John Cuniff, foreman, D. Conger, T. Goldsmith, W. Smith, J. Ferguson, A. Campbell, W. Harrison, A. Maybe, C. Vanhorn, W. More, P. Huff, B. Clap, W. Hale, M. Slot, S. Huff sr., S. Conger, A. Defoe, J. Wright, W. Ross.

JULY 12TH.

Daniel Frazer, Esq., was sworn in as a Magistrate.

The Magistrates in Sessions assembled directed that the Township of Marysburg should be a division by itself, for the purpose of holding Courts of Request, and that the Townships of Sophiasburg and Ameliasburg, jointly, should form a division, and that the Magistrates within those Townships should preside in those Courts.1

COURT OF QUARTER SESSIONS, KINGSTON, 10TH OCT. 1797. Present:-R. Cartwright, J. Peters, A. Fisher, A. McDonell, J. Booth, Wm. Atkinson, T. Markland, Esqrs.

The Commission of the Peace was openly read.

The Sheriff returned the precept.

R. Macaulay, Foreman; J. Cumming, W. Robins, J. Russel, J. Franklin jr, J. Caldwell, J. Fraser, P. Daly, F. Prime, J. Miller, M. Clarke, S. McKay, H. Simmons, W. Cottier, P. Grass, S. Hawley, D. Hawley, R. Wilkins, A. McGuin, Geo. Murdoff.

The Magistrates in Sessions fined the following Constables Twenty Shillings each for non-attendance :-M. Purdy, T. Miller, C. McKenzie, J. Finkle, B. Huff.

OCT. 12TH.

[The following sentence was given for petit larceny.]

The Court sentence Wm. Newberry and Caleb Williams to receive each Forty lashes, at the public whipping post in Kingston, on their bare backs.

[For misdemeanour.]

The Court sentence Nicholas Tudor to sit in the stocks for two hours.

It is ordered that the sum of Twenty-Two Pounds Ten Shillings be levied from the County of Prince Edward and the Township of Adolphus in the County of Lenox, for the payment of member's wages.

1 This alters the arrangement made by the Court on April 10th, 1794.

TH

CURRENT EVENTS.

HREE months ago the Transvaal issued the ultimatum, with its "forty-eight hours' notice to quit," which preceded the invasion of Natal, Bechuanaland and Cape The War. Colony, and it is safe to say that both parties are disappointed with the results so far. The Boers, knowing that they could mobilize their forces and march with a facility that no other army in the world can equal, expected to be in Durban before this, and to have as prisoners of war General White's command and the garrisons of Mafeking and Kimberley. The British expected that General Buller would have eaten his Christmas dinner in Pretoria, or at any rate would have gained admission to the enemy's country at some point or other. It is not wonderful that the Boers miscalculated. We have heard so much about their ignorance, their conceit, and their contempt for the "rooineks," that we ought to be prepared for one or two delusions on their part. But who was prepared for the ignorance of the London press and of the well-informed British public! Even Commander-in-chief, Lord Wolseley, at one time styled "Britain's only general," naively confesses that his eyes have been opened. Similar confessions would be much more in order from the newspapers which did their best, while negotiations were going on, to fan the flame of popular passion to fever heat. They marvelled every day at their own patience and magnanimity, and at the criminal forbearance of the Government, which at a word could blot out the two puny Republics from the map of the world. Scarcely had the war began when they plunged into the discussion of what was to be done with the wolf's skin when the animal was killed! Why not? Had not that great "Empirebuilder," Cecil Rhodes, declared that there would be no war, if only Mr. Chamberlain took a firm tone, or that if it did begin, the first fight in which a score or two of the burghers were killed would be the end of it? Had not our own "Bystander" said that when the first Canadian contingent landed in Capetown, they would find the war over? Evidently, the wisest may make mistakes. In 1861, when Fort Sumter was fired on, did not President Lincoln call on the North to give him 75,000 volunteers, for three months, to make an end of the South! And which of President McKinley's cabinet dreamed of the struggle in Luzon lasting for a year!

To any one who knows the condition of South Africa, from within, the present war is heart-breaking. It is a fight to the finish between two ideals of life, which with patience and states

manship might have existed side by side until they insensibly blended into a higher national unity. Faults there were on both sides, owing chiefly to racial peculiarities, but war will acerbate these, and as the real problem in South Africa is not the relation of Boer to Briton, but of white to black, the prospect for the future is as gloomy as it can well be. The comfort we take to our souls, while the conflict rages, is not only that the British ideal of civilization is the higher as well as in accordance with modern political principles, but that the appeal from moral forces to the God of battles was made not by us but by the Government and people of the Transvaal. They allege, it is true, that they did not make their appeal to force, until we had clearly shown our purpose to gather an irresistible army on their borders. None the less, it was their duty to trust to the reason and conscience of the British people, who would never have sanctioned a war of aggression upon them. They were utterly without warrant in staking the independence of their country on the hazard of a war against overwhelming odds, as long as any hope for peace remained. How much hope existed, even in the month of October, they could not possibly know, till the Imperial Parliament met. Declining to wait for its meeting, they issued an ultimatum, which rejoiced their enemies, silenced their friends, and rallied to the support of the Government every man in the British Empire who cared for its honour. Their mistake was irreparable. Who was responsible for it, we cannot tell. Some say that Dr. Leyds misled them with hopes of foreign intervention, if they gained striking successes at the outset. But even if Dr. Leyds were Mephistopheles and Macchiavelli combined, as his enemies allege, Kruger has a will of his own and so has his Secretary of State. Generals Joubert and Cronje and the burghers with scarce an exception, as far as we know, gave their voices for war; and there can be no doubt that the active support of the Orange Free State, and the knowledge that their kinsfolk in the Old Colony sympathized with them, whereas they had ranged themselves in active opposition on the question of the "Drifts" and other disputed matters in previous years, made the Transvaalers feel that they had a fighting chance. Some indeed maintain that President Steyn is the real author of the war; and that his ambition is to be Kruger's successor, as the head of a Dutch South Africa. Others throw the responsibility on Hofmyr and the Afrikander Bond; but these consist chiefly of Englishmen who know nothing of the real state of the case and who fancy that to be Afrikander is to be disloyal. They might as well consider us disloyal, when we say that we are Canadians first of all; or Australians when they say, as they one and all do say emphatically, that they are Australians before everything else. But the fact is that at present no one, outside of Mr. Kruger's innermost

