me Reuter's Agent, Mr. Mackay, and the
odious Malan. I received them sitting on my bed in the dormitory, and
when they had lighted cigars, of which I always kept a stock, we had a
regular _durbar_. I began:

'Well, Mr. Grobelaar, you see how your Government treats representatives
of the Press.'

_Grobelaar_. 'I hope you have nothing to complain of

_Self_. 'Look at the sentries with loaded rifles on every side. I might
be a wild beast instead of a special correspondent.'

_Grobelaar_. 'Ah, but putting aside the sentries with loaded rifles, you
do not, I trust, Mr. Churchill, make any complaint.'

_Self_. 'My chief objection to this place is that I am in it.'

_Grobelaar_. 'That of course is your misfortune, and Mr. Chamberlain's
fault.

_Self_. 'Not at all. We are a peace-loving people, but we had no choice
but to fight or be--what was it your burghers told me in the
camps?--"driven into the sea." The responsibility of the war is upon you
and your President.'

_Grobelaar_. 'Don't you believe that. We did not want to fight. We only
wanted to be left alone.'

_Self_. 'You never wanted war?'

_de Souza_. 'Ah, my God, no! Do you think we would fight Great Britain
for amusement?'

_Self_. 'Then why did you make every preparation--turn the Republics
into armed camps--prepare deep-laid plans for the invasion of our
Colonies?'

_Grobelaar_. 'Why, what could we do after the Jameson Raid? We had to be
ready to protect ourselves.'

_Self_. 'Surely less extensive armaments would have been sufficient to
guard against another similar inroad.'

_Grobelaar_. 'But we knew your Government was behind the Raiders.
Jameson was in front, but Rhodes and your Colonial Office were at his
elbow.'

_Self_. 'As a matter of fact no two people were more disconcerted by the
Raid than Chamberlain and Rhodes. Besides, the British Government
disavowed the Raiders' action and punished the Raiders, who, I am quite
prepared to admit, got no more than they deserved.'

_de Souza_. 'I don't complain about the British Government's action at
the time of the Raid. Chamberlain behaved very honourably then. But it
was afterwards, when Rhodes was not punished, that we knew it was all a
farce, and that the British Government was bent on our destruction. When
the burghers knew that Rhodes was not punished they lost all trust in
England.'

_Malan_. 'Ya, ya. That Rhodes, he is the ... at the bottom of it all.
You wait and see what we will do to