The able English journalist, Mr. Garrett, who lately went to
South Africa to edit the Cape Times, prints in the weekly issue of July 24th a most interesting interview with President Kruger, of the Transvaal. " Oom Paul" is furious. because, though he has got Swaziland he has not got access- to the sea, and finds himself, as he says, "shut into a kraal for ever." Very politely, but very firmly, Mr. Garrett pointed out that the reason why England could not allow " Oom Paul" free access to the sea was because he had displayed so marked a predilection for intriguing with foreign Powers. He has already tried to play off Germany against England ; and next time it may be some other Power. Why, said Mr. Garrett, will you not adopt the South African stand- point,—" that every other European Power, beyond the Maritime Power of England, which keeps the coasts, is an exotic, an intruder, in the South African States and Colonies IP4' Mr. Garrett ended by proposing, as the amateur diplomatisti, that the Transvaal should enter the South African Railway and Customs Union, and, in exchange, get a port. That is a very ingenious suggestion, and if it meant the absolute and irrevocable abandonment of the aggressive Particularism; hitherto practised by the Republic, we should not object. We fear, however, that it might not mean that. The guiding principle in dealing with the Transvaal should be to make the fact of our suzerainty as absolutely clear and andis. plated as it is in the case of an Indian feudatory State. To have relations with foreign Powers should be considered a sort of treason as it would be in the case of Hyderabad. That principle once acknowledged, we would gladly agree to the exchange of a seaport against the entering of the Customs and Railway Union.
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