They did even more than the compromise required of them, in order to help the Government, the leaders giving their digit impressions to encourage the rank and file to do the same. When, however, the registration was complete, and the aim of the Government was reached, the Colonial Secretary repudiated his part of the contract. General Smuts has said in Parliament: "It may have been a misunderstanding." The Asiatics say: "It was a broken promise."
Lord Selborne counselled the Royal sanction to a measure which stamped them as a nation of criminals. By its administration they have been illegally deported, fined, and imprisoned, until their confidence in British justice is in ruins. It will need a generation of wise and good rule to restore it.
