Rev. NEHEMIAH TILE, of the Tembu Tribe, was born in Tembuland and educated at Boloto. Went to work at Queenstown. Became a member of the Wesleyan Church and was baptized by Rev. Dugmore, a missionary of the Wesleyan Methodist Church. He soon became a lay preacher and ultimately an evangelist. Was sent to Pondoland in the year 1870. He succeeded in building up congregations and soon became a personal friend of the Paramount Chief Mhlontlo and Chief Lehane of the Bas.utos. His congregations increased.

In 1873 he built a church at Cwecwe, Pondoland. Was partly responsible for the establishing of the Umgwali School, now an important educational institution in the Cape. On the recommendation of some ministers, Nehemiah Tile was sent to Healdtown Institution where he took the Theological Course. After completing his studies he was licensed as a minister • and sent to Qokolweni. As a minister Nehemiah Tile was a success. A powerful preacher, a devoted servant of the Church, a friend of his people. His work prospered and his people had great admiration for him. The fuss his people made over him did not fail to increase his enemies. Soon Rev. Chubbs, a brother minister of the same church, accused Rev. Tile of (a) taking part in political matters, (b) of stirring up a feeling of hostility against magistrates in Tembuland, (c) of addressing a public meeting on a Sabbath day, (d) of refusing to inform him (Rev. Chubbs) of his activities,, (e) of donating an ox at the circumcision of Dalinyebo, heir to the Paramount Chieftaincy (this is a national custom). Rev. Tile was tried by the Wesleyan Methodist Church ministers at a meeting summoned for that purpose. Letters were produced, but the name or names of the writers were concealed. Rev. Nehemiah Tile insisted that he be given the names of the writers. A misunderstanding arose, Rev. Nehemiah Tile tendered his resignation, and’ Ieft the meeting. This was in 1884.

After a consultation with. Paramount Chief Ngangelizwe and his chief councillors, it was decided that a National Church be established with Nehemiah Tile as head. The whole Tembu Tribe was soon summoned and informed of the Tembu Church that was to be established. It was not long before a Church was erected at the Royal Kraal, and thereafter the work progressed. Chief Ngangelizwe himself became a regular attendant at the new church, later he was converted by Nehemiah Tile to the Christian Faith. Strange as it may seem, yet it is a fact that Nehemiah Tile and all his followers were looked down upon by all or most of their kith and kin who were still members of the European-controlled Church. Indeed they were even refused admission to churches at Cwecwe. Even this behaviour failed to daunt the spirits of Tile and his band of followers.

It was Nehemiah Tile’s wish that his ministers should be trained. in accordance with the Church of England priesthood. Before he died, however, he ordained J. Gqamani, C. Kula, and Mkize as ministe-°. On his death-bed he appointed Rev. J. Gqamani as his successor. Prior to his death he was visited by two European missionaries who tried to persuade him to advise his followers to join their Church. Needless to say this was rejected. Nehemiah Tile had established the Tembu Church; he was near the end of his life which he had dedicated to the salvation of his people. He now exhorted them not to turn back, but to look forward and upward, lifting ever higher the Banner of the Tembu Church which knew no difference between men, but believed that they were the same in the face of God, with equal rights and privileges. Nehemiah Tile died in 1885.

Present at his death-bed were the Paramount Chief and natural ruler of the Tembu Tribe, Dalindyebo, son of Ngangelizwe, Councillor Mqwetyane, his wife and children, and. his successor, Rev. Gqamani. A great man had fallen asleep. He: was mourned by the whole Tembu Tribe, and indeed other tribes among whom he had laboured during his lifetime.

Rev. Tiyo Soga, the first of the African race in South Africa to become an ordained minister of the Gospel, was born in 1829, at Gwali, a station of the Glasgow Missionary Society in the Chumie Valley, Cape Province.
His father was one of the chief councillors of Gaika. A polygamist and husband of eight wives and a father of thirty-nine children, and personally a remarkable man. Tiyo’s mother was the principle wife of Soga, and Tiyo was her seventh child. Soga was killed in the war of 1878. His wife became a Christian, and young Tiyo began to attend school in the village, taught by his elder brother Festire. From the village school he was sent to Mr.. William Chalmers who discovered that Tiyo was a bright boy.

