The story of South Africa written especially for young people ...

Front matter

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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT

THE

Chapter I

First European settlement by Portuguese — Coming of the Dutch — Arrival of French Huguenots — Africander type — Trek Boers — Colonel Gordon — English eyes on the Cape — Holland invaded by French — Arrival of British fleet — Rumors of coming of French to the Cape — British protection refused — Threat of British — "Father" Sluysken — Eve of first British attack.

Chapter II

Conflict of authority — British blockade Table Bay — Terms offered by British — Surrender of Cape Colony to British — Restored to Dutch — Ceded to Great Britain — Slavery suppressed — Dissatisfaction of Boers — The "Great Trek" — Settlement in Orange Free State— Paul Kruger an immigrant — Zulu warfare — Matabele tribe — Transvaal Republic — Natalia Republic — Pietermaritzburg.

Chapter III

Pretorius — Attack by British on Natalia — Natalia, a British possession — Second Trek — Basutos — Doctor Philip — Giving back to British rule of Orange River sovereignty — Transvaal Republic — British give up Orange River country — Secheli — Doctor Livingstone — Slavery called "apprenticeship" — Third contact between Boer and Britain-r-Discovery of diamonds — Rush to the Cape — 'Claimants to the diamond lands — British courts award the lands to Orange Free State — British flag over the territory before courts decide — Money paid to Orange Free State to relinquish claim.

Chapter IV

Third contact of Africander and Briton — Civil war growing out of presidential election — Schoeman opposed to Pretorius — Kruger to drive out Schoeman — Story of Kruger — Otawayo — Zulu warfare — Transvaal annexed by British — Sir Bartle Frere — Sir Gaunt Wolseley — Mass meeting of Boers — Laing's Nek — Majuba Hill — Transvaal restored to Africanders and Kruger elected president.

Chapter V

British seize Bechuanaland— Lo Bengula— Gold discovered — Rush of speculators- Diamonds discovered — Kimberley diamond fields — The Rand gold mines-^Cecil Rhodes premier— British plan to take Swaziland — Marquis of Ripon and Mr. Chamberlain — Rate war— President Kruger's stand in the matter — Complaints of Uitlanders against the republic.

Chapter VI

Plans for Uitlander uprising — Criticisms of President Kruger — Tales at Pretoria of proposed uprising — Restlessness of Boers — Preparations to resist raid — Mrs. Kruger — Jameson's raid — Jameson defeated and.made prisoner — Condition ol Johannesburg — Criticism of raid.

Chapter VII

Cecil Rhodes and his schemes — Africanders determined on independence — Kruger re-elected president— Petition of Uitlanders — Complaints against Transvaal government — Note of British government — Reply of South African government — Chamberlain's famous speech — Shipment of English troops to South Africa — ■ Africanders prepare for hostilities.

Chapter VIII

October, 1899 — Document of South African Government — Reward Offered for Cecil Rhodes — Description of Volksraad — Orange Free State aroused — Proclamation of President Stein — "Oorlog" — War! — The forces of Great Britain — Strength of Africanders — News of Capture of two English regiments — Surprise in London — Besieging newspaper offices and War Office for news — War realized as being a real thing.

Chapter IX

General Buller embarks for Cape Town — Arrival at Table Bay — Stormburg — The story of the armored train — Manning of the train — The push to Frere — The train attacked and destroyed — Prisoners of war — Boer treatment of prisoners — First battle of the war — Boer's encampment — "I will wait" — Night in the prisoners' hut — The evening hymn of the Boers.

Chapter X

Reports from seat of war — Ladysmith and Colenso — Censorship of newspapers — Shelling of Mafeking— Fitting out of the "Maine" by women — Prisoners of war on the way to Pretoria — Story of Cecil Rhodes and the diamond operator — Prisoners reach Pretoria — "On to Kimberley" — Defeat of Gatacre at Stormburg — Escape of newspaper correspondent, his hardships and gaining of his liberty.

Chapter XI

Check of General Methuen — Magersfontein — The queen's grief — Hospitals at Pietermaritzburg — Strength of British force — Christmas Day in camp — New year opens well for English — British demonstration before Colenso — Force for relief of Ladysmith — Confidence in General Buller — Capture of Potgieter's Ferry — Arrival of General Buller— Operations for relief of Ladysmith— To Springfield.

