CHAPTER VII.
GRIQUALAND WEST—WHY WE TOOK IT.
GRIQUALAND WEST is the proper, or official, name for that part of South Africa which is generally known in England as the Diamond Fields, and which is at the period of my writing,—the latter part of 1877,—a separate Colony belonging to the British Crown, under the jurisdiction of the Governor of the Cape Colony, but in truth governed by a resident administrator. Major Lanyon is now the occupier of the Government House, and is “His Excellency of Griqualand” to all the Queen’s loyal British subjects living in and about the mines. This is the present position of things;—but the British Government has offered to annex the Province to the Cape Colony, and the Cape Colony has at length agreed to accept the charge,—subject to certain conditions as to representation and other details. Those conditions are, I believe, now under consideration, and if they be found acceptable,—as will probably be the case,—the Colonial Office at home being apparently anxious to avoid the expense and trouble of an additional little Colony,—Griqualand West and the Diamond Fields will become a part of the Cape Colony in the course of 1878. The proposed conditions offer but one member for the Legislative Council, and four for the Assembly, to join twenty-one members in the former house, and sixty-eight in the latter. It is alleged very loudly and perhaps correctly at the Fields that this number is smaller than that to which the District is entitled if it is to be put on the same footing with other portions of the great Colony. It is alleged also that a class of the community which has shewn itself to be singularly energetic should be treated at any rate not worse than its neighbours who have been very much more slow in their movements, and less useful by their industry to the world at large. Whether such remonstrances will avail anything I doubt much. If they do not, I presume that the annexation will almost be immediate.
The history of Griqualand West does not go back to a distant antiquity, but it is one which has given rise to a singularly large amount of controversy and hot feeling, and has been debated at home with more than usual animation and more than usual acerbity. In the course of last year (1877) the “Quarterly” and the “Edinburgh Reviews” warmed themselves in a contest respecting the Hottentot Waterboer and his West Griquas, and the other Hottentot Adam Kok and his East Griquas, till South African sparks were flying which reminded one of the glorious days of Sidney Smith and Wilson Croker. Such writings are anonymous, and though one knows in a certain sense who were the authors, in another sense one is ignorant of anything except that an old-fashioned battle was carried on about Kok and Waterboer in our two highly esteemed and reverend Quarterlies. But as the conduct, not only of our Colonial Office, but of Great Britain as an administrator of Colonies, was at stake,—as on one side it was stated that an egregious wrong had been done from questionable motives, and on the other that perfect state-craft and perfect wisdom had been combined in the happy manner in which Griqualand West with its diamonds had become British territory, I thought it might be of interest to endeavour to get at the truth when I was on the spot. But I have to own that I have failed in the attempt to find any exact truth or to ascertain what abstract justice would have demanded. In order to get at a semblance of truth and justice in the matter it has to be presumed that a Hottentot Chief has understood the exact nature of a treaty and the power of a treaty with the accuracy of an accomplished European diplomate; and it has to be presumed also that the Hottentot’s right to execute a treaty binding his tribe or nation is as well defined and as firmly founded as that of a Minister of a great nation who has the throne of his Sovereign and the constitutional omnipotence of his country’s parliament at his back. In our many dealings with native tribes we have repeatedly had to make treaties. These treaties we have endeavoured to define, have endeavoured to explain; but it has always been with the conviction that they can be trusted only to a certain very limited extent.
The question in dispute is whether we did an injustice to the Orange Free State by taking possession of Griqualand West in 1871 when diamonds had already been discovered there and the value of the district had been acknowledged. At that time it was claimed by the Orange Free State whose subjects had inhabited the land before a diamond had been found, and which had levied taxes on the Boers who had taken up land there as though the country had belonged to the Republic. Since the annexation has been effected by us we have, in a measure, acknowledged the claim of the Free State by agreeing to pay to it a sum of £90,000—as compensation for what injustice we may have done; and we have so far admitted that the Free State has had something to say for itself.
