The Morning Post last Saturday published a curious tale which
seems to call for further investigation. Two young Transvaal Boers, Muller and Lelyveld, it is alleged, enlisted, like others of their countrymen, in the Transport Corps of the German South African Field Force. Last August they were arrested at Windhoek on a charge of conspiring against the German Government, an after a trial where they were not legally assisted and were forbidden to communicate with a British Consul, were sentenced to five years and ten months' imprisonment each. They were, according to the Morning Post, taken to Germany to serve thtir sentence, and are now in prison at Harburg. One of the men is an ex-employe of the Netherlands Railway, while the other is partly British and served with our forces during the war. Both are said to be men of good character. .We have no knowledge as to what truth there may be in the story, and South Africa is a land of wild romances; but there is nothing inherently improbable in the arrest of British subjects for foolish talk, which may have been construed into a conspiracy against the German Government. We trust that the Foreign Office will investigate the affair, and our anxiety is all the greater because of the nationality of the persons concerned. Since the Boers are our fellow-subjects, it is our business to show them that British citizenship is not a meaningless phrase.
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