The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1899-01-22
People OF All Classes beg His Favor
and View Him as the Potentate
of the Black Continent.
CECIL'S RAILROAD SCHEME
THE CAPE TO CAIRO PROJECT CON-
SIDERED BY THE CABINET.
Britain Tightening Yer Grip on North
Africa-EngIish Views of Samoa
and the Philippines.
Copyright. 1899. by the Associated Press)

Copyright 1899, by the Associated Press)
LONDON, Jan. 21-Great Britain seems
to shake to it's foundation whenever Mr..
Cecil Rhodes steps foot on the island. He
is the biggest man in the kingdom to-day.
peers, cabinet ministers, promoters with
Munchausen schemes, duchesses craving for
tips on "Kaffirs' Cor South African securi-
ties) workmen who cherish dreams of emil
grafton and bishops soicitious for African
souls haunt his hotel and beg for even the
briefest interviews as though he had al
ready realized his aspiration. The popular
mind credits him with being the potentate
of the African continent
The Cabinet met yesterday, specially to
discuss Mr.. Rhodes's scheme for govern
ment guarantees of the Cape to Cairo Rail-
road and telegraph Mr.. Rhodes after
wards conferred with Mr. Joseph Chamber
lain, the secretary of state for the colonies,
and Sir Michael Hicks-Beach the chancel-
Tor of the exchequer. Mr.. Rhodes says
&l000OO0O 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.
Before the projectors can act in the matter
there will be a formaiity in the shape of
parliamentary bill; but, the Imperialists
~-+~S NO OciNhCu W ulENt over TIE SO-cdll6Q
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 gov
eminent to lift him out a hole by throw
ing good money after bad into railroad
through wilderness. They also find
coincidence in MIR. Rhodess home coming
and the revisal of newspaper outbursts
against the Beers oppression of British
residents in the Transvaal
BY slow steps, so as not to arouse the an
tagonism of the powers, but in pursuance
of definite plan, Great Britain is tighten
ing her grip on North Africa. The Egyp-
tan convention so far as the Sudan is con
cerned, accomplishes all that those who
prodded the Marquis of Salisbury to declare
a protectorate, could have desired Great
Britain no longer governs through the
Khedive. She becomes a eoequal ruler and
ignores the mixed tribunals. This means
that the governor general is responsible
only to Downing street and Parliament. The
comment of the Liberte of Paris that Great
Britain does not annex the Sudan-she
palms it like a sleight-of-hand professor"
is a specimen of the spirit in which France,
already incensed at Great Britain, regards
Great Britain's progress toward absolute
sovereignty in Egypt.
Samoa commands but small interest in
Great Britain, and tie belief seems to pre-
vail that the dispatches magnify the i'm
portance of the consuls battles and that
Germany will manage to gracefully disavow
the acts of her agents. A diplomatic re-
marked that Germany is filling for the
United States government the role Russia
has low in, Of
that of the conspirator to be looked for
behind every war cloud. The British gov
eminent, however. welcomes the Samoan
incident as another link of the Anglo-Amer-
lean understanding which they are so de-
sirous of fostering.
British investors in the Philippines are
curiously ignorant of American politics, and
are seriously discussing the possibility of
President Mckinley appointing an English
man to govern the islands. They argue that
1t is impossible to find in America an ex-
perienced 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 fnanciers are beginning to take
gloomy view OF the future OF the PDlllp-
pines Mr. Ernest Ruffert, the head of
Lombard-street house. who bought large
tracts of lands about Manila, said to a rep
resentative of the Associated Press: 1.-The
land is useless under the present condi-
tions. We could not plant crops with the
possibility OF the natives destroying them
over night. The United States will be un-
able to rule more than the fringe of the
islands without an army of 100000 men.
They might buy the native leaders, but
they would not stay bought, and the United
States must rebuy them periodically. The
end of the matter viii be that the United
States win 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 reaction and drop
IN prices must soon come. This prediction