THE VENEZUELA BLOCKADE.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 11551, 6 April 1903, Page 5

THE VENEZUELA BLOCKADE.

It is a littlfi startling (writes Mr Lu.y in tha "Sydney Morning Herald") to hear On official autliviity that, the money claims for which iro have endangered the peace of toe world, and blockaded Venezuela. Mnour.t t>» £5500. As a financial transMt&m, tnndacti'd strictly on business principles, it would have been well worth if* Iblfour's while to press doable th.it Wnount on the creditors, bid them £° *way, and sty nothing mora of the matjw»*' We shall never know in precise form gribaj the bombardment ihaa co*t'^J__*'^

ccrt<iinly far exceed any money l"iat will bo extracted from Venezuela. " The Admiral of Ihe Fleet told me that in cable mewsa.ges alone he had for some time been spending between £600 and £700 a week. The rool bill of the blockading fleet will more than brine up the balance to tho aggregate of British claims. The Admiral's flagship, the Ariadne, at anchor off the I'.-.rfc oi Spain, kept steam up night and day, a costly luxury with a steamer of over 11,000 tonnage. Dot-t-rd alumt the harbour under tho guns of the flagship were half a dozen miserable little craft vcty nrucii of the class of the Thames pennv'steamb-vat* This was a portion of the fleet of capturf dbv a British man-of-war. When I was at,"Trinidad the Handy Man was looking for bis share of prize-money, a bounty in wliich the Admiral himself would' have a modwt r-haTe. It is part of the settlement already arrived at that these jiliijvs shall be given back to Venezuela. Th.re will be some saddened moments undrr Admiral Douglas's command if that mKius there is to 'be no prizemoncv. At. b:st it would not amount to much. But. ia these days the distribution i.s rare.