CONTENTS.

^ CHAPTER XII.

Lord Buller's~plan tcTstorm Spion Kop— Preparing to cross the Tugela— Pontoon 'bridges — Lord Dundonald— Capture of Boers — English kind to their prisoners — The dying Boer boy— J Check of Sir Redvers Buller — Boer force— English force — English killed and wounded— Battle of Spion Kop— Repulse of English— Comments in London.,

Chapter XIII

Censorship of news — English newspaper opinions — Dissatisfaction of army — General Buller encourages the men — Church in camp — A poor sermon — Boer talk of Boers — Reinforcements for Buller — Move to be made — Plan of attack.

Chapter XIV

Troops moving — Boer gunning — "Long Tom" — In Ladysmith — Prices of commodities and things used for food — Hopes set on Buller — Orders to retire — Opinions as to defense and assault — Another trial — Another hope — Hussar Hill — Orders for a general advance — A gain — Americans with the troops — Monte Cristo in the possession of the English — Ladysmith eight miles away.

Chapter XV

Ladysmith eight miles away — Difficulties in reaching the town — Newspaper criticisms — Buller's plan and works — Taking of Colenso — Boers in retreat — Characteristics of Buller — "On to Ladysmith" — Meeting the Boers — Splendid fighting of English and Boers — Losses of English — Suffering of English wounded — Buller' s change of plan — Soldiers disappointed — Soldiers encouraged — The last attempt to save Ladysmith.

Chapter XVI

Majuba Day — Firing at dawn — Preparations— Dundonald — Description of firing— — The battle — Capture of Barton's Hill — Railway Hill — In front of fire of Mausers — English in possession of Railway Hill — Innis Killing Hill — Battle of Pieter's won — Would capture of Ladysmith end the war? — Bravery of Boers — Would fight "till the last man" — English in possession — Victory!

Chapter XVII

Preparations — The Ladysmith balloon — "Buller is coming" — Ladysmith six miles away — "Dundonald, on!" — The Ladysmith picket — Ladysmith relieved — Condition of garrison — Pepworth's Hill — Bulwana Hill — Kimberley — Rhodes' regiment — General Roberts — Relief of Kimberley — Hatred of Rhodes — Letter from envoy extraordinary of Orange Free State — Retreat of Cronje — Colesberg — Roberts pushing on — Bloemfontein entered.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XVIIL

Kitchener — Gatacre — Mafeking holding out — Capture of Cronje — Death of Joubert— Estimate of his character — March towards Pretoria — Baden-Powell relieved at Mafeking — Character of Baden-Powell — Annexation of Orange Free State — Flight of President Kruger — Johannesburg entered — Fight for Pretoria — Entrance of Pretoria — Mortality of British army — Losses of Boers.

Chapter XIX

General Roberts thinks the war nearly over — Troops dismissed — Troops to go to China in the new war — Pacification of the Transvaal — Kruger with $25,000,000 gold — Boers consider Free State still free — Fighting — Despatches and reports — Kruger will have peace only on his own terms — Boer peace envoys — Their address to the people of the United States — Suffering in British army — Flight of Kruger.

Chapter XX

Was the war over? — Interview with President Kruger — "Fight to the bitter end" — Hospital scandals — Trouble with China — The "Boxers" — The Boers not giving up — Dissatisfaction of England over the war — "The war is not over," said Kruger — British losses in men — Cost* in money — Coming to agreement — Terms — The end in sight.

