Burt A. The Evolution of the British Empire and Commonwealth From the American Revolution
Подождите немного. Документ загружается.
During
the
Long
French
War:
(I)
The
Western
Hemisphere
145
combination,
which
would be
impossible
unless Britain
took
the lead
by
a
generous
restitution
of
conquests.
Another
important,
though
secondary,
influence
on British
policy
was
the
humanitarian
drive
against
the slave trade.
Though
Britain
alone
had
abolished it in
the
midst of the
war her action
had been
pretty
effective
as
long
as
the war
lasted. But
now that
peace
was
com-
ing,
it was
obvious
that the
trade
would flourish
again
unless
she
could
persuade
the
other
powers
to
abolish
it
too. In
the
spring
of
1814
the
House
of
Commons
passed
a
resolution
against
the surrender
of colo-
nies
without
abolition,
and the
ministry
assured Wilberforce
and his
friends
that
it
would
get
general
abolition. The
Dutch,
glad
to
get
their
colonies
back,
readily
issued
the
necessary
decree;
but
the
French,
suspicious
that
Britain
was
trying
to
cripple
the
colonies
she
was
restoring,
would
promise
abolition
only
after a
few
years
when their
islands
were restocked with
slaves
and
thus
able to
compete
with
the
British.
Anxious to
placate
French
opinion,
and
to
get
at least some
French
concession of the
principle,
the
British
accepted
the French
condition.
Though
Britain
thus
bargained
her colonial
conquests
to
get
the sort
of world
she
wanted,
she
did
not
give
everything
back
to the former
owners. Of
the French West Indian
islands,
she retained two
small
ones.
One
was
Tobago,
which had been
British from 1763
until it
was
lost
during
the
American
Revolution,
by
which
time it had
acquired
a
definite
British
character,
much more so
than
perhaps
any
other
of
the
ceded
islands.
The inhabitants of
Tobago
rejoiced
when a British force
recaptured
it in
1793,
lamented
when
it was returned to
France
by
the
Treaty
of
Amiens
in
1802,
and
when
it was
finally
taken
in
1803
they
earnestly petitioned
that
it should never be
alienated
again.
In
1814,
there
were
no
French
settlers left
in
Tobago
and there was no
question
about
its
retention.
The
other
French island
was
St.
Lucia,
which
also
had
once
been
English.
Its
only
value
was
its
harbor,
and
for this
it
was
kept
at
the behest of
the
Admiralty,
which otherwise would
have
had
none
in that
part
of
the
West
Indies.
Britain also
kept
the South
American
territory
that
contained the
three
little Dutch
colonies
of
Essequibo,
Demerara,
and
Berbice,
which
were
united
in 1831
to form
British Guiana.
These settlements had
attracted
British
planters
and
merchants
from
the
close
of the Ameri-
can
Revolutionary
War,
when
a
number
of
British
planters
went there
from
Tobago
and
prospered.
During
the
years
of
British
occupation,
from
1796 to
1802 and
from
1803,
still
more
British went and Liver-
146
CHAPTER
NINE:
pool
merchants
invested
heavily
there.
Even
so,
the British
government
did
not
decide
to
keep
these Dutch
settlements
until
very
late
in
the
day,
but
contemplated
substituting
them
for
Guadeloupe
when
France
insisted
on
recovering
that
island
and
something
else
had to
be
found
for
Sweden.
Then
Sweden
agreed
to
accept
the
offer
of
a
million
pounds
instead,
and
this
was to have been a
charge
upon
the
Dutch,
until the
British
government
assumed
it as
part
of the
arrangement
with
the
Dutch
when
the
latter
formally
ceded
the
territory
to
Britain
in
1814.
Another
provision
of
this
arrangement
allowed
the
Dutch
to
continue
trading
in
the little
South American
colonies
they
thus
abandoned.
The
only
territory
acquired
from
Spain
was
Trinidad,
which
was
captured
early
in
1797
and
formally
ceded
in
1802,
so
that it
did
not
come
under
review
in
the
general
peace
settlement
of
a dozen
years
later.
Spain
had
neglected
the
development
of
this
island
until
the
1
780's,
and
then
had tried
to make
something
of
it
by
attracting
foreign
Roman
Catholics with
the offer
of
land. From
the
Caribbean
islands
to
the
north,
French and
Irish
went,
and
some
English
too
because
the
religious
qualification
was
not
seriously
enforced.
