pelled to spend several months at the Cape amongst the natives, noticed and reported upon the capabilities of the Peninsula as a station. In their memorial addressed to the directors, they had expressed their surprise that the Spaniards and Portuguese had never yet made use of Table Bay to lie in wait for and intercept the argosies from the East.

(8) Generally speaking, England had been indifferent to the value of the Cape. In 1620 two officers of the East India Company, Captain Andrew Shillinge and Humphrey Fitzherbert, took possession of Table Bay in the name of His Majesty James I, and their reasons for doing so are set forth in a document preserved in the archives of the East India Company. They said, 'This great country, if it were well discovered, would be kept in subjection with a few men and little charge, considering how the inhabitants are but naked men, without a leader or policy. We also thought to entitle the king's majesty thereto by this weak means rather than let it fall for want of prevention into the hands of the States, knowing very well that his Majesty is able to maintain his title by his hand against the States, and by his power against any other prince or potentate whatsoever; and better it is that the Dutch, or any other nation whatsoever, should be his subjects, than that his subjects should be subject to them or to any other. . . . Many more particulars might be alleged, as the certain refreshing of your fleets quickly acquired out of your own means by plantation, and to be hoped for from the Blacks when a Government is established to keep them in awe. The whale fishery, besides, persuades us that it would be profitable to defray part of your charge. Time will, no doubt, make the Blacks your servants, and by serving you they will become hereafter, we hope, servants of God.'

Nothing. however, came of this proclamation: the colonial policy of England under the Stuarts being generally weak and irresolute. Moreover, plans of colonisation and settlement in North America may have distracted King James' attention from South Africa. In 1620 he had granted a well-known charter to Sir William Alexander, with power to colonise Nova Scotia and the adjoining country. Also, in 1620, two months after the Pilgrim Fathers had sailed from England, the Council of Plymouth obtained from King James a patent which gave them absolute power over all the land between the 40th and 48th degrees of north latitude. The rulers and merchants of England had long turned their eyes to the western continent, inheriting a feud with the French colonists of the Quebec valley, which was destined to be fought out to the end.

(9) The Netherlands East India Company, when once established at the Cape, held its position unchallenged by any European power. According to the spirit of the times its merchants and directors were strict monopolists, discouraging competition and free immigration. "The proposition that any free men or burghers, not in the pay of the company, should be encouraged to cultivate the ground was first made about three years after Riebeek's arrival. Accordingly some discharged sailors and soldiers, who received, on certain conditions, plots of ground extending from the Fresh River to the Liesbeck, were the first free burghers of the colony'.' This freedom was very much curtailed, and the burghers were compelled not only to submit to many petty and vexatious rules and edicts issued by the Governor, but to pay a large portion of their earnings to the Company. The political equality of their colonists was never for a moment ad

1 See Despatch from Riebeek to Chamber of XVII, 28th April,

6

mitted by the Company. The burghers were permitted, as a matter of grace, to have a residence in land of which possession had been taken by the sovereign power, there to gain a livelihood as tillers of the earth, tailors, and shoemakers.' The Dutch people, generally, have never taken the same view of colonization as the English, and although they built up a powerful mercantile marine and commanded for a long time the avenues of trade, they never managed to call into existence a Plantation with a self-sufficing and self-respecting life of its own. To the Virginian settlements, and to many of the American colonies, the English Government conceded large powers of local and municipal government from the very beginning. The European population in 1657 consisted of 134 souls, 100 of whom were servants of the Company, ten free burghers, six married women, twelve children, six convicts.

(10) It was not until 1687 that a really important immigration to the Cape Colony took place, and this was of French refugees during the governorship of van der Stell. These men had left their country at the time of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (October, 1685), and had swarmed into England, Holland, Northern Germany, Switzerland, and the American colonies. The East India Company might have obtained thousands of them, but, as immigration to the Cape on a large scale was not thought advisable, a select few were chosen who might carry on their methods of cultivation, of which the Dutch were ignorant. Within a couple of years ninety-seven families arrived, and were located in the vicinity of Capetown, at Stellenbosch, Drakenstein, Fransche Hoek, and the Paarl. Before leaving Holland they were required to take an oath of fidelity to the Company. These refugees numbered only 300 at first, but their descendants now form a large portion of the population of the Cape. The

French language was introduced to the Cape Colony by these people, but was stamped out so effectually by the Dutch East India Company, that in less than 150 years after the first landing of the refugees not a man spoke it. The only traces that remain are found in the names of certain well-known Cape families and such places as Fransche Hoek, the valley in the western province where so many of the early immigrants lived.

(11) For nearly 150 years (from 1651-1795), the Netherlands East India Company maintained its hold upon Table Bay and the Cape Peninsula, but during this long interval there was little or no real colonial progress in South Africa itself. This period has frequently been passed over as comparatively unimportant and, as far as exciting incidents are concerned, there was little to awake the stagnant life at Capetown. But it was during these years that influences were being brought to bear upon the resident colonists which influenced their character greatly, and resulted in the formation of a certain type of character. The Huguenot refugees who had already sacrificed so much for their faith and liberties, were brought in contact with the autocratic officials of the Dutch East India Company, whom they found hard and exacting masters in all things. The rules and regulations passed by the governing clique at Capetown were petty and harassing. The only chance a burgher had of making money and of improving his position was by selling the produce of the Cape, in the shape of vegetables, fresh meat, milk, and wine, to passing vessels, yet he was debarred from doing this with success by the vexatious rules of the Governor. He was also forbidden to roam far afield in the desert and veldt. On all sides he was crushed, cabined, and confined, and, to escape from thraldom, he fled from the rule of Capetown officials and began to lead that nomadic

The

life which for many generations has been the distinctive characteristic of the true South African Boer. habit of 'trekking,' as it was called, became infectious, and in spite of wild animals, savages, and all the dangers of an unknown country, the patriarch Voertrekker, with his flocks and herds, went further and further afield. For more than 100 years they lost touch with the civilised world, and scarcely ever knew the ministrations of a predikant or preacher, still less those of the schoolmaster. Unlike the New England Colonists, who made education a matter of local and even village management from the very beginning, the Dutch and French burghers of the Cape neglected church and school. They took the Bible with them, almost their only literature, and loved to find in the wanderings of the Patriarchs a parallel to their own history. Their contact with the native races kept them keen, alert, and ready to attack or defend as occasion came, and regarding themselves as chosen instruments sent forth to cultivate the land, they looked down upon them with contempt. Thus the Boer, with his Calvinistic faith and dogged self-will, became incapable of all control, and was always wandering outside the pale of the law. His 150 years in the desert converted the Boer, whether Dutch or French, into a keen and crafty pioneer, but an impatient member of an organised State.

(12) In November, 1795, the officers of the Dutch East India Company left Table Bay after an occupancy of 150 years. They were compelled to take this course by the action of the British Government, who were afraid that the post would fall into the hands of the French Government owing to its defenceless state. The United Provinces of Holland had already been overrun by the French armies, and the Stadtholder was forced to take refuge in England. The Cape of Good Hope was re