LOBENGULA, KING OF THE MATABELES Frontispiece

VASCO DA GAMA DISCOVERING CAPE OF GOOD HOPE 19

THE GREAT TREK 38

MATABELE WAR: DEFENDING A LAAGER. (R. Caton Woodville.) . 55

PRESIDENT KRUGER. GENERAL JOUBERT 62

TREKKING HOME: LAST OF THE COMMANDO 71

DEFENDING RORKE'S DRIFT: BATTLE OF LAING'S NEK 78

BATTLE OF MAJUBA HILL. (Drawn by R. Caton Woodville.) 95

KIMBERLEY DIAMOND MINES 102

THREE GENERATIONS OF BOERS "8

THE IMPERIAL YEOMAN'S LAST RIDE. (R. Caton Woodville.) 135

BOERS ATTACKED BY BRITISH CAVALRY 142

EXODUS OF BRITISH SUBJECTS. (Wal Paget.) 151

A FIELD BATTERY FORDING A RIVER IN FLOOD 158

A DIFFICULT RECONNOISANCE; NEAR COLESBURG 175

BREAD FOR SOLDIERS: A FIELD BAKERY 182

COLONIAL TROOPS SURPRISE BOERS. (Dinner left cooking on the

stove) 19 1

IN THE TRENCHES AT MAFEKING 198

CLEARING THE KOPJES .. 215

"TO ARMS! THE BRITISH ARE COMING!" 222

HAULING GUNS UP COLE'S KOP 231

FORWARD TO PRETORIA! HORSE ARTILLERY OF FRENCH'S

DIVISION .. 238

THE ATTACK ON SPION KOP 255

BULLER'S TRANSPORT WAGONS 262

LOSS OF BRITISH GUNS: TUGELA RIVER 271

"FIX BAYONETS!"— IN THE TRENCHES AT LADYSMITH 278

From Sketch by special artist, Mr. Melton Prior.

FIELD MARSHAL LORD ROBERTS: GEN. SIR REDVERS H. BUL-

SALUTING FIRST WOUNDED CARRIED FROM FIELD 302

(A traditional custom of the British Army.)

ESCAPING BOERS TO MEET BABOONS 311

BIVOUAC NEAR COLESBURG 3^

BATTLE OF CAESAR'S CAMP. (Melton Prior.) 335

GENERAL FRENCH MEETING CECIL RHODES. (Villiers.) 342

(Sanatorium Hotel, Kimberley, on the Evening of "Relief.")

RELIEF OF KIMBERLEY: ARRIVAL OF THE MUTTON 351

LORD ROBERTS AND STAFF STARTING FOR A RECONNOIS-

SANCE 362

GUARDS CLEARING THE SUBURBS OF JOHANNESBURG 371

Perhaps it is as well, before going into the story of South Africa, to speak aoout the place, its natural conditions, its resources, and the like, which will help to a clearer understanding of the tale of the Africanders who came to a wild country of blacks and made of it a republican land which has always attracted the attention of Great Britain.

Nature has divided that part of Africa lying south of the Bambesi River into three regions. A strip of low lying land skirts the Indian Ocean all the way from Cape Town to Natal, Delagoa Bay and northeast to the mouth of the Bambesi. Between the principal port of Natal, Durban, and Cape Town this strip of land is very narrow ; in some places the hills come down almost to the sea. To the northeast of Durban the plains become wider. This low lying land is swampy, and from Durban northward the climate is malarious, as the English soldiers engaged in the war with the South African Republic only too unhappily discovered.

The second region is higher, but the surface is much broken, reaching from Cape Town to the Bambesi Valley, something like 1600 miles. The Quathlamba Mountains are here and rise to a great height.

Beyond the mountains, to the west and north, is the third natural division, a great table land rising from three to five thousand feet above the sea level.

The coast of Africa is poor in harbors. There is no port between Cape Town and Durban, while from Durban to the Bambesi there are only two good ports — Delagoa Bay and Beira. Except Saldanha Bay,

x 3 i 4 THE STORY OF

which is twenty miles north of Cape Town, the western coast has no harbor for a thousand miles.

The temperature in South Africa is lower than might be supposed. This is because there is more water than dry land in the southern hemisphere. The mean temperature in South Africa proper is seventy degrees in January and eighty in July, though there are days of exceptional moist tropical heat.

In most parts of the country the climate is dry. Around Cape Colony winter and summer are well defined, though in the rest of South Africa there is a wet season for five months when the heat is intense, while the rest of the year is the dry season, when the air is cooler. In the parts where the rain fall is heaviest the moisture quickly disappears, by evaporation and absorption, and the surface remains parched till the next wet season, consequently the air is generally dry and clear and cool.

The rivers are not rivers during the greater part of the year. In the dry season they are without water altogether, or consist of a succession of small pools hardly enough water being in them to supply the cattle with drink. And when they are rivers, as rivers are known, they are most of the time so deep and wide that they can neither be forded nor navigated, the rains which continue for hours and days converting them into great torrents.

The purity of the air and its dryness makes many parts of South Africa suitable for persons with chest diseases, and it was here that Cecil Rhodes came when delicate in health, and was cured so effectually that ever since he has been a trouble to the Africanders.

