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Native Races and the War by Josephine E. (Josephine Elizabeth Grey) Butler
page 42 of 161 (26%)
Europeans. We have a very different tale to tell of the Kaffirs, and the
difference has always been so evident to these border Boers that, ever
since 'those magnificent savages,' (the Kaffirs,) obtained possession of
firearms, not one Boer has ever attempted to settle in Kaffirland, or
even face them as an enemy in the field. The Boers have generally
manifested a marked antipathy to anything but 'long-shot' warfare, and,
sidling away in their emigrations towards the more effeminate Bechuanas,
they have left their quarrels with the Kaffirs to be settled by the
English, and their wars to be paid for by English gold.

"The Bechuanas at Kolobeng had the spectacle of various tribes enslaved
before their eyes;--the Bakatla, the Batlo'kua, the Bahúkeng, the
Bamosétla, and two other tribes of Bechuanas, were all groaning under
the oppression of unrequited labour. This would not have been felt as so
great an evil, but that the young men of those tribes, anxious to obtain
cattle, the only means of rising to respectability and importance among
their own people, were in the habit of sallying forth, like our Irish
and Highland reapers, to procure work in the Cape Colony. After
labouring there three or four years, in building stone dykes and dams
for the Dutch farmers, they were well content if at the end of that time
they could return with as many cows. On presenting one to the chief,
they ranked as respectable men in the tribe ever afterwards. These
volunteers were highly esteemed among the Dutch, under the name of
Mantátees. They were paid at the rate of one shilling a day, and a large
loaf of bread among six of them. Numbers of them, who had formerly seen
me about twelve hundred miles inland from the Cape, recognised me with
the loud laughter of joy when I was passing them at their work in the
Roggefelt and Bokkefelt, within a few days of Cape Town. I conversed
with them, and with Elders of the Dutch Church, for whom they were
working, and found that the system was thoroughly satisfactory to both
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