Excerpt from On the Eve of the War: A Narrative of Impressions During a Journey in Cape Colony the Free State, the Transvaal Natal, and Rhodesia; September, 1899, to January, 1900 This book has been almost entirely written during part Of the months Of January and February, 1900, and I have thought it usually best to leave any sur mises or anticipations which it contains as they originally stood. In dealing with a very critical moment Of South African history, extending over the period just before and just after the outbreak Of war, uncorrected ideas are much more interest ing than ideas watered down to suit later events. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.