To obtain their release they had each to find sureties of L1,000, while Jones, Edgar's murderer, had been set at liberty on bail being found for L200 unpaid.
3 .-- _The Uitlanders' Petition._ These proceedings only resulted in more signatures to the petition addressed to the Queen.

When Sir Alfred Milner, March 28th, 1899, forwarded a copy to Mr.Chamberlain it contained 21,684 signatures.

Sir Alfred Milner did not undertake to guarantee the authenticity of them all, but gave reasons for considering the greater number as _bona fide_.
Mr.Wybergh in a letter of April 10th, to the British Vice-Consul, explains the measures that had been taken to collect and verify the signatures.

They were such as to inspire confidence.

He states that among the whole number, only 700 are of illiterate or coloured people; and adds, that after the dispatch of the petition 1,300 other signatures were sent in, thus raising the total to 23,000.
The Government of Pretoria, after a lapse of more than a month succeeded in raising a counter-petition addressed to itself, which, at first, it stated, contained 9,000 signatures; some time later, on the 30th of May, the British Government was informed that it numbered 23,000 signatures.
Krueger wished to prove that he had at least the same number of partisans.
Only he had out-witted himself in the drawing up of this counter-petition.