The district in question at a period not very remote was as little valuable perhaps as any land on the earth’s surface lying adjacent to British territory. The first mention I find of the Griquas is of their existence as a bastard Hottentot tribe in 1811 when one Adam Kok was their captain. The word Griqua signifies bastard, and Adam Kok was probably half Dutchman and half Hottentot. In 1821 Adam Kok was dismissed or resigned, and Andreas Waterboer was elected in his place. Kok then went eastwards with perhaps half the tribe, and settled himself at a place which the reader will find on the map, under the name of Philipolis, north of the Orange river in the now existing Orange Free State. Then some line of demarcation was made between Waterboer’s lands and Kok’s lands, which line leaves the Diamond Fields on one side or—on the other. Adam Kok then trekked further eastward with the Griquas of Griqualand East, as they had come to be called, to a territory south of Natal, which had probably been depopulated by the Zulus. This territory was then called No Man’s Land, but is now marked on the maps as Adam Kok’s Land. But he gave some power of attorney enabling an agent to sell the lands he left behind him, and under this power his lands were sold to the Orange Free State which had established itself in 1854. The Free State claims to have bought the Diamond Fields,—diamonds having been then unknown,—under this deed. But it is alleged that the deed only empowered the agent to sell the lands in and round Philipolis on which Adam Kok’s Griquas had been living. It is certain, however, that Adam Kok had continued to exercise a certain right of sovereignty over the territory in question after his deposition or resignation, and that he made over land to the Boers of the Free State by some deed which the Boers had accepted as giving a good title. It is equally certain that old Waterboer’s son had remonstrated against these proceedings and had objected to the coming in of the Boers under Kok’s authority.
We will now go back to old Andreas Waterboer, who for a Hottentot seems to have been a remarkably good sort of person, and who as I have said had been chosen chief of the Griquas when Adam Kok went out. In 1834 Sir Benjamin D’Urban, that best and most ill-used of Cape Colony Governors, made a treaty with old Andreas undertaking to recognise him in all his rights, and obtaining a promise from the Hottentot to assist in defending the British border from the hordes of savagery to the north. There was also a clause under which the Hottentot was to receive a stipend of £150 per annum. This treaty seems to have been kept with faith on both sides till Waterboer died in December, 1852. The stipend was punctually paid, and the Hottentot did a considerable quantity of hard fighting on behalf of the British. On his death his son Nicholas Waterboer came to reign in his stead. Nicholas is a Christian as was his father, and is comparatively civilized;—but he is by no means so good a Christian as was the old man, and his father’s old friends were not at first inclined to keep up the acquaintance on the same terms.
Nicholas, no doubt mindful of the annual stipend, asked to have the treaty renewed in his favour. But other complications had arisen. In 1852 Messrs. Hogge and Owen had acted as Commissioners for giving over the Transvaal as a separate Republic and in the deed of transference it was agreed that there should not be any special treaties between the Cape Colony and the Natives north of the Orange river, as it was thought that such treaties would interfere with the independence of the Republic. Poor Nicholas for a time suffered under this arrangement, but in 1858 a letter was written to him saying that all that had been done for his father should be done for him,—and the payment of the £150 per annum was continued though no treaty was made.[5]
In the mean time, in 1854, the severance had been made of the Orange Free State from the Colony, the bounds of which were not then settled with much precision. Had they been declared to be the Orange and the Vaal rivers in reference to the North, East, and South, the Diamond Fields would have been included,—or the greater part of the Diamond Fields. But that would not have settled the question, as England could not have ceded what she did not possess. Thus there was a corner of land as there have been many corners in South Africa, respecting which there was doubts as to ownership. Waterboer alleged that the line which his father and old Adam Kok had made so long ago as 1821,—with what geometrical resources they might then have,—gave him a certain apparently valueless tract of land, and those again who assumed a right to Adam Kok’s land, asserted that the line gave it to them. The Kokites, however, had this point in their favour, that they had in some sort occupied the land,—having sold it or granted leases on it to Dutch Boers who paid taxes to the Orange Free State in spite of Waterboer’s remonstrances.
