The South-African crisis - pagina 17

THE SOUTll-Al'lUCAN

13

CllISIS.

In any case as regards the Boers,

who

have

since 1S04

moiuited up from 60,000 to more than half a milHon, the increase

makes

this fact still

more

interesting

is

considered amongst the Boers as a

is

What

without doubt extraordinary.

is

that fecundity

l)le,ssing

of the

Almighty and that the wife-mother without a shadow of feuniiisme rejoices in her unquestioned predominance in family

life

of

desire

all

and

in social

luxury

the

Free from

arrangements.

women

Boer

almost

are

exclusively devoted to their husbands and their children.

They are strong and courageous. Without dishonouring their sex the}' handle the rifle and mount the horse The enthusiasm of

men.

like

their national feeling

when the when was they who

often surpasses even that of their husbands and ;

in October

war broke

out,

it

father

hesitated

and even refused,

hearts

of

boys

their

with an

years

of fourteen

irresistible

on

set

fire

the

and even thirteen

desire to go to the front.

The English with some rare exceptions

2)

have always

painted the Boers for us as "exhibiting a most lamentable picture of laziness and stupidity" and their ''passing

as

1891

hi

1,1

population Africa,

6,549

at

27,689

ol

a lazy,

of a

the

dull,

of

total

and inactive

of England,

natives

German}', 899

But the

life"!

1,527,244 representing the black

Cape correctly speaking of Russia,

6,648

866

'1<472,000

women

and white

were natives of

of Scotland, 4,iS6 of Ireland,

of Holland, 696 of

Norway, 354 of France and 343 of Denmark.

Official

Sweden and

Handbook,

p. 234.

names of Froude, Sir George Gray, Selous, Gordon Gumming, J. C. Jlilner, and H. A. Bryce. Sir George Grey, holds up the Boer as a model of the civil and communal spirit. Ct. Purvis and Biggs, p. 55. Froude said: "No people on earth were less stupid." P. 115. 1

-)

,

quote,

outside

Mr.

Gladstone's

followers, the

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