circle, can tell with authority who is responsible for the substance or the form of the ultimatum. It is not of much consequence for us to know; the important point is that the Boers stood and stand by it, and until they acknowledge themselves beaten, discussion of old issues is a waste of time and strength.

The most important question for us to ask is, will there be foreign intervention? Unless the unexpected happens, there will not. France would like well to give us a

Will other Powers interfere ?

Roland for our Fashoda Oliver; but without Russia she will not move; and though Russia would have no objection to make trouble, she will not; for she never acts on impulse, but on considerations of far-reaching policy. She is not ready. War would at once bring into the field against her in the East the formidable army and navy of Japan, and all that she has been preparing the way for there would be endangered. If Germany were willing to join a great continental alliance, the temptation might be irresistible; but though Germany is more incensed against Britain at present than even France or Russia, so far as we can judge from the press, it looks like a case of blowing off steam rather than of resolute purpose to provoke a quarrel. The Kaiser controls the foreign policy of his country, and he understands the plain facts of the situation perfectly well. Our Empire would fight all three Powers rather than tolerate interferencc. The British fleet could give a good account of the combined fleets; and the hostile coalition would bring about what Europe dreads most, an alliance of the English-speaking peoples that would never be broken. Very different would the situation have been but for the war between the United States and Spain. That revealed to the man on the street the truth regarding his national isolation, and his real danger had Britain been hostile or even indifferent; and the claims of blood, of descent, of common interest, and common moral aims, ideals and hopes can now exert their legitimate influence. The price paid for such a result was by no means great; for apparently there is no other way but war by which facts can be made to stand out clear to the vision of the common people.

in the war.

Few members of the Parliament of Canada fancied that they Canada's share were sharing in the responsibility of war, when they passed resolutions last August, taking sides in the controversy between Britain and the Transvaal. They passed them as lightly as they had passed another in favour of a separate Parliament for Ireland. What that would have meant is abundantly clear now. In both cases they considered that they were exerting only "moral pressure;" but if our moral pressure has any force at all, and it would be an impertinence to say that a unanimous vote of the Parlinment of Canada means nothing,

then we committed ourselves to active participation in war, should that result, without the slightest discussion on the issues or on the supreme question of the principles according to which Canada should contribute to the war power of the Empire. That was surely unwise; and it is no wonder that the London Economist, sanest of all the British weeklies, deprecated our action and hinted that though our "members no doubt wished to show their affection for lhe Mother Country, they might perhaps be more usefully engaged in attending to Canadian busiThe Economist had some right to consider the resolutions as only rhetorical fireworks; but when Mr. Chamberlain informed us, three months later, that a Canadian force of 500 men (infantry preferred, save the mark!) would be an acceptable contribution, it was impossible to decline; and the Government acted rightly in sending double the number and offering as many more. The constitutional course would have been to summon a special session of Parliament, before taking action; but that would have seemed ungracious, as he who gives quickly gives twice, and in view of the resolutions passed unanimously on the merits of the case it would have been an expensive and laborious superfluity None the less, Canada has been stampeded into a war that it has never discussed, instead of entering upon it, like the people of the United Kingdom, with calmness and dignity. and due regard to Parliamentary government; and when any one tried to raise the question of constitutional procedure, he was screamed at as disloyal, even though-as in the case of Mr. Tarte-he had been an earnest member of the Imperial Federation League, when those who are now among the loudest shouters sneered or kept aloof, because they were not sure which side of the fence was likely to be popular. Our national self-respect is lowered by dealing with the supreme and awful question of Peace or War in this tumultuous fashion. Other questions may be rushed in the same way; and liberty itself is imperilled. Already we see some of the baneful results. One school-board makes public inquiry into the conduct of a teacher, who before the war prescribed to his pupils as the subject of an essay the South African controversy, along with a calm statement of the points at issue. Another board dismisses the principal of the public school for giving expression to his opinions on the subject. City fathers call a meeting to censure their mayor because he prayed that Her Majesty might have, among other blessings of the year, "peace with honour," just what the Queen prays for everyday, in common with all good women and all men who are not savages! If there is one thing more than another which a free people must preserve as the indispensable price of freedom, it is liberty of speech, and that means not liberty to echo the cries of the hour-any harsh-voiced parrot can do that