erday. The Port Captain has instructed that the steamers shall be ready to cross the bar inwards at 12 o’clock today.
The Government needs no reminder of its responsibility for the maintenance of order.
I have the honour to be,
Sir,
Your obedient servant,
(Sd.) HARRY ESCOMBE
(APPENDIX Y)
SIR,
I observe, in your leader in this morning’s issue of The Mercury, you give it as your opinion that Mr. Gandhi was ill advised in landing and coming through Durban on Wednesday last; and, as I was certainly a party to his coming ashore as he did, I shall feel obliged by your giving me an opportunity of answering your remark. Hitherto it has been useless to speak unless you were prepared to adopt the programme of the Demonstration party and its particular mode of attaining its ends; but, now that the Committee is dissolved, and the minds of men are no longer being inflamed, I trust that my letter will receive calm and thoughtful consideration. Let me commence by saying that, while the agitation was proceeding, I obtained a copy of Mr. Gandhi’s pamphlet published in India, and concerning which we received Reuter’s cable some months ago, and I can assure your readers that Reuter not only misrepresented the pamphlet, but misrepresented it so much that, on reading the two,
I cannot but come to the conclusion that the writer of the cable had not read the pamphlet. I can say, further, that there is nothing in the pamphlet which anyone could take exception to on the ground of untruthfulness. Anyone can obtain a copy and read it if he chooses. Let your readers do so and answer honestly: Is there anything in it untrue? Is there anything in it which a political opponent was not justified in saying in support of his cause? Unfortunately, the mind of the public was inflamed by Reuter’s version of it,[35] and throughout the recent disturbances, there was not a man to point out to the public the difference between the true and the untrue. I don’t wish to hurt any man’s feelings by repeating the words which he uttered in the hour of excitement and which, I know, in his calmer moments he will deeply regret, but, in order that the position may be understood, I must place before your readers, shortly, what Mr. Gandhi’s position was before he took the step of landing and coming into town. I shall, therefore, without mentioning names, give the effect of just a few