When it was first explored, South Africa was filled with wild animals — lions, leopards, elephants, giraffes, the rhinoceros, the hippopotamus, thirty-one species of the antelope, zebra, quagga, buffalo and other wild creatures. The Dutch settlers struggled against these animals and after many dangers nearly exterminated them in some sections, till now there are only two regions where big game can be found.

Snakes of all kinds used to infest the country, poisonous and venomous, but they have nearly disappeared in the places where the white man has come.

There are beautiful flowers there, of a topical kind, though most of the regions have few blooms on account of the dryness of the surface of the ground. In general, South Africa is bare of forests, only a few existing and these are carefully guarded by the Forest Department. The prickly pear, however, is there, and men and cattle have much difficulty with its sharp thorns. A large part of the prickly pear region is used for ostrich farming.

To the east where there is much rainfall there are more trees and less thorny. All around Kimberley, where there were once many woods, the trees have nearly all been cut down for fuel and to make props for the diamond mines. The people have planted the Australian gum tree in some places, besides the eucalyptus and the oak, and they are growing well and will alter the climate for the better.

Cape Colony is the largest political division of South Africa. It contains about 292,000 square miles, and the population, white and native, is over 2,000,000 — the whites being about 400,000. Only a small division of it is suitable for farming, portions of it being too dry and barren for stock raising. Under the summer rains the prickly shrubs sprout and the sprouts are good eating for goats and sheep. Towards Kimberley and Mafeking the country is better watered and grazing animals find grass and nutritious shrubs. The year 1899 found South Africa with 3,000 miles of railway and nearly 7,000 miles of telegraph. In Cape Colony there were nearly twenty-five hundred vessels of all sorts. The foreign commerce is large, the importations of one year being more that eighty millions of dollars, while the exports, which included a great proportion of gold and diamonds from Kimberly, were close on to a hundred and twenty-five millions.

Natal has greater natural advantages than any other part of South Africa. It lies on the seaward slope of the Quathlamba Mountains, and its scenery is very beautiful. It is well watered by never ending streams that are fed by the snows and springs of the mountains. While the higher places toward the west are bare of shrubbery, there is always abundance of grass lower down, and toward the coast there is wood in plenty. The climate is a great deal warmer than in Cape Golony, in places the heat is intense. This heat is caused by the Mozambique channel which brings a warm stream of water from the hot regions of the Indian ocean, and this acts on the climate of Natal as the gulf stream acts on the climate of North and South Carolina and Georgia. The principal crops are sugar, coffee, indigo, arrowroot, ginger, tobacco, rice, pepper, cotton and tea. The coal fields are large. The population amounts to 828,500, tHe whites being 61,000.

The Orange Free State is between four and five thousand feet above the sea, and is 48,000 miles in area. It is mostly level, though there are mountains more than 6,000 feet high. There are few trees, though cattle and flocks find grazing nine months out of twelve. The air is fine and bracing. Occasionally there are violent thunder storms, with hail stones large enough to kill the smaller animals, and sometimes men. The valley of the Caledon river, to the southeast, is one of the best corn growing parts of Africa. The grazing farms are very large, but require the care of only a few men, so the population does not increase very rapidly. The Orange. Free State, which is about the size of the State of New York, has only about 80,000 white people in it, and 130,000 natives. A railway built by the Cape Colony government connects Bloemfontein, the capital, with Cape Colony, Natal and Pretoria, which is the capital of the South African Republic.

SOUTH AFRICA.

The South African Republic, usually called the Transvaal, has an area of about a hundred and twenty thousand square miles. The white population, of 345,397, is mostly centered about the Witwatersrand mining district. The natives number about 700,000. All the Transvaal belongs to the interior, except a strip of low land on the eastern and northern borders, where there is much malaria. Like the Orange Free State the Transvaal is principally grazing country, there being but few trees. The winters are very cold, and the scorching sun of summer quickly dries up the moisture and bakes the soil, stunting and yellowing the grass most of the year. The Transvaal up to a few years ago had little to attract strangers. But in 1884 gold was discovered, and it has since been known as probably the richest gold country in the world. Later on, 1897, diamonds were discovered. The output of gold in 1898 was $69,154,000, and of diamonds, $212,812.01. The total output of gold since gold was first discovered there amounts to more than $300,- 000,000, with ten times that amount in sight, according to experts. The imports of one year are estimated at $107,575,000.

