ANGLO-COLONIAL NOTES.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXI, Issue 63, 15 March 1900, Page 2

ANGLO-COLONIAL NOTES.

(From Our London Correspondent.)

LONDON, February 10. THE HOTCHKISS BATTERY.

A CHAT WITH MAJOR. CARTHEW-

YORSTOUN

The battery of Hotchkiss guns for the second New Zealand Contingent was hurried down from the Elswick works by passenger train to Southampton, and left on Saturday in charge of Major Carthew-Yors-toun by the Canada. Owing to the pressure of work at Elswick, the pack saddles and ammunition saddles are not yet quite ready. They will, however, follow by mail steamer and should arrive in Capetown a week after the Major, an interval which will be well employed by him dn training the mounted detachments in the use of the gun. Considering the simplicity of the gun and the superior intelligence of the men who will doubtless be carefully selected and in whom the Major feels every confidence, he thinks that about a •week's instruction should suffice to enable the battery to take the field in a thoroughly efficient condition. Major Carthew Yorstoun was kind enough to grant me a short interview at the Junior United Service €lub oil the eve of his departure, and I was favourably impressed by his energy and enthusiasm in connection with quick-firing guns and his entire freedam from red tape ideas and restrictions. In the short chat we had, 1 learnt from him that he saw service with the old 24th (the South Wales Borderers) in the Zulu campaign, so that he is well acquainted with the scene of operations in IXatal. He also took part in the ad,vance on Dongola in the Soudan campaign and in the Tirah campaign, in both of which he was in charge of machine guns, the Maxims. He is therefore able to speak with some authority on quick firing machine guns. Finding that the question of the carriage of such guns-was in an unsatisfactory condition he set to work to try and improve it, and in the Tirah campaign devised a pack saddle equipment for the Government of India which worked very well in the mountainous country in which the British forces had to operate. On his return to England he worked out his idea more fully and induced the Elswiek people to manufacture this pack saddle equipment on the lines which he had tried with such success on the Indian frontier. It is his hope and object to demonstrate the superiority of the pack equipment over any form of wheeled carriage. With the former the guns can be carried ..everywhere over the roughest country taken along at a gallop so as to keep pace with cavalry or mounted infantry and can be got in or out of action in under half a minute. Major Yorstoun expects that one of the results of the present campaign will be the full recognition of the importance of machine guns. I questioned Major Yorstoun as to the difference between the Boers' Hotchkiss and his battery. The latter, it must be understood, is a rifle calibre gun, while that which the Boers seem to use with such effect is in all probability a quick-firing canBon of small calibre something like the Hotchkiss used in the British and other navies. Cammell and Co., the great Sheffield armour plate makers, have generously presented the battery with four shields weighing about 40 lbs each, which will be found very useful. The guns can be fired lying flat on the ground as well as in the other position on the tripod mounting, and it is expected that the former position with a shield 3 feet by 2 feet 2 inches in front of the gun, and the gun protruding through a small port, will be the most usual

one. Among the mass of experimental details it may be worth while mentioning that the guns will be carried in the firing line on their mountings by hand by two men, the front legs of the mounting swinging forward in line with the rear, and the gun being- carried as on a litter. The ■battery has been manufactured and organised with the greatest care by Major Yorstoun in conjunction with the Hotehkiss Company, and Armstrong, Whitworth and Co., the respective donors of the guns and equipment, whose patriotic generosity is a fitting counter part of the enthusiastic loyalty of the colonies. No similar battery has ever been in action in the past, so its working against the Boers will be followed ■with keen interest by all military men. I came away from my short interview feeling that the New Zealanders will reciprocate heartily the confidence which' Major Carthew-Yorstoun feels in them and that they will take the field with first rate weapons and a first-rate man in charge of them._

The "Standard's" correspondent in Durban by the way declares that he learned on excellent authority that in • November last the Whitworth-Arm-strong Company offered to lend the Natal Government four Hotchkiss guns.' The offer was referred to the War Department, who advised that they should be declined. A similar proposal was then made to the Government of Cape Colony with a like result. Subsequently the company, offered «. battery to the New Zealand^ Government with the result you al-| ready know. THE vSOCIAL CANAAN, New Zealand gets a splendid advertisement in the "Clarion" from one: "William Ranstead." who calls tho! colony the Socialist Canaan and says, "It is a treat to live in a country -vhere there's nothing to kick at." 'After brief reference to the iranchjse, old ace pensions, the land policy, advances to settlers, State railways, prohibition orders, strikes, the Public Trust Office, the unemployed, and the Government Life Insurance Department, Mr Ranstead calls New Zealanders "Collectivists," and compares

