TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 9739, 29 May 1897, Page 7

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

LrrT-". has been heard of late

The of the claim made by the Transvaal Transvaal Govermhent' for Claim. indemnity on account of Dr.

• Jameson's raid, but it can be safely presumed that it is still under consideration, and that it forms one of the circumstances whioh help to make up the seriousness of the present position of affairs. Truth to teU, if it were not for the possible consequences of the claim, it would be a humorous document. The sum claimed as compensation for (a) material damages and (b) moral or intellectual damages is £1,677,938 3s 3d, and the 3s 3d irresistibly reminds one of the half-pence which do roused Mr Mantalmi s wrath on one occasion. The " moral or intellectual ** damage which the South African Republic experienced by reason of the raid is assessed at a round million, and the details of the claim on account of material damages are as follows:—" (1) Expenditure for _-—itary and commando services in connection with the incursion, the sum of £156,735 4s 3d. (2) Companiwttioo to the Netherlands South Afrioan Rail way Com**wby for making use, in accordance with the concession granted to that Company, of the railway worked by it during the co_nnan_o on account of the incursion of Dr. Jameson, £9500. (3) Disburse—enta to s_vzviag relatives of slain and wounded, £234 19b 6d, (4) For annuities, pest—ions and disbursement- to widows and children of slam burghers and to relatives of unmarried slain burghers, as also to wounded burghers, a total sum of £28,_43. (5) Expensea of the telegraph department, for more overt——, mare telegrams on -service in South A£*icanoominunication, more cablegrams, <_*_, £4682 lis 34. (6) Hospit— expenses for the care of the wounded aad sk— man, Ac, of Dr. Jameson, £225. (7) _\)r support of members of the families of -x>minax—eered burghers daring the com_—oda, ——77 83 8— (8) Compensation to be paid to the com__—e_—l lmrg}—ts for «]—_ — - «—-—*<_— <.n*3 t.i i m.TiTJ.' i __j3 i i 11 i M - Til in _*"'* ip mi mm m -A of exporues _f -tbe O—iage Free . State, "£56,01U9a Id. Total, The odd pezu_—3 ax— whillmga _— —c no do—bfc _aa—rf>e— _» ghre __9 idea *t-Jmtrr —a— —hnira ___ bomu Bimti <—r__ _r u_ <—a—__rttia-__r

worked out. The official statement contains a remark»that "in this claim are not included the lawful claims which might be made by private persons by reason of the actions of Dr. Jameson and his troops." Bat most people will think that President Kroger, as it is, is claiming a good deal more than he will get, a fact of which he is, no doabt, folly aware. His claim verifies the truth of the old jingle as to one of " the faults of the Dutch " being " giving too little and asking too much."

! Thb evidence heard by the The Transvaal Raid Commis- ; Pretoria sion has thrown a good ! AraenaL deal of light upon Dr. Jameson's disastrous undertaking, and in some'instances matters have been broaghtforwardof which very few people had ever heard before. One of these was the plot to seize the arsenal at Pretoria. This scheme was hatched during the preliminary arrangements for the abortive revolution in Johannesburg, and it was utterly unknown to many of the conspirators. The method proposed was amazingly daring, one might almost say impudent. About twenty Johannesburg Uitlanders were to go to Pretoria, and at two o'clock in the morning of December 28th were to overpower the one or two sentinels which guarded the arsenal, eeize the buildings, and transport the arms and ammunition by waggon to Johannesburg. The plan might have prospered but for one thing. The conspirators overlooked the fact that the date mentioned was the time of year at which the Boers hold the great religions festival known as Nachtmaal. Pretoria was full of Boers, in consequence, and the Uitlanders, who usually numbered half the male population, were completely outnumbered. In Mr Garrett's recently published book on the raid he has the following remarks on this matter :—" Christmas and New Year are great times to take communion. At the end of December and beginning of January Church square at Pretoria is white with the tents of outspanned waggons. Bearded farmers and fat frows, and families, by scores of waggons, drawn from the Pretoria district up to several days' journey distant, have come to town to partake of Nachtmaal ; and in each waggon, along with the Bible, comes the rifle—in case of game on the way, or thieves, or other need. At any rate, those who had no rifle with them could 'soon be supplied. It was a ready-made garrison! So when Jameson suddenly precipitated matters, and Johannesburg sent to spy out the land at Pretoria, lo! the Church square was thick with Boers. The Pretoria surprise was a wild and hazardous idea in any case. But with Pretoria full of Boers it dissolved into thin

