“With regard to the South African Republic, Great Britain has moreover refused until the present to allow her to regain her original position in respect to foreign affairs, a position which she had lost in no sense by her own faults. The original intention of the conventions to which the republic had consented under pressure and circumstances has been perverted and continually been used by the present British administration as a means for the practice of tyranny and of injustice, and, among other things, for the support of a revolutionary propaganda within the republic in favor of Great Britain. “And while no redress has been offered, as justice demands, for injustice done to the South African Republic on the part of the British government; and while no gratitude is exhibited for the magnanimity shown at the request of the British government to British subjects who had forfeited under the laws of the republic their lives and property, yet no feeling of shame has prevented the British government, now that the gold mines of immense value have been discovered in the country, to make claims of the republic, the consequence of which, if allowed, will be that those who—or whose forefathers—have saved the country from barbarism and have won it for civilization with their blood and their tears, will lose their control over the interests of the country to which they are justly entitled according to divine and human laws. The consequence of these claims would be, moreover, that the greater part of the power will be placed in the hands of those who, foreigners by birth, enjoy the privilege of depriving the country of its chief treasure, while they have never shown any loyalty to a foreign government. Besides, the inevitable consequence of the acceptance of these claims would be that the independence of the country as a self-governing, independent sovereign republic would be irreparably lost. For years past British troops in great numbers have been placed on the frontiers of our sister republic in order to compel her by fear to accede to the demands which would be pressed upon her, and in order to encourage revolutionary disturbances and the cunning plans of those whose greed for gold is the cause of their shameless undertakings. “Those plans have now reached their climax in the open violence to which the present British government now resorts. While we readily acknowledge the honorable character of thousands of Englishmen who loathe such deeds of robbery and wrong, we cannot but abhor the shameless breaking of treaties, the feigned pretexts for the transgression of law, the violation of international law and of justice and the numerous right-rending deeds of the British statesmen, who will now force a war upon the South African Republic. On their heads be the guilt of blood, and may a just Providence reward all as they deserve. “Burghers of the Orange Free State, rise as one man against the oppressor and the violator of right!