There
was a
still
greater
influx
from the
French
islands when
they
were
infected
by
the
fever
of the
French
Revolution. The
population
of
Trinidad,
number-
ing
nearly
eighteen
thousand
in
1797,
was
thus
mostly
French.
In
addition
to
being
a
refuge
for
Frenchmen,
who
were
enemies
of the
British,
Trinidad
was
also
a
haven
for
fraudulent
debtors
from
the
West Indies
generally
and the home
of
outlaws
who
raided the
other
islands
to
carry
off slaves.
It was
only
natural,
therefore,
that the
Brit-
ish
should
want to seize
Trinidad;
the
capture
was
easy
because
the
Spaniards
who were
there
were
quite
bitter in
their
attitude
toward the
French. The
British
retention
of
the
island
by
the
Treaty
of
Amiens
was
inspired
chiefly,
if
not
entirely,
by
the
fact
that
it
offered
a
most
convenient
base
for
contraband
trade
with
the
Spanish
Main,
which
had
been an
object
of British
policy
for
generations.
Britain
did
not
even
try
to
take
any
other
Spanish
possession
in
the
New
World,
Trini-
dad
being
the
only
one
that
harbored
any
French
menace.
In the
provisions
for
the
government
of
these
additions
to
the British
Empire
in
America,
there
is
a
striking
contrast
between
Tobago
and
the
others. The
former,
because
of its
history
and
character,
was
treated
as one
of the
old
family
that
had been
unfortunately
lost
for a
while.
Each time it
fell
into
British
hands,
they
at
once
reclothed
it
with
Brit-
ish
laws and
institutions after
the
traditional
pattern,
and
it
behaved
During
the
Long
French
War:
(I)
The Western
Hemisphere
147
just
as one
of
the
old
colonies. For
example,
its
assembly
was asked
to
enact
the 4.5
per
cent
Leeward
Islands
duty
on
exports,
and
the
char-
acteristic
refusal
followed. The
other new
colonies,
however,
were
foreign
in
character,
and
there the
authorities in London
again
faced
the
problem
that
they
had
bungled
on
a
large
scale
in
Quebec
and
on
a
smaller
one in
Grenada.
This
time it was
not taken
for
granted
that
foster
children
would be
just
the
same
as those
that had
always
been in
the
family.
Slowly
and
tentatively
the British
government
worked
out
a
new
system
for
these
acquisitions,
and a new
type
of
British
colony
arose
the crown
colony,
in which
the
complete
control
of
legislation
and
of
all
administrative
officers is in the hands of the
Crown,
meaning
of
course
the cabinet in
London.
4
This
development
had an
unconscious
beginning
in
the
disposition
of
the
conquered
French
colonies,
with
the
exception
of
Tobago,
at
the
very
outset
of
the
long
French
war;
and
it
sprang
from
a desire to
give
every possible
satisfaction to the French
royalists,
on whom the
British
government
then relied
for valuable
cooperation
in
these colo-
nies.
The British
commanders,
as instructed
by
London,
included
in
the
terms
of
capitulation
an
undertaking
to
preserve
the
government
as
it
had
been under
the
French
monarchy,
particularly
in the
administra-
tion
of
justice
and
the collection of
taxes,
until
the restoration
of
peace.
British
governors
were
then
sent
out
to
restore
civil
government,
and
their
instructions
enjoined
"conformity
to
the ancient
laws and
institu-
tions"
of the
conquered people,
with
the
exception
that the British
navigation
laws
were to be enforced.
Each
governor
was
also directed
to
form
a small
council of
the
leading
landowners,
whose advice
he
should
seek but not
necessarily
follow;
not
to
exclude
Roman Catholics
from
this
body,
but
to
require
of
them
the
oath
prescribed
by
the
Quebec
Act;
not
to
interfere
with the
Roman
Catholic
religion,
except
to
restrain its
clergy
from
making
converts
and to establish
toleration
for
other
churches;
not to
impose
any
new
taxes;
and
to
follow British
Treasury
instructions
in
applying
the
revenues,
which would
be
col-
lected
by
a
receiver
general
appointed
by
the
Treasury.
The commis-
sions,
which
endowed
the
governors
with
authority,
were
framed
after
the common
British
model but
departed
from
it
by
omitting
every
4
Though
the
empire
already
had
two crown
colonies,
Gibraltar
and
Newfoundland,
they
were
regarded
as
atypical
because
of
the
peculiar
circumstances
of
each,
the
former
being
merely
a naval
station
and the
latter
a
land
in which
settlement was
officially
discouraged.
