BOND FIGHTING STRENGTH IN BEGINNING OF 1899

Efficiently Mounted Infantry. At least about 142,000 trained.

15,000   Orange Free State, between 18-50
years  . . . . . . . . . . . . .  20,000

25,000 Transvaal, between 18-50 years . . 30,000

40,000   Cape Colonies, between 18-50
years  . . . . . . . . . . . . .  60,000

2,000   Natal and elsewhere, between 18-50
years  . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2,000

18,000   Of above, aged 16-18 and 50-60  . .  30,000
-------                                        ------
100,000             Artillery  . . . . . . . . . . . . .  2,000

600   Orange Free State, including
trained reserves . . . . . . . .     600

1,400   Transvaal . . . . . . . . . . . . .   1,400
-------                                         -----          -------
102,000   . . . . . . . . . . .   Total at least about          144,000

102,000 highly efficient, and 42,000 partly trained.

The mounts are docile, hardy and nimble, with large reserves available.  The above includes 500 Johannesburg Mounted Police, a picked body of men armed with carbine, revolver, and sabre.

Small Arms . . . . . . . . .   About    250,000

Martini-Henry rifles in Orange Free State }
                                          } 100,000
   " " " in Transvaal }

Guede rifles in Transvaal  . . . . . . . .   10,000
Mauser rifles in Transvaal . . . . . . . .  120,000
Revolvers in both States . . . . . . . . .   20,000
------

Artillery, both Republics . . . . . . . .   140

Maxims and Nordenfeldts, modern  . . . . .       50
Field cannon and Howitzers   "   . . . . .       70
Siege and heavy guns         "   . . . . .       20

BOER CONSERVATISM

Rudyard Kipling truly said “the Boers are the most conservative people on earth.”  Habits and views which had prevailed two hundred years ago with their forefathers are still tenaciously preserved by them.  We see this in matters of language, religion, in certain antipathies, and even in attire.  They are justly famed for hospitality, not only amongst themselves, but also towards strangers, and a very pleasing trait, no doubt handed down from the seigneurial Huguenots, is the genial politeness which a stranger will receive in an otherwise wholly uncultured Boer family.

On his farm the Boer is chief and supreme after the patriarchal fashion—­no thought of tolerating an equal or a rival in authority.  Collectively also, as in governmental representation, he is extremely averse to the introduction of any foreign element; such a factor would meet with his undisguised suspicion and jealousy.  It must be Boer supremacy, and to this strangers must submit; the Boers to figure