The Sun.
London, England, 1857-12-17 00:00:00

.REINFORCEMENTS FROM .THE GAPE.

(From the Times )

It is not with Out reason that the attention ch
Parliament was called to the smallness of the mili-
tary contingent despatched from the Cape to the
assistance of the Indian Government. At the
period of most severe emergency, when the forces in
India were manifestly outnumbered by successive
masses of mutineers, and England was too distant
for a timely appeal, the only-resource open to Lord
Canning lay in the colonies interposed between the
mother country and Calcutta. Ceylon might do
something, the Mauritius a little more, but the
mainstay of hope was in the garrison of the Cape.
When the termination of the Russian War had dis-
engaged a large portion of our army the opportu-
nity was taken to raise the military establishment
of the Cape colony to a very considerable strength.
In itself the policy was., not injudicious, - for the
climate was a healthy one, and a sufficiency of oc-
cupation was promised in tbe development of a
new system, by which it was anticipated that the
costly nuisance of Caffre wars might be at last ex-
tinguished. Although, moreover, the idea was
not openly promulgated, it is clear that much
might have been said for maintaining at this con=
veuient and salubrious station a force which would
thus have been pushed on half way to India,
and, be SO much the more within call. Accord-
ingly a strong division of troop, comprising, we
believe, ten fine battalions, was concentrated at
the, Cape, 'and to this army, representing as large
a body of soldiers as was encamped at Chobbain,
was - 'afterwards added tbe' German Legion;
equivalent in strength to four good' regiments
more. Naturally, therefore, when the mutinies
broke out in Bengal, and every company of red-
coats was worth an unspeakable price at Calcutta,
it was expected that our Cape garrison would be
turned to excellent account ; and these anticipations
were the more warrantable inasinuch.as there was
no danger whatever on the Caffre frontier. Never-
theless, whereas the Governors of Ceylon and the
Mauritius actually stripped their settlements of sol-
diers for Lord Canning's succour, two regiments
first, and subsequently a third, appear to constitute
the whole amount of the force hitherto despatched
from the Cape to India, although the military
establishment of the colony was as strong as that
of the Punjab, and there was neither war nor ap-
prehension to distract it. At a later period, as we
learn from Mr. Labouchere's statement, a fourth
battalion—the 80th—has been sent by Sir G. Grey
to Ceylon ; but the sum total of these reinforce-
ments does certainly not represent an adequate
amount of succour despatched from one Govern-
ment to the other, considering the relative necessi-
ties and resources of each.
The case becomes the more remarkable from the
fact that Sir G. Grey appears to have thoroughly
appreciated the straits to which Lord Canning was
reduced, and to have exerted himself, as far as his
contributions went, with extraordinary zeal. Re-
sides the infantry,he sent two companies of artillery,
a remittance of 60,0001. in specie, and, what was
probably of greater service, a considerable number
of horses. Both he and the colonists, in fact,
are reported as having exhibited singular energy
and devotion, giving up their own horses for the
public service, and refusing no sacrifice which the
occasion seemed to invite. Yet, with all these de-
monstrations, the force actually. detached from the
Cape establishment for the emergencies of India
was utterly disproportioned to the demands of the
latter Government and the means of the former.
It was even less, in fact, than our foregoing re-
marks may have made it appear, for the 95th, one
of the regiments despatched to India, had just
arrived at Cape to relieve the 89th, ordered to
New Zealand ; so that it was no deduction from
the strength of the garrison. It seems as if Sir
George Grey took the 89th, which was already pro-
pared for embarking, and the 95th, which was just
ready for disembarking, and thus made up a de-
tachment for India without much prejudice to the
regular establishment of the colony. - Afterwards
the 13th Light Infantry sailed for the same place,
and the 80th, it appears, has followed ; but even
these draughts must have left the Cape garrison at
a strength far beyond the wants of the settlement.
It can hardly be too much to assume that a couple
of battalions added to the German Legion would