The
old
Province
of
Quebec
had
also
been
a
crown
colony,
but
this too
had
been
regarded
as
exceptional
and
the
condition
disappeared
in
1791.
148
CHAPTER
NINE:
reference to
a
council
or an
assembly,
so
that
there
would
be
no
in-
dependent
local
check
upon
a
governor.
He would
rule
as
directed
from
London.
This
autocratic
form
of
government,
imposed
on
captured
French
colonies as a war
measure,
was destined
to
have a
larger
and
more
permanent
application.
As the
war
widened
and
the British
scooped
up
colonial
possessions
of France's
allies,
these other
acquisitions
were
treated
in the
same
way,
apparently
as
a matter of course.
It
was
not
until
the
Treaty
of Amiens
in
1802,
when Britain
returned
all
her
French
conquests
and all
the
others
except
Trinidad
and
Ceylon,
which
were then
permanently
ceded
to
her,
that
what
had
been
adopted
as an
expedient
for the
duration of
the
war was
projected
beyond
it
and
began
to
assume
permanence
as a
new
type
of
government
in
the
Brit-
ish
Empire.
The transition was
much less difficult
in
Ceylon,
which
we shall
consider
presently,
than
it
was
in
Trinidad,
where
it
was
ac-
cepted only gradually
and after much deliberation.
The
government
in London did not
know what
to
do
with
Trinidad,
now
that it was
definitely
a British
possession. Having
an
area
of some
seventeen
hundred
square
miles,
it
was
half
as
big
again
as
all
the
British
Leeward and
Windward
islands.
Its
virgin
soil
was
as rich as
their land
had
long
ceased to
be,
and its climate was
reported
to
be
not
unfavorable
to
Europeans.
Its
population
had
increased
to
more
than
twenty-eight
thousand,
and its
development
was
only beginning.
For
its
further
development
the
government
advised
that there would
have
to
be
a
great
increase
in
its
working population;
but
the
prospect
made
parliament
restive,
for
though
that
body
did not abolish the slave
trade
for
another five
years
it
was
already
very
sensitive about
anything
that
might
increase
it.
Nor was this
the
only
embarrassment the
ministry
faced
as a result of the retention of
Trinidad. British
merchants
in-
terested
in the
obvious
possibilities
of the
island
were
agitating
for the
introduction
of
English
laws
and the
traditional British form of
govern-
ment;
but British
confidence in
this form of
government
for
tropical
colonies,
where climate
had
discouraged
white
labor,
was
being
under-
mined
as the
result of
experience
in
the
old West
Indian
islands. More-
over,
the
governor
was
pointing
out
the dilemma
that the
establishment
of
an
assembly
would
raise
because the
majority
of the
population
were
"free
people
of
color." It
was
their
control of that
body
if
they
were
allowed to
vote,
and their
permanent
alienation if
they
were
not. The
secretary
of
state
assured the
governor
that there
was
no
intention
of
making
any
such
change
until it
was clear
that this
would be advanta-
During
the
Long
French
War:
(I)
The
Western
Hemisphere
149
geous
to
both
mother
country
and
colony.
A
commission,
composed
of
the
governor
and
two
other
officials from
England,
was
created
to
investigate
conditions
and
report
on
how the
colony
should
be
governed
and
settled.
The
commission
quarreled
over
charges
that one of
the
members
made
against
the
governor's
administration of
justice.
5
All
three
members were
recalled,
and
a
new
governor
was
sent
out in
1 804.
The
new
governor
was
expected
to find a
solution for the
compli-
cated
problem
of
Trinidad.
His
instructions,
while
admitting
that
the
existing
circumstances
of the
island
would not then warrant the
general
introduction
of
British
laws
and
institutions,
urged
the
adoption
of
measures
that
would make
this
progressively
possible,
and
definitely
suggested
that the best course
might
be
to follow
the
example
of
Can-
ada
under
the
Quebec
Act.
The
governor
and his
advisory
council
got
the
attorney
general,
an
Englishman
who
had held
this office for some
years,
to work out
a
constitution
as a
draft of
an
act of
parliament,
and
sent
him
home
with it. It
resembled
the
Quebec
Act but
differed from
it
by
giving
taxing
power
to
the
legislative
council.
