The South-African crisis - pagina 9

THE SOUTH-AFRICAN

CRISIS.

they are proud, and during the great war ofmdependence they sealed with their blood their aversion for

Now, the same kind of thing has

everything English.

happened

at

Cape

^).

Captain

Percival

himself

1808: "An Englishman will be surprised at

testified in

the

the

aversion,

and even the hatred which the Dutch

seem to entertain towards us"

^).

was the reaction from the rivalry of the two great naval powers of the seventeenth century the struggle in which Holland had succumbed. Resentment against ^'perfidious Albion" had nowhere penetrated the national spirit more profoundly than in the Netherlands; and England herself had rendered this resentment the more bitter by the highhanded manner in which she never ceased to apply to Holland the It

—

Vae still,

sions.

victis principle.

"Dutch'' and "double Dutch" are

amongst the English populace, invidious expresTime indeed has softened these racial anti-

pathies.

In Holland

it

is

true there are a few^ circles

that are open to the charge even of Anglomania, but

on the other hand a historian like Rogers

in his "History

Holland" has frankly acknowledged not only that

of

England was indebted to Holland

for a large share of

her civilization but also that England had very badly

repayed this valuable service

^).

At the time when the Cape was annexed the relations between the tw^o countries were still very strained, and Mr. Theal the well known historian of the V)

Chase, Ihstonj of Sotilh-Africa, p. 349.

-)

Percival.

•'i

In the series: "The Slori/ of Un; Naliona"', the last page.

p.

305.

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