SOUTH AFRICA.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XII, Issue 746, 31 December 1859, Page 4

SOUTH AFRICA.

: By the arrival of the Royal Bride, we have papers from the Cape of Good to the 26th of October, and from Graham's Town to the 22nd. The' Cape Commercial Advertiser' of the 22nd states that the principal event of the month has been the termination of the long drought, which had thinned the flocks in many districts, and emptied the shops by intercepting supplies from the great stores aud at the seaports. Droughts equally severe are said to have occurred in South Africa in every period of eight or ten years, or at least within eleven' or twelve years of each other, with less extensive or less severe ones every five or seven years. But the great increase of valuable stock as well as of population in new towns and villages in the interior, gives increasing weight every year to this order of the seasons. It appears that we have nearly reached if not actually, the limit assigned by our climate to increase and multiplication, depending for support on our soil and surface in a state of nature. Art must now advance, provide food by industry and the means of transport by ' country roads' and bullock waggons, or our next great drought will make us forget the past by its more terrible losses and suffering. If the number of our sheep, for example, were double what they were last year, and they will certainly be so by the time of our next great drought, they will certainly perish not by thousands but by millions. They will have starved each other, and trekking will be by that time impossible, from the general disposal of Crown lands. It was nearly impossible on this occasion from the wildness of the area affected by the drought. It is now perfectly clear that we can no longer live and thrive by rains as scattered by the clouds, and roads in a state of nature. The earth like the first garden, was given to man 'to keep it and dress it.' If he neglects this duty, if he thinks it too troublesome to store up the water and to level the surface, he should also refuse obedience to the contingent command to ' increase and multiply.'

Adverting to the destructive effects of the dl'OlHlfc in Ilia Eastern Province, fto'Grakn's Ton Journal' remarks: — -Tin's affliction lias indeed been severe—paralyzing trade, and its evils permeating, as it were, every branch of industry. With our existing means of transport, lamentably deficient even in the best of seasons, it may be imagined that on occasions of protracted drought, like the present, the inconvenience and loss to trade and commerce must be immense. Hence trade is dull —the wagons which a few months ago used to crowd our streets in dozens may now be counted in one's and two's and three's: our breadstuff's are imported from the Western Province, and have to be conveyed nearly one hundred miles upon land; so that the increased tax upon provisions, arising from the increased rate of carriage alone, is very severe—to say nothing almost of the entire absence of all kinds of vegetables. In short, potatoes, cabbages, peas, general!}' so plentiful at this season of the year, are not to be obtained "for love or money," the standing dish for all men, rich and poor, being meat and rice one day, and rice and meat the next! Upon the necessaries of life the advance from cost of carriage is extravagant. Upon rice it is 33 per cehtyon sugar 20, on flour 16 to 18, and on soap aboht 22§ per cent. On meal, the carriage amounts to about 25 per cent.—a muid of meal, weighing ISOlbs., being worth from 455. to 475., and the carriage amounting to from 10s. 9d. to 11s. 6d. It maybe imagined that with such a tax upon the barest necessities of life, our poorest classes have hard work to " make two ends meet." But the

same causes that produce this effect also put a stop upon all kinds of progress and improvement, and thus make it difficult for all hands to obtain employment. The difficulties of transport press much more \heavily on the inland towns—in many of which.', the supplies of groceries, &c, are almost exhausted, and rise daily in price as the stock diminishes, without any chance of replenishing it "for'the present. In other towns business is almost entirely suspended, the markets are scarcely ever visited; the stores are filled with all kinds of produce,—wool, hides, &c, —waiting for conveyance to the port of shipment, and indeed all communication with.other districts is almost.entirely cut off. This is.not;confined to one locality, but extends from Port .Elizabeth to the Orange River. The second evil arising out of the recent drought has been the stoppage; of all agricultural pursuits, excepting iipon</,a>!trip of country a few miles from the coast. This has; not only thrown many of our farmers into difficulties, butalso a largenumber, of coloured people, who are employed by the agriculturists in sowing and.reaping time. These having been thrown out of employ are greatly reduced in circumstances, manyhemg compelled to sell their last head of live stock in order to buy bread for themselves. The recent rains, however, have fallen in time to save

i some crops, while it is not too late to make up for the lost; time should the weather continue fa'voury' able and propitious throughout the season. A few

'■. months ago the average value of a small load of flfjiproduce, consisting of 1 muid meal, 806 lbs. ppta;fe;ftoes, and 25 lbs. butter, would be from £4 7s. to £^£5.- At the present moment the same quantity of P|| produce of similar quality would realize no less. Hfthan £20 ! The third and direst calamity caused f|; by the drought is the immense losses in stock, $ which have died of sheer poverty. These, it is i| computed, are fully equal to one-third of the whole, '§■ so that, taking the returns published in the Blue i- Book of 1857, the capital of the colony has been reduced by £2,133,000. The last monthly mail (says the 'Graham's Town Journal'), brought us the gratifying intelligence that Sir George Grey's? recall has been rescinded by the Palmerston Ministry, and that his Excellency has he'en invited by the Duke of Newcastle to proceed home, if so inclined, and confer personally with him. With Sir George Grey's knowledge and experience of the wants of the country and people, we may expect to find that some good will result from his visit to England. His opinions will be received as the expression of public opinion in South Africa, for nothing could have been more flattering and conclusive than the numerous addresses presented to him by all classes, colours and creeds. The great question of tion—and its applicability to the various disjointed ■ States now existing here, will be pressed upon the "*Homel Government, and Sir George Grey may come out armed with power to carry it into effect. The Cape Town and Wellington Railway works are progressing favorably. One of the locomotives has arrived. •■The materials for the electric telegraph have also been received, aud will soon be erected,, v •