In 1844 the United Presbyterian Mission sent him to Lovedale. At Lovedale he slowly but surely crept to the head of all his classes. About 1846 he went to Scotland with Mr. Govan, and continued his studies at Inchinnan, and afterwards at the Glasgow Free Church Normal Seminary. He returned to Africa with the Rev. George Brown. Became an evangelist at Keiskama and at Amatole,. and later returned to Scotland with Mr. Niven about 1850. He entered the Glasgow University in 1851, and in 1852 he began to attend the Theological Hall of the United Presbyterian Church at Edinburgh. He completed his course in 1856, and on leaving, his, fellow-students presented him with a valuable testimonial in books, as a mark of universal respect and esteem. Having passed the final examinations, he was licensed at the end of that year by the United Presbyterian Presbytery of Glasgow to preach the Gospel. The following year he married Miss Janet Burnside in Glasgow.

This lady stood faithfully by her hunband’s side through all the difficulties of his life. The late Rev. Tiyo Soga was the father otf four sons and three daughters. His sons are well known in South Africa. They are Dr. John William Soga, M.D., C.M., Glasgow University, and Mr. Allen Soga, also at Glasgow University, who at one time acted as Assistant Magistrate at St. Marks. The Youngest son, Mr. J. F. Soga, is a M.R.C.V.S. of Dick College, Edinburgh. Tiyo Soga’s eldest daughter died in 1880. The second is engaged in mission work in the Cape Province. The youngest is a music teacher in Glasgow, Scotland.

The Rev. Tiyo Soga returned to South Africa in the year 1857 and proceeded to Peelton, in the district of Kingwilliamstown, a station of the London Missionary Society. Later he moved to Emgwali, where, along with the Rev. R. Johnson, who had been a class-fellow in Edinburgh, he set about reorganising the good work that was broken by the wars of the previous years. Rev. Soga succeeded in converting a very large number of his countrymen. Then came the task of building a church. To do this he visited a number of larger towns to collect funds. He had already preached to many European congregations with great acceptance. In 1860 lie received and accepted an invitation to an audience by H.R.H. Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh who was in Cape-town at the time. Rev. Soga travelled extensively in the Cape Province and his work grew wonderfully, but in 1866 he had to cease work for a time on account of ill-health. During his illness he completed his translation of the Pilgrim’s Progress into Xosa. He also composed a number of hymns of great merit, including the famous Lizalis’ idinga lako (Fulfil Thy promise, 0 Lord).

He gradually became worse until he could move about only with the greatest difficulty. In 1868 he rendered most valuable service as one of the Board formed for revising the Xosa Bible, which was translated by the Rev. W. Appleyard. In 1867 the Rev. Tiyo Soga moved from Emgwali to Somerville at the request of the late Chief Kreli and continued there in spite of all difficulties to preach, organise and translate. In 1871 a change for the worse came about as a result of getting thoroughly wet while visiting Chief Mapasa on mission work. He died on the 12th August in the arms of his friend, the Rev. Richard Ross, at the age of 42.
The Rev. Tiyo Soga was neither an enthusiast, a fanatic nor a bigot. He was a true Christian, a thorough gentleman, who died in the service of his Master.
From the many articles that appeared in the Press at the death of the Rev. Tiyo Soga, we can only insert the following two:
“This gentleman-for in the true meaning of the word he was, to all intents and purposes, a perfect gentleman-was a pure-born Kaffir. His father was, and still is, a councillor of Sandile’s tribe, and an avowed heathen, in point of fact, a “Red Kaffir.” His son, however, as a youth, was sent to the Missionary Institution at Lovedale, and there distinguished himself so much by his keen intelligence and his ready aptitude for learning, that he was sent home to Glasgow to prosecute and complete his studies at the University of that place. He went through the full curriculum required in Scotland from candidates for the ministry, and in due time was licensed and ordained as a minister-missionary of the United Presbyterian Church. As a preacher, he was eloquent in speech and keen in thought, and talked with a Scottish accent, as strong as if he had been born on the banks of the Clyde, instead of those of the Chumie. He took a deep interest in everything calculated to advance the civilisation of his countrymen, and did so with a breadth of view and warmth of sympathy, in which mere sectarianism had no part. Among his accomplished works we may mention his translation of the Pilgrim’s Progress into Kaffir, which so high an authority as Mr. Charles Brownlee pronounces to be a perfect masterpiece of easy idiomatic writing. His services as one of the Board of Revisers of the translation of the Bible into Kaffir have been invaluable, and will now be seriously missed. In general conversation and discussion on ordinary topics he was one of the most intelligent and best informed men we ever knew; and many an hour have we spent with him, in which one utterly forgot his nationality ar his colour.”–The Cape Argus.
” The Kaffir youth who six years before left the shores of South Africa, little removed above his Christianised countrymen, having just as much knowledge as fitted him with efficiency to conduct a station school, and just as much power over the English language as enabled him to be a tolerable interpreter to the preacher yet ignorant of the Kaffir language, now returns to his native shores and people, thoroughly educated; an ordained minister of the Gospel, an accredited missionary of the Cross, and with a knowledge of and mastery over the English language which has often surprised those best capable of judging. A wonderful transformation has been wrought during these few years. In him there comes a new power into the Colony and Kaffirland, if the Colony and Kaffirland only recognise and receive it. The mental grasp and the moral capability of the Kaffir race are demonstrated in him. Men cannot despise the Kaffir race as they contemplate him. Without race-pattern or precedent, the first of his people, often strangely alone, surrounded and pressed upon by peculiar difficulties, he has manfully and successfully wrought his way up to the comparatively high level of educated English Christian life-the conquered has become the conqueror.”

