The Cape War.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume VI, Issue 684, 25 April 1879, Page 2

The Cape War.

Our last night's cablegrams from the Cape show most unmistakably that the English forces have not been successful against the Zulus. Serious blunders have been followed by more serious disasters, and toned down as evidently the cablegrams have been, the information they convey can only be interpreted to mean that, so far, at all events, the Zulus have been everywhere victorious. It is nothing to the purpose that the engagements m which our troops have been defeated were m the nature of surprises by overwhelming superior numbers. The result is the same. An English general is expected to guard against surprise, and m an open fight English soldiers are expected to crush superior numbers. We have had the worst of it, and there is no use m saying that ws have not. In spite of the warning that the enemy intended to attack a convoy that was about to be despatched to Luneburg, the only guard provided was one hundred men of the 80th Regiment. The convoy proceeded on its way, and was attacked by 4000 Zulus. Only forty men out of the hundred reached Luneburg, forty having been killed, and twenty being 'missing. Nothing is said about the supplies, which, of course, fell into the hands of the enemy. The guns and ammunition, which had been deserted m the field, and which were' useless to the Zulus, were afterwards recovered ; and now we have the news that an insurrection has broken out m the Transvaal, the Boera having resented Lord Ohelmsford's ordering them to active service. Sir Bartle Frere proceeded to Fretova to pacify the Boers, and they invested the town and declared they would hold Sir Bartle prisoner until the British Government redresses their grievances. A cablegram supplies the information that General Pearson was besieged m a place called Ekowe ; that he made a sortie from it on the night of the 14th instant, which, as our cablegrams of last night informs us, resulted m a loss of 220 of the British forces, and is now abandoned. Most of the British reinforcements have now reached the Cape, and, probably, we shall soon hear of better news. Experience teaches England nothing m her wars with savages. This Zulu business, as with the old wars m New Zealand, is certain to cost both m men and money a great deal more than it ought. In the end, England will come out of the scrape with what honor and glory can be achieved m the destruction of an inferior race, but m the meantime her soldiers are being slaughtered by the wretched blunders of their commanders.