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Star (Christchurch), Issue 6065, 31 December 1897, Page 2

In events of Imperial interest, India and Africa have during 1897 loomed more largely than other parts of the British dominions. In the earlier months of the year it became known that there waa grave danger of famine in India, owing to the failure of the crops. At once there was a sympathetic movement throughout the Empire to provide ways and mean? of averting the threatened catastrophe. Money was generously subscribed by the public, and the Indian Government — rather tardily, as some thought, but most efficiently — set about distributing food among the distressed millions, and providing public works on which they might, earn a comparatively independent livelihood. By these means a great calamity, which under native rule would have caused the sacrifice of millions of lives by the cruellest of all processes, was neutralised, and famine was held at bay until, in September, it was announced that owing to the copious rainfall all necessity for further relief had passed away. The extent of the dearth and of the ameliorating measures necessary to cope with it may be realised from the fact that £*>r some months close upon four millions of men were employed on relief works. An epidemic disease that ravaged ft large portion of Southern India adtled to the sufferings of that vast dependency, and taxed the skill of its rulers and the endurance of its people. Some disaffe ton w«ip, in c mspquencf, ap. parent, but 1 he' good sen«e of English and natives alike prevented it from spreading. There ensued, however, a serious armej rising among the Mohammedan tribes inhabiting the hill country Iving on the northwestern frontier of ludia, who had been living under & loose eorc of British protectorate. Owing to the inaccessible, nature oh' the country and, the methods of warfare pursued by. the tribes, the campaign "undertaken to' quell the rising has proved arduous and tedious; but the work, j which is now all but completed, has given opportunities of demonstrating British valour and resource, and the result will probably be the permanent pacification of those disturbed regions. In African affairs, the most important event of the year was the report of the South African Committee set up by the House of Commons to inquiie into the Jameson raid and into those conditions in the Transvaal that had provoked it. This has led to a better understanding, although the Government of the Transvaal is proving very dilatory in giving effect to its promise of internal reforms. There have been desultory " wars " with the Caffre tribes of Bechuanalaud and other regions in and around Rhodesia, in South Africa ; while further north', on the west coast, there has been a campaign against Benin; and at the present moment there are semimilitary movements in progress in British Nigeria and the back country of the Gold Coast, which will result in a wide extension of British influence. Turning lo Northern and Eastern Africa, we find that another Soudan campaign has so far been successfully prosecuted without any serious fighting. Railway construction, both in Lower Egypt and in Uganda, is being vigorously prosecuted, and these lines will give England such a strategic position that she will be able to establish her rule and protect her interests in those regions comprised between the Mediterranean, the Red Sea and the central lakes of Africa.