Griqua West, a British possession bordering on Cape Colony and the Free State, is chiefly important because of the Kimberley diamond mines. These mines were opened in 1869. They have given $350,000,- 000 worth of diamonds in their rough state, with double that amount after cutting.

Bechuanaland, the British protectorate, is north of Cape Colony and Griqualand and to the west of the Transvaal. In area it is a little over 200,000 square miles, the population, mostly natives, being 200,- 000. A railway and telegraph connect it with Cape Colony and Rhodesia.

Rhodesia includes what was formerly British South Africa and a part of that known as British East Africa. It contains about 750,000 square miles, or about one-fourth of the area of the United States withi8 out counting Alaska. There are said to be between one and two million people there and only about 6000 whites. It is a country new to civilization, so no actual statement can be made as to its commerce.

It is perhaps well to have this statement of South Africa, though it may appear dry and uninteresting.

TH 4tory of South Africa has more interest in it, and will now be

tokL

Chapter I

First European settlement by Portuguese— Coming of the Dutch—Arrival of French Huguenots — Africander type — Trek Boers — Colonel Gordon — English eyes on the Cape— Holland invaded by French— Arrival of British fleet— Rumors of coming of French to the Cape — British protection refused — Threat of British — "Father" Sluysken— Eve of first British attack.

HE first Europeans to visit South Africa were the Portuguese. Portuguese commerce lay west of Madagascar, so they did not put in at Table Bay which might have been made a port of supply in the southeastern portion of Africa. But when the Dutch took the trade from the Portuguese, that southeastern part became very important. Their sea road going east was south of Madagascar so that in the long voyage from Holland to Batavia it was necessary that they should have a port of supply at the turning point. In this way they would stop at Table Bay for fresh water, fish, and for barter with the natives.

It was in 1650 that the Dutch East India Company, hearing reports of the resources of Table Bay, decided to establish there a station. On the 24th of December, 1651, it being Sunday, an expedition set out. After a voyage of a hundred and four days the emigrants first saw the home that was to be theirs thereafter. The Dutch East India Company had sent Jan Van Reibeek as first officer of the expedition. He and three skippers inspected Table Valley and picked out as a site for a fort the ground a little in the rear of where the post office of Cape Town i now stands. Here the fort was built. In it were dwellings and barracks. Around the fort were walled enclosures, or Kraals, for cattle, besides workshops and tents for the settlers. This was the first European settlement in South Africa.

In 1658 the colonists introduced slave labor, compelling the West African negroes to work for them. To these slaves the Dutch East India Company added Malay convicts from Java and other portions of its East Indian territories. Some of these Malays took wives among the native African slave women and their children were the beginning of the dark people which began to form the population of Cape Town and its nearby regions. In 1689 nearly four hundred French Huguenots came from Holland and joined the colonists at the Cape. They were refined, energetic people, and many of the colonial families of South Africa are descended from them. The Huguenots loved their language and their Protestant faith, but the company forbade the use of French in religious services and in all official writings, so by the middle of the eighteenth century the Huguenots were blended with the Dutch colonists in language as well as in religion and politics. Many German Lutherans having emigrated to the Cape, at last, in 1780, the company sanctioned a church of that persuasion.

The Africander type of people began to appear when the settlers moved by degrees from the coast to the interior parts of the country.

The Dutch and Germans were of the humbler classes, they were away from home, communication with Europe was difficult, and they lost feeling for the places of their birth. The Hueguenots had no home country — France had banished them and Holland did not own them. In this way the whites who went into the interior of Africa had no bond between themselves and Europe, they were a new people whose lot in life lay in Africa. They became stockmen and hunters and protected themselves against lions and leopards and the savage Bushmen who resented an invasion of their country. They were isolated and wild, their children grew up untaught, their wives lost the cleanly habits of the Dutch and French, the men themselves neglected the elegances of life, but retained their religious enthusiasm, and a great love of personal freedom which the company could not entirely control. The company might appoint magistrates and assessors, but they could not govern the wandering stockmen, who were called Trek Boers, because they "trekked" from one place to another, and who formed themselves into companies of fighters in order to disperse and destroy the savage Bushmen. The colonists never agreed with the governor and council appointed by the. Dutch East India Company, so the governor was not responsible for the people.