When
the author
reached
England
a new
government
was in
power,
and
it was
too
ab-
sorbed
by
the war
against
Napoleon
to
give
much attention
to Trinidad
for some
years.
Meanwhile
die administration
of
Spanish
laws
under
an
English
chief
justice
produced growing
confusion,
which
helped
to
stir
up
a new
agitation
in the
colony
and
among
the
interested
mer-
chants
in
England.
This
movement
came
to
a head in
1810,
when
a
meeting
in
London
voted
to
petition
the House of
Commons
and
to
press
the
secretary
of
state
for the establishment
of British
laws
and
political
institutions
in
the
island.
Again
the
secretary
of
state
professed
anxiety
for
the
adop-
tion
of
English
law and
doubts
of
the wisdom of
granting
an
assembly,
but he would
not
act until he
could
get
from the
governor
the best
opinion
in
the
island.
This
time the
governor
collected
a committee
of
leading
colonists
and
they strongly
backed the demands
made
in
Lon-
don.
But
petitions
from
others and
an
emphatic
letter from
the chief
justice
opposed
the
change.
This
conflict of views left the
ministry
free
to follow
its own
inclination,
which was to leave
things
as
they
were;
and toward
the end
of
the
year
the
secretary
of
state
wrote to the
gover-
nor
explaining
this decision.
An
assembly,
said
the
secretary
of
state
in this
dispatch,
was
out of
6
Which
led to the
prosecution
of
the
governor
in
England,
reminiscent of the
proceed-
ings
against
Warren
Hastings.
150
CHAPTER
NINE:
the
question
because
of the
peculiar
conditions
in
Trinidad
the
pre-
ponderance
of
"people
of
color"
and
the
small
proportion
of
British
among
the whites
and so
was
any
other
kind
of
legislature
in
the
island. The reason
he
gave
for
this
was
the
recent
abolition
of
the
slave
trade,
which
made it essential
for
the Crown
to
retain
full
power
of
legislation
for
the
colony.
Some
of
this
power
might
be
delegated
to
the
governor,
but his
exercise
of
it
would
always
be
subject
to
review
in
London.
The
secretary
of state
reserved
judgment
on
the
modification
of
the
laws
as
an
"extensive
and
complicated"
business
that
could
not
be
undertaken
without
more
investigation.
In
conclusion
he
expressed
the belief that
this
form
of
government
which
was
at last
being
imposed
permanently
on
Trinidad
had
proved
its
advantages
elsewhere. The
obvious
reference
is
to
Ceylon,
but
he
may
also
have
been
thinking
of
the interim administrations
in
Guiana
and
the
Cape
Colony
and
even,
perhaps,
of
the other
empires
from
which
Britain
had
taken
this
example
of
colonial
administration.
"This
dispatch
is
of
the utmost
importance
in
the
history
of the
British
Empire,
for
it closed
the doors
to
any
fundamental
change
in
the
system
of
government,
not
only
in Trinidad
but
in all
the
conquered
colonies,
for
a
good
many years
to
come."
6
There
had been
some
thought
of
getting
parliament
to
legislate
a constitution
for
Trinidad;
but
the
ministry preferred
to
keep
its
own hands
free
to deal
with
that
colony
as
might
seem
best,
and
parliament
acquiesced
in
the
decision.
The
dispatch
just quoted
was
printed
for
the information
of
parliament
without
raising
any
objection
in
that
body.
The issue
having
been
settled
in
Trinidad,
there was
no
question
of
any change
of
laws
and
governmental
institutions
in St. Lucia and the
settlements
in
Guiana
when the
peace
settlement at
the close of the
Napoleonic struggle
transformed
British
occupation
into
British
posses-
sion.
For some obscure reason
the authorities
in London
thought
that
the terms
granted
to the Dutch
when
they capitulated
were still
binding
after
peace
had been
signed,
but
it
is
doubtful
if this
made
any
real
difference.
There had been no such
thought
about Trinidad and there
was
none about
St.
Lucia,
yet
they
experienced
no more alteration in
government.
In
St.
Lucia,
however,
the
British
governor
had more
power
than
his French
predecessor
because
the French
office of
intend-
ant
was
combined with
that
of
governor
at the time
of the
conquest.
6
Helen
Taft
Manning,
British Colonial
Government
After
the
American
Revolution
(New
Haven,
1933),
p.
362. This
is
a
masterly
treatise.
