Tales have been received from the Cape of Good Hope,
of such kind that, unless they are fabrications, they should make the empire ring with the demand for redress. It is asserted that British subjects engaged as civilians in the service of the army, have been flogged—flogged without trial ! According to the story, the mother of one person who had thus been visited by a military officer with Lynch law appealed to a superior officer, Colonel Cloete ; who replied by a simple and laconic reiteration of the fact, that the man had been punished for disobedience ! This may be true, but it is incredible. Colonel Cloete is accounted a person of discretion, and it is more easy to believe the whole story false, the letter imputed to him a forgery, than the allega- tion of such gross and ignorant oppression. Nevertheless, incredu- lity must not be the shield under which British officers in remote provinces may possibly treat Englishmen like Russian serfs : there will, of course, be an official explanation of these transactions.
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