SOME PLAIN SPEAKING.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XXXXII, Issue 196, 19 September 1900, Page 4

SOME PLAIN SPEAKING.

.—I —». « SOMETHING DIKE AN ANSWER, The Boer delegates were favoured with some plain speaking by Mr, Thos. Grant, of Chicago, when they went West. " You issued," said Mr. Grant, addressing the Boers, "what is called an 'ultimatum' to Great Britain, commanding her to withdraw her troops from her own territory within a given number of days. Great Britain not having removed her troops as ordered by you, you immediately invaded the nearest British territory, took forcible possession of it annexed it by proclamation to your own country, established local governments in every town i that you occupied, levied taxes on the inhabitants, and, in fact, acted as absolute owners of the country. This is what you call' fighting for your independence.' The British did not invade your country. Oh, but you say they intended to do so, That is a mere assertion unsupported by any evidence. The fact is, you began this war in a moment of madness, when you were suffering from what the French call 'tete montee,' and the Americans 'swelled head.' Now, when things seem going against you, you run round the world for sympathy. You say that you are fignting for the same principle that our American forefathers iid in the end of last century. I can use plain language as well as President Kruger, and I say that the statement is a deliberate lie. Our forefathers fought because they objected to being taxed without any representation in the taxing body. That taxation without representation is the very tiling that you Boers have been carrying on in South Africa. You have been taxing Englishmen, Americans, Germans, and ill foreigners without giving them any roice in the government of the country. My personal opinion is that the only nistake—the criminal mistake, I woukl say—which the British Government made was in saving you from the Kaffirs, who, but for England's inter:erence, would have wiped you off the "ace of the earth.