Yet Sluisken still had some doubts.
In the past, to reduce conflicts with the Xhosa, the Boers had given them some guns and small trinkets, but the natives had seemed unimpressed. After they had settled in—indeed, the Xhosa had even helped them build some thatched huts in the mountains—Sluisken brought the matter up with Marlvik.
The latter did not hide anything, smiling as he said, "Because our doctors cured several seriously ill natives. One of them happened to be the mother of the Ngika Tribe's Tribal Chief."
Well, the old woman's fever had refused to break at the time. After taking two days' worth of "Crown Prince's Blessing," she had barely pulled through.
What Marlvik did not say was that the Security Bureau had also given the Ngika and Kalecka Tribes six hundred Flintlock Guns each. The Boers would never have dared give them that—they had been seizing native land ever since arriving at the Cape of Good Hope. How were they supposed to keep taking it if the natives were armed?
With that batch of weapons alone, they could trade the Xhosa for enough land to settle twenty or thirty thousand people.
Over the following days, the Boers began learning from the natives how to herd livestock and build camps.
They had brought plenty of food from the city, and together with the supplies delivered by French Smuggling Ships, it was enough to last until the Potato harvest.
Amsterdam.
De Witt, a senior adviser to the French Treasury Department, studied the data his subordinates had gathered from stockbrokers and could not help frowning deeply.
He was in charge of this financing operation, but after more than half a night of maneuvering, there had been no sign of large-scale selloffs of United Kingdom stocks in the Amsterdam market.
That made