As Gordon went to the Cape specially for the purpose of treating the Basutoland question, it may be well to describe briefly what that question was. Basutoland is a mountainous country, difficult of access, but in resources self-sufficing, on the eastern side of the Orange Free State, and separated from Natal and Kaffraria, or the Transkei division of Cape Colony, by the sufficiently formidable Drakensberg range. Its population consisted of 150,000 stalwart and freedom-loving Highlanders, ruled by four chiefs--Letsea, Masupha, Molappo, and Lerothodi, with only the three first of whom had Gordon in any way to deal. Notwithstanding their numbers, courage, and the natural strength of their country, they owed their safety from absorption by the Boers to British protection, especially in 1868, and they were taken over by us as British subjects without any formality three years later. They do not seem to have objected so long as the tie was indefinite, but when in 1880 it was attempted to enforce the regulations of the Peace Preservation Act by disarming these clans, then the Basutos began a pronounced and systematic opposition. Letsea and Lerothodi kept up the pretence of friendliness, but Masupha fortified his chief residence at Thaba Bosigo, and openly prepared for war. That war had gone on for two years without result, and the total cost of the Basuto question had been four millions sterling when Gordon was summoned to the scene. Having given this general description of the question, it will be well to state the details of the matters in dispute, as set forth by Gordon after he had examined all the papers and heard the evidence of the most competent and well-informed witnesses. His memorandum, dated 26th May 1882, read as follows:-- "In 1843 the Basuto chiefs entered into a treaty with Her Majesty's Government, by which the limits of Basutoland were recognised roughly in 1845. The Basuto chiefs agreed by convention with Her Majesty's Government to a concession of land on terminable leases, on the condition that Her Majesty's Government should protect them from Her Majesty's subjects. "In 1848 the Basuto chiefs agreed to accept the Sovereignty of Her Majesty the Queen, on the understanding that Her Majesty's Government would restrain Her Majesty's subjects in the territories they possessed. "Between 1848 and 1852, notwithstanding the above treaties, a large portion of Basutoland was annexed by the proclamation of Her Majesty's Government, and this annexation was accompanied by hostilities, which were afterwards decided by Sir George Cathcart as being undertaken in support of unjustifiable aggression. "In 1853, notwithstanding the treaties, Basutoland was abandoned, leaving its chiefs to settle as they could with the Europeans of the Free State who were settled in Basutoland and were mixed up with the Basuto people.