” And how was the Rev. Tiyo Soga received when he returned to his native shores and people? Perhaps it was to be expected that in the Colony there should be manifested a great amount of caution and reserve, and that not a little suspicion should be entertained regarding him. Perhaps, too, it was only natural that, with some, special enmity should be aroused, and words of strong indignation used. We can excuse those men and women now who said we had made him specially to order in Scotland, and that he was the finest specimen ever imported of home educational cramming. This was a new thing under the South African sun. The thieving Kaffir, the marauding Kaffir, the irreclaimable Kaffir, a University-educated missionary of the Cross. This was too good to be true. At least men would wait and see. It was a mere experiment, and time alone could tell how it would succeed. Few went to the length of foretelling the time, near at hand, when he would have reverted to the red clay and blanket and all the heathen ways of his people.
” But while there was much of this’ reserve and caution everywhere, and not a little such doubt and suspicion, he was received by all missionaries and by all ministers of the Gospel-with one or two painful exceptions-with open arms and with most joyous hearts. From one end of the Eastern Province to the other there were only a few so-called professing Christians-miserable specimens surely of the disciples of the Nazarene-who did what they could, by indignant word and threat, to keep him out of the pulpits of the churches to which they belonged, and who absented themselves from divine service, because, despite them, he should conduct it.

” To the fine sensitive disposition of Tiyo Soga, to his generous manly nature, all such manifestations were very galling, and very difficult to bear. He had strength of mind and he had charity and forebearance enough to rise above them, and wisdom to make of them new incentives to his life-work.”
The colonists, generally, soon came to know him. He was watched with lynx-eyes everywhere on the frontier. Whenever lie preached or lectured, or addressed, such criticising crowds flocked to hear him as was the experience of no other South African missionary of his day. Nobly he stood this public test. He came out of the fire, in public estimation, purer and stronger than ever before.”-The Journal.

Chief Sebele I. was the son of Sechele I., head of the Bakwena Tribe, whose country extended from Bechuanaland to the Transvaal. He was a kind and just man, Very much respected by his people. His appearance commanded respect. He did not countenance quarrels and disliked strife. He was a friend of the missionary of the London Missionary Society. The Bakwena and the Bangoakwetsi Tribes belong to the same stock. Thev originally came from Loc. They are of the same family with the Basuto, Bahurutsi, Bamangoato and the Baphalane. These people are now resident in various parts of Bechuanaland, Transvaal, Orange Free State, and Basutoland.

