THE TRANSVAAL REPUBLIC.

Grey River Argus, Volume XXXI, Issue 5302, 24 September 1885, Page 3

THE TRANSVAAL REPUBLIC.

With regard to the bankruptcy of the Transvaal Republic, a commmunication in the Cape Argus dated Pretoria, July 26, Bays :- " Government having failed to procure a loan necessary to carry on administration, and land taxes not coming in, payments from the Treasury have been temporarily suspended. ' ' The Cape Argus, commenting on the news, writes : "What has long been foreseen has at length come about, and the Transvaal is in a worse j position than when it put up its i shutters with three half-crowns in the till. The desperateness of the situation is apparent. A committee of the Volksraad, which was recently appointed in conse- j quence of impending difficulties, recommended that acknowledgements of indebtedness as to arrear taxes, should be taken from the burghers, coupled with a scheme of redemption within three years. These acknowledgments, being really preferrent mortgages on the farms of the burghers, would be taken as liquid documents, and upon these the Govern- , ment hoped to raise money from any persons, we suppose, willing to advance it. Either the burghers will not give the documents, or nobody will advance anything upon them. At any rate the crisis of bankruptcy is upon the Government, and the Treasury has temporarily as it is put, to suspend payment. The Treasury bills which it is proposed to issue would, in the nature of things, be a forced currency, and then we shall see what the result will be. The instinct of self preservation would probably come to the front, and the collapse would come. It is ruinous to read that some members of the Vclksraad, ' among whom is General Smit,' have gone home. There is always that resource in the Transvaal. When the crash comes, the Boer can retire to his from, leave the civil service to its fate, dispense with the offices of the postman, and relapse into primitive simplicity. What is to come afterwards, when the primitively simple citizens have to settle all questions with the rifle, need not be gone into."