The latest news of the insurgents is that Gomez is advancing on Havana, and promises that at the gates of the city he will show General Weyler whether the island is really pacified or not.

He has issued a proclamation, saying that Spain might as well stop any attempt to grant reforms to Cuba.  He says:  “We will accept neither reforms nor home rule.  Spain must know that this war is one for independence, and that the Cubans would rather die than yield.  The day we lifted our flag of liberty, we wrote on it:  ‘Independence or death.’”

* * * * *

The committee appointed to inquire into the Transvaal raid has sent in its report to Parliament—­or, to speak correctly, it has sent in two reports, for the members could not agree.

One report says that, whatever justification there may have been for the people of Johannesberg to rebel against the rule of the Boers, there was none whatever for Mr. Cecil Rhodes to organize and dispatch an invading army into the Transvaal.

This portion of the committee declares that the blame rests entirely on Cecil Rhodes, notwithstanding the fact that Dr. Jameson did finally invade the territory without direct orders.

They find that Cecil Rhodes seriously embarrassed the home and colonial governments, by thus breaking the peaceful understanding between the nations; and further, that he used his high position to provoke a rebellion, and deliberately deceived the home Government that he might be able to carry out his own personal plans.  The Government in England is declared to be entirely innocent of any knowledge of the affair, but two officers of the colonial Government are found guilty.

To the surprise of everybody, the report contains no suggestion for the punishment of any of the offenders.

In regard to Cecil Rhodes’ refusal to produce the telegrams which they asked for, the committee says that he ought undoubtedly to be disciplined for his conduct, but that it would take so much time to do so that it would perhaps be as well to let the matter alone.

This is one report.

The other is much stronger in its tone.  It blames everybody concerned, and says that there is little doubt that the raid was simply a plot arranged to make wealthy men wealthier.

This report does not agree that the home Government is entirely blameless.  It says that it is a pity that the matter was not more fully investigated, so that it could be thoroughly ascertained whether the Government, and especially Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, was in truth ignorant of the plot.

Both reports agree that the officers who led the raiders imagined that they were acting under orders from the British Government, and that they have been punished more heavily than they deserved.  The second report suggests that their commissions should be restored to them.

After the raid was over these soldiers were arrested and sent to England, where they were tried for invading a friendly country without proper authority.  They were found guilty and sent to Holloway Jail in London.