Then there was another thing which rankled badly: Messrs. Sampson and Davies were still in gaol.{45} The feeling throughout South Africa was reflected in the monotonous announcement which appeared in the _Cape Times_ week by week for thirteen months:--'To-day Messrs. Sampson and Davies complete the--week of their imprisonment in Pretoria gaol for the crime of not signing a petition.' It seemed scarcely credible that the President should still harbour any illusions about his magnanimity; nevertheless, for some weeks before the celebration of the Queen's Record reign it was rumoured that the two prisoners were to be released upon that occasion as a mark of his Honour's sympathy. Opinion had not been unanimous upon the attitude of either the President or the prisoners; but an ugly incident silenced most of the President's apologists. Gold stealing and the purchase of stolen gold were being carried on such a scale and with such impunity that at last, in desperation, the directors and officials of one of the big mining companies (the City and Suburban G.M. Co.), at the risk of being shot by desperadoes, took upon themselves the functions of the detectives and police. They caught 'red-handed' two notorious characters and delivered them over, with the gold in their possession, to the authorities. The thieves actually boasted then that nothing would happen to them as they had 'made it all right;' and a few days later one of them was allowed to escape out of the Court-house buildings which stand in the middle of a large square. The other was convicted and sentenced to six months' imprisonment. He was a criminal of a bad and dangerous type, the head of a gang known to be concerned in gold stealing and burglary as a profession. The penalty was regarded by all parties as most inadequate and the judge himself commented adversely upon the drafting of the law which tended to screen the prisoner. Not one mitigating circumstance was forthcoming! And yet, whilst ignoring a fresh outburst of protest against the detention of Messrs. Sampson and Davies, and whilst the Industrial Commission was exposing the gold thefts and denouncing the complicity of the police, Mr. Kruger decided to remit three-fourths of the sentence and to discharge the thief unconditionally. Is it to be wondered that such ill-advised action called to mind the prisoners' boast, and that it was contrasted prominently with the treatment of the two Reformers? Three events of importance marked the year 1897 in the history of the Transvaal. The first was the High Court crisis in February; the second, the appointment of the Industrial Commission of Inquiry; the third, the Queen's Record Reign celebration.