Uie LiLieraia to i-abian Socialists -and..j Uit loriuo x'l'ogrutibiveii. axis enUiuse& j over Uie pcu^io uuu says, "'j.iieie»! inure jjT.d.eucai j>j'oij.iiisjm nere "uuaJu in ! miy OLiier purl m tne WUi'iU. iiie : people iJi'iue tiiitiiibeivea on uie.r plain cuuixuon sense. -Lhey cioorii , spend years taliaug about things. ; 'ihey aie- intensely practical ana man- j age die eouniry s lousiness as; tiiey do ' tiieir own. lne Government ohiciais \ treat the State as a gigantic trading concern and lay fcaeiuseives out in ; every way tiiey can to push the ousi- > ne^-i. . . . -LsoUiiiiy jl have see.li ', outside tliie Lriush isles can be coon- : purecl Lo Aevv ieaaaud as a home fot j .Britishers My mends are j aaiviug me when 1 intend to return. | . . . Why should JL esei1 lea.ye saci> j a country, wii-ii such. laws, such la±i.u, ! such a eiiiuaie,' uaid such exquisite, sceneryV Here mere is no aristocracy, j no SHd'obery. 'mere axe no very rich J people, aacf.no poor, fiere no so-uer, i -industrious man need lack any of the j I comforts o± me' bo -ur iumsteau j i has settled down for g-ood in Vvanganui. ABSENT LANDLORDS. On tihe list of subscribers to the j Bushmen's i und are to be found tiie ■ names oi some absentee landowners j in Aew Zealand, who by putting- their ; names down for handsome doiwiuoiw . show that they bear no ill-feeling for ha.ving had Uien- land oonvpulsortly taken from them by me Uovernaneat and ■cut up for small settiemients. llie ausentee landowner appears not to be such a heartless grabber after, all. One who had just subscribed a substantial sum did, indeed, seem to ue genuinely out up at the prospect of having- his estate cut up. As i nappen v know a good deal about, the estate, in question i think his point of view ia worth consideration b,\r those who are too apt to consider the big landowner "a social pest" who is receiving; more Uhun his desert? when in return for a fair price he is forced to sell his prope)rty p The landowner in question, although 1?* has never been out. to the colonies himself, has a business intimately connected with the colonies, and has? j for nearly half a century done much i to entourage the development, of tho colonies and the colonials. He has | contributed generously to colonial j undertakings and charities; he has given valuable material aid to colonial Authors, artists, and scientists; he is imbued with the Imperial instinct/ and has such a genuine affection far New Zealand that for some years ha j has looked forward to one of his sons | making his home in the colony. \\ It'n this end in view, more than twenty years ago, he purchased & large tract of bush land. This he lias cleared*, sown, stocked, fenced, built upon and j improved, year after year sinking a large amount of capital on his property in order to turn it from virgin forest into a country gentleman's estate. He has placed game in the coverts and fish in the stream, laid out roads, planted English trees, carefully preserved picturesque clumps of. j the native bush, and made ornamental waters. In order to do this he has spent thousands oi' pounds In the colony on the property, when he sees n prospect, of * return for his j lavish expenditure, when has son <s , iust ready to come into his inheritJuice, to become a young colonist, and j likely to be a large employer ol colonial labour «oid purchaser of coltonial produce and to spend a large part of his patrimony in the colony, the father is threatened with compulsory purchase by the Government, and has the prospect before his eyes of seeing what he has laboured to male© a beautiful estote cut up Into small dairy farms. So much the better for the country, I shall be told. Perhaps so. My intention is not to ar-ue the question of large estates aslunst close settlement, but to show them the other side of the picture, as the absentee landlord sees it he-re in England. A COLONIAL WEDDING. A wedding of special interest to Christchureh people took place at the Congregational Church, MarMumt Square, Chelsea, on the 7th, when two young colonials from the Cathedral City—Mr Robert Frederick Black, the eldest son of Mr R.W. Black ot j "HolmwoocL/1 Pendaltbn, Christ-1 church, and Miss Lilian Barber the ; only daughter of Mr Fountain Bar- | ber* of the same city, were united in j holy matrimony by the, Rev. Freder- j ick Hastings. The bride was given away by her uncle, Dr. Henry Woofi- , ward, LL.D-, F.R.S., the keeper a! HW | Geological Department of the- British Museum (natural History). She wore a grey coat and skirt of Kaoapoi tweed, a crushed strawberry ribbed silk blouse, trimmed with cream laCe, and a grey velvet picture hat with white ostrich tips, and lined with chiffon to match the blouse. She carried a shower bouquet of white j azaleas, lilies of the valley, and tulips, j and wore a gold bangle with a star | and crescent set in pearls, and a gold j ■aixl pearl brooch, the gifts of the, bridegroom. The bridesmaid Was her CoUSto, MISS Alice B. Woodward, the well-known book illustrator, who waa gowned in grey Japanese fcilk, with a chiffon ruffle,- and carried a shower < bouquet 'of white narcissus and hya-, cinth, and wore a gold monogram brooch, the gifts of the bridegroom. The bridegroom was attended by Mr ; F H Hobbs as best man. After the I ceremony a reception was held t>y Mrs Woodward at 129, Beaufort-st, j Chelsea, at which several New Zealand friends of the bride aold bridegroom were present. After a brief honeymoon in Bristol Mr and Mrs Black intend to settle In Merthyr Tyd.nl, in South Wales, where Mr Bia:Ck is at present resident engineer of the British Electric Traetitm Company.