have formed a force amply stflicient for 'the real
needs of the colony, , especially when contrasted
with the overwhelming exigencies of India. Of
the rest, every man and gun should have been for-
warded to Bengal without an hour's avoidable de-
lay.
It happens that the state of the Cape Colony
itself is at this moment exceedingly remarkable,
and, in a political sense, not unfavourable. The
Caffres have been converted by a famine of their
own manufacture from unmanageable enemies into
humble
opmfheeoncuydrisc:afnktosi
itnostaeapdro
rthnewirn weizatatrled2s,antdhedyesttoronky
upon themselves to ravage their own territories
ll
been a dreadful dearth,
one of time ago, in obedience
their own crops. The natural consequence has
under the visitation of
which many have expired,
and thousands more are
only kept from starvation b
Intelligence
from.proceedtiine spgsnt
the Irish famine. resem-
bling in some sort those of our home authorities in
as-
sures us that since the Ist of last January 19,239
Caffre suppliants had crossed the border into the
British territory
and b
theet,d wholeo
of
the populationllast
war.
It een provided for by British
charity—a number which is reckoned, and we think
with great probability, to represent nearly a half of
that a at
thisthe left in
has i n
beenßritish
m e
sur C
surmised
ari d
suicidal infatuation of our savage neighbours ori-
ginated in designs of deadly hostility, and was
meant as a prelude to a war of desperation—the
sacrifice of their possessions being partly su-
perstitious as a propitiation to their deities, and
Partly political, just as a eoinbatant throws
away his scabbard or an invading force burns
the ships from which it landed. Nothing,
it is said, but the imposing force arrayed along
the frontier prevented this outbreak, so that the
Cape garrison per formed the best of services by
preserving peace without bloodshed. Without en-
tering, however, into these ingenious speculations,
it must be perfectly plain that the very worst that
could be done by the Ca,ffres was absolutely noth-
ing compared with what the mutineers were doing
in India. In the most extreme case conceivable it
is certain that the colonists themselves, supported
by a few hundred regular troops, could give an
excellent account of every Caffre coming in their
way. Englishmen and savages were not in the
proportion of 1 to 10,000 on the banks of Kei, as
they were on the banks of the Ganges. It might
have scandalised certain philanthropists at home to
learn that cattlestealers had been irregularly shot,
and that borderers wore meeting blacks on pretty
even terms ; but the necessity must for once have
been accepted, and the colony would have been un-
questionably secured.
We collect from our reports and correspondence
that what with his own force on one side of the
frontier, and whatwiththe destitution on the other,
Sir G. Grey has really succeeded to all ap-
pearance in relieving the settlement from its
hitherto interminable obligations of the Caffre
wars. These restless and implacable heathens are
half-starved half-cowed, and abased; excellent roads
productive of vast saving in traffic, have been
constructed in various parts, and the whole colony
is prosperous and well affected. These are, no
doubt, valuable services, and, if the troops had not
been imperatively wanted elsewhere, the duties on
which they were kept might well enough have been
considered satisfactory. Compared, however, with
the urgency of the Indian crisis, all these demands
were utterly insignificant, and if Sir George Grey
had despatched every single soldier from the colony,
as was literally almost the case at Ceylon and the
Mauritius, and trusted for the protection of the
frontier to the levies of the colony exclusively, we
are certain that his resolution Would have met with
nothing but approval among th©
people of this
country. As it is, he has probably fallen into the
natural error of overrating the importance of the
particular affairs committed to his charge. He was
commissioned to protect and improve the Cape
Colony,,and to make an end, if possible, of its peri-
odical calls for men and millions.
In this he seems
to have succeeded, but he would have given'greator
satisfaction at home if he bad left, for the time, his
provinces without roads and his frontier without
troops, and had sent four-fifths of
his garrison on
their way to India with as much energy and zeal
as he showed in despatching the first detachment,

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