OUR LONDON LETTER.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1857, 5 February 1880, Page 3

OUR LONDON LETTER.

[fbom in a pbebs cobehspondent.] LONDON, December 19.

The greatest alarm prevails throughout political and military circles in London at the position into which General Sir Frederick Roberts, the commander of our forces in Afghanistan, has been forced, together with the 7000 troops that he led to Oabul. No one denies that he is in a situation of the utmost peril, and there being now no telegraphic communication within several miles of him, and those several miles swarming with hostile Afghans, it may possibly be some time before we shall be able to hear anything more from him personally, and it is certain that weeks must elapse before we can afford him any substantial measure of relief. Affairs had been slowly but surely increasing in gravity in and around Oabul, but it was not until yesterday that we knew the full measure of the danger to which General Roberta and his men were exposed. The crisis has evidently been gathering ever since the ex-Ameer Yakoob Khan forsook his palace in Cabul and came into the English camp. Since his departure thence for Peshawur all the Native tribes have not been slow to act upon various and strong incitements to revolt against our rule. Most likely we do not know the whole truth in the bare particulars which are officially vouchsafed to us, and this week wo have seen by more than one instance that wo shall have to wait the arrival of letters before we can receive that full information which will enable us to appreciate the history of the events which have brought about the present situation. For there is in India an official called a Press Commissioner, whose original duty it was to furnish all the Indian newspapers with such intelligence as the Go-vornor-in-Council wished to be published, but whose duty has in these days of warfare been interpreted to be to prevent the publication of any real news at all, and especially from those “Special correspondents” who are so obnoxious to the autocratic Roberts. You may recollect that some few months ago that General dismissed from his camp and sent back to India the representative of a London newspaper for no other offence than that of speaking the truth about the state of the army in the field. Then he ordered an officer of his own selection to go on writing letters for that journal which did not want the productions of an official amateur, and did not print them. But this week we have learned that even officers on active service with him are not free from his wrath, and on his discovering that a surgeon of high rank had written to an Indian newspaper an account of the barbarous treatment of some Afghans by men belonging to our force, a matter which he had officially reported to head quarters, tho doctor was straightway sent homo to India.

So that, under these circumstances, we are wholly in the dark as to Yakoob Khan, whose abdication of the throne of Cabul is the starting point of this present history. When he came to our camp and was really treated as a distinguished prisoner on parole, mysterious rumors were spread that ho was not altogether free from blame, if not guilt, concerning the massacre of Major Cavagnari and the oil er members of our embassy in Cabul. These charges were so persistent that it was deemed necessary to appoint a Special Commission to inquire into them. That Commission has inquired, and has presented its report to the Government of India, but we do not yet know even its purport. Wo are told, however, in the latest letters which have reached us that the step which General Roberts took in sending Yakoob down to Peshawur must not be interpreted as having anything to do with the result of the Commission. Since he quitted the Bala Hissar, and told us the spot where we could and did find a large quantity of treasure —gold, it may be noted, that came from the Russian mint, and has since been used, such is the irony of fate in this instance, in paying our own soldiers —anarchy has pro-

vailed in the city, and at length the position became absolutely untenable. General Roberts has, therefore, retired to his cantonments at Sherpur, some miles distance north of the city, where he is now shut up, though the military people try to smooth over the actual facts by saying he is entrenched. True, ho has provisions that would last him for five months if he is contented to remain immured, but that is doubtful. The whole country around has risen in arms against us, and the number of the hostile natives in the neighborhood of Cabul alone is officially estimated at thirty thousand. It is hoped that the necessity for procuring food will compel these Afghans to disperse, and so enable Roberts to get out of Sherpur, if not to re occupy Cabul, which ho would do had he a force sufficient at his disposal. But he has not, and so we must wait the turn of events. There is too much reason to believe that the violent harangues of Radical speakers in England during the past few months have produced an undesirable effect on the Government, which is, by consideration of the great expense, prevented from doing what is really necessary, and would enable us to achieve our ends.

But if in Afghanistan things have not gone smoothly with us, at all events in South Africa, where but a few months ago we seemed to be nearly overwhelmed with difficulties as great as those which we are encountering in India, we have achieved a decisive victory over the last of the native chiefs who showed fight against us, and this it is believed will be the date from which the pacification of that country will really date The letters which have been delivered by the mail that reached London last night contain accounts of the capture of the mountain stronghold to which the native chief Moirosi had retired with his forces. It was shelled for three days before we finally assaulted and took it. During the engagement Moirosi himself was shot through the neck by a bullet, and crept into a cave, where he ox pired. He had dared us for a long time, and nothing would induce him to yield, but we have conquered with only one great effort. The Boors in the Transvaal still threaten to be troublesome, but now that nearly all our troops would be free to march into the Transvaal it is hoped that they will see the uselessness of further resistance.

