The Dominion. MONDAY, APRIL 26, 1915. GERMAN INTRIGUES IN SOUT AFRICA

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2445, 26 April 1915, Page 4

The Dominion. MONDAY, APRIL 26, 1915. GERMAN INTRIGUES IN SOUT AFRICA

That German money, German agents, and German influence have been at work for some years in South Africa there oatt be no doubt, and while the South African Blue Book, whioh arrived in New Zear land by'a recent mail/ is not .directly concerned with these particular facts, it casts some most suggestive light upon the sccret transactions that-have passed between tho German authorities' irt the SouthWest and tho leaders of the late rebellion. Thirty yeai's ago, first at Ludei'itzbUcht, and afterwards at St. Liicia Bay, Germany strove, it may be recollected, tb gain a footing in Soiith Africa. It was in iBB4 that the Cologne Gazette declared: "The more England settles herself comfortably on the Bed Sea and on the Suez Canal as the great military road to India, the more does there recede from her view that remote South African land, iii which tho British element is retiring in hopeless contest with men of German blood." BErnhardi looked to the "low element to threaten the vitality of England,'' while evidence, has Been accumulating; for some time past that German emissaries, and especially German missionaries have been systematic ally preaching sedition among tho scattered population of the veldt. From time to time the Cape papers have published extracts from School Board minutes showing how the German Consul in Cape Town has been instructed by the German Chancellor to dole out £10 notes to teachers in Government schools on tho understanding that they were to promote Germanism in their schools and neighbourhood. Blit with the outbreak of the great war tho campaign underwent a complete transformation. Secrecy was no longer observed. General Mulleb put_ the matter bluntly enough at Kleinfontein in October. "Now is the time," he said, "to get our independence back. That independence is guaranteed by the German Kaiser, and Beyers has the treaty in his pocket." Maritz, who is understood to have disappeared into Central Africa, but whose death at tho hands of the Germans was reported in February ih Johannesburg, boasted of his ability to overrun South Africa, and stated that the Germans had placed at his disposal a hundred guns and unlimited quantities of small arms, ammunition and money, He also showed Colonel BouWer numerous telegrams and heliograph messages from the Germans indicating that he had been in communication with the Germans since the early days of September. De Wet, with more humour than cold logic, told the burghers that the Germans had always been their friends, and that there was an understanding between MARitz and the Governor of German South-West Afrioa that when a Republic was established the Germans would acknowledge their independence. They would only have, he sa-id, with unconscious humour, to give Walfisch Bay to the Germans, and "that was a pity, because it was a nice bay, and would be very Useful when we have our fleet." Extravagant as this language may appear to be, its effect upon the credulous burgher was amazing. There is reason to believe that the Government- have more information since the Blue Book was published of German designs. There is a statement made by the German Chancellor that the German Government had been approached by "numerous and important Boers" to make a declaration as to the attitude of the German Empire towards an independent South Africa. In bringing this matter to the notice of Parliament, General S.Mtms declared: "There is sufficient evidence to show that the Boer feeling for the ideal thc.v had lost was being worked upon by the machinations of German intriguers." There was, he added, 110 dnubt that the whole rebellion rested on the subject of German assistance; Germany would give the money, and the guns, and the rifles. Wlif.Hiwi' sluw-fe WPK . aiicf bona Hd to be held out there wera 1

references to German assistance; and there was the treaty which Majutz had signed to the German authorities. Fortunately the German schemes went wrong once again south of the Zambesi, just as they went wrong a few months before ill Belgium; Instead of finding a Country in open rebellion led by members of the Government, they fourid the drastic military action df Ministers enthusiastically acclaimed by the overwhelming majority of both races. That tliey succeeded in their calculations to a certain extent is shown bythe fact that during tho brief period of the trouble) ten thousand rebels, many of Whom believed that the British Fleet had been blown off the high seas, and that German grenadiers Were marching through Piccadilly, were cither captui'ed or surrendered. The Germans overlooked the loyalty of the Cape Dutch, the loyalty of the towns and oities, and they had. conveniently . forgotten the servitude they had imposed upon those Boers, who, after tho Ahglo-Bocr war, had temporarily trekked into German South-West Africa. In the language of Col.oS'lir, Commandant MentZ, who had gone into the field against "ftij? owii flesh and blood," they had forgotten that when peace was signed thirteen years ago there was ..no longer a_.questiort. of Dutch and British. "We all have equal rights. Let us trust one another."

The crushing of the rebellion arid the defeat of Oefliian riifrchinfi,tiona iii British South Africa shattefs for ever the aspirations of the Boef for independence. The war of 18S9-1902 with its struggle both material and maral Could not leave behind tho same South Africa. Great alterations have taken place t in the character of the people, which are bound to. have consequences. The war was followed by changes of a fundamental character. The Act of Ufiibii ended old irovemmcmis; boundaries disappeared; old land-mafks wftro swept away, and as General Smuts says : "The people as a Consequence lost then' anchor." The recession of self-government to the provinces misled the old Boer into believing that the Majuba- policy had been repeated, and he never doubted that within ten years <pf the signing of the VereCniging Treaty the Vierkleur would again be hoisted. But tho cherished ideal of independence, which has been striven for by thesd extremists, has now bden rudely shattered. Tho ideal of the future is the Closer amalgamation of the two great races.