NOTE Ir has been impossible to avoid in this volume more or less pointed reference to certain nationalities in certain connections; for instance such expressions as "the Boers," "the Cape Dutch," "the Hollanders," "the Germans," are used. The writer desires to say once and for all that unless the contrary is obviously and deliberately indicated, the distinctions between nationalities are intended in the political sense only and not in the racial sense, and if by mischance there should be found something in these pages which seems offensive, he begs the more indulgent interpretation on the ground of a very earnest desire to remove and not to accentuate race distinctions. General references are also made to classes-" the civil service," "the officials," &c. There are officials in the Transvaal service who would earn the confidence and esteem of the public in any administration in the world. It is hardly necessary to say that there is no intention to disparage them. |