Tho small-pox still prevails in tho Eastern Province, and deaths aro of frequent occurrence. It is sfcill lingering at Graham's Town and Tort; Elizabeth, and has recently appeared atOadook, .Bedford, Farmorfield, Fort Beaufort, King William's Town, Fort Pcddio, Alice, Somerset, Graafl-Reinot, Hopo Town, and indeed in almost all tho country towns. The military head-quarters aro now stationed in Capo Town. The Lioutenant-Governor, General Wynyard, will remain here until relieved by the Governor. With the exception of occasional thofts by .Bushmen on the bordor, advices from the Froo Stuto report things as being quiet. Everything in Transvaal also appears to bo in a state of quietude and prosperity. Thomas Bodie, apprehended beyond the Kei some time ago, trading with the natives in munitions of war, has been sentenced to five years' imprisonment, with hard labour. The property belonging to the prisoner in the territory where the offence was committed to be forfeited to the Crown, with the reservation, however, that if the prisoner will remove and remain absent from the province of British Kaffraria, the Trans-Keian Territory, and the country contiguous to the JBashee boundary, the sentence of imprisonment shall not be executed. Having been brought before the Resident Magistrate, and the sentence duly explained to_ him. Bodie declared that he was anxious and willing^to conform, in every respect to the latter clause of it; he was, accordingly, escorted on the following morning to a locality beyond the boundaries of the province of Kaffraria, and discharged from custody.

Mb. Robert Stephenson, M.P. —The death of this distinguished engineer comes with startling rapidity after that of poor Brunei. He died on the 12th of October, at his residence in Gloucestersquare, in the 56th year of his age. He was born at Wellington, Northumberland, on the 16th December, 1803. His father, who had felt the want of an early education, resolved that his son should not suffer from the same cause, and accordingly sent him to a school at Long Benton, and in 1814, placed him with Mr. Bruce, at Newcastle. Robert soon displayed a decided inclination for mechanics and science, and becomingamember of the Newcastle Literary and Philosophical Institution, was enabled to take advantage of its library. Under Mr. Bruce, Robert acquired the rudiments of a sound practical education. There still exists in the wall over the door of the cottage at Killingworth a sun-dial of their joint production, of which the father was always proud. In 1818 Robert was" taken from school, and apprenticed to Mr. Nicholas Wood as a coal-viewer. In 1820, however, he was sent to Edinburgh University for a single session, Where he attended the lectures of Dr. Hope on chemistry, those of Sir John Leslie on natural philosophy, and those of Professor Jamiesou on geology and mineralogy. He returned home in the summer of 1821, having gained a mathematical prize, and acquired the most important knowledge of how best to proceed in his self-education. In 1821 he was apprenticed to his father, who had then commenced his locomotive manufactory at Newcastle, kit after two years, finding his-health failing, he accepted, in 1824, a commission to examine the gold and silver mines of South America, whence he was recalled by his father when the Liverpool and Manchester Railway was in progress, when he reached home in December, 1827. His next employment was a' branch on that line, followed by the construction of the Leicester and Swanuington Railway; then the London and Birmingham, of which he was

ultimately appointed engineer. His engagements on different lines of railway afterwards became very numerous, but he was more remarkable for | the magnificent conceptions and the vastness of some of his successfully-executed projects, such as the High-level Bridge over the Tyne, at Newcastle, the viaduct (supposed to be the largest in the world) over the Tweed valley at Berwick, and the Britannia tubular bridge over the Menai Strait—a form of bridge of which there had been previously no example, and to which, considering its length and the enormous weight it would have to sustain, the objections and difficulties seemed almost insuperable. Mr. Stephenson was also employed in the construction of many foreign railways. He was consulted, with his father, as to the Belgian lines; also for a line in Norway between Christiania and Lake Miosen, for which he received the Grand Cross of the Order of St. Olaff from the King of Sweeden; and also for one between Florence and Leghorn, about 80 miles in length. He visited Switzerland for the purpose of giving his opinions as to the best system of railway communication. He designed and was constructing the Victoria tubular bridge over the St Lawrence, near Montreal, on the model of that over Menai Strait, in connection with the Grand Trunk Bailway of Canada, for uniting Canada West with the western States of the United States of America. It is not long since he completed the railway between Alexandria and Cairo, a distance of 140 miles. On the line there are two tubular bridges —one over the Damietta branch of the Nile, and the other over the large canal near Besket-al-Saba. The peculiarity of the structure is that the trains run on the outside upon the top of the tube, instead of inside, as in the case of the Britannia Bridge. He was lately constructing an immense bridge across the Nile at Kaifre Azzayat, to replace the present steam-ferry, which is found to interfere too much with the rapid transit of passengers. Mr. I Stephenson also took much interest in public affairs, | and in 1847 was returned for Whitby, in the Conj servative interest. He had a great gold medal of honour from the French Exposition of 1855, and is said to have declined a knighthood. He was the author of a work "On the Locomotive Steamengine," and another "On the Atmospheric Railway System."