by him in the Chamber of Mines, that should they
fail to obtain these rights for themselves they were prepared to
co-operate with another party and force the Government to put them up
for public auction, so that at any rate the mines should not have
them. The object of this threat was to compel the mining companies to
come to terms with him and compromise matters.

One of the notarial contracts referred to has been made public, and
it contains the names of Mr. 'Koos' Smit, the Government Railway
Commissioner, and one of the highest officials in the State;
Landdrost Schutte, Chief Magistrate of Pretoria, and Mr. Hendrik
Schoeman, one of the most prominent commandants in the Transvaal and
a near relation of the President. Needless to say, all are members of
the Kruger family party, and were most prominent supporters of his
Honour at the time of the 1893 election. They claim that they were
definitely promised a concession for the bewaarplaatsen as a reward
for their services in this election. The precedent quoted on
behalf of the companies in support of their claim is that of the
brickmaker's license under the Gold Law. Brickmakers have privileges
under their license similar to those granted with bewaarplaatsen, but
in their case it is provided that should gold be discovered or be
believed to exist in the areas granted under their licenses, the
holder of the license shall have the right to convert his area into
Law. The companies urged that this reveals the intention of the law,
and that such a condition was omitted in connection with
bewaarplaatsen simply and solely through oversight, and because at
that time it never occurred to anyone to suppose that the
gold-bearing deposits would shelve off and be accessible at such
great distances from the outcrop as where the bewaarplaatsen are
located. The companies moreover pointed out that these areas were in
every case located in the middle of property held under mining
licenses, that they themselves owned the surface of the property and
therefore no one else could work on them, that the areas were in
themselves too small and too irregular in shape to be worked
independently of the surrounding ground, and that the granting of
them to others could not be justified by any right on the part of
applicants, and would merely be placing in their hands the means of
imposing on the owners of the surfaces and the adjacent claims an
excessive purchase price or the alternative of being blo