The Portland daily press., 1900-08-13
SOLD IERS STARVING.
English Red Tape Me thOds Condemned
By Correspondent

Correspondence of the Associated Press. } !
London, August MIR. A. G. Hales,
representative in South Africa of the
Daily News Is the latest war correspon-
dent to attack the methods and the red
tape of the British war Office. He says:
1.-The men under Lieut.. General Sir
Leslie Rumble have to hold a frontage
line from Winburg, via SenekaRalmost to
the borders Of Basuto land. This front,
extending nearly a hundred miles, is con-
stantIy threatened by a determined enc
my who know the country 10 hold this
line intact, General Rumble has to march
from point to point as his scouts warn
him.
General BUNDLES task is colossal
one and gigantic efforts should be made
to keep him amply supplied With food
for his soldiers. But the men are abso-
lutely starving. Many of the infantry
men are so weak they can barely stagger
along. They are worn to shadows, and
move with weary, listles footsteps. This
is what the soldiers have been getting to
eat for long time:-
Zone pound of raw flour, which the
soldiers have to co after hard day
march, is served out to each man every
alternate day. The following day he
gets a pound of biscuits. There is no fuel
excepting little ox-dung dried by the
sun. II a soldier is lucky enough to pick
up little he can go to the nearest water
of which there is plenty mix his cake
without yeast or baking powder, and
make some sort of wretched mouthfuI.
He gets one pound of raw fresh meat
daily, which nine times out OF ten he
cannot cook and there his supplies end.
''What has become of the rations OF
rum, of sugar, of tea, of cocoa, of gro
ceries generally? Ask at the snug little
railway sidings where the goods are
stacked and forgotten Ask In the big
stores In Cape Town and other seaport
towns. Ask In your own country, where
thousands of pounds worth of foodstuff
lie rotting in the warehouses, bound up
and tied with red tape bsndages. Ask
yes ask, but don't stop at asking-damn
somebody high up in power. Don't let
some wretched underling be made the
soape goat Of this criminal state of affairs,
for the faint of this shameful thing rests
upon every Briton whose home, priv1l-
eye and prosperity are being safeguarded
by these furnishing men. The folks in
authority will probably tell you that
General Rumble and his splendid fellows
are so isolated that food cannot be OBJ
tained for them. ] say that is false. Two
war correspondents traversed that coun-
try and got through with winter supplies
for themselves. Why cannot the trans
port people manage to do the same? If we
war correspondents could not manage
transport business better than they do
most of as would willingly stand up and
allows ourselves to be shot at.
"Our men on the fields of war are
furnishing, whilst millions worth of food
lies rotting on our wharves and in our
cities, food that ought with ordinary
management, to be within easy reach of
our fighting generals. Rumble faces the
work with men whose knees knock
under them, whose hands shake from
weakness, from poverty OF blood and
muscle, brought about by continual
hunger.
Yours be the shame if the empires
flag be lowered. You stand in your music
halls and shout songs full of sentiments
for your soldiers and you let him 90 so
hungry that have often seen him quar-
rel with Niger for a handful of raw
mealies on the march,