d the whole matter as a great joke) writing a despairing letter to
Steyn to the effect that the game was up and that it was time to take
the last final step. A reply was received from Kruger encouraging the
Boers to continue their hopeless and fatal resistance. His reply was to
the effect that there were still great hopes of a successful issue of
the war, and that he had taken steps to make proper provision for the
Boer prisoners and for the refugee women. These steps, and very
efficient ones, too, were to leave them to the generosity of that
Government which he was so fond of reviling. There are signs that
something else had occurred to give them fresh hope and also fresh
material supplies. It looks, upon the face of it, as if, about that
time, large supplies of rifles, ammunition, and possibly recruits must
have reached them from some quarter, either from German Damaraland or
the Portuguese coast. At any rate there has been so much ammunition used
since, that either Reitz must have been raving or else large supplies
have reached the Boers from some unknown source.

So much for the official attempts at peace.

They have been given in some detail in order to prove how false it is
_that the British Government has insisted upon an unconditional
surrender_. Far from this being so, the terms offered by the British
Government have been so generous that they have aroused the strongest
distrust and criticism in this country, where they have seemed to be
surrendering by the pen all that had been won by the sword. Nothing has
been refused the enemy, save only independence, and that can never be
given, if the war has to continue until the last Boer is deported out of
Africa.

It is only necessary to refer briefly to the unofficial Boer attempts at
peace. A considerable body of the Boers, including many men of influence
and of intelligence, were disposed to accept the British flag and to
settle down in peace. The leaders of this party were the brave Piet de
Wet, brother of Christian, Paul Botha of Kroonstad, Fraser of
Bloemfontein, and others. Piet de Wet, who had fought against us as hard
as any man, wrote to his brother: 'Which is better, for the Republics 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 asid