Mr. NELANI JORDAN NOBADULA, born in 1844, at Tandjesberg, Graaff Reinet. His father was a servant to a Dutch farmer. Nelani attended a country school where he was taught to read and write. Later he went to East London and was employed by a carpenter. Also attended night-school. When he left East London he had reached Standard III. besides being a good carpenter. In 1876 he went to St. Mark’s Institution for further education. The Xosa War broke out during 1877 and he was obliged to leave school. After peace was declared he was appointed teacher and catechist of the Anglican Church to which he had become attached. In1882 he was sent to St. John’s College to study theology. During school hours he was at school, and in the afternoons and evenings he attended the Theological Classes. Ordained in 1887 as priest and appointed to Mount Frere where he worked all his life. Died in 1920. Established the Hebehebe, Unyika, Gqogqora, Sikobeni, Nqadu, Xabane and Tower Unyika Anglican Stations in the Umtata and St. Cuthbert’s Dioceses. He did much missionary work among the Bacas and the Pondos at Mount Frere. His six sons and three daughters are well educated. He had much influence over chiefs and heathen people.

Rev. MARSHALL MAXEKE, B.A., was born on the 1st November, 1874, at Middledrift, Cape Colony, where he received his early education. Later he was sent to Lovedale Training College with the son of Chief Gonya. After some; years . his parents moved to the north and settled in Johannesburg, where he worked as a harness-maker with Mr. (now Dr.) Tantsi, who became a great friend of his. About that time the MacAdoo Jubilee Singers of America visited South Africa, and Mr. Maxeke was so attracted by their harmony that he resolved to follow them to America to study music. While working in Johannesburg Mr. Maxeke became a local preacher. At this time the lady who later became Mrs. C. M. Maxeke, was already studying in the Wilberforce University, America. In 1897 Bishop Turner, who was then chairman of the Missionary Board, paid a short visit to South Africa, and on his return he was accompanied by Messrs. Maxeke and Tantsi. On arrival in America they went straight to the Wilberforce University where they joined classes. Mr. Maxeke won the Rush Prize and passed the B.A. Examination with honours in Classics and Mathematics. After passing the Theological Examination he was ordained in 1903 as an elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church.

He returned to, South Africa the same year and married Miss Charlotte Manye who had already returned from America and was teaching in Pietersburg, Transvaal, and doing missionary work. A son was born to them. Both Rev. and Mrs. Maxeke continued their good work until he died at Boksburg, Transvaal, in 1928. He compiled the first Xosa A.M.E. Church Hymn Book. Rev. Maxeke was a powerful preacher and an eloquent platform orator. A good writer, and at one time editor of the Unateteli u a Bantu, a weekly publication in Johannesburg. He took keen interest in the politics of the country. Was a prominent member of the African National Congress. Rev. Maxeke was a real progressive man and played an important part in. the education of his people, especially in mission schools. He was a favourite of the African Chiefs in the Cape, especially in Tembuland where he and Mrs. Maxeke did much for the education of the Tembu children.

MONTSIOA, or Seja-Nkabo-aTauana. Among the best known chiefs of the mid-Victorian days. The son of Tauana, the son of Thutlwa, the son of Tshidi, head of the second branch of the House of Tau, who was King of the Barolong about 1740. Montsioa was born soon after 1810, so that he was a young man in the late•twenties of the last century when Mzilikazi, with his well-trained
armies, trekked from the east; conquered the Bechuana Tribes and proclaimed himself supreme ruler of Central South Africa. He then commenced to levy taxes on the Bechuana tribes, including the Barolong along the Molopo River. In 1830 the Barolong seized King Mzilikazi’s tax-collector, by name Bhoya, and killed him and his companion in cold blood. This seemingly isolated act brought down upon the Barolong the full force of Mzilikazi’s wrath, and the Matabele impies swooped down upon them like an avalanche. The Barolong, who had fought their way down from the great lakes and were known among other tribes as ” baga Rungoana le bogale” (the people with the sharp spear)) witnessed, for the first time, a kind of warfare which made no distinction between man, woman or child; and for nearly three-quarters of a century thereafter, the Matabele and all tribes allied to them, (e.g., Zulu, Xosa, Swazi, Shangaan, etc.,)) were regarded with awe, and the Bechuana would have nothing in common with them. It speaks volumes for the magical force of Christianity if their descendants now intermarry with members of such tribes.

