Employees (again almost entirely foreigners) had been warned that should they accept positions and work under English control they would lose all benefits accruing from the system of a self-protective agency organized years before and amounting to a large sum in the possession of the Hollander Directorate. Every day groups of men could be seen standing outside of the railway offices. They indulged in long talks and much gesticulating. Some, adhering to the orders of their former employers, refused to work or to assist the powers now in control. Others admitted the situation and went to work. The town became full of idle persons, whose

Gradually it became known that many of them were under orders to leave the country. These orders had no reference to the born burgher or to those who had become naturalized before the outbreak of hostilities, or to those who were engaged in occupations that were not inimical to the interests of the public, regarded as future British subjects.

The proscription became more sweeping, until it appeared as if the previous leniency of Lord Roberts (which, beyond all doubt, had been misunderstood and abused) had changed to measures appearing to be most drastic and severe.

It seems a strange and sudden jump

allegiance and adherence were to ideas and interests contrary, under the circumstances, to the permanence of English rule. They were people of foreign birth who had held civil appointments under the Pretorian Government, who could never, in the course of events, occupy those positions again. The fact that the government they had served had deserted them and paid its indebtedness in worthless money made them much to be pitied. At the same time, the fact remained that, under the existing order of things and in the continuance of English rule and influence, their services would be no longer required.

that I have taken from purely personal narrative to a somewhat scattering account of inner politics, but without this as an explanation there could come no coherent understanding of the present condition of things in Pretoria.

And now to tell of the present conditions as they actually exist and are apparent on the surface.

It will take a long time before the latent hatred and dislike of the unprogressive party of the Boers will die away. It may take years, it may take another generation. But there exists a strong progressive party that has already proved itself to greatly outnumber the discontented

ones. And the leaders of this party have taken hold with a will, and before long their work in the reconstruction and amalgamation of this unhappy land will be evident.

It is the unsettled position that is now galling to every one; and here I must mention something that has arisen very similar to one of the questions evoked during our war with Spain-the volunteer. Here in South Africa, serving as ordinary troopers, are men from every corner of the Empire. There are young clerks and barristers from London, men of private means and fortune, shopkeepers, mineowners and sheep-raisers from Cape Colony, judges and tea-planters from Ceylon and India, and hardy Australians. and Tasmanians from the antipodes. Our cousins from our own side of the water also business men from Montreal and the French Canadians of Quebec, young fellows from the Western cattle ranges, and hundreds of Americans also, for one meets them everywhere.

They have all had Pretoria before their eyes, they should go home with " Pretoria" in their throats; and the fact of the matter

is that England has now before her but a big policing job.

Honestly, I have never met with a more cheerful set than these same volunteers. The regular English soldier is a product. The volunteer has sprung into existence. He is not an exotic exactly, but he is new to the world so far as England is concerned.

I fell into conversation with a grimylooking trooper the other day. He was acting as orderly, and carried a big blue envelope in his hand.

We had not spoken two words before I knew that he was a gentleman. He was mounted on a sorry little beast with curly hide like a Newfoundland dog.

"Beautiful creature, this," he remarked, by way of beginning the conversation. "I am going to have a photograph taken of him. The fact is, if I can, I'm going to take him home. Rather big' if," he concluded. "We're not allowed many privileges."

Yet here was a man who had provided his own horse (he told me it had been shot back at Kaffir River) and outfit, and, for that matter, from what I have since

learned, he could have outfitted a squadron from his own private purse and never felt it.

suddenly. "There's an awful pretty girl over in that store, but she won't look at Every time I go in there that cross

me.

He thought a little while.

"Well," said he, "I know I will be." He kicked the pony's sides. "Sometimes it's a bit of a bore, but I'm awfully fit, and won't I have a good time when I get back to London !" He slapped the pony with the long blue envelope. "I'd like to ride this gee down the Row," he said, "just to see what people would say."

"Dressed just as you are?" I suggested. "Oh, well," was the answer, "I would like another pair of breeches. Can't get another pair for love or money-been all over town. There is only one thing that worries me, however," he added: "can't get any letters. We've been knockin' about so that I suppose they're tired send ing them after us. Haven't heard from home for almost two months."

