Majesty's dominions, "in order to secure the peace and
safety of Our said colonies and of Our subjects elsewhere."

The terms of his Commission were unusually large, leaving a great deal
to his discretionary power. In choosing that officer for the execution
of a most difficult and delicate mission, the Government, doubtless,
made a very wise selection. Sir Theophilus Shepstone is a man of
remarkable tact and ability, combined with great openness and simplicity
of mind, and one whose name will always have a leading place in South
African history. During a long official lifetime he has had to do with
most of the native races in South Africa, and certainly knows them and
their ways better than any living man; whilst he is by them all regarded
with a peculiar and affectionate reverence. He is _par excellence_ their
great white chief and "father," and a word from him, even now that he
has retired from active life, still carries more weight than the formal
remonstrances of any governor in South Africa.

With the Boers he is almost equally well acquainted, having known many
of them personally for years. He possesses, moreover, the rare power of
winning the regard and affection, as well as the respect, of those about
him in such a marked degree that those who have served him once would
go far to serve him again. Sir T. Shepstone, however, has enemies like
other people, and is commonly reported among them to be a disciple of
Machiavelli, and to have his mind steeped in all the darker wiles of
Kafir policy. The Annexation of the Transvaal is by them attributed to
a successful and vigorous use of those arts that distinguished the
diplomacy of two centuries ago. Falsehood and bribery are supposed to
have been the great levers used to effect the change, together with
threats of extinction at the hands of a savage and unfriendly nation.

That the Annexation was a triumph of mind over matter is quite true, but
whether or not that triumph was unworthily obtained, I will leave those
who read this short chronicle of the events connected with it to judge.
I saw it somewhat darkly remarked in a newspaper the other day that the
history of the Annexation had evidently yet to be written; and I fear
that the remark represents the feeling of most people about the
event; implying as it did, that it was carried out, by means certainly
mysterious, and presumably doubtful. I am afraid that those who think
thus will be disappointed in what I have