The ' Umgeni ' is, we believe, not fitted with
wireless, but if she were, and the captain took counsel's opinion thereby, we can imagine his being advised from this side to come as near as possible to the shore on a calm day and then put the deported men into a boat with oars and advise them to row themselves to land—say to a nice sandy beach on the coast of Devonshire —and finally to torn his vessel round and seek, " full steam ahead," the jurisdiction of the Colonial Courts and the Colonial Act of Indemnity. Possibly our conception of the law is wrong, but these are the considerations which, at any rate, strike a lay mind. And here let tut say that though we raise these legal points as of great interest, it must not be supposed that our personal sympathies are against the action of General Botha. On the contrary, we are inclined to think, taking all the circumstances into account, that he very likely did the right thing, and that when the whole story is told his action may prove to have avoided bloodshed and anarchy of a kind which might have set all South Africa aflame.
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