THE BOER WAR.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 274, 18 November 1899, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE BOER WAR.

WAR NOTES, MOTIONS, AND NEWS.

(VIA ENGLAND.) LONDON, October 6^ Patriotic paterfamilias experienced a nasty qualm as lie read oi: the six or eight millions which the Government will ask for as a first instalment towards the expenses of this little war. Poor pater knows too well from w'liose pockets the money must eventually come. It is not the bellowing1 wastrels of the music halls who howl nightly for war who will subscribe sixpence. No, no. The respectable ratepayer of placable disposition and moderate views will have to pay up land. his wife and dhildren suffer. Such is the way of things in this best of ail possible worlds. , Severe as was the war scare yesterday, the messages from the front are piot without their diverting- features. I ■Fleet-street, for example, was laughing1 : over the news that whereas the Anti- i Boer "Telegraph" man had travelled ; luxuriously out of the Transvaal per j General Joubert's special train the pro-Boer "Chronicle" correspondent obtained no facilities whatever, and with difficulty made one of a crowd of refugees in a coal waggon. Furthermore, the Boers were impolite to him ;to a degree. Remembering the way Mr Massingham has morning" after morning insisted on the benevolence ■

and loving kindness of the poor, dear much - maligned Boer, this practical exemplification, thereof has its humorous side. Evidently the "Chronicle" itself is not unaffected. Its leading article this morning, though sit ill calling "peace, peace" (where there is no peace) exhibits an ingenuous acidity towards our "dear brothel* Boers." They have, says Mr Massingham sadly, 'been badly lead; their diplomacy' lias been neither as straightforward nor as practical as it

ought to lhave been, and there have been bad influences behind President Kruger. All this friends of peace must sorrowfully admit.

Nevertheiess the "Chronicle" still urges stoutly a just casus belli has not arisen.

One would like to know the name of the "eminent statesman" and humorist, who suggested to the "Chronicle" that the puke of Devonshire should proceed to South Africa as Peace Plenipotentiary, "entrusted with full powers to deal with President Kruger?" Some of us would have givena lot to see His Grace's face when he was made acquainted with this engaging proposition. The very idea of this Duke of all Dukes (Who is, by the way, in his 67th year) being shipped off' in a crowded Cape liner to humble Great Britain in the Transvaal to an uncleanly and unspeakable old Boer, whom he would have to address through an interpre-

THE RIVAL GENERALS,

fer! What next, I' wonder, will Mr Massingham propose for the discipline of the House of Lords?