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Notes On Kruger's Book

Notes On Kruger's Book image
Parent Issue
Day
3
Month
October
Year
1902
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

NOTES ON KRUGER'S BOOK.

Oom Paul Scores Chamberlain for His Policy in Jameson Raid. 

Ex-President Kruger's autobiography, which will be published simultaneously in many countries on Nov. 15, will be a volume containing 100,000 words, says a London cable dispatch to the New York Tribune. The Munich publisher, Lehmann, has paid a high price for the book and serial rights in all languages. Mr. Kruger's friends assert that whatever is made out of it will not be kept by him, but will be handed over to the suffering burghers. The French translation has been arranged, and Nighoff has purchased the rights for Holland, and Fisher Unwin has acquired the copyright in the English language for Great Britain, Canada, the British colonies and the United States.

The book contains the story of Paul Kruger's life from childhood to the negotiation of peace. It was dictated by Mr. Kruger to his private secretary, H. C. Bredell, and to Peter Grobler, formerly undersecretary of state for the Transvaal. The English translator is Texeira de Mattos, author of a current version of Chateaubriand's memoirs. The manuscript of the work received in London brings the narrative down to the Jameson raid, and the remainder will include the story of the negotiations with Mr. Chamberlain, an account of the war until Mr. Kruger's departure from the Transvaal and incidents of his life in Holland. The early chapters describe his youth, education, hunting adventures, the shooting of his first lion and his experiences in chasing rhinoceroses and tigers. The succeeding chapters contain an account of various expeditions against Sechid and other Kaffir chiefs. One of the most exciting adventures was when he was alone in a cave underneath the Kaffirs who were besieged.

The history of the Jameson raid is accompanied by reflections on what Mr. Kruger describes as the irritating policy of Secretary Chamberlain in the negotiations. Mr. Kruger's astuteness in diplomacy is revealed in this portion of his deeply interesting book. He also attaches great importance to a series of telegrams between Flora Shaw and Cecil Rhodes, in which Mr. Chamberlain's name is freely used. Mr. Kruger, while politically dead, still speaks in this memoir with his old time vigor and subtlety.