Lydenburg.

Manawatu Herald, 28 June 1900, Page 3

Lydenburg.

■♦ According to a correspondent of the 7 " Natal Times " Ohrigstadt Valley is the place, and Abel Erasmus, of Lydenburg, the man to whom the place belongs, and on whom will fall the task of making it more difficult of access than it already is. This Erasmus is one of the strongest characters among the Boer leaders. He is wealthy and influential, a Boer of the; Boers, who never consults the Government, but always acts aa he himself believes best, no friend of the Hollander gang, but the confidant of Kruger. He is a splendid old man, 70 years of age, whose kindly expression and frank, open countenance .give no clue to his character as a " solid sinner," whose 40 years' rule as Native Commissioner over "a vast district has placed to his credit more oppression and bloodshed among the natives than belongs to any man in the Transvaal. His name is said to act like a galvanic shock to any native in his district. The Ohrigstadt laager is the oldest and strongest pptftfon taken up by the "voortrekl^rs." When the pioneers of tjbe Transvaal were raiding the native*' cattle and making slaves in ail directions, they were occasionally confronted by impis of the natives, before whom they had to retreat, and ty ijhe Ohrigatadfc laager that theV|setirftd foe safety. The valley, wejET watered by three streams and splendidly fertile, lies 75 miles square, M*4 is protected by high volcanic ranges .and \deep rivers-, the only "gate" being the settlement of Lydenburg; ■> "Spme^ 2000 Boers, with artillery^ could there," says the writer, " defy 200,000 British troops foe «a indefinite period. No men, in their i thrtasands, could ever climb those pigmy and giant ridges, or pass the multitudinous death-traps of boulder-built kopjes, intersected with dongas. The force inside the valley so long as ammunition and food lasted are safe. Our troops have had experience of Colenso to Ladysmith. That was comparatively easy to the miles of impossible approaches to the Ohrigstadt valley."