But the matter at the time was in truth unimportant. Encroachments were made also into this very district of Griqualand from the other Republic also. In speaking of the Transvaal I have already described the position there to which such encroachments had led. A treaty became necessary to check the Transvaal Boers from establishing themselves on Griqualand, and the Transvaal authorities with the native Chiefs, and our Governor at the Cape, agreed that the matter should be referred to an umpire. Mr. Keate, the Lieut. Governor of Natal, was chosen and the Keate award was made. But the land in question was not valuable; diamonds had not yet been found, and the question was not weighty enough to create determined action. The Transvaal rejected the treaty, and the Transvaal Boers, as well as those from the Free State, continued to occupy land in Griqualand West. Now the land of the Transvaal Republic has come back into our hands, and there is one little difficulty the more to solve.
Then, in 1869, the first diamond was found on a farm possessed by an Orange Free State Boer, and in 1871 Nicholas Waterboer, claiming possession of the land, and making his claim good to British colonial intellects, executed a treaty ceding to the British the whole district of Griqualand West,—a tract of land about half as big as Scotland, containing 17,800 square miles. There had by this time grown up a vast diamond seeking population which was manifestly in want of government. Waterboer himself could certainly do nothing to govern the free, loudspeaking, resolute body of men which had suddenly settled itself upon the territory which he claimed. Though he considered himself to be Captain of the Country, he would have been treated with no more respect than any other Hottentot had he shown himself at the diggings. Yet he no doubt felt that such a piece of luck having turned up on what he considered to be his own soil, he ought to get something out of it. So he made a treaty, ceding the country to Great Britain in 1871. In 1872 his stipend was raised to £250,—in 1873 to £500; and an agreement has now been made, dated I think in October 1877, increasing this to £1,000 a year, with an allowance of £500 to his widow and children after his death. It was upon this deed that we took possession of Griqualand West with all its diamonds; but the Orange Free State at once asserted its claim,—based on present possession and on the purchase of Adam Kok’s rights.
I think I shall not be contradicted when I say that amidst such a condition of things it is very hard to determine where is precisely the truth and what perfect abstract justice would have demanded. I cannot myself feel altogether content with the title to a country which we have bought from a Hottentot for an allowance of £1,000 a year with a pension of £500 to his wife and children. Much less can I assent to the title put forward by the Free State in consequence of their negotiation with Adam Kok’s Agent. The excuse for annexation does not in my mind rest on such buyings and sellings. I have always felt that my sense of justice could not be satisfied as to any purchase of territory by civilized from uncivilized people,—first because the idea of the value of the land is essentially different in the minds of the two contracting parties; and secondly because whatever may be the tribal customs of a people as to land I cannot acknowledge the right of a Chieftain to alienate the property of his tribe,—and the less so when the price given takes the form of an annuity for life to one or two individuals.
The real excuse is to be found in that order of things which has often in the affairs of our Colonies made a duty clear to us, though we have been unable to reconcile that duty with abstract justice. When we accepted the cession of the Province in 1871 the Free State was no doubt making an attempt to regulate affairs at the Diamond Fields; but it was but a feeble attempt. The Republic had not at its back the power needed for saying this shall be law, and that shall be law, and for enforcing the laws so enacted. And if the claim of Great Britain to the land was imperfect, so was that of the Free State. The persons most interested in the matter prayed for our interference, and felt that they could live only under our Government. There had no doubt been occupation after a kind. A few Boers here and there had possessed themselves of the lands, buying them by some shifty means either from the Natives or from those who alleged that they had purchased them from the Natives. And, as I have said, taxes were levied. But I cannot learn that any direct and absolute claim had ever been made to national dominion,—as is made by ourselves and other nations when on a new-found shore we fly our national flags. The Dutch had encroached over the border of the Griquas and then justified their encroachment by their dealings with Adam Kok. We have done much the same and have justified our encroachment by our dealings with Nicholas Waterboer. But history will justify us because it was essentially necessary that an English speaking population of a peculiarly bold and aggressive nature should be made subject to law and order.
