bey--"Nae halvers and quarters,--hale o' mine ain and nane o' my
neighbours." The bankrupt Boer had to let his enterprising neighbour
in to do the digging, or get no gold at all.

[Sidenote: _Hated Johannesberg._]

Nevertheless, the upspringing as by magic of the great city of
Johannesberg in the midst of the dreary veldt filled Kruger's soul
with loathing. When once asked to permit prospecting for minerals
around Pretoria, he replied, "Look at Johannesberg! We have enough
gold and gold seekers in the country already!" The presence of this
ever-growing multitude was felt to be a perpetual menace to Dutch, and
more especially to Dopper supremacy. So, in his frankly confessed
detestation of them, their Dopper President for five years at a
stretch never once came near them, and when at last he ventured to
halt within twenty miles of their great city it was thus he commenced
his address to the crowd at Krugersdorp:--"Burghers, friends,
_thieves_, _murderers_, _newcomers_, and others." The reek of the Rand
was evidently even then in his nostrils; and the mediaeval saint that
could smell a heretic nine miles off was clearly akin to Kruger.
Unfortunately for him the "newcomers" outnumbered the old by five to
one, and were a bewilderingly mixed assortment, representing almost
every nationality under the whole heaven. In what had suddenly become
the chief city of the Transvaal, with a white population of over
50,000, only seven per cent. were Dutch, and sixty-five per cent. were
British. These aliens from many lands paid nearly nine-tenths of the
taxes, yet were persistently denied all voice alike in national and
municipal affairs. "Rights!" exclaimed the angry President when
appealed to for redress, "Rights! They shall win them only over my
dead body!" At whatever cost he was stubbornly resolved that as long
as he lived the tail should still wag the dog instead of the dog the
tail; and that a continually dwindling minority of simple farmer folk
should rule an ever-growing majority of enterprising city men. Though
the political equality of all white inhabitants was the underlying
condition on which self-government was restored to the Transvaal, what
the Doppers had won by bullets they would run no risk of losing
through the ballot box, and so one measure of exclusion after another
rapidly became law. When reminded that in other countries Outlanders
were welcomed and soon given the franchise, the shrewd old President
replied, "