Missionary Travels and Researches in South AfricaLivingstone, David
Religion
Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa
Livingstone, David
Missions -- South Africa; South Africa -- Description and travel
Ten years after he was firmly established in power he entered into a
treaty with the colonial government, and during the twenty years which
followed not a single charge was ever brought against either him or
his people; on the contrary, his faithful adherence to the stipulated
provisions elicited numerous expressions of approbation from successive
governments. A late governor, however, of whom it is impossible to speak
without respect, in a paroxysm of generalship which might have been
good, had it not been totally inappropriate to the case, set about
conciliating a band of rebellious British subjects (Boers), who murdered
the Honorable Captain Murray, by proclaiming their independence while
still in open rebellion, and not only abrogated the treaty with the
Griquas, but engaged to stop the long-accustomed supplies of gunpowder
for the defense of the frontier, and even to prevent them from
purchasing it for their own defense by lawful trade.
If it had been necessary to prevent supplies of ammunition from finding
their way into the country, as it probably was, one might imagine that
the exception should not have been made in favor of either Boers or
Caffres, our openly-avowed enemies; but, nevertheless, the exception was
made, and is still continued in favor of the Boers, while the Bechuanas
and Griquas, our constant friends, are debarred from obtaining a
single ounce for either defense or trade; indeed, such was the state of
ignorance as to the relation of the border tribes with the English, even
at Cape Town, that the magistrates, though willing to aid my researches,
were sorely afraid to allow me to purchase more than ten pounds of
gunpowder, lest the Bechuanas should take it from me by force. As it
turned out, I actually left more than that quantity for upward of two
years in an open box in my wagon at Linyanti.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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