Kruger at their head, at once undid all
the little good he had done.

When Mr. Burgers got to England, he found that city capitalists would
have nothing whatever to say to his railway scheme. In Holland, however,
he succeeded in getting 90,000 pounds of the 300,000 pounds he wished to
borrow at a high rate of interest, and by passing a bond on five hundred
government farms. This money was immediately invested in a railway
plant, which, when it arrived at Delagoa Bay, had to be mortgaged to
pay the freight on it, and that was the end of the Delagoa Bay railway
scheme, except that the 90,000 pounds is, I believe, still owing to the
confiding shareholders in Holland.

On his return to the Transvaal the President was well received, and for
a month or so all went smoothly. But the relations of the Republic with
the surrounding native tribes had by this time become so bad that an
explosion was imminent somewhere. In the year 1874 the Volksraad raised
the price of passes under the iniquitous pass law, by which every native
travelling through the territory was made to pay from 1 pound to five
pounds. In case of non-payment the native was made subject to a fine of
from 1 pound to 10 pounds, and to a beating of from "ten to twenty-five
lashes." He was also to go into service for three months, and have a
certificate thereof, for which he must pay five shillings; the avowed
object of the law being to obtain a supply of Kafir labour. This was
done in spite of the earnest protest of the President, who gave the Raad
distinctly to understand that by accepting this law they would, in point
of fact, annul treaties concluded with the chiefs on the south-western
borders. It was not clear, however, if this amended pass law ever came
into force. It is to be hoped it did not, for even under the old law
natives were shamefully treated by the Boers, who would pretend that
they were authorised by the Government to collect the tax; the result
being that the unfortunate Kafir was frequently obliged to pay twice
over. Natives had such a horror of the pass laws of the country, that
when travelling to the Diamond Fields to work they would frequently go
round some hundreds of miles rather than pass through the Transvaal.

That the Volksraad should have thought it necessary to enact such a law
in order that the farmers should obtain a supply of Kafir labour in a
territory that had nearly a million of native inhabitants, who, unlike
the Zulus, are wi