Mafeking.

Manawatu Herald, 13 January 1900, Page 2

Mafeking.

« BADEN-POWELL'S GRIM HUMOR. On Saturday, 21st November, very little of importance occurred; and Sunday was observed as a day of truce. A letter from Cronje was received, in which he confessed his inability to carry the town by storm. He warned us that he was expecting a siege gun to arrive on Monday, and that he would resume the bombardment of the town at 6 o'clock next morning. In return for his courtesy in giving notice of his intention to bombard the town, the Colonel informed General Cronje that the town was surrounded by mines. Some are arranged automatically, and others are connected

with headquarters. The gaol, he further said, was chiefly occupied by the General's own countrymen, and over this he had placed a yellow flag, which would enable the General to avoid firing on it if he thought fit. He further pointed out that if the Boer General insisted in shelling the town, full of inoffensive civilians and women, this would afford a precedent for the British forces when they invested the Transvaal. The Colonel concluded by thanking the General for his courtesy. Another curious correspondence took place between Wessels Montsiaa and General Cronje. It seems that Cronje wrote to Montsiaa telling him that the battle waa not between the white and the black men, and asked him to send his women and children out of the stadt, as he intended shelling the town. Wessels, after consultation with Mr G. C. Hebell, the Magistrate, sent the iollowing reply : He could not see, he said, how it was that Cronje was not at war with his people, because Cronje's men had taken his cattle, and had threatened his men with rifles pointed at their heads and breasts. For himself, he was a subject of the Queen, but the Queen had not instructed him to fight Cronje. Her orders to him were to keep quiet. This he would do, but could not find any safer place for his women and children than his own kraal, because they could not sleep out in the veldt without auy shelter. For himself, he had no quarrel with the Dutchmen, and hoped they would not interfere with him.