During
the
Long
French War:
(I)
The
Western
Hemisphere
151
On
the
other
hand,
the
British
had there
set
up
a court of
appeal,
or
superior
court,
after
the
French
model
because this
island,
as
a
depend-
ency
of
Martinique,
had
not
possessed
one of its own. For
a while
this
colonial
counterpart
of
a
parlement
in France claimed
that
no
legisla-
tion
could
be
valid
until
registered
by
it;
but
when,
shortly
after
the
cession,
this
court
balked at
registering
orders
in council
and
acts
of
parliament,
the
governor
told
its
members,
on
orders from
the
secretary
of
state,
that
their
authority
was
confined
to
the administration
of
justice. During
the
war
a
similar
incident had occurred
in
Guiana,
where
the
Dutch
had
combined Demerara
and
Essequibo
under
one
governor
with a
"court
of
policy"
to
assist him.
In
1812 this
court
objected
to a
proclamation
sent
out from London
for
the
governor
7
to
issue,
and he held it
up
until the
secretary
of state
administered
a
"stinging
rebuke"
for his
lack
of obedience.
In all these nascent
crown
colonies
the
prerogative
of
the
Crown
was
supreme.
Legislation
was
by
imperial
order in
council,
though
only
when
important,
and
by
gubernatorial
proclamation.
Occasionally,
as
we
have
just
seen,
a
proclamation
was
actually
drafted
in
London;
sometimes
a
governor
was
ordered to
prepare
as
well
as issue
it;
usually
it
was the work of
a
governor acting
on
his
own
authority,
but
then it
was
always
liable to
be
overruled
by
tie home
government.
Taxation
was
a
more delicate matter.
At
first
it
was
supposed
that the old
taxes,
which
were
continued,
would
suffice.
They
did
in
Guiana
but not
in
Trinidad or
St.
Lucia,
where there
was a
growing
deficit.
Though
there
was no
legal
doubt
of the
Crown's
right
to
levy
new taxes
in the
con-
quered
colonies,
8
it was ten
years
after
the cession
of
Trinidad
before
tie home
government
admitted
the
necessity
and decided
how
to
meet
it
in that
island. The method
was to
consult
the
governor
on
what
taxes
would be best and
then
to authorize
him
by
order
in council
to
impose
them. The same
thing
was done
in
St. Lucia
a
few
years
afterward.
The administration
of
justice
was
purged
of
torture,
with
tie result
that criminal
procedure
developed
"grievous
delays"
and lost some
of
its
certainty
in Trinidad
and
Guiana,
for torture
had been embedded
in
the
old
Spanish
code and
continued
with it
by
the Dutch.
English
criminal
law and
trial
by jury
would have
cured
these faults
and
were
7
A
Dutchman
y
the
second
whom the
British
entrusted to
carry
on
the
administration.
It
was not
until
after
this
incident
that British
military
men were
appointed
to the
government
there*
8
Except
in
Demerara,
where the
Dutch
had
given
taxing
power
to
a
semi-representative
body,
the
"combined
court"
mentioned above.
152
CHAPTER
NINE
suggested,
but
the
ministry
rejected
them
as
inapplicable,
especially
trial
by
jury
because
it denied
justice
to
the
blacks
in
the
old
West
Indian
colonies.
Therefore
minor
adjustments
that
served
as
palliatives
had to
be
found.
There
were
also
difficulties
in
the
application
of
the
old
French,
Spanish,
and
Dutch
civil
laws
in
these
colonies,
but
they
were
gradually
reduced
after
English
judges
toot
over
the
courts
and
as
some
features
of
English
laws
were
introduced.
CHAPTER
X
The
Colonial
Empire during
the
Long
French
War:
(II)
The
Eastern
Hemisphere
THE
TWO
most
important
colonial
prizes
that Britain
won
in
the
long
French
war were
east
of the
Atlantic:
Cape Colony
and
Ceylon.
Both
were
taken
from
the
Dutch for
purely strategic
reasons,
but
otherwise
these
two additions
to the
empire
were
as
different
as
they
could
be.
As soon
as
the French Revolution
threatened
to
engulf
the
Nether-
lands,
the
British
government
resolved
to
beat
the French
to
the
Cape
of
Good
Hope
lest this
one
key
to the
whole of
the
Orient
fall
into
the
hands
of the
enemy.
