and then sent us with the orders we now have to go and see the great white Chief, and that is now what we are trying to do. I have no power given me but to ask for time. The King sends his messengers first, because it is the custom of the country to do so, and not to send a great Chief till arrangements have been made where the Chiefs are to assemble to talk about peace. We have no power to talk about terms of peace. None but messengers have yet been sent. The messengers sent to the lower column went before the fighting began; they were detained and did not return to the King’s kraal till we did.’ I said I was satisfied they ought to be sent on at once to Lord Chelmsford. “I would give a letter, written by me to Lord Chelmsford, to Umfunzi, to be given by him with his own hand to Lord Chelmsford, and outside the letter I would say that no one but Lord Chelmsford was to open it. This appeared to please them much. I said I would write to the commanding officers along the road they were going to look after them, and to the officer at Rorke’s Drift to see them safe to Ibabamango.’ ‘Would a white man be safe going with them?’ ‘Yes,’ they said, ‘quite,’ and they wished one could be sent with them; but still more, the King would be pleased if a white man was sent to him. I said I would not send a white man alone into Zululand with them, because my Chief did not approve, still less could I send one to the King, because I was only under the big Chief. Anything they wished to say about peace or anything else they must say to the big Chief when they saw him.”—(P. P. [C. 2374] p. 111). At no time during the war, indeed, did we encourage the Zulu king in his persistent efforts to get peace; but more of this hereafter. Here we will only add one further instance, namely, that of two messengers sent to Colonel Pearson at Etshowe, who, although brought blindfold into the camp, were kept as prisoners in irons until the garrison was relieved. The pretext for this detention was that they were _supposed_ to be spies; but officers present were satisfied that there were no grounds for the supposition, or for the treatment which they received. Sir Bartle Frere of course inclines to the opinion that _all_ Cetshwayo’s messengers were spies, his entreaties for peace but treacherous pretexts to cover his evil intentions. Some of the men sent were old accredited messengers to the Government, whose names are frequently mentioned in earlier Blue-books, yet Sir Bartle Frere says of them: “In no case could they give any satisfactory proof that they really came from the king.”[165] But the High Commissioner’s habit of finding evil motives for every act of the Zulu king, made the case of the latter hopeless from the first.