On the subject of South Africa Mr. Chamberlain pointed out
that his great object was to unite the Dutchmen and the' Englishmen in the administration of African affairs, and declared that but for the folly of the Jameson raid, there would have been very little, if any, difference between the Englishmen and the Dutchmen in relation to our Colonial policy. Even now, while he was determined to act with the strictest justice towards the Boers, he did not at all despair of persuading the Boers that they could no longer refuse the Outlanders a fair share in the government of the Transvaal without rendering the grievances of the great majority of Transvaal subjects quite intolerable, and so endangering that independence of the Transvaal on behalf of which they were reasonably jealous. He spoke quite frankly of the injustices, the abuses, and the " corruption " of the Boer administra- tion, and declared it to be the positive duty of the paramount State,—the United Kingdom,—to get the Boers to remove these abuses for their own sakes as well as for the sake of the Englishmen. And he concluded with a rebuke to the panic which exists as to the power of the English settlers in Matabeleland to hold their own against the revolt of the natives. In troubles of this kind English settlers had always shown themselves able to defend themselves, and they would do so now. It was a singularly frank and manly speech.
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