THE ASHANTEE DESPATCHES.
THE news from Ashantee published in London on Wed- nesday is, with one single and most serious exception, exceedingly satisfactory. It shows, in the first place, that Sir Garnet Wolseley is an administrator as well as a soldier, and that he understands thoroughly, one point excepted, the exceptional responsibilities of his position. His motives for risking so many valuable lives in an unimportant expedition against four petty villages in the bush, villages not on his line of march to Ooomassie, are quite conclusive. He had discovered that the Ashantees and Fantees alike had con- sidered him merely a new Governor, and did not understand that he was also Commander-in-Chief in a war, with forces yet to arrive. This impression, while it encouraged the Ashantees, who of course could not see the preparations at Woolwich, discouraged the native allies, whose constant cry had been for a European leader who had never come. Farther, be had found that the "friendly" tribes were in the habit of adhering to the strongest, and were convinced that the Europeans, though the stronger in the open, would never venture into the bush in pursuit of Ashantees, who therefore were, for practical purposes, much the more trustworthy allies. He had finally decided that a little personal experience in the bush might teach him himself a very great deal. Instead, therefore, of ordering Colonel Wood, commanding at Elmina, to attack the unfriendly villages around—villages proved to be harbouring Ashantees, and without either women or children, that is, ruled by men who expected war—Sir Garnet went himself, arranged a movement which was kept absolutely secret, and after ineffectually summoning the chiefs, marched on their villages, and destroyed them, with- out killing one woman or child. One child had been left, but an officer took that, the men quarrelled for the play-
thing, and the child will probably reappear one day as cook in one of Her Majesty's ships. The march was of the most daring kind, for Sir Garnet, with only 178 Europeans, 205 trained and disciplined Negroes, and 126 Houssas, had to march twenty-one miles through unchopped bush, which might con- tain any number of Ashantees, and did contain a great many, whose policy was much like that of Red Indians,—to keep in the forest, and fire on the invaders while themselves invisible. As almost invariably happened, however, in the old Red Indian wars, the heavy fire of the white men disconcerted them, the single gun and the rocket-tubes frightened them, and the Houssas dashing into the bush, caused a general flight. How many of them were killed the General does not know, nor does it sig- nify, except so far as this, that the smaller the enemy's loss and the greater his demoralisation, the better for the expedi- tion. If the Ashantees fled after a large loss the contest will be serious, for clearly they can fight ; but if they fled after a very small one, which we imagine to be the truth, the struggle is over before it is begun. It is moral effect, not mas- sacre, which is wanted in Ashantee, as in India ; and this effect has, we agree with the despatches, been thoroughly attained. First blood is everything in this kind of war, and it seems from the latest reports almost certain that the Ashantees, either believing their allies cowed by the skirmish, or them- selves alarmed by the Europeans, have decided to recross the Prah and make for their own kingdom. If that is correct, and the despatches seem incapable of any other interpretation, they will spread terror throughout Ashanteeland, and render the neutrality of all the tribes who will be behind Sir Garnet Wolseley as he advances, tolerably certain. The neutrality, in fact, may be changed, as Sir Garnet hopes, into active assistance, as the beaten tribes will want to share in the plunder of the great kingdom, and will acquire that indescribable but incurable dread of what the white man may do, which makes us so formidable in Asia. If with less than 200 Europeans Sir Garnet can penetrate as far as he likes into the bush, then of course the best thing to do will be to follow him, and not to fight him, he being clearly as formidable as Coffee Calcallee, and much closer to themselves. In fact, as the news spreads, the brunt of the work will be left to the warrior tribe which supports the throne of Ashantee and dominates the population, and it is to defeat this tribe which, either from organisation, or genealogy, or creed, is separate and braver than any other, that the Europeans are required. The despatches published are believed to have been severely edited, but even if this is not correct, it is quite clear that Sir Garnet considers Europeans, and a good many of them, abso- lutely essential to success.
And this brings us to the one paragraph in his despatches which excites in us a little fear. Is there not some sign of rashness of judgment in the summary condemnation of the Houssas as effective troops I Sir Garnet says :—" No less important is the lesson I have myself learnt from this affair. I have been shown how little reliance can be placed on even the best native troops in this bush fighting, where it is impos- sible to keep them under the immediate control of European officers. The Houssas showed undeniable courage and spirit, but their uncontrollable wildness, the way in which they fired volley after volley in the air, or at imaginary foes in the bush, expending all their ammunition, shows how little use they are for the work we have in hand. I do not doubt they will improve under the teaching of the officers of my force, and I hope shortly to have them more under my control, but I cannot expect ever to make of them a thoroughly disciplined body." These Houssas, who behaved exactly like French recruits, who, as Sir Garnet acknowledges, display the utmost gallantry, "had been drilled," remarks Colonel Evelyn Wood, quite in- cidentally, just two and a half days, scarcely sufficient to take the wildness out of any recruits, certainly not out of Afreedees, whom Brigadier Hodgson turned into such soldiers, or the Sikhs, who so nearly beat ourselves. It is conceivable that something may be suppressed in this part of the despatch— some habit which British honour cannot put up with, as, for example, the mutilation of the dead—bat even as regards that, there remains a question for Sir Garnet Wolseley, namely, whether these men can be considered disciplined at all. He says, and of course says accurately, that in fighting the Houssas get out of hand • but how could two and a-half days' drill teach them to obey orders, or how many has he executed or otherwise punished for not obeying them ? Clive could do nothing with his convicts till he shot a few of them ; and Dumouriez' men, who won Jemappes, ran screaming to hide themselves in ditches; while General Hodgson's men, being
more savage than all, became insubordinate, and were restored to obedience by a summary process it is not worth while to repeat here. Of course the Houssas may be irreclaimable barbarians, or, like some tribes of Red Indians, uncon- trollable in war ; but then, how did Captain Logan turn them into such very effective police I Two and a half days seems but a little time to allow savages almost without officers to become disciplined, even if they were not black Mohammedans, with houri on the brain, and probably some drug or other on the stomach. They will improve, the General says, under the " teaching of the officers of my force," but the officers of his force will scarcely im- prove under the certainty that their chief neither can nor will believe that their men can be made trustworthy. A little more experience would seem necessary to a judgment which, if correct, will either compel the Government to garrison West Africa with Europeans, or, as Mr. Bright desires, to retire from settlements too costly in life to keep. A judgment based on two days and a half's drill can hardly be considered beyond correction in the light of other experience. Meanwhile, of course, Englishmen must be sent, and it is worthy of note that, as usual when Englishmen are at work, the marines and blue-jackets have exhibited no sign of extra illness.
Since this was written, the Daily News has received a full account of a second expedition, made to clear the road beyond Dunquah, an expedition entrusted entirely to Colonel Festing, the native allies, and fifty drilled West Indian negroes. The expedition was directed against the Ashantees' camp, which was destroyed ; but the Ashantees, once seeing our men in the open, commenced a galling fire, and slowly hunted the force back to its own camp at Dunquah. They charged most bravely, " and at one time nothing kept back the attack of the enemy but the steady working of Captain Rait's seven Houssas with the 7-pounder gun and a rocket-tube. These men have been trained entirely by Captain Bait since the arrival of the Expedition on the Coast, and except for his own immense personal exertions on this day, worked the gun and rockets entirely themselves." These are the men whom Sir Garnet Wolseley, on the strength of one day's experience with a mob of them, drilled only for two days and a half, has summarily and finally condemned.
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