can we blame a man who gives candid expression to his opinions such as they are? Ignorance, however, is bound to do harm even when associated with candour, and the result was that in 1885 a very drastic law was rushed through the Volksraad, as if thousands of Indians were on the point of flooding the Transvaal. The British Agent was obliged to move in the matter at the instance of Indian leaders. The question was finally carried to the Secretary of State for the Colonies. In terms of this Law 3 of 1885 every Indian settling in the Republic for the purpose of carrying on trade was required to register at a cost of twenty-five pounds subject to heavy penalties, and no Indian could hold an inch of land or enjoy the rights of citizenship. All this was so manifestly unjust that the Transvaal Government could not defend it in argument. There was a treaty subsisting between the Boers and the British known as the London Convention, Article XIV of which secured the rights of British subjects. The British Government objected to the Law as being in contravention of that Article. The Boers urged in reply that the British Government had previously given their consent, whether express or implied, to the law in question.
A dispute thus arose between the British and the Boer Governments, and the matter was referred to arbitration. The arbitrator’s award was unsatisfactory. He tried to please both parties. The Indians were therefore the losers. The only advantage they reaped, if advantage it can be called, was that they did not lose as much as they might have done otherwise. The Law was amended in 1886 in accordance with the arbitrator’s award. The registration fee was reduced from twenty-five to three pounds. The clause, which completely debarred Indians from holding landed property, was removed, and it was provided instead, that the Indians could own flxed property in such locations, wards and streets as were specially set apart for their residence by the Transvaal Government. This Government did not honestly carry out the terms of the amended clause, and withheld from Indians the right to purchase freehold land even in the locations. In all