Montsioa, as a young man just turned twenty, must have taken a prominent part in Bhoya’s execution, for the poets of the day immortalised the event with the following lines in his honour:

Re kile ra ineelela dichaba,
Ra ineela, ka lecogo, merafe;
Seja-Nkabo a sale mmotlana,
A sale mo tharing eaga Sebodio.
Jaana ke mmonye a tlhatlosa Motho lekgabana
A mo pega ncoe ja Ga-Khunoana tlhogo,
A nale mmaba, a ea go bolaoa,
Seja-Nkabo-a-Tauana.

Too long we’ve bent the knee to foreigners,
Too long we’ve yielded the arm to strangers;
Montsioa, at that time, was still a baby Astride the back of his mother, Sebodio. Now have I seen him lead a man up hill, Leading him up to the crest of Mount Kunana; Conducting a foeman up to his kill,
Seja-Nkabo, the son of Tauana.

After their destruction by the Matabele, Tauna and his people found a shelter among Moroka’s people-the Seleka branch of the tribe at Thaba ‘Nchu, now O.F.S. Here the first party of immigrant Boers, under Sarel Celliers, on their way north, found them. They, too, had a taste of Mzilikazi’s sword and also found an asylum under the. wing of Moroka at Thaba ‘Nchu. The Barolong and the Boers were later reinforced by a contingent of Griqua horsemen, under an intrepid leader named Dout. The Barolong evies were led by Tauana’s son, Motshegare; the combined forces being under the supreme command of Hendrik Potgieter-a friend of the natives, if ever there was one. Together they defeated Mzilikazi’s armies and forced the Matabele to trek to the far north, now known as Southern Rhodesia.

After this overthrow and expulsion of Mzilikazi, Tauana and his people returned to the Molopo region, where he died and was succeeded by Montsioa as Chief of the Ra-Tshidi section; but, under him, they were not left long to enjoy their hard won peace. Soon after the voortrekker wave had spent itself by spreading out and settling land in the distant areas of the Northern Transvaal, the southern territories were overrun by stray whites, whose land-hunger vied with their utter disregard of the vested rights of those whose territories they invaded. Some bands of these were labelled filibusters (or freebooters), but the difference between the aspirations of such freelances and those of the newly established Transvaal Republic the natives found it very hard to define. The similarity between them was particularly noticeable after the passing of the Potgieters, the Pretoriuses and others who, with their native friends,. bore the brunt of the pioneer work. Their places in the now settled country were taken by the new Pharaohs who knew not Joseph, and it was the bane of Montsioa’s chequered life to have them as neighbours.

For instance, parties established the miniature republics of Stellaland and Goschen, with Vryburg as their capital; but, to their credit let it be said that these settlers in their diminutive republic troubled the Bechuana very little. Much of the brigandage against Montsioa and the filibustering forays into Bechuanaland were usually organised on Transvaal soil and all captured cattle were promptly driven across the frontier into the South African Republic. Other Barolong tribes were cajoled and organised against Montsioa. The Ra-Tlou section, descended from the senior House of Tau, were assured that they alone should be at the head of all Barolong affairs including Montsioa’s, and they were urged to join the Boers in their campaign against that usurper in order to bring about a desirable readjustment. Of course, white people were new in the country and it was not suspected that the solicitude of these intriguers for the regulation of the Barolong succession was stimulated by anything but a keen desire to place the House of Tau in its rightful position.

The tactics of the adventurers were remarkable. They first .engineered a treaty between the British Government and the Transvaal Republic. Under this treaty the English were to prevent the sale of arms to savages, so that white men alone could purchase firearms. The terms of this agreement were enforced by the British authorities with a firm hand, but some white men soon saw that the effect of the pact was to limit the spread of British Dominion in the interior. Most ” savages ” resisted the Boer expansion with no other object but to bring their own people under British protection; and many British pioneers sympathised with the violation of that treaty. Some actually came into Barolong territory and shared in the native defence of their country against Boer encroachments. Among these may be mentioned the late Richard Rowland, Christopher Bethell and others. They not only procured arms for Montsioa but actually helped his warriors in battle. Bethell fell on the battlefield among the sons of Montsioa near the present Transvaal-Bechuanaland boundary.