The accusation against our Colonial Office of having stolen the Diamond Fields because Diamonds are peculiarly rich and desirable can not hold water for an instant. If that were so in what bosom did the passion rise and how was it to be gratified? A man may have a lust for power as Alexander had, and Napoleon,—a lust to which many a British Minister has in former days been a prey; but, even though we might possibly have a Colonial Secretary at this time so opposed in his ideas to the existing theories and feelings of our statesmen as to be willing to increase his responsibilities by adding new Colonies to our long list of dependencies, I cannot conceive that his ambition should take the shape of annexing an additional digging population. Has any individual either claimed or received glory by annexing Griqualand West? From the operations of such a Province as the Diamond Fields it is not the mother country that reaps the reward, but the population whether they be English, Dutch, or Americans,—the difficult task of ruling whom the mother country is driven to assume.
It is known to all Englishmen who have watched the course of our colonial history for the last forty years that nothing can be so little pleasant to a Secretary of State for the Colonies as the idea of a new Colony. Though they have accrued to us, one after the other, with terrible rapidity there has always been an attempt made to reject them. The Colonial Secretary has been like an old hen to whose large brood another and another chick is ever being added,—as though her powers of stretching her wings were unlimited. She does stretch them, like a good old mother with her maternal instincts, but with most unwilling efforts, till the bystander thinks that not a feather of protection could be given to another youngling. But another comes and the old hen stretches herself still wider,—most painfully.
New Zealand is now perhaps the pet of our colonial family; and yet what efforts were made when Lord Normanby and afterwards when Lord John Russell were at the Colonies to stave off the necessity of taking possession of the land! But Englishmen had settled themselves in such numbers on her shores that England was forced to send forth the means of governing her own children. The same thing happened, as I have attempted to tell, both in British Kafraria and Natal. The same thing happened the other day in the Fiji Islands. The same feeling, acting in an inverse way,—repudiating the chicks instead of taking them in,—induced us to give over the Transvaal and the Orange Free State to Republicanism. Our repudiation of the former has lasted but for a quarter of a century, and there are many now of British race to be found in South Africa who are confident that we shall have to take the Orange Free State in among the brood in about the same period from her birth. British rule in distant parts, much as it is abused, is so precious a blessing that men will have it, and the old hen is forced to stretch her poor old wings again and still again.
This I hold to be the real and unanswerable excuse for what we have done in Griqualand West and not our treaty with Waterboer. As far as right devolving from any treaty goes I think that we have the best of it,—but not so much the best, that even could I recognize those treaties as conveying all they are held to convey, I should declare our title to be complete. But, that such treaties are for the most part powerless when pressure comes, is proved by our own doings and by those of other nations all round the world. We have just annexed the Transvaal,—with the approbation of both sides in the House of Commons. Our excuse is that though the Transvaal was an independent State she was so little able to take care of herself that we were obliged to enter in upon her, as the law does on the estate of a lunatic. But how would it have been if the Transvaal instead of the Orange Free State had been our competitor for the government of the Diamond Fields? If we can justify ourselves in annexing a whole Republic surely we should not have scrupled to take the assumed dependency of a Republic. In such doings we have to reconcile ourselves to expedience, however abhorrent such a doctrine may be to us in our own private affairs. Here it was expedient that a large body, chiefly of Englishmen, should, for their own comfort and well being, be brought under rule. If in following out the doctrine any abstract injustice was done, it was not against the Orange Free State, but against the tribes whom no Waterboer and no Adam Kok could in truth be authorized to hand over either to British or to Dutch Republican rule.
For a while I was minded to go closely into the question of Kok v. Waterboer and to put forward what might probably have been a crude expression of the right either of the one Hottentot or of the other to make over at any rate his power and his privileges of government. But I convinced myself, when on the spot, that neither could have much right, and that whatever right either might have, was so far buried in the obscurity of savagery in general, that I could not possibly get at the bottom of it so as to form any valid opinion. Books have been written on the subject, on the one side and on the other, which have not I think been much studied. Were I to write no more than a chapter on it my readers would pass it by. The intelligence of England will not engage itself on unravelling the geographical facts of a line of demarcation made between two Hottentot Chieftains when the land was comparatively valueless, and when such line could only be signified by the names of places of which the exact position can hardly even now be ascertained. When subsequently I read the report which the Secretary of State for the Colonies made to the Governor of the Cape Colony on 5 August 1876, informing the Governor of the terms under which he and the President of the Orange Free State had agreed to compromise the matter, I was glad to find that he, in his final discussions with the President, had come to the same conclusion. I here quote the words in which Lord Carnarvon expressed himself to Sir Henry Barkly;—and I would say that I fully agree with him were it not that such testimony might seem to be impertinent. “At the earlier interviews Mr. Brand repeatedly expressed his desire to submit proof of the claim preferred by his Government to a great part of Griqualand West. I had however determined from the first that there would be no advantage in entering upon such on enquiry. It was obvious that there could be no prospect of our coming to an agreement on a question which teemed with local details and personal contentions.”