That it
was also
the door
leading
into
the
treasure
house
of the South
African
interior
was
a dream
yet
unborn;
and
no
one
could
see
any
commercial
value
in
the
colony
that had
spread
from
Cape
Town
when
the
British
expedition
took
possession
of
it in
1795.
There
seemed
to be
nothing
to
develop
in
that
country.
Its
soil
was too
poor,
its
climate
too
dry,
and
its
geographical
position
too remote
to
attract
European
settlers;
and
its
native
population
was so
backward
that
it had
never
suggested
any
possibilities
of
profitable
trade.
It
was
nearly
a
century
and
a
half since
the
Dutch
East India Com-
pany,
discovering
that
some
crops
could
be
grown
near
Table
Bay
and
that
cattle
could
be
procured
from
the
Hottentots,
planted
a
few
settlers
there
to
provide
the
company's
ships
with fresh food
for
the
long voyage
to
and
from
the
East;
and
the
only
other
colonists
that had come
to
the
country
had
been
brought
for
this
very
purpose
by
the
company
in the
next
couple
of
generations
two hundred
Huguenot
refugees
and
per-
haps
four
times
as
many
Dutch.
During
the
eighteenth
century
this
French
element
reluctantly
yielded
to
absorption
by
the
majority.
The
stern
Calvinism
that
they
had
in
common
helped
to
draw
them to-
gether;
and
the old
High
Dutch
tongue
of
the
original burghers,
though
154
CHAPTER
TEN:
surviving
as the
written
language
of their
descendants,
had
broken
down
as
the
ordinary
conversational
medium,
giving
rise
to a
new
language,
Afrikaans,
which
was more
acceptable
to the
Gallic
portion
of the
population.
Dutch
and
Huguenots
were
now one
people
Boers
speaking
their
own distinctive
tongue
and
attached
to
the
land
in
which
they
lived
rather than
to
that from
which
most
of
them
had
come.
This
century
also
saw
the
complete
failure of all
the
efforts
of
the
company,
which
ruled
autocratically,
to
keep
the colonists
close
to
the
port
and
apart
from
the
natives.
The
marauding
Bushmen,
the
lowest
type,
to whom
the
settlers'
cat-
tle
were
fat
and
easy prey,
were
hunted down and driven off.
Racial
segregation
was
impossible
with
the
Hottentots,
a
mild
pastoral
people
who
inhabited
the better-watered
territory along
the
southern
coast.
Their
society
disintegrated
almost
at
a touch.
The whites
took their
flocks
and
their
lands,
transformed
them
into
a
half-caste
race,
and
reduced
them to a
position
of
menial but
still
genial
servants.
The
mixture of
blood
was
wholly
one-sided,
the
white
community
preserving
its
ethnic
purity.
Here
we
should
also notice
that
slavery
was
devel-
oped
in the
colony.
This was
"by
circumstance rather
than
by
neces-
sity."
The
Cape
did
not
need to
import
slaves,
for its climate
was
not
inimical
to white labor
and its
economy
was
largely
self-sufficient;
but
it
"lay
between
the two
great
slave-trading
coasts of
the
world."
1
More-
over,
contact
with the
Dutch East Indies was
responsible
for the
intro-
duction of
Malays,
who
were the
skilled workers
of
the
colony
and
"ranked
themselves above all other slaves
and free
Hottentots."
2
Fi-
nally,
toward the end
of
the
century,
the Boers
who
had been
trekking
far to the eastward came into
permanent
contact with the
Kaffirs,
the
vanguard
of the
fierce
Bantu
race who
were
pressing
down
from
the
interior;
and then
began
a
series of bitter Kaffir
wars that
lasted
for a
hundred
years.
The
expansion
of the
colony,
which
defied
repeated
decrees
of
the
company
to
stop
it,
was
the
combined
product
of
the
soil
and the
cli-
mate.
It
was eastward
rather than
northward,
because
the
interior
was
arid.
In
the
vicinity
of
Cape
Town,
where
the
rainfall was
usually
plentiful,
was the
"land of
corn and
wine,"
with
wheat
fields
and
vine-
yards
cultivated
by
slaves. But
it
was
no lush
country.
It
was a
poor
one,
providing
practically
nothing
for
export
except
as
ships'
stores;
1
C. W. De
Kiewiet,
A
History
of
South
Africa
(Oxford, 1941),
p.
21.
2
Eric
A.
Walker,
A
History
of
South
Africa
(2nd ed.;
New
York,
1940),
p.
87.