LIGHT ON THE GUERILLA WARFARE.

Wanganui Chronicle, 1 March 1901, Page 3

LIGHT ON THE GUERILLA WARFARE.

Mr. John Stuart has (St. James Gazette says) an interesting and highly instructive ■Jllle in the Morning Post on the guerilla phase ol tho war. Mr. Stuart has hada long and waned experience of the South African life >« *» !#» Pl«»es. Botha '. *^ Mr. Stuart, is Kjbtte be&e;' than in the hands of his "&«**•;" ./p»e ng™-in-r Boers luivo regarded him wuk extreme suspicion ever since he entered mtr negotiation with Lord Roberts, for they declare that those negotiations included * «««* proposal which would have beneuUed Untha at the expense of his countrymen. Sr£ impossible, to say with wry certainty Ulo is i^nonsible for tire few operations w ich Lavi^t directed lately .from the Lni« Botha i»WH«d a Boß^*^"' i sion After a violent scejic wjtn^Jie Pres dent he was unanimal v ouf-v^ed even mJ brotlicr Christian and his old friend id partner in many a carious piece of businek Mr. Lucas Meyer, deserting Mm. I i so know that since that date «m>« of Botha's relations, who resule near GieyS in Natal, have been informed tC»ffh too usual Boer underground iS 4^ Mr. Botha is YlC^uS iritrrd in <i a-emojte part of the countrj, ki therefore jttfcejthat the arts; committed in his name are jretdly the acts of Mr. Soholk Burger, Mr. M^PT, Mr. JSen Viljoen, and a few others. The correspondent expresses the beliei that M Pc Wet were dead or a prisoner to brigandage which is now raanpant in Iho Transmal and in the River Colony v ouhl not «r.se ou that account. The it of Boers in the fleld is being con-

stantly swelled by youngsters from, the western province of Capo Colony. ThisJs duo to the women and the parsons. Obviously, a woman who can cry, and raise her voice in loud lamentation, and shake her fist in the face of her younger son because ho is not humping a rifle on the I bleak and lonely veldt in defence of his I blood brothers and their lost cause, is a I great political force; and that particular manifestations of femininity is doing a deal of mischief in that colony. Mr. Stuart, after stating that arms and ammunition are still largely smuggled to the Boers through Delagoa, Bay and through Capetown itself, says : —The danger which I anticipate, and which will become a very real danger unless strong and prompt measures be taken, is not an organised rebelion in the Cape Colony. Nobody who knows the colonial Boer's anxiety for his own skin would expect that. What I am afraid of—and the peril is nearer than we seem to imagine—is the extension o this vague guerilla brigandage to an indefinite numder of colonial districts. If there be any. sort of rebellion in the Cape Colony it will follow the nlnn of rebellion which has been adopted in the defunct republics. The remedy for all this is simple. Every Boer who has borne arms against us, whether he resides in a town or on his farm, should be deported to a laager on the coast, and that laager should not be situated in a district where the populace sympathises with the late republics. Every fresh prisoner of war should be gaoled. I should also herd the women and children into separate laagers—of course, treating mem well. And, especially so far as the Oape Colony is concerned, do not spare the parsons, who abandon doctrine lor politics. If a few of them were laid by the heels a surprising amount of good would be done. Naturally I anticipate the proclamation of martial law in the Cape Colony wii/Uin a week. It should have been proclauiiieci a year ago,