n contemptuously by the grim old President from the Volksraad to
the customary committee of true-blue "doppers," whose ignorance of the
industrial conditions of the Rand was equalled only by their personal
devotion to himself. Here the adverse findings of the commissioners on
the dynamite and railway monopolies were reversed; and the
recommendation for a Local Board for the Rand was condemned as
subversive of the authority of the State. At length, after the report
had been tossed about from Volksraad to committee, and from committee
to Volksraad, until very little of the original recommendations
remained, the Government took action. In addition to an immaterial
reduction of the exorbitant rates charged by the Netherlands Railway
Company--a concession subsequently alleged to have been the price paid
by the Hollander Corporation to avoid further inquiry into its
affairs--it was announced that, with the object of lessening the cost
of living on the Rand, the import duties upon certain necessaries in
common use would be reduced, in accordance with the recommendations of
the Commissioners on this point; but that, since it was obviously
inexpedient to diminish the revenue of the Republic, the duties upon
certain other articles of the same class would be raised to an extent
more than counterbalancing the loss upon the reduction. _Parturiunt
montes; nascitur ridiculus mus._

[Sidenote: Krueger re-elected president.]

This singular display of mingled effrontery and duplicity marked the
closing months of the year (1897). In the February following Mr.
Krueger was elected to the presidency of the South African Republic for
the fourth time. It was generally recognised that the success of his
candidature was inevitable, but few, within or without the Transvaal,
had expected him to secure so decisive a victory over his competitors.
The figures--Krueger 12,858, Schalk Burger 3,750, and Joubert
(Commandant-General) 2,001--were additional evidence of the impotency
or lukewarmness of the reform party among the burghers. The first act
of President Krueger, on his return to power, was to dismiss Chief
Justice Kotze. Mr. Kotze's struggle for the independence of the law
courts, thus summarily closed, had commenced a year before with what
was known as the "High Court crisis." At that time President Krueger
had obtained power from the Volksraad by the notorious law No. 1 of
1897 to compel the judges, on pain of dismissal, to renounce the
righ