by the Governor at William's Town, and that Sir
Harry Smith had returned to Cape Town. News soon
came that Sandilli was preparing to contest the reality
of his deposition. Sir Harry Smith hastened rapidly
back to King William's Town, in the centre of British
Caffraria. On the 19th December, the T'Slambie chiefs
assembled at Fort Murray, on the summons of Mr.
M'Lean, the Commissioner of the T'Slambie tribes.
The insincerity of the most influential men was then
very apparent: the capture of Sandilli was politely
declined by all, as an attempt so impossible for the
prowess of any of them, as to be amusing to think of.
At a meeting of the Gaikas, held on the same day by
the Governor, at Fort Cox, Sutu, the mother of Sandilli,
the "great widow" of Gaika, was appointed chief
ruler of the tribe, in the place of Sandilli. In the
three days following this meeting, information more
and more definite was received through the Caffre
Police, of the lurking-place in which Sandilli was
concealed. It was resolved to attempt a sudden blow
by arresting him. Colonel Mackinnon was to march
from Fort Cox up the banks of the Keiskemma
with 600 troops, direct on Sandilli, while Lieutenant
Eyre was to cut him off from retreat into the
strongholds of the Gaika tribe in the Amatola Mountains.
Colonel Mackinnon started on the 24th December; his
vanguard being ninety-two of the Caffre Police before
mentioned. While they were in a gorge, which shut
in the swift river so closely that our men could only
march in single file, a deadly fire was poured in upon
every part of the force except the Caffre Police. It
was with extreme difficulty that the defile was forced,
after a disastrous loss of officers and men killed and
wounded. On the following day the whole of the Caffre
Police deserted, with their horses and arms, to the enemy.
Of course the expedition totally failed of its object
against Sandilli: Colonel Mackinnon led his men by a
long compass round to Fort White, where he arrived on
the 25th December; and he immediately sent orders to
Lieutenant-Colonel Eyre to fall back with his intercepting
force on William's Town. As soon as the Gaikas were
in the open field, they hemmed in Sir Harry Smith at
Fort Cox, investing his hundreds of men with more than
as many thousands. Colonel Somerset, at Fort Hare,
sent a body to his relief, which was driven back. He
himself set out on the 29th, in much greater strength,
to force the passage. The Caffres attacked him in
immense numbers, and with most determined courage.
They were well armed with guns and spears. After
four hours of hard fighting, in the early part of which a
small piece of artillery was used with great effect, but
the end of which was waged hand to hand, Colonel
Somerset was compelled to withdraw from the contest,
to abandon the piece of artillery, and to retire to Fort
Hare, whence he started. Lieutenant Melvin and
Lieutenant and Adjutant Gordon, of the Ninety-first
Regiment, were killed; and Ensign Borthwick, of the
Ninety-first, was wounded. About twenty privates
fell, and many more were wounded. The struggle,
thus disastrously commenced in two or three set
engagements, was quickly carried on all along the Caffre
frontier. The military villages of Woburn, Auckland,
and Joannasburg, were attacked; their male inhabitants,
to the number of seventy, butchered; and their women
and children carried off, or turned adrift nearly naked,
to reach the Forts as they best could. As the attempt
by Colonel Somerset to communicate with Sir Harry
Smith was so signally defeated, some anxiety was felt
for Sir Harry in his isolated position. On the 31st,
however, he arrived safely at King William's Town.
Wearing the cap of a trooper to escape being made a
target, he put himself at the head of 250 men, and
dashed through the masses of Caffres without any
casualty. He had left a force at Fort Cox, well
provisioned, and fully sufficient in numbers to maintain
themselves till reliefs could be brought up.

On the 3d of January, a force of Caffres attacked Fort
White, which is the fort nearest to King William's
Town—about twenty miles from it. Two of Sandilli's
brothers commanded. The small garrison under
Captain Mansergh reserved their fire till the Caffres were on
the breastworks, and then poured in a charge that killed
twenty Caffres on the spot, and caused a retreat.

On the 7th of January, the Caffre chief Hermanus,
who had received from our government a large grant of
territory on the Blinkwater, in the district of Albany, to
the North of Fort Beaufort, gathered all his dependents,
Caffre and Hottentot, and attacked Fort Beaufort. But
friendly warning of the attack had been received, and
the defence was most successfully waged. The attacking
force was defeated, and totally dispersed. Hermanus
himself was slain; and his body was carried into the
fort and placed in the middle of the square with the
British flag over it, an example to all Hottentot
beholders. Sir Harry Smith followed up this success of
one of his outposts, with a proclamation declaring that
the Crown lands granted to Hermanus had become
forfeited by his treachery; that "the successors of
Hermanus, and all their rebellious people, are for ever
expelled from the limits of the colony"; and that all men
of this "wicked location," seen within the colony, are to
be regarded as enemies and dealt with accordingly.

On the 21st of January, the most severe action that
had occurred was fought between 6000 Caffre
besiegers of Fort Hare, with its adjacent Fingo village
of Alice, and the garrison of that outpost—about as
many hundreds—under Major Somerset. Fort Hare
lies beyond Fort White, from King William's Town.
This attack was most determined: the Caffres came on
in regular divisions of columns, and steadily braved a
fire from two twenty-four pounders in the embrazures
of the fort. It was indeed the fire of these formidable
pieces of ordnance that broke and disorganised the
attack. Profiting by the havoc and confusion they
caused, the garrison sallied with concentration and
bravery, and, after a stubborn hand-to-hand conflict,
compelled the Caffres to draw off. Upwards of a
hundred Caffres were left dead on the ground. The
Fingoes, a native race, formerly held in bondage by the
Caffres, from which they were delivered in the war of
1836 and brought within the colony, and who have
ever since been friendly to the British against the
aggressive Caffres, behaved with remarkable courage,
and greatly contributed to the success. An affair
occurred to the West of King William's Town, on the
24th of January, in which a small party of Fingoes,
under British command, defeated a much larger body
of Seyolo's Caffres. Sir Harry Smith issued a general
order praising the valour of this body of "intrepid
Fingoes" for the mode in which they drove off the
party of "bullying Caffres."

The accounts are not clear as to the number of troops
yet arrived at King William's Town. Their number
appears to be at least 1600; and two pieces of field artillery
have arrived. The Burgher volunteers and Native
allies would seem to raise the whole force at Sir Harry
Smith's command to about 6000 men. It was understood
that he purposed to march on Fort White, and
into the heart of Sandilli's territory, about the end of
January; in hopes that Sandilli would make a stand,
and enable him to bring the contest to a decisive
termination.

NARRATIVE OF FOREIGN EVENTS.

ANOTHER crisis in Prussian affairs moves only laughter. Frederick William turning off poor Manteuffel,
again talking big, and threatening Austria, no one treats but as a joke; and the little princes that formerly
backed up Austria, and got snubbed for their pains, again plucking up a spirit, and manifesto-ing, in the hope
of snatching something from the fray, adds not a little to the enjoyment of it. But something better than a
joke is the alarm and depression of Austria. This appears to be real. Schwartzenberg could laugh at Prussia