Throughout Europe affairs are in a very unsettled state, and the severe weather which all the capitals have experienced this month has not produced that quietness in politics which such an unusual state of weather might be supposed to bring about. The French Chambers have resumed their sittings for a brief period, and every day seems to bring some new trouble to the Ministry, which is at present supposed to manage the affairs of France, But for two or three days past it has been doubtful whether M. Waddington is any longer the President of the Council, or whether he has given place to M. Froycinet, though either of them, it is fully believed, will have to give place to M. Q-ambetta as early in the new year as he can make up his mind to take office. In Spain the royal wedding has been speedily followed by almost a Parliamentary revolution. There has been another of those singular reconstitutions of the Ministry for which Madrid is peculiar, but the new Premier has come into conflict with a section of the Opposition. They demand that be shall apologise to them, but he says he has done nothing which demands any apology, and some violent scenes have in consequence taken place in the Cortes. At present we know little about what is taking place, for all telegraphic communication has been interdicted. Such scraps of news as have been smuggled across the frontier speak of Marshal Campos and Senor Canovas as if they were the whole of Spain, and are altogether silent as to the King and his new Queen, some news of whom would be infinitely more interesting than the interminable personal squabbles of rival politicians. I told yon in my last letter of the attempt which had been made on the life of the Cz r by the explosion of a mine beneath the line of railway near the Moscow station. It seems astonishing that no one has yet been arrested for being concerned in that event, and to show what “good natured friends” the Emperor Alexander has in Q-ermany, I must tell you that in Berlin the whole affair is regarded as nothing more than a political dodge, which has effected what it was planned to achieve, viz., the destruction of a luggage train, and with it the project of a new scheme of constitutional reform. I need scarcely say that the Russian authorities do not allow any “ special correspondents” to go near the place, but from day to day a good many scraps of information have leaked out, which, taken together, really do present a most suspicious appearance. The cottage from which the mine was fired, was, immediately after its discovery, completely wrecked by the crowd, and all evidence as to its occupants was thereby at once destroyed. Then it has been found out that the mine, which was most carefully prepared, was constructed only by the side of the railway line, and on the wrong side to do any harm to a train going to Moscow, an oversight of which we ean hardly imagine the clever Nihilists to be capable, if it was they who prepared this plot. The latest story about the Emperor Alexander comes from Venice, where the newspapers have revived the old rumors about the great personal dissensions that exist between him and the heir to the throne. These can only be inventions, but they are additional evidence of the great dislike with which Russia is generally regarded, but especially by her nearest neighbours.

Mr Gladstone having finished his political campaign in Midlothian, and addressed many other gatherings of those whom he hopes to represent in the next Parliament, has since proceeded to Glasgow, where he achieved an astonishing feat for a man who is within a few days of seventy years of age. Some time ago he was elected Lord Rector of the Glasgow University, and he took the opportunity of being in Scotland to deliver his inaugural address. He devoted two or three days to the preparation of this discourse, and the result was one of his most admirable essays, which commands the attention and re spect of all men who can regard it from an unpolitical standpoint, and drew repeated rounds of applause from the audience to which it was delivered. It took him an hour and half to read. For an ordinary man such an effort would have been thought sufficient work for a week, but Mr Gladstone truly is, as “ Punch ” calls him, a Colossus of words. The cheers of the undergraduates had hardly died away before the Right Hon. gentleman was off to a large political gathering, where for an hour and a quarter he fired away again at all the political misdeeds (according to his views) of tho present Government. Nor did this suffice to weary him, even for one day. He attended a dinner party at Sir James Watson’s, and left that pleasant house to go to another meeting, at which be was presented with another address, and had to speak again for nearly half an hour But he is at home at Hawarden at last, not, however, without making several small speeches on the road, and one in particular at Preston railway station, where, having to wait for a quarter of an hour, he proceeded to dilate on the treatymaking power of Parliament. His journey to and from Scotland, it must be admitted, was a tremendous success, and exceeds anything that the present generation have witnessed of its kind.

We now know positively that the Government do not contemplate any alteration of the regular course of Parliament, and both Houses are. summoned to meet on what has of late years been the ordinary day, viz., the first Thursday in February. But the Liberals, who have failed by all their bluster to induce Ministers to dissolve during the present recess, have now started the rumour that the life of the present Parliament will come to an end at Easter next. They claim to have ascertained that stringent orders have been issued to all the great spending departments that the rough estimates of next year’s requirements must be made up immediately and several weeks in advance of the ordina>y time, because it is the intention of the Government to get through Committee of Supply before Easter. No doubt if this was the literal and exact fact it would portend a dissolution at that date, but the thing is impossible of accomplishment. Between February sth and the day before Good Friday, even if the Hou e of Commons sat to that extremest time before taking its usual recess, the votes could not be got through, if they were passed as smoothly as in the days before the Obstructionists arose. This latest dodge of the Liberals is only intended in reality to spur up the flagging exertions of the party, lest any quietness might betray their weakness. Their hopes have been much revived this week by their success at the election of a member for the County of Donegal, where an English Liberal was returned by a large majority over the Irish Conservative candidate, but they do not take into account that very little interest was taken in the election locally, and that a large number of the constituents could not be induced to take the trouble to go to the poll.