In 1779 the colonists sent representatives to Holland to demand a share in the government of the colony, which action was due to wrong they had suffered under the company and to a spirit of independence such as led the British colonists in North America to throw off the control of the old country. Two commissioners were sent from Holland to investigate the state of affairs at Cape Colony. The relief proposed was not sufficient, especially to those in the more distant settlements.

In 1795 the people in the interior rose against the government, though they still insisted that they served Holland. The magistrates appointed by the government were set aside and little republics were established. The government might have put down these rebellious uprisings by cutting off food supplies, but other events were claiming the attention of the government, and these were events which drew South Africa into European politics and led to the struggle between the Boer and the Briton — a struggle which, renewed and suppressed time and again, has been going on for more than a hundred years.

At this time, 1795, the Boer population in South Africa was about 1 7,000. The popular language was not that of Holland ; the large number of foreigners, the necessity of speaking to the slaves and native Hottentots had tended to destroy the best forms of the language, and made a peculiar dialect. The people had good sense and manly energy. They were intensely religious, but so far from bigotry that beside the Dutch Reformed Church — in a way the national church— Lutheran and Moravian congregations were recognized.

Colonel Robert Jacob Gordon was commander of the regular military forces in the Cape Colony. These forces, compared with the present vast numbers that go to constitute an army, were unimportant. There was a regiment of infantry made up of twenty-five' officers and five hundred and forty-six privates; an artillery corps of twenty-seven officers and four hundred and three rank and file; fifty-seven men stationed at the regimental depots of Meuron and Wurttemburg, and a corps of mountaineer soldiers, called pandours, of about two hundred men. It is well to remember that at this time the colonists were not entirely in sympathy with the revolt of the interior settlers. On the coast many were in accord with the Dutch East India Company, while all agreed that they were loyal to Holland. The revolutionists in the interior had dismissed the magistrates appointed by the company and had tried to establish little republics which were sympathized with by many on the coast though they were condemned on principle.

The military also were divided on the point of agreement with those in the interior. Of the infantry the officers sympathized with what was called the Orange party (the beginners of the Orange Free State), but the privates were from nearly every country in the north of Europe and were for the party or nation from whom they could get the best pay. The artillery corps, however, was made up of Netherlanders, with a few French and Germans. They were attached to the mother country and believed in all that she did. A large number, though, sympathized with the republic movement in France where the king and

SOUTH AFRICA.

queen had been brought to the guillotine, and would rather have formed an alliance with France that had been roused by ill treatment than with England that had let North America take care of itself and was adding constantly to its possessions.

Weakened by this division of sentiment, the Colony presented an open door to any power that chose to take a point of so much importance as an ocean thorougfare between Europe and the East.

The English government, on the eve of war with France, soon saw the value of the Cape Colony and fearful of France taking possession of it, determined to make it a part of British territory, for the occupancy of the Cape by the French would make England's route to India a difficulty.

As early as 1793 negotiations were opened between Britain and the Dutch authorities concerning the strengthening of the garrison at the Cape by British troops from St. Helena. While this was going on, events were happening that occasioned ill feeling between the Dutch and English, although they were allied against the French. Being harassed by dissatisfaction among their own people, the Dutch made appeals to the British government for aid in men and money. The answer of the English authorities was that their troops were doing nearly all of the defence of the Netherlands, and that the other government was not doing all it could to raise men and money at home.

In making this answer the British acted as though blind to the condition of the Dutch government. For the French had an army of invasion and one after another the Dutch strongholds were falling before the French General Pichegru. Friesland was threatening to make a separate peace with France if Holland did not come with assistance.

The patriotic Dutch refused hospitals for the wounded British soldiers. Then the British offered that if the Dutch government would furnish five hundred to a thousand troops for the better protection of

Cape Colony the English East India Company would transport them to Africa free of charge. The Dutch could not furnish the men, so the offer was not carried into effect.

In the meantime, as was expressed by Friesland, the Dutch people were thinking of changing sides in the war and going over to the French. A letter was sent to the Governor of Cape Colony by the Dutch East India Company informing the colonists that Holland might soon ally with France, for that matters at home were in a bad condition, the French armies were advancing and already occupied a part of the country and that it would be necessary to be careful so as not to be surprised by another power — the letter evidently referring to England. Later reports said that the French were besieging Breda and threatening everything.