The Secretary of State goes on to explain the circumstances under which the £90,000 are to be given. I will confess for myself that I should almost have preferred to have stuck to the territory without paying the money. If it be our “destiny” to rule people I do not think that we ought to pay for assuming an office which we cannot avoid. The Secretary of State in this report strongly reasserts the British right to Griqualand West,—though he acknowledges that he cannot hope by mere eloquence to convince President Brand of that right. “As you think you are wronged,” the Secretary goes on to argue, “we will consent to compensate the wrong which we feel sure you have not suffered, but which you think you have endured, so that there need be no quarrel between us.” Probably it was the easiest way out of the difficulty; but there is something in it to regret. It must of course be understood that the £90,000 will not be paid by the British taxpayer, but will be gathered from the riches of Griqualand West herself.
On the 27 October 1871 the Diamond Fields were declared to be British territory. But such a declaration, even had it not been opposed by the Free State and the friends of the Free State, would by no means have made the course of British rule plain and simple. There have, from that day to this, arisen a series of questions to settle and difficulties to solve which, as they crop up to the enquirer’s mind, would seem to have been sufficient to have overcome the patience of any Colonial Secretary even though he had not another Colony on his shoulders. If there was any Colonial sinner,—Secretary, Governor, or subordinate,—who carried away by the lust of empire had sought to gratify his ambition by annexing Griqualand West, he must certainly have repented himself in sackcloth and ashes before this time (the end of 1877) when the vexed question of annexation or non-annexation to the Cape Colony is hardly yet settled. When the territory was first accepted by Great Britain it was done on an understanding that the Cape Colony should take it and rule it, and pay for it,—or make it pay for itself. The Colonial Secretary of the day declared in an official dispatch that he would not consent to the annexation unless, “the Cape Parliament would personally bind itself to accept the responsibility of governing the territory which was to be united to it, together with the entire maintenance of any force which might be necessary for the preservation of order.” It must be presumed therefore that the lust for empire did not exist in Downing Street. The Cape Parliament did so far accede to the stipulation made by the Secretary of State, as to pass a resolution of assent. They would agree,—seeing that British rule could not in any other way be obtained. But an intermediate moment was necessary,—a moment which should admit of the arrangement of terms,—between the absolute act of assumption by Great Britain and the annexation by the Colony. That moment has been much prolonged, and has not yet, as I write, been brought to an end. So that the lust for rule over the richest diamond fields in the world seems hardly to be very strong even in the Colony. Though the Parliament of the Colony had assented to the requisition from Downing Street, it afterwards,—not unnaturally,—declined to take the matter in hand till the Government at home had settled its difficulties with the Orange Free State. The Free State had withdrawn whatever officers it had had on the Fields, and had remonstrated. That difficulty is now solved;—and the Cape Colony has passed a bill shewing on what terms it will annex the territory. The terms are very unpopular in the district,—as indeed is the idea of annexation to the Cape Colony at all. Griqualand would very much prefer to continue a separate dependency, with a little Council of its own. The intention however of the mother country and of the Colony has been too clearly expressed for doubt on that subject. They are both determined that the annexation shall take place, and the Colony will probably be able to dictate the terms.