The clashes between the Barolong and the Boers extended over several decades. These hostilities necessitated the removal of the headquarters of the tribe to the present site, where the natural formation of the rocks and the thickets in Montsioastad afforded some shelter to the defenders. Thus Baden-Powell’s long defence of Mafeking was not the first; the place having been beleaguered more than once before the British annexation.
The High Commissioner, in a dispatch to the Colonial Office, about this time, points out the cruel anomaly whereby Her Majesty’s Colonial Forces at the Cape were employed to prevent the delivery of arms and ammunition to Natives who were waging a grim struggle in the interests of British colonisation; while the British Colonial Authorities, at the same time, were doing everything in their power to facilitate the delivery of arms to the Boers for use in subduing such loyal friends of the Imperial Government as Montsioa and his Barolong-War Office Dispatches, 1877

Dr. J. E. Mackenzie, son of the famous missionary, writing on the development of Rhodesia, in a colonial magazine some years later, said,  “The British would never be able to repay the debt they owe to those two Bechuana chiefs, Montsioa and Mankuroane of the Batlhaping, for the losses they have sustained in the wars they waged against the Boers in order to keep open for the British the trade route to the North, often in the face of British opposition”.
The history of these hostilities is unique in that Montsioa had! among his praise names an Afrikaans ditty that was sung and played by Boers in the Western Transvaal. I have forgotten the stanzas,. but the refrain was:-

Hoe ry die pad, hoe ry die pad,
Na Montsioa toe?
Kanoonkop o’er en die Molopo deur;
Die Boer die skiet dat die stof so staan Maar die Kaffir op sy plek bly staan.

It is not difficult to realise how these persistent raids and continuous losses of men and possessions which they involved were having a demoralising effect upon Montsioa’s tribe, and their plight eventually attracted the attention of friends of the Natives at the Cape. They strongly supported the Barolong’s frantic appeals for British protection. The result of these petitions was the Warren expedition in 1885, which annexed Bechuanaland as far as the Ramatlhabama Spruit, and proclaimed a protectorate over the territories of Bechuana tribes further north up to the Matabele borders. So that, after a most eventful life, the old warrior and hunter was able to spend the evening of his life in comparative peace.
This peace continued until 1896, shortly after the annexation to the Cape, when he was unsettled by the rinderpest scourge, which swept through Bechuanaland like a blizzard and denuded his territories of nearly every beast. Buffaloes and wildebeest in the forests perished like domestic trine and many flourishing cattle posts were reduced to ruins. So that where formerly large herds of sleek fat oxen swarmed over the grasslands as a moving testimony of Barolong wealth, only heaps of whitened skeletons remained, the only vestige of the animal life that once throve there. It was a heart-breaking situation. The misery of his people being a thing terrible to contemplate. Hyenas and wild hounds gorged themselves to excess, while flocks of carrion birds and other scaven• gers of the woods were attracted by the stench of rotting carcasses.

As a hunter in the chase, Chief Montsioa from his youth up, was as fearless as he was brave in war. He enjoyed a great reputation as a lion-killer-one of the few Bechuana who would follow a wounded lion straight into a thicket. His character in that respect has also been put into irregular verse by the court jesters of his time, for they sang:-

Moogatsa Majang, tau ga di kalo!
Tau ga di kalo, ntoroa Mhenyana.
Ga di ke di bolaoa leroborobo,
Di ba di etsa dipholofolo tsa gopo,
Di ba di edioa pitse tsa gopo,
Lekau ja Gontse-a-Tauana!
Tau di bolaoa dile thataro,
Lefa dile pedi dia bo di ntse.

(That’s not the way to kill lions,
0, husband of Majang!
That’s not the way, 0, offspring of M’Henyana!
Lions should not be butchered by the score
Nor like hunted animals at the chase;
Lions should not be slaughtered in such numbers,
To litter the field like carcasses of dead zebra,
0, descendant of Gontse, son of Tauana! Six lions at a time are quite enough
For, even two at a time are not too few!)

