" It is also incidentally
remarkably confirmed by a passage in Mr. Burgers' posthumous defence, in
which he says: "Hence I met Shepstone alone in my house, and opened up
the subject of his mission. With a candour that astonished me, he avowed
that his purpose was to annex the country, as he had sufficient grounds
for it, unless I could so alter as to satisfy his Government. My plan of
a new constitution, modelled after that of America, of a standing police
force of two hundred mounted men, was then proposed. He promised to give
me time to call the Volksraad together, and to _abandon his design_ if
the Volksraad would adopt these measures, and the country be willing to
submit to them, and to carry them out." Further on he says: "In justice
to Shepstone I must say that I would not consider an officer of my
Government to have acted faithfully if he had not done what Shepstone
did."
It has also been frequently alleged in England, and always seems to be
taken as the groundwork of argument in the matter of the Annexation,
that the Special Commissioner represented that the majority of the
inhabitants wished for the Annexation, and that it was sanctioned on
that ground.
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