He left me and turned down a side street to deliver his note. Afterwards I met him again and learned his name. Some day he may have a title to it. His first cousin has one already, and is general's staff.

on a

Crossing the square, I met my friend the trooper again some time later. He is very young, hardly more than a boy, and he greeted me boyishly.

"I say," he began, "funny thing just now. Met a Tommy over there who looked at me hard and then came up and spoke to me. Somehow I thought I'd seen him before. Isn't this Master Edward?' he asked. Who do you suppose it was the gardener's son from my father's place! We had quite a talk, and he gave me the news of the family. He had got some letters since I had." He switched off

I asked him if he had seen his cousin, whom I knew. "Yes, I saw him the other day," he replied. "Had to salute him. Felt like going up and punching him, but, of course, I couldn't do that."

It happened that I met his cousin with the red lapels and the crowns on his shoulder, and told him. He laughed at the story.

"Cheeky little rascal!" he said. "Would have been just like him to do itand I'd had to put him under arrest. Heard he was here-been trying to get hold of him. This knocking about will do him lots of good.".

Now, that's one type of volunteer. He's out for a lark, and I don't think for one minute that he has regarded anything seriously-even the fact of being shot at. But there is the other sort of chap-of whom I have met several; and his lot is not so easy. He is the man who has abandoned business or a practice to take up his military service, and in many cases he has suffered most severely.

It is only just now, during this period of inaction, when the thing seems almost finished, that he feels the hardship most. But he indulges in little or no complain ing, and only expresses the hope that the war will soon be over. So far as he is concerned it is over, and the English Government has already done a wise thing in beginning to establish the Volunteer Police, which calls for a separate enlistment. Before many weeks have gone I hope to hear that the transports are ready to take some of the volunteers back to the place they came from.

L'

EO XIII. is the two hundred and sixty-third Pope of the Roman Catholic Church, and as such is Bishop of Rome, Vicar of Jesus Christ, successor of the Prince of Apostles, highest Prelate of the Universal Church, Patriarch of the Occident, Primate of Italy, Metropolitan Archbishop of the Roman Province, and finally Sovereign of the Temporal Dominions of the Holy Roman Church.

Leo XIII. was born on the 2d of March, 1810; he therefore celebrated his ninetieth birthday last March. He was elected Pope on the 20th of February, 1878, and he has thus completed more than twenty years of his Pontificate. He has enjoyed a well-earned fame as an adroit diplomat, and all of his policy has as its scope the obtaining and maintenance of good relations with all the Powers, except, naturally, with Italy. His first step was to notify all Governments (except the Italian) of his elevation to the Pontificate, and to follow this up by letters to the various sovereigns, in which he showed how he proposed to dissipate every existing dissension between the Vatican and the respective States. Where relations had been broken off, the Pope proposed, with an equity and courtesy which did him honor, to take them up again.

He began this line of operations by addressing a letter to the German Emperor, a letter now of great historic im

portance, in which he expressed the desire that the dissensions on account of the May Laws should cease. The Kaiser passed on the letter to Prince Bismarck, who suggested to his sovereign the propriety of accepting the propositions of the new Pope and of responding to them in a respectful and well-wishing manner. From that time the Vatican received with eagerness every wish expressed by the Iron Chancellor, even if the Center (the Roman Catholic party in Germany) registered its opposition. The end of all was that Bismarck submitted more than he supposed to the Papal authority in order himself to hold the Center in check. Throughout all the negotiations the Pope in no way endangered good relations with Protestant Germany.

Who does not remember how much Leo XIII. did in order not to rouse inimical feelings in France? He finished by espousing the cause of the Republic, and by breaking with the Royalists and the Imperialists. Many Bishops were not able to swallow the bitter pill, but the Pope never let an occasion pass to prejudice them toward obedience to his will, although that obedience had to be passive in some cases, and not active. Even when the Radical Cabinets, such as those presided over by MM. Bourgeois, Brisson, and Waldeck-Rousseau, had recourse to energetic acts against the clergy, the Pope