this course will meet
your views.

When I had the pleasure of receiving you here on the 8th inst. we
discussed the other principal questions which, in addition to those of
the boundary and the debt, you had submitted to me in previous
correspondence, and I explained to you generally the nature and extent
of the concessions which Her Majesty's Government would be able to make
in regard to them. You were satisfied with these explanations, as far as
they were put before you; and the progress which has been made appears
to me to render it convenient that I should now transmit for your
perusal a draft of the new Convention which Her Majesty's Government
propose in substitution for the Convention of Pretoria. In this draft
the Articles of the Convention of Pretoria, which will be no longer in
force, have been printed alongside of the proposed new Articles, and
where an Article is retained and altered, the alterations have been
shown in order to explain clearly the changes which will be made. You
will find that in the draft, and the map which accompanies it, the
conclusions which have been arrived at in the course of our
communications have been closely adhered to and accurately expressed,
and I trust that you will experience no difficulty in understanding and
agreeing to each of its provisions. If, however, there should be any
point as to which you are doubtful, it may be convenient that you should
again meet me here and receive such further explanations as may be
desirable.

It does not appear to me to be necessary that I should refer in detail
to each Article of the draft. You will observe that in the preamble and
throughout the Convention the wish of your Government that the
designation "South African Republic" should be substituted for
"Transvaal State" has been complied with. In the first Article the
extension of the Western boundary is precisely defined as agreed to. By
the omission of those Articles of the Convention of Pretoria which
assigned to Her Majesty and to the British Resident certain specific
powers and functions connected with the internal government and the
foreign relations of the Transvaal State your Government will be left
free to govern the country without interference, and to conduct its
diplomatic intercourse and shape its foreign policy subject only to the
requirement embodied in the fourth Article of the new draft--that any
treaty with a foreign State shall not have effect without the approval
of