Lord Carnarvon's scheme of Confederation advances in South Africa. The
Dutch States have signified their readiness to con- sider it, subject to certain reservations about boundaries, and the Cape Colony intends to reconsider its refusal to send delegates. Sir Henry Barkly, who has from the first been inimical to the scheme, has called Parliament together for the 10th November, and it is understood that the Premier, Mr. Molteno, will then propose that delegates be sent, either on the ground that his ob- jections have been removed by Lord Carnarvon's second despatch, or with an open avowal that public feeling is unexpectedly strong in favour of Federation. There seems to be no doubt
that a dissolution would result in a large majority for the plan, which has struck the imaginations of the people. If it were pos- sible, as we fear it is not, to retain Cape Town as the capital of the Confederation, all serious opposition would vanish. The South Africans, like the British North Americans, will probably insist on a new capital, nearer to all the provinces, and will locate it a good way off from civilisation.
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