NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, 12 March 1901, Page 4

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Mb. George Griffiths, the well-known author, writing to Public Opinion , says:-— li There are no such persons as Boer soldiers., A soldier is a man who wears a recognisable uniform, and fights according to the rules of the game. The Boer is a mere marauder. One day he buries his rifle and ammunition and takes the oath of allegiance, while his ■ wife sells ; stores at high prices to British troops. Then he digs up the gun and jthe cartridges, breaks his oath, and goes on the shoot again, with the comfortable knowledge that, meanwhile, the soft-hearted British tyrant is feeding his wife and children. Sometimes he gets shaved, puts on the uniform of a dead British soldier, and sneaks into a British camp to pick up what he may learn, or, in company with other scoundrels similarly disguised, advances to a British post as a British soldier, and so doesn't get fired on. Naturally he always opens fire first. He also flogs and murders men of his own nationality who have gone without arms in their hands to persuade him to end a hopeless resistance which is outside the laws of war, and a great deal more like murder than honest stand-up fighting. It might also be well to inform our friends, the enemy- in England, that their heroes are a curiously mean and cowardly kind of brigand. .When Paul Kruger decamped from Pretoria with his plunder, leaving men who had served; him long and : faithfully with nothing but worthless cheques in payment of their salaries, he also left Mrs. Krager to the chivalrous care of the British commander. Ex-President Steyn was ; even more prudent than this. He sent his wife and family to Capetown • when he had already decided to fight. He knew perfectly well what the end would be, and so he wanted to have them under the protection of the British flag. This man was educated in England. Adrian de la Rey is a murderer, for whom there is still a warrant out for the killing in cold blood of a British subject 20 years ago in what is now Bechuanaland. If caught in British territory he could be tried and hanged as a common assassin. De Wet, if the charge is brought home to him, is also a murderer. When it really comes to a fight, he and Steyn are the first to run away, although it must be admitted that Steyn has, on the whole, shown more pluck than Kruger; but then he hadn't as much money to get away with."

The land (says the Cape Times) is full of sedition—seditious talk, sermons, and newspapers. The military, where martial law is proclaimed, are enforcing the law; .- but why should the military be the first to enforce the law, and then to show the public prosecutors of this colony that there is aj very stringent law in force in this colony against all seditious talk and writings? I The j magistrates, or public prosecutors, should take up this question, inquire into it, and enforce the law. The Peace Preservation Act is enforced in the Cape district, bub this does not put a stop to the boastful sedition that is constantly being paraded about. , If martial law were enforced in the Cape district, a large number of persons would soon be informed against, with satisfactory results. The prosecutors mighty usefully study the law on sedition of all kinds in the first and third volumes of the Placaaten, pp. 407-435 and 517-526. It is true that "forfeiture" has been abolished by us, but for high treason and for sedition of every kind the right of the Court to fine a party to the extent of the value of his estate, with imprisonment for life, is still in force, and is so in this country also. Of course, where military law is proclaimed, these seditious talks and writings may be reported to the military commandant, whose authority and powers are swift and sure, and more certain than a trial by jury. But the Magistrates' Courts might also be reminded that they have the power to take criminal proceedings for sedition of every kind. There is a Placaat of September 12, 1674, by which the States of Holland forbad everyone from writing or speaking anything against, the Crown of Great Britain, or the Parliament of England, or the Privy Council, or the (political) Ministers of the Crown, under a penalty of forfeiture of all their l goods and banishment for life. How different to-day are some of the descendants in this colony to those good old Dutchmen. Here, with every liberty in the world, they revile England and all that is English. There, in Holland, they dared not even think evil of a friendly neighbouring Power. But for England's guarantee of protection, Holland would have been under the rule of France or Germany long ere now. It is England that has saved and still protects Holland, but some of the Dutch colonists of this colony are still too rebellious to appreciate the blessings of liberty and protection England affords.

Forty-six years ago a young man entered the' Foreign Office to sit on] a stool as a junior clerk ; to-day be is British Ambassador at Rome. Lord Currie is one of the most courteous of men. He is one of Lord Salisbury's men. He was with the Prime Minister at Constantinople when Lord Salisbury tried, but failed, to bring the Sultan to his senses, and he was with him again in 1878 when the " peace- with honour " drama was staged at Berlin. He was Lord Salisbury's secretary, too, during the first two year.? that Lord Salisbury was at the Foreign Office, and had charge of the important correspondence relating to Cyprus. As Sir Philip Currie he accompanied a special mission to invest the last King of Spain with the Order of the Garter, and he went with Lord Kimberley to Denmark in the sixties. He should know almost as much of the Foreign Office as Lord Salisbury himself, for he has been Assistant Under-Secretary and Permanent Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs. He has helped to settle boundary disputes, and knows something : about Egyptian finance. Seven years ago he went to Constantinople, and was Ambassador to Abdul Hamid before he went to Rome.

Already the Due de Broglie, who is just dead—in his eightieth year—is little more than a memory. Yet in those seven stormy years of French politics between 1873 and 1880, he was one of the most discussed men on the stage of European public life; the avowed defender of . the Constitution against Extremists of the Gambetta kind, the leader of the coalition that made possible the presidency of Marshal Macmahon, and the embodiment of : that; conservatism which still exists in such abundance in France—especially provincial France—'though overshadowed

by the swagger and fro*: and Muster of the -S ■ ! Boulevards. The Duke/was a French patri. y'' cian of the best type; curtly, dignified, and polished by • that eonict with the '■•' World : '■'; ■ which is attained in p highest 'perfection ..' by service in Diplomay. It was after Ihfe'. ■ Napoleonic debacle bffl.B7o-71 that' he ■.came;.' to St. James' as Ambpador; but he is best ' ' remembered as one d the group (including ■':':■> Thiers and Buffet) wh had endeavoured, bv organising the coalitijti known as the Liberal Union, to neutralised few years earlier dt<> 1 forces that were at wrk against the Empire ,': of Napoleon 111. Apian of the highest cat . ' ture and wide literary sympathies, the .Duo de Broglie was happer probably in the study ! than in the Senate Every one of his . voluminous writing! bore the stamp of sclio. larship, and studejts of "heredity" pro, fessed to discern h him not a few, of the traits of his brilliant grandmother, Madatpp \ De StaeL ! ■ "-. ji i M ■ . '.;■■ >v; ■:■,::