CONDENSED CABLEGRAMS.

Manawatu Herald, 30 September 1899, Page 2

CONDENSED CABLEGRAMS.

The Transvaal. Me Ro^c-Innes, ex AttorneyGeneral and othtr members of the C^pe Afrikander party, have urged President Kruger to yield to Great : Britain's demands, as Mr Chamberlain now guarantees ihe indepndenca of the Transvaal against any attack. They point oat that the ! word suzerainty was not used in the British despatch. Endeavours are also being made to induce the Transvaal Government . ta renew the offers to give the franchise to omlandera on the bisia i of a fiv? years' residence, and ateo ; increased representation of the goldI fields in the First V.>lksraad. ■ Sir Matthew White Ridley, Secre 1 fcary of State for the Home Depart*. ment, speaking at B'ackpool, said \hat though the British Government was conciliatory and patient in its \ d:*iins?d with the T.ansvaal, it \ wjuld not turn back from the coarae which it had entered upon, i The *• Times " states that Sir 1 Alfred Mi!ner, Bitish High Com--1 inission^r for South Africa, has sub" [ raiucd to the Cabinet drastic proposals for dealing with the whole dffiiulty. 1 Tup "Diily Telegraph" spates 1 r,haf. General Jmbatt reckons on 18,- --[ 000 troops in ; he T au-iVial, 16 000 \ from ih' Orange Free State, 8000 ■ B>ers in Cap?* Colony, 2000 in Natal • and 6000 H-iJ under and German ■ volunteer*. : The " Traps" and ihe •' Dabats" bo'.h publish articles on the Tran?---1 vaal crisis in which th j y advise th>- ' Boers to attack before the British are i r.ady. : Th< Meat BiHsh despatch has '■ mrensifi d the independent spirit of the Board. i It is expected that Preaiden- ; Ki-uger will demand that thy movi ( g forward of the British reinforc mtjnts be stopped pending the receipt of Great Britain's final proposals. : A run on the banks doing business : in Pretoria had set in. 1 The Orange Fcee State Volksraad, by unanimous resolution, has in*tinoted the Governmenc to try to ti-un peace without violating rbe Honour and independedce of the Republic, and has also promised that the Free State will faithfully fulfil its treaty obligations to the Transvaal. President Steyn has s?nt his f imily to Capetown. Cape boys employed as muleteers by the British at Ladysmith have mutinied and refused to go to the front. Two sho'a were fired *at a British column which was marching to Dundee, n^ar the Transvaal border, bub tho persons who fired them were not discovered. B^erd are looting on the Bechuanamd border, and molesting the Chinese and blacks in Johannesburg hoping thereby to force Great Britain's hand. Attempts are being made by the Transvaal authorities to puTchasp large supplies of wheat and tinned nr-.afcs in Capetown. The Maiqui-) of Salisbury has in * despatch assured the Netherlands Govarnm.nt that the integrity and independence of the Transvaal and he Orange Free state will be sjuarautefd if the advice of Great Britain, which is in the interests of all races, be accepted. Great Britain's preparations for war have already cost a million sterling. The steamer Sumatra will convey the Ist Battalion (84 h Foot) of tbe iiordnr R-giinent from Malta to Sniiih Xfriea. Tbe Brinish War department is puicbasiDg 20,000 males in the United States and Italy for employ • ment in South African operations.

Mr A. IL Waddellj electrical engineer of Duoedin, who was in Johannesburg three years ago, has niv^n the Duoedin, Star some interesting nous on Transvaal af fairs. '" The fort at Johannesburg h (h* sty ) about as far from the c nrrp nf the town aa Maori Hill h to I) ined'ti— about thw saute disi^Qch and elevation, i have been in i , fining the privilege through Jouberi/s nephew, wh ) took me in. Id is a vpry heavy work, the earihwo< k, 25ft thick, being baoked by concrete. The earthwork is at an atigle of 46 like the roof of a house. The area would be about three acres. Krupp disappearing 6in guns were in portion at the time of my visit these pointed townward?, and six Gatlings and four Maxims showed on the o her side. A German engineer bailt the fort. The threat to poison the rivers with cyanide of potassium does not mean much. This i* not the sort of stuff to do very much harm unless under immediate precipitation, and ihan only in its immediate neighbourhood. The notion seems to be to poison the troopers' horses, or prevent them using the rivers, but the troopers will water all the same. The worse that could happen would be that a man would have to shift his horse a few yards above the poison. Foiaoning a running stream is a very different thing to poisoning a well. While I was there a man who was working a cyanide plant made a bet of £10 that fi-th would live bilow his battery, and he won his bet. by catching fiah in the river ten miles lower down. "I do not think there will be a war. At the last minute Eruger will accept the British terms. ; ; But on the Mafeking side the feeling against the British is particularly ke^n since the Jameaon raid, and it is possible that gome of the young Boers, who drink in hatred of the British with their mother's milk, will precipitate thing 3. If there i* war it will take our men six month-, to reach Pretoria. The Baers have paid Erupp alone in five years £5,---000,000 for war material, and this has been paid out of the public revenues without any auditing. Auditors are superfluous with the auiborities there."