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Lyttelton Times, Volume LI, Issue 5600, 5 February 1879, Page 4

The news that hostilities have been commenced against tbe Zulus will have caused no excitement, for the public was prepared by previous announcements for what has happened. If the description of the difficulties to be encountered by the British commanders in the campaign which we published a few days ago is to be taken as correct, then it must be concluded that there is very little hope of gaining anything but defeat. It was the description of a country without roads, divided by rivers frequently unfordable, and of enormous extent. The number of. British troops was ridiculously small, their necessary impedimenta of immense weight and cumbersomenesß, and their poWer of striking a blow very feeble. On tbe other hand, the Zulu King had under his orders 40,000 well armed warriors, trained in habits of discipline that had made them the terror of the kindred South African races, and, in addition, endowed with marvellous powers of speed and endurance. As an example of their campaigning quality, it was stated that a force of these savage troops could perform in a day a march which European troops with their baggage waggons, at tbe rate of one for every fourteen men, could not hope, under favourable circumstances to get through in less than three weeks. To complete the picture the British territory was represented as inhabited by a native population, hating their conquerors, and bound by every sympathy of human nature to tbe Zulu king. The Boers of the neighbouring country of the Transvaal were also represented as disaffected, and unlikely to give the smallest assistance to the campaigning armies. If this sketch was not the work of a bilious exaggerating scribe, then it is plain that the British armies under Lord Chelmsford most speedily be struggling in the waves of the Indian Ocean, thrust into the seething waters by victorious relentless Zola battalions.

There was against this evidence the fact that the British commander was actually prepared to be the aggressor. The force under his command of 15,000 men, including natives, was not in the sad plight of brave men preparing to sell their lives dearly to an advancing foe of overwhelming strength. Their commander was demanding redress for grievances, and the payment of fines for offences against the British subjects, and was. insisting upon the disbandment of the enemy’s army as well as the acceptance of British interference for the future in certain matters of Zulu administration and polity. These demands were pressed, and on the enemy’s refusal an ultimatum had been sent, with the threat of an immediate advance against him. The firmness of this attitude argued a state of preparation and a confidence of victory quite incompatible with the correctness of the description of affairs which we have been discussing. There seemed every reason to conclude. that the writer had exaggerated and misrepresented, or that he was wholly ignorant of military matters. Lord Chelmsford has proved himself a capable commander in the field. He has won his laurels in South African war, and a reputation for military sagacity which forbids the belief that he is capable of any rash march into the country of a powerful enemy, without the means of ensuring the security of his communications or the tranquillity of the subject population behind him. The event has proved that Lord Chelmsford’s position was stronger than it was described to be. The ultimatum sent to Oetewayo having been disregarded, hostilities at once began. The troops at the latest news have crossed the frontier and carried the enemy’s principal outpost. Now the winter above referred to represented, under date Oct. 1 last, that the troops were not within 500 miles of the frontier. Their advance proves that when the war began they must have been camped on the very line. Either the correspondent was very wrong in his facts, or the British commander has remedied all the deficiencies under which he was labouring. In either case the outlook for the campaign just begun is good.