The Great Boer War | Page 9

Boer riflemen. Half of
our men were killed and wounded. Ingogo may be called a drawn battle,
though our loss was more heavy than that of the enemy. Finally came
the defeat of Majuba Hill, where four hundred infantry upon a
mountain were defeated and driven off by a swarm of sharpshooters
who advanced under the cover of boulders. Of all these actions there
was not one which was more than a skirmish, and had they been
followed by a final British victory they would now be hardly
remembered. It is the fact that they were skirmishes which succeeded in
their object which has given them an importance which is exaggerated.
At the same time they may mark the beginning of a new military era,
for they drove home the fact--only too badly learned by us--that it is the
rifle and not the drill which makes the soldier. It is bewildering that
after such an experience the British military authorities continued to
serve out only three hundred cartridges a year for rifle practice, and that
they still encouraged that mechanical volley firing which destroys all
individual aim. With the experience of the first Boer war behind them,
little was done, either in tactics or in musketry, to prepare the soldier
for the second. The value of the mounted rifleman, the shooting with

accuracy at unknown ranges, the art of taking cover--all were equally
neglected.
The defeat at Majuba Hill was followed by the complete surrender of
the Gladstonian Government, an act which was either the most
pusillanimous or the most magnanimous in recent history. It is hard for
the big man to draw away from the small before blows are struck but
when the big man has been knocked down three times it is harder still.
An overwhelming British force was in the field, and the General
declared that he held the enemy in the hollow of his hand. Our military
calculations have been falsified before now by these farmers, and it
may be that the task of Wood and Roberts would have been harder than
they imagined; but on paper, at least, it looked as if the enemy could be
crushed without difficulty. So the public thought, and yet they
consented to the upraised sword being stayed. With them, as apart from
the politicians, the motive was undoubtedly a moral and Christian one.
They considered that the annexation of the Transvaal had evidently
been an injustice, that the farmers had a right to the freedom for which
they fought, and that it was an unworthy thing for a great nation to
continue an unjust war for the sake of a military revenge. It was the
height of idealism, and the result has not been such as to encourage its
repetition.
An armistice was concluded on March 5th, 1881, which led up to a
peace on the 23rd of the same month. The Government, after yielding
to force what it had repeatedly refused to friendly representations, made
a clumsy compromise in their settlement. A policy of idealism and
Christian morality should have been thorough if it were to be tried at all.
It was obvious that if the annexation were unjust, then the Transvaal
should have reverted to the condition in which it was before the
annexation, as defined by the Sand River Convention. But the
Government for some reason would not go so far as this. They niggled
and quibbled and bargained until the State was left as a curious hybrid
thing such as the world has never seen. It was a republic which was part
of the system of a monarchy, dealt with by the Colonial Office, and
included under the heading of 'Colonies' in the news columns of the
'Times.' It was autonomous, and yet subject to some vague suzerainty,

the limits of which no one has ever been able to define. Altogether, in
its provisions and in its omissions, the Convention of Pretoria appears
to prove that our political affairs were as badly conducted as our
military in this unfortunate year of 1881.
It was evident from the first that so illogical and contentious an
agreement could not possibly prove to be a final settlement, and indeed
the ink of the signatures was hardly dry before an agitation was on foot
for its revision. The Boers considered, and with justice, that if they
were to be left as undisputed victors in the war then they should have
the full fruits of victory. On the other hand, the English-speaking
colonies had their allegiance tested to the uttermost. The proud
Anglo-Celtic stock is not accustomed to be humbled, and yet they
found themselves through the action of the home Government
converted into members of a beaten race. It was very well for the
citizen of London to console his wounded