Nevertheless Colonel Colley’s judgment, although convicting Mr. John Shepstone of having enticed the chief Matshana to an interview with the intention of seizing him, was received and acted upon in Natal as an acquittal of that officer. So far was this the case, that, although Lord Carnarvon directed that the Bishop’s costs should be placed upon the colonial estimates, the Legislative Council of the colony refused to pay them on the grounds that they were the costs of the losing party. In his report Colonel Colley gives his opinions as follows: “That Matyana was enticed to an interview, as stated by the Bishop, and was induced to come unarmed, under the belief that it was a friendly meeting, such as he had already had with Mr. Shepstone, for the purpose of discussing the accusations against him and the question of his return to his location. “That Matyana, though very suspicious and unwilling, came there in good faith; and that the accusations against him—of meditating the assassination of Mr. Shepstone and his party, of a prearranged plan and signal for the purpose, and of carrying concealed arms to the meeting—which are made in Mr. J. Shepstone’s statements, are entirely without foundation. “That Mr. Shepstone at that time held no magisterial position, but was simply the commander of a small armed force charged with the execution of a warrant; and that the manner in which he proposed to effect the seizure, viz. at a supposed friendly meeting, was known to and sanctioned by, if not the Government, at least the immediate representative of the Government and Mr. Shepstone’s superior, Dr. Kelly, the resident magistrate of the district. “That Mr. Shepstone did not attempt to shoot Matyana, as described by the Bishop, but fired into the air after the attempt to seize Matyana had failed, and in consequence of the attempt made almost simultaneously by some of Matyana’s men to reach the huts and seize the arms of Mr. Shepstone’s men. “The concealment of the gun,” he continues, “and the fact that a number of Matyana’s men were killed in the pursuit, is not disputed by Mr. Shepstone. “I confess that I have had the greatest difficulty in forming my opinion on this latter point, and especially as to whether Mr. Shepstone fired into the air as he states. _The weight of direct evidence adduced at the inquiry lay altogether on the other side._”[51] Colonel Colley then proceeds to give the considerations by which he has been influenced in coming to a conclusion directly opposed to the side on which, as he himself says, lay the weight of direct evidence. These considerations were threefold. The first is an opinion of his own, considerably at variance with most people’s experience, namely, that a story handed down by oral tradition “crystallises into an accepted form,” by which he explains away the fact that so many witnesses told the same story, and one which stood the test of cross-examination, without any important variations.