couraged by the Commissioners of Inquiry, whilst the mass of the Colonists, who are usually neutral, would acquiesce in any practical plan for the general good; and the ill-disposed be kept in sufficient check. The important recommendation which is here developed, was printed by the Aborigines committee. Why it was not adopted, does not appear on the proceedings; but there were substituted for it the resolutions of the Report as they now stand in the parliamentary papers, which have been universally disapproved. The Aborigines Protection Society published a strong remonstrance against important portions of the Report: so little founded is the common imputation, that the philanthropists at that time dictated the proceedings of the Aborigines committee, and controlled the Colonial office. The report actually made is an apology for that office; and saved it from the disclosures to which the local inquiries, proposed by the rejected recommendations, must have led. It was a victory of the system of the Colonial office over the reform proposed in the first Report of the Committee of 1835, what had unquestionably responded to the genuine wishes of the philanthropists; and their grand error lay in not going much further in resisting the conclusions of the second Report.

The measures afterwards pursued on the Caffre question, partook too much of the spirit which prompted the evasion of the proposed reform. One of the objections to the old system was its unsteadiness, which made colonists and Caffres equally uncertain what to expect. This evil has not ceased. Sir Andries Stockenstrom, who made the treaties and the new system, and therefore was the best qualified to execute them, was speedily removed from the post of Lieutenant-Governor in a manner to bring both into doubt and discredit. Yet so little was he liable to reproach, that when he came to England to remonstrate against the injury, he was indemnified with a high pension, and a baronetcy, perhaps the first ever bestowed on a colonist. So efficient, too, is he now, although placed in retirement with such a pension, that in the present difficulties of the frontier he is called to a high command, to the general satisfaction. In addition to the vacillation shown in the treatment of the founder of the new system, the treaties have been materially changed twice during their brief existence of seven years. The Caffres, indeed, acquiesced in the changes made; and the governor of the Cape expressly declares that they fully understood' those changes; although the Times' rashly asserts that they could not be presumed to comprehend the originals.

Again, the agency in Caffreland has been inconveniently altered; and lately the inconceivable mistake has been made of preparing to abolish the office of lieutenant-governor of the

frontier. Such proceedings on our part must have produced the worst effect on our neighbours; but the proclamation with which the governor of the Cape set out in the present unhappy affair, betrays its real causes. It is an undeniable fact that the Caffres have been at peace with the colony since the war of 1834-5, at the close of which new treaties were made with all the tribes separately, in which one of those tribes received our warmest acknowledgments for its fidelity to its old engagements with us. Those treaties were made in 1837; and some of the separate chiefs have unquestionably performed their parts under them. This is distinctly stated by the frontier newspapers in the midst of the excitement of the last six months: and, at the circuit at Graham Town, in April, 1845, a petty Caffre chief, and two others, given up to us under the treaties, were condemned for cattle stealing. It is further certain, that in 1845, our troops were drawn off from the frontier to a great distance in order to suppress serious disturbances, when the peace of the colony was at the mercy of the Caffres, yet they respected it religiously; although marauding increased, on the withdrawal of OUR guards. Nevertheless, the Cape government has now made upon the whole Caffre people a war of the most formidable description, which is raging under circumstances demanding the most rigid scrutiny.

If the treaties with the Caffres, which originated in the recommendations of a committee of the House of Commons, and the returns of frontier depredations by these people, which were the subject of anxious inquiry by their committee during three sessions in 1835, 6, 7, had been printed, as was to be expected, among the parliamentary papers, together with proper documents to explain what has been doing on the Caffre frontier since 1836, it would be easy to form a correct opinion upon the grave alternatives raised by events which have occurred at the Cape.

These alternatives are ;- whether the system of peace and conciliation aimed at by the House of Commons in 1837 was wisely conceived?-or whether, on the contrary, a system of coercion be indispensable to crush a 'war party' in Caffreland, both for the protection of the colonists, and for the ultimate advantage of the Caffres themselves,' as the Governor of the Cape declared, in a proclamation of the 31st of last March.

These questions involve another, respecting the manner in which the system of peace and conciliation actually established by the treaties of 1837, has been administered by the authorities of the Cape during the last nine years; but in the absence of all parliamentary documents respecting their administration, the proclamation of the Governor of the Cape, repub

lished in London,* may be safely reasoned upon, with the assistance of other intelligence. Its material passages, independently of acts of aggression by the Caffres, which it details, are as follows:

'I shall not dwell upon the imperfect manner in which the obligations of the treaties of 1837 were, from the first, fulfilled by the chiefs considered as representing the nation,-upon the extent to which depredation and plunder were practised against the colony, or upon the disposition to screen the thieves, and evade making compensation, so often manifested by certain of the chiefs. It will not be necessary for me, in this document, to go further back than the month of September, 1844, when I met the chiefs upon the question. Reluctant to have recourse to extreme measures, I proposed certain modifications of the frontier system, which were adopted by the chiefs and embodied in new treaties, to secure increased protection against Caffre marauders for the persons and property of the colonists. The new engagements were carefully explained and fully understood.

pro

'For a considerable time, the measures taken did not, in their working, disappoint the expectations I had formed. During about eight months, depredations upon the colony in a great measure, if not altogether, ceased. The erection of Post Victoria, the rewards mised and paid for the apprehension of criminals, and the means at the disposal of government to punish crime, combined their influence to relieve the frontier inhabitants from the harassing and vexatious system of plunder to which they had been so long exposed.

