A history of the colonization of Africa by alien racesJohnston, Harry
History
A history of the colonization of Africa by alien races
Johnston, Harry
Africa -- Colonization; Africa -- Discovery and exploration
The same body also established an industrial mission (initiated by
Dr James Stewart, the founder of Lovedale) in British East Africa,
halfway to Uganda.
Footnote 140:
Who worked for many years in Nyasaland and in East Africa, and was
drowned in Like Nyasa in 1895.
CHAPTER XI
THE BRITISH IN AFRICA, II
(_South and South-Central._)
Towards the close of the 18th century Great Britain cast longing
eyes at the Cape of Good Hope, as a victualling station for her
ships on the way to India which could not remain much longer in the
weak grasp of a Dutch company and must not fall into the hands of
France. In 1795 the British Government despatched a strong
expedition with the authority of the Prince of Orange and took
possession of Cape Town, after a brief struggle with the local
authorities. Free trade, with some preference for British goods, at
once took the place of the grinding monopoly and vexatious
restrictions of the old Dutch company; and various other liberal
measures were enacted, which would have done much to reconcile the
Dutch colonists to British rule were it not that, when England at
the Peace of Amiens in 1803 restored the Cape of Good Hope to the
Dutch Republic, there followed three years of direct Dutch rule
under two most enlightened men, De Mist and Janssens, who did much
to efface from the settlers’ remembrance the justly hated
selfishness of the old Dutch East India Company. Therefore, when
Great Britain resumed, in a manner intended to be permanent, the
administration of Cape Colony in 1805, a still more decided
opposition was shown to her forces than before; and even after the
cession of this colony by Holland in 1814 there remained among the
Dutch settlers a certain lukewarmness, and a disposition to find
fault with the actions and motives of the Colonial Government and of
the British people. In 1806, when Cape Colony passed definitely
under British control, it had an area of about 125,000 square
miles[141]. The boundary on the East was the Great Fish river, and
thence a curving line which ended at Plettenberg’s Beacon, about
fifty miles south of the Orange river. The boundary on the north was
an irregular line from Plettenberg’s Beacon (dipping far south in
the middle) to the mouth of the Buffalo river (Little Namakwaland)
on the Atlantic Ocean. The population of the colony (not counting
the military forces) was about 26,000 Europeans (of whom 6,000 lived
in Cape Town), about 30,000 Malay and negro slaves, some hundred
thousand Hottentots and half-breeds, perhaps another hundred
thousand Kafirs and a few thousand Bushmen. The industries and
pursuits of the European settlers were limited to vine-growing, the
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