We take from the Straits Times the following translations of Dutch telegrams referring to the War The Hague, 27th November.
Further reports regarding the-action at Grasspan show that General Lord Methuen's force occupied the hills around, in the evening, in overpowering numbers. The Boers, who were Free Staters, retreated for strategic reasons in good order, taking their artillery with them. The combatants on both sides were quite exhausted. The British troops had to rest the next day. Grasspan is now in heliographic communication with Kimberley. The advantages gained by General Lord Methuen at Grass-pan were secured at the cost of heavy losses, mainly suffered by the naval brigade which took part in the action with heavy artillery.
The Africanders in Barkly West (Cape Colony) have joined the Transvaalers.
Queenstown has been occupied by Fre Staters.
"The Free Staters have occupied Stormberg in Cape Colony, and have taken up a position southwards. The Cape Afticanders ave interrupted both telegraphic and railway communication between that place and Cape Town.
President Kruger's health is arousing uneasiness; he is suffering from kidney disease.
28th November.
The Governor of Natal reports that the Boers there have retreated upon Weenen, 'a town eastward of Colenso, and that the advancing British force is now three miles to the north of the Mooi River.
General Lord Methuen has taken Honey-The British nawapapeee state that nest-Kloof station to the north of Grasspan with two millions of cartridges.
The Times says that the Boers, notwithstanding that they have retreated into the northern part of Natal, have a large force stationed between Estcourt and Maritzburg, where General Buller has arrived.
The Boers near Estcourt have blown up, by means of dynamite, the middle railway bridge at Frere.
It is officially announced that the total British loss at Grasspan amounted to 200 men, including the Sth Lancers, whose main body seems to have been surprised and made prisoners by the Boers. The naval brigade there seems also. to have fallen into an ambuscade during the action.
President Kriiger has protested to the Consuls of the different Powers represented at Pretoria against breaches, on the British side, of the war-conditions Inid down in the Geneva Convention. These breaches were very glaring, above all in the action at Willow Grange near Estcourt.
29th November.
The British War Department keeps disquieting silence which draws the more attention from the fact that there is no interruption now on the telegraph lines.
The British troops under General Lord Methuen lost five hundred men at Belmont.
The total British loss during the campaign amounts now to 3,000 men.
The main body of the force under General Gatacre is at Putterskraal, in the north of Cape Colony.
The various commandos of General Joubert's troops are posted at Ladysmith, on the bank of the Tugela River, in the country to the east of Maritzburg, and near Estcourt.
Cronje's troops are posted near Kimberley and on the banks of the Modder River.
On Monday there was a battle which lasted ten hours in which General Lord Methuen's troops compelled 8,000 to retreat to the Modder River. A Brit column crossed that river. The British ost 1,500 mon in killed and wounded. The Boers lost 400.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.