The Worcester spy. [volume] (Worcester, Mass.) 1898-1904, 1899-01-23
Cecil Rhodes Appears
in England.
THE SAMOAN AFFAIR
Discussed and Other News
From Great Britain.

to shake to it's foundations whenever
Mr.. Cecil Rhodes steps foot on the is
land. He is the biggest man in the
kingdom today. Peers, cabinet minis
tiers, promoters with Munchausen
schemes, duchesses craving for tips on
'kaffirs'' Cor South African securities),
workmen who cherish dreams of emil
grafton, and bishops solicitous of Afri-
can souls, haunt his hotel, and beg
for seven the briefest interviews, as
though he had already realized his as
piration. The popular mind credits him
with being the potentate of the Afri-
can continent.
An inconsideratel newspaper has de-
scribed how Mr.. Rhodes ate his meals
to the accompaniment Of business, dis
missed a couple of millionaires while
he cracked an egg, sold mines over his
beefsteaks, and ate oatmeal while or
ganizing a company or two. 1t was
therefore suggested that the breakfast
hour was the surest time to see him.
and the result is that while he break
fasts, his secretaries repel the invasion
of mobs of importunate spectators.
The cabinet met yesterday, specially,
to discuss Mr.. Rhodes scheme for gov
eminent guarantees of the cape to Cal
TO railroad and telegraph. Mr. Rhodes
afterward conferred with Mr.. Joseph
Chamberlain, the secretary of state for
the colonies, and Sir Michael Hicks
Beach, the chancellor of the excheuuer.
Mr.. Rhodes says G10,000,00O will cover
the entire cost of the work, and there
is little doubt that he will carry his
point with the government and raise
all the money he needs in the city. Be-
| fore the projectors can act in the mat
ter there will be a formality In the
shape Of a parliamentary bill; but the
imperialists may be backed to drive
over the so-called Little Englanders, -
who are preparing an opposition to the
scheme, declaring that the Rhodesian
empire is making for a gigantic fiasco
| and that Mr.. Rhodes wants the govern
ment to lift him out of hole by throw
ing good money after bad, into a rail-
| road through a wilderness. They also
| find coincidence in Mr. Rhodes home
coming and the revival of newspaper
outbursts against the Beers oppression
| or British subjects in the Transvaal.
by SLOW steps, so as not to arouse the
violent antagonism of the powers, but
In pursuance of a definite plan, Great
Britain is Tightening her grip on North
Africa The Egyptian convention, so
| far as the Soudan is concerned, accom-
pushes all that those who prodded the
Marquis OF Salisbury to declare a pro-
tectorate, could have desired Great
Br1tafn no longer governs through the
knedlVe. She becomes a co-equal ruler
ana ignores the mixed tribunals. This
means that the governor general is re-
sponsible only to Downing street and
| parliament
Inc comment of the Liberte of Paris.
D,tkr
Soudan-she palms it like a sIeight- of
hand professor" is a specimen of the
spirit in which France, already in
eensed at Great Britain, regards Great
Brltalns progress toward absolute SOW
ereignty in Egypt.
Samoa commands but small interest
in Great Britain and the belief seems
to prevail that the dispatches magnify
the Importance of the consuls battles,
and that Germany will manage to
gracefully disavow the acts Of her
agents.
A diplomat remarked that GERMANY
is filling for the United States the role
Russia has played in the eyes of the
Anglo-Indian, that Of the conspirator
to be looked for behind every war
cloud.
The British government, however,
welcomes the Samoan incident as an
other link Of the Anglo-American un-
derstanding, which they are SO DESTROYS
of fostering.
British investors in the Philippines
are curiously ignorant of American pol
itics, and are seriously discussing the
possibility of President Mckinley APP
pointing an Englshman to govern the
Islands. They argue that 1t is impos-
sible to find in America an experienced
administrator acquainted with the
character of the Filipinos, and suggest
the name of Ex-Governor Creagh, of
British Borneo, who is now living in
England, as being eminently qualified
and willing to take the post.
Some financiers are beginning to
take gloomy view of the future of
the Philippines. Mr. Earnest Ruffert.
the head of Lombard street house,
who bought large tracts of land about
Manila said to a representative of the
Associated Press:
1.-THE land is useless under the pres
ent conditions. We could not plant
crops with the possibility of the natives
destroying them overnight The United
States will be unable to rule more than
the fringe of the islands without an
army of hundred thousand men.
They might buy the native planters;
but they would not stay bought, and
the United States must rebuy them pc
riodically. The end Of the matter will
be that the United States will sell the
Philippines"
A majority of the London spectators
handling American stocks have been
badly bitten through pinning their
faith to the prevailing idea that a re-
action and a drop in prices must soon
come. This prediction has been fost-
cred by the financial papers. For
weeks they have been declaring that
the phenomenal advances were arti-
fetal and could not possibly be main
tanned, speaking Of the boom" sarcas-
tically, in such terms as the Amer
lean mania" The result has been that
many professionals have been caught
on the bear side, selling Americans for
4 fall, which failed to materiallze. They
found that the heavy selling of the
Venezuelan and free silver" periods
had not left enough stocks here to
meet their orders, and they were forced
to buy in America at advanced prices
Still, the stock exchange here adj
heres to the opinion that the boom"
will be overdone, that the ebb will set
n in the natural course Of events and
hat it cannot be far distant.
The Statist, in a somewhat alarmist
one, points out that the unprecedented
mount OF American capital employed
IN Europe, ten or fifteen millions
,hefy in London and Berlin, may be
withdrawn at its owners pleasure and
that possibly American speculation viii