretary. They were informed by Sir M. Hicks-Beach, in a letter dated Aug. 6, that it was "impossible, for many reasons that the Queen's sovereignty should now be withdrawn."]

APRIL 30. Secocoeni and Cetewayo.-Sir T. Shepstone writes :

"I find that Secocoeni acts as a kind of lieutenant to Cetewayo. He receives directions from the Zulu King, and these directions are by Secocoeni issued to the various Basuto tribes in the Transvaal."

- MAY. The Transkei annexed.-Kaffir tribes subdued. The Transkei territory annexed by British.

20. Mr. Kruger dismissed from office. - By direction of Sir T. Shepstone, the following letter is sent to Mr. Kruger :

"OFFICE OF SECRETARY TO GOVERNMENT, "TRANSVAAL, May 20, 1878.

'SIR,-I am directed by the Administrator to inform you that, in accordance with the provisions of the law under which you were appointed a member of the Executive Council, your tenure of that office expired on the 4th Nov. last.

"After the line of conduct which you have thought it right to pursue with regard to this Government, and especially after the undisguised notification which you have given it in the letter addressed by you and Mr. Joubert, of the 14th inst., to the Administrator, that you intend to persevere in an agitation that threatens, as you yourself believe, danger and ruin to the country, his Excellency sees no advantage, and does not feel justified, in suspending the operation of the law any longer for the purpose of enabling you to retain that office and the pay attached to it. I am also under the necessity of calling your attention to the fact that on the 8th January last, when you personally applied to me at Pretoria to be paid the arrear salary due to you, which, according to law, was at the rate of £200 a year, you demanded salary at the rate of £300, on the ground that you had been promised that increased rate before your first departure for Europe; and that, relying upon your word, and influenced by your urgency, as well as by a desire to avoid the appearance even of any breach of faith on the part

of his Excellency, who was then absent from the seat of Government, I paid you at this increased rate, without further question, and without authority. I now find that the only ground you had for preferring this claim was a private conversation with the Administrator, in which you complained that your salary was inadequate, whereupon he told you that he wished to retain your services to aid the new Government, and that he would recommend that you should be retained permanently as a member of the Executive Council, to be called up for your advice when required, at a salary of £300 per annum, instead of the £200 to which you then were entitled.

"The reply you made was that you were a representative man, and must act according to the feelings of those you represented, but that when you were relieved from those trammels you could act according to your own convictions. You neither accepted nor rejected the proposal, and nothing has since passed to renew or confirm it; therefore you were not justified in making the demand you did, and I have made myself responsible for the payment to you without authority of the amount in excess of your usual salary.

"I have, etc.,

"(Signed) M. Osborn,

"S. J. P. KRUGER, Esquire."

"Secretary to Government."

The letter of May 14, referred to above, was one handed to Sir T. Shepstone by Mr. Kruger and Mr. Joubert an hour or so before their departure for England. In it they indicated their intention not to abide by the result of their mission, should it be adverse to the object they had in view (the annulling of the annexation), and, in declaring that the annexation had failed to bring about the promised success and welfare, they described the state of things as "threatening danger and general ruin," which, in their opinion, could be averted only "by justice being done to our country and people." In for

warding this letter to Sir Michael Hicks-Beach, Sir T. Shepstone said: "The only act which from their point of view would be a measure of justice sufficient to prevent the calamities to which they allude is the retransfer of the Transvaal to them." In his reply to Mr. Kruger and Mr. Joubert Sir T. Shepstone wrote:

"With regard to the danger and ruin to which you point as certain to follow the refusal of Her Majesty's Government to withdraw from the Transvaal, I feel that I should not be doing my duty . . . if I hesitated for a moment to express to you my deliberate opinion, formed upon sufficient knowledge and observation, that upon the conduct of you two gentlemen will the momentous issue you describe entirely depend. No two men in the Transvaal have done more to make the general ruin you deprecate possible than you have, and upon no shoulders will the responsibility of averting it press so heavily as upon yours."

- JULY. (a) The troubles with Zululand.—One of the wives of a Zulu chief flies in a wounded condition from Zululand twelve miles into Natal for protection, but is followed two days later by a considerable force of Zulus, who threaten the police if they interfere, carry off the woman to Zulu territory, and there kill her. [A similar outrage followed soon after. Sir H. Bulwer demanded that the leaders should be surrendered for trial in Natal. Cetewayo offered £50 instead.]

-- (6) The Zululand boundary question.-The three Commissioners appointed by Sir Henry Bulwer in February to deal with the boundary question report greatly in favour of the claims of the Zulus. Sir Bartle Frere, who is to make the final award, takes time to consider the subject, in order to personally inquire into it. [See Nov. 16.]