How the Convention was Contravened.

“Go and tell your people,” said he once to a deputation from the uitlanders, “that I will never change my policy.”

For once he spoke the truth, and having seen him I feel convinced he never will, but he has persuaded so well and spoken so fairly, that I doubt if a Colonial Office official will abandon hope of him.

I recall to mind the last portion of Article 14 of the London Convention, which refers to those persons other than natives who may enter the South African Republic. “They shall not be subject, in their persons or property, commerce or industry, to any taxes, local or general, other than those which are or may be imposed on citizens of the South African Republic.”

How does that agree with a fourpenny tax on a four-pound loaf of bread? Or a shilling tax for every four pounds of meat, or a shilling tax on every four pounds of potatoes, or a sixpence for every half-pound of butter eaten at breakfast by a miner and his family?