But there have been other difficulties sufficient almost to break the heart of all concerned. Who did the land belong to on which the diamonds were being found, and what were the rights of the owners either to the stones beneath the surface, or to the use of the surface for the purpose of searching? The most valuable spot in the district, called at first the Colesberg Kopje,—Kopje being little hill,—and now known as the Kimberley mine, had been on a farm called Vooruitzuit belonging to a Dutchman named De Beer. This farm he sold to a firm of Englishmen for the very moderate sum of £6,600,[6]—a sum however which to him must have appeared enormous,—and the firm soon afterwards sold it to the Government for £100,000. To this purchase the Government was driven by the difficulties of the position. Diggers were digging and paying 10s. a month for their claims to the owners of the soil, justifying themselves in that payment by the original edict of the Free State, while the owners were claiming £10 a month, and asserting their right to do as they pleased with their own property. The diggers declared their purpose of resisting by force any who interfered with them;—and the owners of the soil were probably in league with the diggers, so as to enhance the difficulties, and force the Government to purchase. The Government was obliged to buy and paid the enormous sum of £100,000 for the farm. Many stories could be told of the almost inextricable complexities which attended the settlement of claims to property while the diggers were arming and drilling and declaring that they would take the law into their own hands if they were interfered with in their industry.
In 1872 the population had become so great,—and, as was natural in such circumstances, so unruly,—that the Governor of the Cape Colony, who is also High Commissioner for all our South African territories, was obliged to recommend that a separate Lieutenant Governor should be appointed, and Mr. Southey who had long held official employment in the Cape Colony was sent to fill the place. Here he remained till 1875, encumbered by hardships of which the difficulty of raising a sufficient revenue to pay the expenses of the place was not the least. Diamonds were being extracted worth many millions, but the diamonds did not come into the pocket of the Government. In such localities the great source of revenue,—that which is generally most available,—is found in the Custom duties levied on the goods consumed by the diggers. But here, though the diggers consumed manfully, the Custom duties levied went elsewhere. Griqualand West possessed no port and could maintain no cordon of officers to prevent goods coming over her borders without taxation. The Cape Colony which has been so slow to annex the land got the chief advantages from the consumption of the Diamond Fields, sharing it, however, with Natal. Mr. Southey is said to have had but thirty policemen with him to assist in keeping the peace, and was forced to ask for the assistance of troops from the Cape. Troops were at last sent from Capetown,—at an expense of about £20,000 to Griqualand West. During all this time it may easily be conceived that no British aggressor had as yet obtained the fruition of that rich empire for which he is supposed to have lusted when annexing the country.
The Lieutenant Governor with his thirty policemen,—and the sudden influx of about 300 soldiers from the Cape—was found to be too expensive for the capabilities of the place. “In 1875,” says the Colonial Office List for 1877, “the condition of the finances rendered it necessary to reduce the civil establishment, and the office of Lieutenant Governor, as well as that of Secretary to Government, was discontinued, and an administrator appointed.” That administrator has been Major Lanyon who has simply been a Lieutenant Governor with a salary somewhat less than that of his predecessor. That the difficulty of administering the affairs of the Colony have been lessened during his period of office, may in part be due to circumstances and the more settled condition of men’s minds. But with such a task as he has had not to have failed is sufficient claim for praise. There have been no serious outrages since he reached the Fields.
Annexation to the Cape Colony will probably take place. But what will come next? The Province does not want annexation;—but specially wants an adequate, we may say a large share in the constituencies of the joint Colonies should annexation be carried out. I sympathise with Griqualand West in the first feeling. I do not think that the diggers of the Diamond Fields will be satisfied with legislation carried on at Capetown. I do not think that a parliamentary majority at Capetown will know how to manage the diggers. Kimberley is so peculiar a place, and so likely to shew its feeling of offence against the Government if it be offended, that I fear it will be a very thorn in the side of any possible Cape Colony Prime Minister. That Downing Street should wish to make over to the Colony the rich treasure, which we are told has been acquired with so much violence and avarice, I am not surprised,—though such annexation must be prejudicial to that desire for South African Confederation which is now strong in Colonial Office bosoms;—but that the Colony should accept the burden while she already possesses that which generally makes such burdens acceptable,—viz., the Custom duties on the goods consumed by the people,—is to me a marvel. It may be that the Cape Parliament was induced to give its first assent by the strongly expressed wishes of the Secretary of State at home, and that it can h