'It was not unnatural that, in the minds of such a people as the Caffres, this restraint should tend to strengthen that party amongst them commonly called the war party,' consisting chiefly, but not exclusively, of the young men who have reached manhood since the last war. When the duty of protecting the native tribes beyond the northern boundary required last year (1845) the temporary withdrawal of troops from the eastern frontier, depredations recommenced; which, never quite discontinued, have recently assumed a peculiar and more audacious character, and which, coupled with other unequivocal indications of hostile feeling, clearly evince that the party in Caffreland which prefers war with the colony to peace without plunder, has gained an unfortunate ascendancy.

So far as a feeling of hostility amongst the Caffres might be provoked, or palliated by even one solitary act of violence, outrage, or injustice committed by any Colonist in Caffreland, the Caffres are without excuse. No Caffre can charge the commission of any such act during, at all events, the last seven years. It is with pride and pleasure I make this statement, which I believe to be accurate, even to the letter.'

It is then stated, that imprudent speeches of colonists at

• Colonial Gazette, June 6, 1846.

public meetings, exaggerating the strength of the Caffres, have encouraged the war party. And thus three causes,-1st, the growing up of young men; 2nd, the wishes of the plunderers; and 3rd, the rashness of colonists, have enabled the war party 'to win over some chiefs, of whom better expectations had been formed; have induced others in secret to attach themselves to its interests, and have set aside or overawed some other chiefs, who were honestly inclined to abide by their engagements with the colony.'

The conduct of Sandilla, the successor of Gaika, an old ally, in a serious dispute in January and February last, is then explained at length. He had agreed to the establishment of a military post by us, beyond the limits of the Ceded territory,' -that is to say, IN CAFFRELAND. The war-party, according to the governor, afterwards got an influence over Sandilla; and against his own deliberate act, led him to gainsay it. He, at the same time, committed breaches of the treaties, and behaved with great violence to the frontier authorities, and to some traders. This dispute however was settled, after exciting a strong expectation of war.

'Subsequently,' says the governor, a more peaceful message was transmitted by Sandilla, and other chiefs, and there was some reason to think that amicable relations had been re-established.'

The settlement of this dispute took place before the 9th of February last, on which day the lieutenant-governor of the frontier announced to the inhabitants, that there was not the slightest cause for alarm, he having received that morning, from all the chiefs of Caffreland, the most satisfactory assurance of their desire and determination to maintain peace and tranquillity among their people.'*

* On this occasion the Cape papers published the following remarks and document:

'A message, of which the subjoined is a copy, has been forwarded by the resident agent, to the lieut.-governor, and apparently justifies the conclusions come to:

6

Message of the chief Sandilla, Xo Xo, and their respective chief men, assembled at the Tyumie residency, 7th of February, 1846,

'TO HIS HONOUR THE LIEUT.-Governor.

'My heart is not at rest, because I could not speak to you at the meeting, in consequence of the multitude which followed me. I am sorry my people and your people have been disturbed by my rashness, but it is the first time, and I can only plead my youth in defence of my conduct. You must, therefore, not faint in warning and advising me, for you saw I beat them back, when my people pressed on us. They had been told you would make a prisoner of me. If I am again hasty in my words, the agent must not be in a hurry to report before he assembles my great men, and consult with them before he sends my words to you. You are the shield of my land, and war is not in my heart.

From the 9th of February to the 17th of March, nothing was done by the Caffres; but the alarm among the Colonists was not diminished. Many farmers left the frontier, and public meetings were held throughout February to urge the government to restrain the Caffres from future aggressions.'

The opinion upon which the governor of the Cape mainly rests his declaration of war, is thus expressed in a frontier Journal of the 20th of February :

'We have seen several letters from missionaries, that speak in unequivocal terms of the danger to be apprehended by the colony from the machinations and warlike propensities of what has, very properly, but significantly, been termed Young Caffreland.' The young men who have risen up since the last general irruption burn with desire to test their prowess with the colony.'

Active preparations were at the same time made by the Colonial government against the worst; and on the 17th of March an event occurred, upon which the governor of the Cape, on the 31st of March, at Cape Town, places his determination to begin the war, upon the assumption of a design on the part of the Caffres to attack us.

The responsibility for the dreadful events which have happened since, now depends mainly upon the correctness of the governor's views respecting that design.

The last great outrage,' says he, has been of such a nature as to prove their hostility to the colony is deeply rooted and widely spread; to show beyond all further doubt or question, the point to which the chiefs and people have been for some time tending, and to make it the imperative but painful duty of the Colonial government to punish the delinquent parties in such a manner as to crush the hopes of all those in Caffreland who look forward to enrich themselves by war and plunder.

'A Caffre who had committed a crime-not in Caffreland, but in the colony, was apprehended at Fort Beaufort, and in the common course of law, sent to Graham's Town for trial. A number of armed Caffres burst into the colony; attacked the persons in charge of the prisoner, rescued him by force, and then cruelly murdered and mutilated a colonist, to whom the culprit had been fastened for security.

I told my people I only came to talk with you. I swear war is not in my heart; but confusion, I hear, prevails in my country and in your country, and we sleep in the bush for fear. The colonists must go home, and not allow the drought to injure their property any more. I fell, my father, and in my message I forgot I was a chief. Sandilla, Xo Xo, Vena, Chala, Macome, Vandala, Checelas, (and thirty Amapakata Demalus)-C. L. Stretch, J. P. Diplomatic agent.

I have appointed special pakatis to each store and shop, to convince the traders they may live in peace in my country.

Sandilla

(his mark