And here is a rare coincidence: the name ” Montsioa ” (he who is taken out) bears the same meaning as the Hebrew name “Musheh” (Moses) ; and, as the Se-Rolong expression has it-Ina lebe seromo (an ill name is an evil omen).
Chief Montsioa survived the rinderpest catastrophe by barely one year. At the age of 86 he succumbed to pulmonary disorders aggravated by a fatty heart. He was buried by his people in his cattle fold. Rev. Alfred S. Sharp, Wesleyan Missionary, now in retirement in England, conducted the funeral service. Among the Europeans in attendance were Mr. George J. Boyes, Resident Magistrate (who died at Capetown, not long ago) and some Transvaal Boers, including his former military foes who, despite their proverbial weakness in the face of colour, could respect a brave man whenever they met one.

Among Chief Montsioa’s Transvaal friends included General Piet Cronje, a former adversary and the noblest Minister of Native Affairs that ever sat in a Kruger Cabinet. He spoke the Barolong tongue almost like a native and answered to ‘the native sobriquet of ” Ra-Ntho’akgale.” After the peace in 1885, the old chief sometimes visited his Boer friends across the Transvaal border. On such occasions Dr. Molema’s father or the Doctor’s father-in-law (Rev. M. J. Moshoela, now of Klerksdorp) accompanied the old warrior as secretary, and sent back during his absence, one bulletin after another to keep his people informed of the progress of their beloved chief and his reception among the Boers.
SOL T. PLAATJE.

Mr. JACOB MANELLE, Canterbury scholar. After completing his education he was ordained priest and worked at the Cala Parish, Cape Province, under Archdeacon Coakes. He worked for many years in the Diocese of St. John’s. Mr. Manelle was the first Native Priest in his diocese. Chairman of the Native Missionary Undenominational Congress. He died in 1928, at the age of 70.

Mr. Elijah Makiwane was born in 1850 at Sheshegu, Cape Province. His parents became Christians after his birth. Elijah was taught by Joseph Mjila, afterwards going to Lovedale in 1865. He gradually mastered his lessons until he became the first student in the Theological Class qualifying for the Ministry of the Free Church. As a student he was uniformly diligent and successful. He became assistant teacher at the Mission School in 1867, and subsequently taught the junior classes at the Institution. At one time he acted as assistant editor of the Isigidini Santa Xosa. The telegraph office was opened at Lovedale in 1872, and he was given full charge of the work. Mr. Makiwane, being of a religious turn of mind, took up the theological course, which was no different to that of Europeans in Scotland at the time, and was the second after Mr. Mzimba to qualify. He was ordained, and in 1875 was licensed by the Free Church Presbytery of Kaffraria, and in 1877 was called by the Church at Macfarlane to be their pastor. He was the second ordained native missionary in connection with the Free Church; his fellow student, the Rev. P. J. Mzimba, being the first.

At one time Mr. Makiwane was a teacher at Lovedale and during that time his pupils were the highest in marks. At Macfarlane he did splendid work for the church, amidst great difficulties. Had charge of the native as well as of the European members of the Free Church of Scotland, and his work was always very satisfactory. In 1877 he married Miss Maggie Majiza, an old Lovedalian, but in 1883 she died, leaving three children. On account of his conduct, Mr. Makiwane was, in the year 1871, presented with a certificate of honorable mention by the Board of Lovedale, which may be quoted as indicating the position held by him while studying at Lovedale. In 1889 he married Miss Mtywaku, of Peelton. She died in 1917 leaving six children. He left Macfarlane for Tsolo,  and in 1920 retired after fifty years’ service as a minister. Later, on account of the: shortage of ministers, he resumed his work. In 1927 he married Miss Maggie Dlova who had been teaching in the Transkei for many years. Mr. Makiwane died at his home in 1928.

