"The Government was powerless to control either its white citizens or its native subjects, and that it was incapable of enforcing its laws or collecting its taxes; that the Treasury was empty; that the salaries of officials had been and are for months in arrears; and that sums payable for the ordinary and necessary expenses of Government cannot be had; that payment for such services as postal contracts were long and hopelessly overdue; that the white inhabitants had become split into factions; that the large native population within the boundaries of the State ignore its authority and its laws, and that the powerful ruling king, Cetywayo, is anxious to seize upon the first opportunity of attacking a country the conduct of whose warriors at Sekukuni's mountain has convinced him that it can be easily conquered by his clamoring regiments." [Sidenote: Kruger's Visit to London] President Burgers himself recognized the situation, and a month before the annexation was consummated told the assembled Volksraad that "matters are as bad as they ever can be; they cannot be worse." Practically, he supported the policy of Sir T. Shepstone, and shortly afterwards retired on a pension to live at Cape Town. The Hollanders, who stood to lose heavily by the supremacy of British ideas and intelligence in the country, did their utmost to arouse the fanaticism of the farmers by printed manifestoes and memorials of the most inflammatory character, but without much success. In the end the only practical opposition made was the appointment by the expiring Executive Council, on the day before the Proclamation, of a delegation to England composed of Mr. Paul Kruger, Vice-President, and Dr. E. J. P. Jorrissen, Attorney-General. These gentlemen went to London and were well received personally, and a similar result followed from a second deputation headed by, Mr. Kruger in 1878. One evil, however, came from these visits. Instead of the astute Paul Kruger being impressed by the power of Great Britain, or conciliated by the courtesy of political leaders, he seems to have been interested chiefly in the study of party tactics and of the disintegrating influence of politics when carried into the field of Colonial government and foreign affairs. Coupled with the knowledge thus gained of a Radical faction which was already denouncing Lord Carnarvon's Confederation scheme, and of the anti-expansion views of Mr. Gladstone, Mr. John Morley and Sir William Harcourt, was a keen appreciation of the strength of the Home Rule issue then evolving such incipient power in the field of partisan battle. It was not hard for Mr. Kruger to discern, or hope for, the coming fall of the Beaconsfield Government; the growing power of a Radical element which would parallel the case of the Transvaal with that of Ireland; and a future in which some strong movement in the now quiet and peace-environed Boer country would result in a reversal of British policy.