they were obtained. Katir robberies at the diamond-
mines in time approached such large dimensions, that
repressive penal acts were passed and enforced against
these indiscriminative purchases. Consequently now on
Cape Town breakwater may he seen convicts who
arrived in the country too late for illicit diamond buying
to be considered as one of the arts of a clever speculator.
In a few years, even if it is not now the case, it will be
considered bad taste to introduce the topic of amateur
diamond purchases in some large, wealthy, and highly
respectable South-African establishments. The “ illicit
diamond-buyer ” is to-day the “ company promoter,”
and public opinion, as soon as the law awakes, will
equally approve of some professors of “ flotation”
joining their diamond-buying predecessors in undignified
seclusion. .
Our own countrymen form no inconsiderable portion
of the Transvaal population; but the descendants of
many will be of South-African birth, for there Is an old
and true proverb, “ he who has once lived in South
Africa will return to it again.” When once the
Transvaal is crossed by railways, the British farmer who
is willing to permanently leave his old country and
settle in what ought to be one of the finest farming
regions of the world, will find a land worthy of his
adoption. To the present time the resources of the
Transvaal have only been sought beneath its surface,
which remains practically untilled and untouched.
The Boer farmer is simply a possessor of flocks and
herds, and will probably remain so; the only hope of
his being aroused from this deadly apathy, which
keeps back the hands which register development on
the clock of his country, is to encourage other farmers
to settle in his midst, and show him what may be made
of this wilderness. But the farmer must wait for the
railway, and the railway will largely depend on the
produce of the farmer. Johannesburg to-day is the
most English town in the Transvaal; Pietersburg the
most German; Pretoria the most cosmopolitan. One
of the strangest features amongst the English is to find
so many who would do equally well, if not better, at
home. Many young fellows come out full of hope,
who have had no other training but that most hopeless
vocation of commercial clerk. Of course, some have
succeeded in obtaining good positions, but others have
almost patrolled the country,—sometimes a schoolmaster
in a Boer’s family, or the keeper of a small road-side
store, seeking fortune as an inexperienced prospector,
or even temporarily engaged as a waiter in an hotel; but
you still hear no grumbling, but relief expressed that
they have at least escaped the restrictions on life at
home, breathe fresh air, and have less worry.
It certainly is a fact that no one seems to starve in the
Transvaal; and it is equally true that men whose
circumstances after a long stay in the country have
become hopeless, if not desperate, still describe it as the
finest and most improving land on earth. Whether it
is that the knowledge of increased age and long absence
from home have made return impossible, owing to
precariousness of the livelihood they might expect to
find, or whether it is the more free and untrammeled life
led in Boerland, and the easy way by which men still, by
some means or another, subsist, however bad their
pecuniary resources may be, are questions that may
perhaps be both answered in the affirmative. I t is
usual at some hotels to let the needy speculators and
adventurers live on as boarders till better times arrive ;
and an acquaintance who once had a sleeping-share
in an hotel told me that the consideration was not
alway financially wrong. Whilst these indigent guests
lived free, they advertised and recommended the hotel;
the food was not missed when a large number of visitors
had to be provided for, and in the changing fortunes
of the country these derelicts frequently became once
more able to pay their arrears. My experience was
that every man obtained his subsistence by some means,
though his affairs were in the blackest condition ; even
the “ loafers ” do not starve in South Africa. As I was
told by an old trader who had traversed the country :—
No one starves, for if such a thing did occur, it could