LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
THE OUTLANDERS.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR?']
SIR,—A letter in the Spectator of June 17th, signed Charles H. Fox, reproduces for the hundredth time a misconception which must have perverted the opinion of many Englishmen. It is based on the unfortunate word "Outlander." Take one sentence of Mr. Fox's letter. "These Outlanders
foreigners) are allowed to come as visitors, but the Dutch farmers intend to keep the management of the country in their own hands, which they cannot do if they at once give . the franchise to a crowd of visitors." The paragraph con- jures up at once the image of an isolated territory, distinct in manners, language, and customs, like any European State, from its neighbours, inhabited by a self-centred little com- munity of primitive farmers nursing a peculiar system of life and law, and anxious to keep it unspotted from the
• world. On this secluded corner bursts in a vulturous crowd of goldseekers from lands remote and alien, who desire only to fill their pockets and leave the country poorer in gold and honour than they found it. They have no permanent interest in its institutions, and yet they desire to share in them. This, 1 feel convinced, is a rough sketch of your correspondent's mental picture. It suggests (nrutatis mutandis) a new ver- sion of Israel in Egypt. Let me try to represent the truth. First, as to the relation of the Transvaal to its neighbours, taking it as an "isolated State" to which " foreigners " are attracted for purposes of their own. Secondly, as to the character of the " foreigners " in this "isolated State." In the first place, the Transvaal, as far as its population, its languages, its customs, and on the whole its politics are con- cerned, is simply in the position of a province of what may be called the Commonwealth of South Africa. Were it not for the irksome necessity of swearing and forswearing allegiance and other formalities, the people of Cape Colony, the Free State, and Natal might (as to some extent they do) carry their homes and families across the border without feeling the smallest variety in their method of life or their sur- roundings. They would hear the same easy interchange of languages, Dutch and English, among the majority of the population, would carry on the same methods of farming, I discuss the same social questions, and find the same types of I society. The emigrant, were it not for the artificial dis- tinctions in politics, would find little difference between the Transvaal and the other States of South Africa in choosing his new home. By distorting the position of the Transvaal in relation to its neighbours, by considering it as an isolated and peculiar State, the Englishman can easily overlook the grotesqueness of its political system, just as he feels no surprise in seeing tyranny and freedom jostling one another in neighbouring States of Europe. But the Outlander sees on a background common, as it were, to all the provinces of South Africa, such glaring inequalities as the Transvaal oligarchy and the freedom of British rule. If this is realised, one can hardly be surprised at his dis- content. Secondly, as to the character of the Outlander. He is usually represented as a wolf among lambs ; a keen. faced, greedy stranger from beyond the seas. I am not able to quote exact statistics, but it should be remembered that a vast number of these Outlanders are simply inhabitants of Cape Colony, young men mainly, gone up to the Golden City to get work. There is hardly a family in the old Colony which cannot count more than one of its members "on the Rand." These men change their residence with as little concern as an Englishman would feel in moving from one county to another. They are not on strange ground. They speak the language and are used to the customs of their new land, and would have no objection to transferring their allegiance were they to be treated as citizens. They have not left their homes "to make their fortunes and return," any more than the English man of business who moves his office and his family from one part of England to another. I say nothing of the genuine "foreigners," the English and European immigrants, but be it remembered that Johannes- burg is not populated by speculators and prospectors ; it is absurd to talk of young clerks and men of a moderate business filling their pockets with gold, &c. As for saying that "they come to get rich," the same accusation might be levelled against goldseekers, or indeed any emigrant, in any country of the world ; it was such men who populated [We are extremely glad to publish our correspondent's able and temperate letter, which we believe contains a sound and impartial picture of the situation.—En. Spectator.]
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