Constitution of the Union of South Africa

These Dutch immigrants were more pleasing to van der Stel's intensely patriotic soul than the Huguenots, whom he disliked as aliens and for the trouble their independent and uncompromising spirit gave him. The annual fair instituted by him at Stellenbosch on the date of his own birthday was the place to see van der Stel at his best. Here he was in the beautiful settlement founded by himself, among people every one of whom was familiar to him. Here he watched them engaging in the old Dutch sports imported from the fatherland ; the school children paraded before him and their elders came to drink wine and gossip with him. He himself was a notable farmer and tree-planter. He made the best wine at the Cape, planted trees round his house at Constantia, which are still one of the glories of the peninsula, and had the best crops and the best-fed cattle in the colony.

Growth of the Colony.

At first the company's idea had been simply to have a victualling station at the Cape. Nevertheless, only five years after van Riebeek's arrival, the company found it advisable to allow nine of the settlers' families to establish them selves as independent landowners. But they still were under obli gation to take their turn at guarding the fort and were bound to let the company have all the produce they wanted to sell at a fixed price. One result was a continual enlargement of the bound aries of the settlement. The free burghers were always seeking better pastures farther afield. This search had the disadvantage from the company's point of view of stirring up strife with the natives. At first the Dutch only knew of two races of natives, the Bushmen, a tiny race of men in a very low stage of civilization, who lived entirely by hunting and were quite as ready to hunt the tame cattle of the farmers as more savage beasts, and the Hotten tots, who were more advanced than the Bushmen; they kept cattle of their own and were able to work in copper; but they were expert cattle-thieves. Thus the settlement was often called upon to repel raids of Hottentots or Bushmen, instead of quietly raising produce for sale to passing ships.

Nevertheless, after the Peace of Nijmwegen of 1678 the corn pany determined to try the experiment of a more vigorous colo nizing policy, in the hope of thereby reducing the cost of the gar rison and of developing territory which was manifestly productive. German as well as Dutch families were sent out to take up land, and also the Huguenot refugees, some 200, exiled from France by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. There was some doubt about sending them, since their religion was not of the same form of Protestantism as that of the Dutch and Germans, and because they were not easily assimilated by the Dutch. To obviate these

objections the Huguenot families were dispersed among the earlier Dutch settlements, their language and separate form of religion being discouraged by van der Stel. This policy was so successful that to-day, though such names as Malherbe, Delarey, de Vil liers recall this immigration, there is nothing else to distinguish the families from the Boers. The Huguenots included the most efficient workers of France. Wine-growing especially was brought to perfection by the newcomers, notably in the vineyards of Constantia, where excellent wines are still produced.

Cessation of Immigration.

Unfortunately the company still considered that any rights the burghers enjoyed were held merely on sufferance. The burghers had an infinitesimal representation on the Council of Policy at the Cape, and for the sale of their produce they still had to give first option to the company at prices fixed by the officials. The church and schools also were entirely under the control of the officials. Already, too, com plaints were heard that the Government gave the burghers insuf ficient protection in their disputes with the Hottentot marauders in the outlying districts. The burghers had, in addition, special grievances against Adriaan van der Stel, the governor who suc ceeded his father Simon in 1699, inasmuch as he and his sub ordinates not only appropriated the very pick of the estates, but also competed unfairly with the free members of the community in the sale of produce to the company or passing ships. Finally, in 1707, Adriaan was recalled by the company: at the same time it was decided that the recurrence of similar troubles could best be avoided by the prohibition of immigration.

Accordingly from 1707 for over a century there was no immi gration to South Africa of Europeans ; and indeed barely more than 5o years after the Dutch East India Company took over the Cape the supply of fresh Dutch stock, except for a few individual cases, came finally to an end. Thus the Dutch part of the popula tion of South Africa is mainly the result of natural increase since that date. It appears that during those so years about 2,500 Europeans at most came into the country from overseas, of whom only a half were of Dutch nationality. On the other hand the Dutch had far the largest number of women, which accounts for the German, French and other nationalities being so rapidly ab sorbed into the Dutch South African nationality. Even so it is remarkable that from this small nucleus of Dutch population has developed the immense preponderance of that race to-day.