ho had fought bravely for the Boer cause, to
his brother, the famous general. 'Which is better for the Republics,'
he asked, 'to continue the struggle and run the risk of total ruin as
a nation, or to submit? Could we for a moment think of taking back
the country if it were offered to us, with thousands of people to be
supported by a Government which has not a farthing?... Put passionate
feeling aside for a moment and use common-sense, and you will then agree
with me that the best thing for the people and the country is to
give in, to be loyal to the new government, and to get responsible
government...Should the war continue a few months longer the nation will
become so poor that they will be the working class in the country, and
disappear as a nation in the future... The British are convinced that
they have conquered the land and its people, and consider the matter
ended, and they only try to treat magnanimously those who are continuing
the struggle in order to prevent unnecessary bloodshed.'

Such were the sentiments of those of the burghers who were in favour of
peace. Their eyes had been opened and their bitterness was transferred
from the British Government to those individual Britons who, partly from
idealism and partly from party passion, had encouraged them to their
undoing. But their attempt to convey their feelings to their countrymen
in the field ended in tragedy. Two of their number, Morgendaal and
Wessels, who had journeyed to De Wet's camp, were condemned to death by
order of that leader. In the case of Morgendaal the execution actually
took place, and seems to have been attended by brutal circumstances, the
man having been thrashed with a sjambok before being put to death.
The circumstances are still surrounded by such obscurity that it is
impossible to say whether the message of the peace envoys was to the
General himself or to the men under his command. In the former case the
man was murdered. In the latter the Boer leader was within his rights,
though the rights may have been harshly construed and brutally enforced.

On January 29th, in the act of breaking south, De Wet's force, or a
portion of it, had a sharp brush with a small British column (Crewe's)
at Tabaksberg, which lies about forty miles north-east of Bloemfontein;
This small force, seven hundred strong, found itself suddenly in the
presence of a very superior body of the enemy, and had some difficulty
in extricating itself. A pom-pom was lost