air. . . ~ The geese of the Capitol were

not more useful to Rome than the Boers in the Church square were to Pretoria. * Once again,' the Boer historian of the future will remark,' we were saved by our religion 1' *" The Johannesburgers appear to have believed that the Boers suspected something, and had therefore delayed their departure after the conclusion of the Nachtmaal festival. It is not quite certain whether this was actually the case. On the contrary, this --air seems to have been another of tbe mistakes made by the revolution—lies. If they had made their attempt a week before they might have succeeded and the subsequent history of the movement might have been very different. As it was it failed, because no one remembered the occurrence of one of the chief incidents in the Boer's calendar. Judged from the point of view A Great of the interest) taken in the Football event and the number of Match, spectators thereat, the final , match of the English Asis—cia,r tton Cop Competition was the greatest, football match which has ever been played in Great Britain. The teams left in for the final were the representatives of the famous Aston Villa (Birmingham) Club and the Everton (Liverpool) Club, and the deciding ground was the Crystal Palace. Thither from an early hour in the morning, excursion trains carried thousands of enthusiasts from all parts of the country, and by the time the match began the ground could hardly have been more crowded.. The official returns showed an attendance of 65,024 persons who paid for admission, while it is believed that fully another 5000 were present who escaped paying anything by swarming over one set of tnrnstile gates. This, it may be said, is claimed by the Crystal Palace authorities to be the the first time they have been unable to cope with a crowd, and the Palace has seen some enormous throngs in its time. We do not propose to go into details as to the game—it is sufficient to say that after a struggle-—rkedby first-d-waplay on the part of both teams and intense excitement on that of the spectators, the result of the match, which was in doubt to within five minutes of the finish, was a victory for the Aston Villa by three goals to one. The winners were subsequently presented with the cup by Lord Rosebery, who in the course of a brief address, said that football offered splendid facility for bringing out the indomitable pluck of the Britisher, and he thanked both teams for tbe fine exhibition they had given of a great game. The match was a most profitable one for the teams engaged. The Crystal Palace people were to guarantee the Football Association the sum of £1200 in the first place, and, in addition, were to pay od a head for every person entering the ground after 30,000 had been passed and Is per head for every person over 40,000. So that on an attendance of 65,000 they would have to pay the enormous sum of £2700. They themselves took the receipts from the reserved seats, accommodating 9000 persons, ■which would represent a large sum. Although the money referred to would be paid to the Association, the two Clubs playing the match would take the whole of the receipts after the Association had deducted a certain sum to meet expenses. The Aston Villa team returned to Birmingham on the following Monday, and were received with tremendous enthns_am by a crowd estimated to number at least 100,000 persons. Both this Club and the Everton Chxb bad their rise in small church organi-satio-a, the Aston Villa being founded some twenty-three years ago by some young men attending a Wesleyan chapel, and the Everton Club being connected with a Congregational chapeL The latter Club has an income of £10,000 a year, and last year it paid £4500 to players for wages and ta-ara-_jg expenses. The figures for the Aston Villa Club, which is a much larger organisation, would undoubtedly be larger in proportion. After this, little can be said of the huge sains spent on baseball in the United States.

As every other paper in __c Jubilee Great Britain has someand the thing to say every day Death Bate, about —c D__u—d JobOee the Lancet of course eo_d not be expected to keep -__ut. It therefore t selects as its subject tbe posaibla effect of the Jubilee rejoicings _pone —e_fcb r**e of London. Thia is quite a modern version of _b_ mummy —fc Egjrj—i— _ ___g_e—_ _fc xs lii ?ii w is 1 Ii i xntoar—a_rigr lapo*—r~t—re *--**-^>*--i*'***j***-- , w— -will be very great. It goes into some -geoiooß figare— shoniag +**«■ ———-—»——lffcy >—_ or _*_—• ——_t—_% .penilei i ■ i""T-*-—g - .ft—o _———>„ of t—to jB-amiiiiniu w___t w_- o__r •_—rd

standing room to a tithe of their number, and one is left to draw the inferences that those who do see the pageant from the streets will have to put up with a good deal of squashin g x and that there will be a large number who will have to be contented with a very distant view of the proceedings, if they see them at all. The Lancet looks forward to the removal, through excitement and over-exertion, of some few who are "ripe to depart," but otherwise it does not seem to think anything very dreadful is going to happen, for which consolation those of us who will have relatives or friends in London on that day should be grateful. The paper assumes that the Queen, in deciding upon an outdoor service at St. Paul's on Jubilee Day was influenced by a desire that her lieges should not suffer overcrowding in a hot and stuffy interior, which, a* most people know, ia very unhealthy. The suggestion is an ingenious one, but the Daily News, we regret to notice, scoffs at it, remarking that ** The Queen has always been iutolerant of the atmosphere of crowded places, and her choice of the outßide of St. Paul's is probably no more than a way of giving effect to her wish to breathe at her ease." Her Majesty's choice inShi3 matter does not, it appears, meet with the approval of one of the religious papers, which declares in effect that she will set a had example to her people, who are already too fond of staying outside churches and being " buttresses instead of pillars." But we do not imagine that the Queen's example on this occasion will have much effect on the church-going proclivities of her subjects, who will go to church or stay away just as they like and as they have always done.