Kgame II. was the Paramount Chief of the Ba-Mangoato. These people broke away from the main tribe of the Bakoena during the chieftainship of Mothibi, son of Ngoato-after whom the tribe is now called. Kgame found it necessary to appeal to the British Government for protection against invaders in his country, now Bechuanaland Protectorate. Kgame was a wise ruler-stern yet kind, strict yet sympathetic. He was a real father to his people, whose interest he had at heart. In 1882 Kgame II. introduced a law prohibiting the making of Kaffir beer and the selling of liquor in his country. He also abolished circumcision among his people.. Converted to the Christian faith, and was a strong supporter of the London Missionary Society. Kgame was very rich in stock and money, and he encouraged his people to breed stock. He discouraged outsiders from coming to his country to buv livestock and totally prohibited the selling of cows and heifers to outsiders. Produce could be sold to foreigners only with the permission of the Chief, who alone had the right to stipulate the price; thus Kgame was chief, statesman, soldier and agent all in one.
Kgame often had trouble with the northern tribes. On one occasion Mzilikazi sent forty warriors to levy a tax. Orders were given to his councillors to have these warriors arrested and killed. Mzilikazi, hearing that his men were killed at once despatched a regiment to subdue Kgame. Receiving information that Mzilikazi’s warriors were invading his territory he led his army to meet the foe. Mzilikazi’s army was defeated with heavy losses and had to flee. After this battle smaller tribes hastened to pay homage to Kgame and to seek protection.
When Kgame was converted to Christianity he married according to Christian rites against the wishes of h’s father, Sekgoma. By this act John Mackenzie, a missionary of the London Missionary Society earned the disfavour of the aged Sekgoma. In those days the head kraal (or capital) of the tribe was at Shoshong. It has since been removed to Serowe.
As we have already stated, Kgame was strict, and often imposed a fine of 30 head of cattle on those who insisted on brewing Kaffir beer after the prohibition. A good horseman and a lover of animals. He had hundreds of horses. On day while riding a stallion he was kicked on the leg by a mare and was crippled for a long time. He was also very fond of hunting big game, and is said to have been one of the best shots of his time. Kgame made much money by selling the skins of the lions and other big game he shot and also elephant tusks.By his first wife, Kgame had one son and five daughters. When she died he married again. His second wife gave birth to two children, one is now acting as Regent. On Kgame’s death his son Sekgoma, succeeded him, but did not live much more than a year. Sekgoma’s son, Kgame’s grandson and heir, is as yet a minor, therefore Tshekedi, Kgame’s only son by his second wife, is acting for him.
When the Prince of Wales visited the Ba-Mangoato tribe he was met at Palapye Road Station, a number of miles from Serowe, by a full Ba-Mangoato regiment, and travelled to the head kraal in one of the two wagons made on the order of Sekgoma, Kgame’s son, costing £500 each. These wagons are well furnished and contain a sitting-room, a bedroom and a kitchen. Kgame had a number of regiments wearing uniform. The Black Watch, a mounted regiment, was the Paramount Chief’s bodyguard. Kgame had built a large church of stones, wood and iron before he died. Kgame was one of those rulers who was liked and respected by the Boer, the Briton and the Bantu. He will not be forgotten by his people for many years to come.
Tsekedi recently visited England to interview the British Government in connection with the mineral rights of the Ba-Mangoato tribe in their territory in Bechuanaland Protectorate.

King Daudi and Queen Irene of Uganda are Christians. They have both visited England. It was King Daudi’s Mutesa, Emperor, who made it possible for missionaries to carry on their work in the heart of Africa. In 1875 Sir H. M. Stanley, the great explorer, wrote the following letter from Central Africa:-
” Mutesa, Emperor of Uganda, Unyoso, Usoga, Karagwe-an empire of 360 geographical miles in length by 50 miles in breadth-has begged me to tell the white men that if they will only come to him, he will give them all they want. Now, where is there in all the pagan world a more promising field for missions than Uganda? Here, gentlemen, is your opportunity, embrace it.”
It was not long before large sums were collected and donated so the Church Missionary Society to send missionaries to Uganda. One of the first to arrive was Alexander Mackay, an engineer missionary who was much admired by the natives for his mechanical skill. Uganda is to-day a British Protectorate with a Christian King and the most flourishing of cotton exporting areas in the Empire. The yield of cotton in the past five years has grown from 52,000 bales to 200,000 bales, the latter of a value of £3,500,000. The people of Uganda are very progressive, and are increasingly anxious to obtain the best education they can. A bookseller reported that he had reached £250 on one day in sale of books. Before the white men came to Uganda the natives used to make garments themselves by beating bark very thin, and when soft and pliable sewing it together. A very large number of men own motor bicycles and motor cars. The roads throughout the country are very good.