government to exculpate itself, because by the press law which they enacted in 1896 the president has the power, on the advice and with the consent of the executive, to prohibit the circulation of printed or published matter being in his judgment against good morals, or dangerous to peace and order in the republic. A country which has press laws of that kind, whether it be a republic or an autocracy like Russia, must take the responsibility with the right; it cannot exculpate itself when it permits a propaganda of that kind to take place in the columns of its press.
I have given you reasons for characterizing the policy pursued by the Transvaal government since 1884, and I am quite prepared to think that the time had arrived at which it was necessary to take some serious step. Because if what I have said is correct, if the policy of the two republics is really what it has been represented as being, then the state of things was this: there were upon our borders in South Africa two states of great military power—because although their population is not great, yet the whole of that population, as we see, is trained to arms and fights very well—^and those two military powers were engaged in a propaganda among our own people for the ultimate absorption of nearly the whole of our colonies in a big South African Republic from which England was to be excluded. It is perfectly unnecessary to say that that propaganda had already had considerable effect among the Cape Dutch. It may or may not, but what we do know is that even if it had not, such a propaganda if allowed to continue could hardly fail to have an effect sooner or later, because the fact of its not being checked would be taken as a proof of weakness on the part of this country. It is equally unavailing to say that no steps have been taken by the governments of the two republics actually to carry out the scheme of that propaganda. It is not likely, not having the support of Germany, that they would take any steps in peaceful times. But if it is the fact
