His second letter is dated 31st of July, more than six weeks after the Bloemfontein Conference. He writes to Mr. Fischer who acted as go-between the Cape Afrikanders and President Krueger. Mr. Chamberlain had requested that a mixed Commission be appointed to enquire into the merits of the franchise law, passed in accordance with Mr. Krueger's proposals. Here is Sir Henry de Villiers' judgment upon Mr. Krueger's and Mr. Chamberlain's proceedings. "I am convinced Mr. Krueger's friends must now regret they did not recommend to President Krueger three months ago, as I strongly urged, to offer voluntarily a liberal franchise bill with such safeguards as would prevent the old burghers from being swamped. "Mr. Chamberlain's speech was more moderate than I expected it would be, and as he holds out an olive branch in the form of a joint enquiry into the franchise proposals, would it not be well to meet him in this matter? I know that it might be regarded as a _partial_ surrender." The last sentence runs as follows: "I don't think that President Krueger and his friends realise the gravity of the situation. Even now the State Secretary is doing things which would be almost farcical if the times were not so serious." According to Sir Henry telegrams were suppressed by Dr. Reitz on the plea that "the Government should not disseminate lies by its own wires." Mr. de Villiers added: "The Transvaal will soon not have a single friend left among the cultivated classes." Events have proved he had a better opinion of them than they deserved. He goes on with the following: "The time really has come when the friends of the Transvaal must induce President Krueger to become perfectly frank and take the new comers into his confidence." And ends with saying again: "As one who signed the Convention in 1881 I can assure you that my fellow Commissioners would not have signed it if they had not been led to believe that President Krueger's policy towards the Uitlanders would have been very different from what it has been." In a letter written the same day to his brother Melius, one can see in what fool's paradise Dr. Reitz and his colleagues were living: "When I was in the Transvaal three months ago, I found that Reitz and others had the most extraordinary notions of the powers and duties of a Cape Ministry in case of war. They are Ministers of the Crown, and it will be their duty to afford every possible assistance to the British Government. Under normal conditions a responsible Ministry is perfectly independent in matters of internal concern, but in case of war they are bound to place all the resources of the Colony at the disposal of the British Crown; at least, if they did not do so, they would be liable to dismissal." Here is his opinion on the proceedings in the House of Commons: