THE CAPE OF GOOD HOPE.

Globe, Volume IV, Issue 460, 4 December 1875, Page 3

THE CAPE OF GOOD HOPE.

Cape files to October 19tb have reached Melbourne. The following is a summary of the news : The proposed confederation of the South African colonies and states is being much discussed, and many meetings have been held to urge the Government to have Cape Colony represented at the conference which is to be held to consider Lord Carnarvon’s proposals. Parliament was to assemble on November 10th, and it was confidently hoped that delegates should then be sent to the conference. The opposition of the Molteno Government to the proposed confederation has rendered them very unpopular. They have since somewhat modified their views, and tho Hon J. X. Merriman stated to his constituents on October Bth, that the Ministry were not opposed to the conference, though there were certain subjects that they objected to the discussion of. They disapproved of the conference, because they considered the whole thing informal, vague, and indefinite. Delegates from the various colonies and states were to be asked to meet without anything definite to confer upon. They were asked to meet two or three Imperial delegates, who knew nothing at ail about the country or the native question, to dis cuss that and other matters. 1 his he contended was clearly illegal and impolitic. He was not opposed to a conference of the various states and colonics, hut he held that it should be clearly decided and understood beforehand what subjects were to be discussed at such a gathering. The Ministry decidedly objected to the separation question or the native question being brought forward or discussed at such a conference. A universal native policy was an impossibility ; and besides this, it would be found most detrimental and unsuitable, from the mere fact that different classes of natives required different legislation—they could not be all treated alike. The colony was at the present moment engaged in large public works ; five millions of money had been borrowed for carrying on these public works, which were being pushed forward with vigor in various parts of the country. Was this not scope enough for colonial statesmen, without trying their ’prentice hands at discussing schemes of federation which could not possibly lead to any good results ? Mr Merriman some time before insulted Mr Froude at a public luncheon, given in celebration of the opening of the Port Elizabeth and Uitenhage railway on September 21st. His conduct was markedly reseated by the company. Mr Froude, who has been the guest of Sir Garnet Wolseley, at Natal, has staled that although obstacles might retard its accomplishment longer thau was at first anticipated, he had the fullest confidence in the ultimate success of his mission. The rebellion in the diamond fields has collapsed. Henry Tucker and other leaders were arrested. Franz Dahl, a Russian by birth, and a painter by trade, has sworn that be was a spy with the rebels at Kimberley, and that part of their plot was to carry off Lieutenant-Governor Southey and Secret tary Currey, and put them over the Vaal. The rebels were also to get two cannon from the Free State. The avowed object of the Diggers’ Protection Association was to overthrow the present Government, and then to offer themselves and the territory to the Free State, and in the event of their overtures being rejected, to constitute themselves a republic, with Tucker as president. Dahl admits that he has been convicted of inciting natives to steal, and that he had intended to shoot a man named Blanch. His statements are much doubted. The leaders of the rebellion were tried for riot, but were acquitted. and the charges of sedition were then withdrawn by the Crown. It was stated in the Griqualand West Legislative Council, that one of the leaders had publicly mentioned that when the troops left another rising would take place, the object being to annex Griqualand to the free states. The troops were expected to return to Gape Town in October or November. An expedition has been sent to the fever haunted marshlands of North-Western Africa, to punish a horde of pirates which plundered a British vessel early in the year, A schooner named the Geraldine, laden with j salt and earthenware, when going up the

Congo River, on her way to Punta da Lenha, ran ashore near the town of Manuel Yecca, near the haunt of a well-known pirate chief. The vessel grounded at noon. At night she was surrounded by hundreds of canoes. The captain had only a revolver, and his crew were unarmed, and so they had to take to their boats. In getting away four Kroomen were left behind, and they were murdered; but the boat, dashing away before a fourknot current, was left unmolested, or rather was not followed, fcr the pirates were eager for plunder. An expedition, consisting of the Active, the Spiteful, the Encounter, the Foam, the Ariel, and the Merlin, under the command of Commodore Sir William Hewitt, sailed up the Congo River, above Bull Island, but was compelled to anchor owing to the difficulties of navigation. The islands which form the delta of the Congo are intersected by numerous narrow creeks, and the banks are covered with mangrove swamps and thick bush, and it is upon these islands that the natives have their villages, which they have all along believed impenetrable to attack. These natives are known by the name of Mossonlongees, which word means pirates of the river. One of their means of livelihood is levying black mail on the palm oil which the natives of the interior collect, but are unable to take themselves to the traders, because between them and the trading stations are these lawless tribes, who taking the oil ■exchange it on behalf of themselves and the others for Manchester goods chiefly. On the 30th of August an expedition consisting of twenty-seven boats, including seven steam launches, and a party of 280 seamen and marines, was despatched under the command of Captain Bradshaw, of the Encounter. Some of the creeks were not more than 50ft wide in their narrower parts, and up these steam launches 42ft in length had to proceed. The mode of landing adopted was for the gun boats to go up the creek first, thiowing in shot and shell and rockets, commencing at a short range and continuing it up to such ranges as 1700 or 1800 yards, so as to drive back the enemy for at least that distance. After this firing, the scouts would advance, followed by the column. Day after day the work of destruction was proceeded with. All the creeks were explored as far as Punta da Lenha, and every village was burnt, including some important ones belonging to the notorious pirates Anezanze, Manuel Yecca, and Macalata. In all 67 villages were destroyed, which afforded hr mes for thousands of inhabitants, and a large number of men must have been killed. Amongst the English forces, there was only one man killed —he was a guide—and there were only five men wounded, one of them being Mr Dixon, the senior engineer of the Ariel. To get at the villages was a work of wondrous difficulty. The men had to struggle through loathsome black mud, sometimes almost up to their waists, through mangroves intricate and apparently interminable. Yet they sometimes marched as much as 10 miles a day, the scouts performing exceptionally good service, whilst the marines were remarkably steady and were ably commanded. Upon the first day the whole force was landed, but afterwards it was difficult to move such a large body through the country, so the seamen were kept as a reserve force. In the way of loot there was nothing got as there was in Asaantee, where the ornaments were of gold, but here of brass; some few curios in the way of horrid fetishes were all that were brought back as prizes by an expedition which was splendidly organised and most ably conducted throughout. After three weeks’ operations, the squadron dispersed. The statement that it is probable H.R.H. the Prince of Wales will visit the Cape has occasioned a good deal of excitement. The scarcity of provisions in that part of Sent 1 ' Africa called De Onderveld has induced the inhabitants to resort to cannibalism. A party of Korannas came a few weeks ago among the farmers of the Onderveld, beseeching for work that they might avert starvation. In proof of the position to which they were reduced, one of them produced from his knapsack a human bone, the llesh of which he had eaten. Madame Anna Bishop has been giving concerts at Capetown.