Having grown up in a thoroughly Afrikaans environment, he was
        unaffected by British influences experienced during his student years
        in Cape Town, at school in Rondebosch and at the South African College
        School, and while receiving his legal training in Cape Town, London
        and Scotland. On his return in 1868 he was admitted to the Cape bar,
        but the following year went to the diamond-diggings in Griqualand
        West. He found no diamonds, returned to practise in Cape Town, and in
        1872 became member for George in the Cape parliament. In 1874, at the
        invitation of President Brand, he became chairman of the Appeal Court
        in Bloemfontein and shortly afterwards the first chief justice of the
        Orange Free State, a post he retained for thirteen years.
             The awakening Afrikaner national consciousness met with a ready
        response from him, and in spite of opposition  from Brand, he
        encouraged the formation of branches of the Afrikaner Bond in the
        O.F.S. Although he was not a member of the Genootskap van Regte
        Afrikaners at any time, he sympathised strongly with the aim and
        objects of the first Afrikaans language movement.
             Upon the death of Brand, Reitz was the obvious choice as his
        successor, and on 4 January 1889 was elected president of the O.F.S.
        His assumption of office brought a turn in the hisotry of the
        republic. While Brand had consistently opposed a closer alliance with
        the Transvaal, Reitz as early as March 1889 acceded at Potchefstroom
        to a political and a railway treaty --- the beginning of a policy
        which brought the two Boer republics into even closer accord and which
        was continued by President M. T. Steyn.
              Nevertheless, Reitz did not turn his back on the British
        colonies. On the contrary, under his direction trade and customs
        agreements with the Cape and Natal were concluded. He was fully aware
        of the central position occupied by his state. In 1895 he was obliged
        to resign for reasons of health.
             Treatment in Europe, followed by ten months' recuperation at Kalk
        Bay, brought about his recovery to such an extent that in July 1897 he
        began a practice at the bar in Pretoria. After six months he was made
        a judge in the Transvaal criminal court, and in 1898 he was appointed
        Secretary of State in the place of Dr. W. J. Leyds. The Transvaal
        crisis hd been becoming more serious, and Reitz was immediately in the
        midst of it. It fell to him, on 10 October 1899, to hand the British
        Agent in Pretoria the ultimatum which resulted in the outbreak of the
        Second Anglo-Boer War.
             Throughout the war Reitz faithfully carried out the duties of his
        office. He accompanied President Kruger when Pretoria was evacuated.
        After Kruger's departure oversea, Reitz accompanied the government in
        the field under the Acting President, General Schalk Burger. Reitz
        shared the privations of the fighting burghers, as his war poems show.
        His sense of humour, combined with his sincere humility and humanity,
        made him a beloved figure. Scornfully though he might jest about the
        "Lady Roberts", the big British gun which was captured, it was with
        touching pathos that, on signing of the peace treaty, he penned his
        'Vaarwel aan de Vierkleur'.
             As Secretary of State he signed the Treaty of Vereeniging, but as
        a private citizen he declined to take the oath of allegiance to
        Britain, and was exiled from his country. For two years he wandered
        abroad, at first in the Netherlands, where his wife and younger
        children had already gone in 1900. Financial need drove him to the
        U.S.A., where he unsuccessfully tried farming in Texas and then
        undertook a lecture tour. He returned to the Netherlands, where his
        health completely failed. Under extremely difficult circumstances his
        wife travelled with him from one spa to another and from doctor to
        doctor. They received help from friends in the Netherlands such as
        Leyds, H. P. N. Muller and G. A. A. Middelberg, and returned to South
        Africa in 1904.
             Gradually Reitz's health improved. He again began to take an
        interest in affairs of state, and after the Union of the four
        colonies, was appointed Senator and elected President of the Senate in
        1910, aqn office which he occupied until 1921. At the age of 85 he
        retired from public life and was to spend his last years peacefully at
        Gordon's Bay. By his first wife, Blanca Thesen, he had eight children.
        In 1889 he married Cornelia Mulder, of Delft, and they had seven
        children. The village of Cornelia, O.F.S., is named after her.
             Reitz's first verses were mainly adaptations from English;
        nevertheless these, as all the other verses, are typical of the
        growing spirit of nationalism among Afrikaners at that time. Reitz
        consistently employed Afrikaans, which he also advocated, and defended
        it as a medium for literature in 1880 against the Rev. A. T. Wirgman,
        who had referred to it as 'a barbarous patois'. In 1888 he collected
        the Afrikaans anthology 'Vyftig uitgesogte Afrikaanse gedigte'. A
        second edition, expanded to 60 poems, appeared in 1897, and a third
        (this time containing 62 pieces) in 1909. These volumes included some
        of Reitz's own verses, such as his rendering of Robert Burns's 'Tam o'
        Shanter' in a purely Afrikaans setting as 'Klaas Gezwint and zijn
        paert' (originally published in 'Het Volksblad, 19.6.1870). Humerous
        adaptations include Cowper's 'John Gilpin' ('Jan Jurgens'). His
        charming little love-song from hthis collection 'Die steveltjes van
        Sannie' is particularly popular (originally published in 'Het
        Volksblad' 29.11.1873).
             Besides these light humerous verses Reitz wrote poems showing
        strong patriotic feeling, such as 'Ter nagedagtenis van Kommandant
        Louw Wepener' (O.F.S. Monthly Magazine, Nov. 1877). Patriotism is also
        the keynote in his own collection 'Oorlogs en andere gedichten'
        (1910), inspired by the Second Anglo-Boer War and written in the style
        of the old 'Patriot', though some poems are in Dutch. In this he
        differs from Marais, Celliers, Totius and Leipoldt, who sublimated the
        agonies of war into the first true Afrikaans poetry.
             Reitz admired, and felt a great kinship with Robert Burns and had
        the same veneration as had the Scots poet for his native tongue,
        country and people. He is a true national poet with a sense of the
        humerous and the dramatic in the typical, homely Boer atmosphere which
        he depicts in the vernacular. His feeling for his country strikes a
        deeper note. Reitz's patriotism and interest in the history of his
        country also appear clearly from his 'Korte geschiedenis van
        Zuid-Afrika van 1486 tot 1835' (together with G. McCall Theal, 2nd
        ed.1891), a short biography of President Steyn, in the series 'Mannen
        en Vrouwen van Betekenis' (1902) and the biography (together with J.
        H. Hofmeyr jr.) 'Het leven van Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr (Onze Jan) (1913).
        He wrote an autobiographical sketch entitled 'Iets oor my voorouers en
        my leer- en studiejare' in 'Die Brandwag, 10 December 1918.

Source:  F. J. Du Toit Spies and Felix V.Lategan