Page:The Annual Register 1899.djvu/477

 1899.] CHBONICLE. 53

26. Lord Kitchener drove the last rivet of the bridge over the Atbara, and declared the trade road open by that route to the Soudan.

— The expedition from Uganda under Colonel Martyr reached Rejah, having established effective occupation of the country. The section of 350 miles between Rejah and Fashoda alone remained to complete the line from Mombasa to Cairo.

— At the Rennes trial, Captain Freystatter, one of the judges of the court martial by which Captain Dreyfus was tried and found guilty, declared that documents unknown to the prisoner had been shown to the judges.

28. The hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the birth of Goethe celebrated with great enthusiasm at Frankfort, and in several other German cities.

— The Danish Ministry reconstructed by the Premier, M. Horring, in anticipation of the meeting of Parliament.

— The convent of the Dominican sisters at Sparkill, New York, burnt down. Three children and a servant lost their lives, and about twenty children were seriously injured.

29. The British and Russian representatives in China agreed to refer to arbitration the dispute with reference to the ownership of certain land at Han-kau claimed by British merchants.

— The Trinidad Volunteer Artillery Corps disbanded by the governor with ignominy for mutinous behaviour.

— The Prussian Diet formally closed by the Imperial Chancellor, who delivered the royal message expressing the King's regret at the rejection of the Rhine-Elbe Canal scheme.

30. Two Transvaal police officers arrested at Lorenzo Marques by order of the Portuguese Government, but were subsequently released.

— An attempted Mahdist insurrection made on the Blue Nile, in which the leader and two of the Mahdi's sons were killed, and the movement suppressed by Captain Neville Smyth, V.C.

— An accident occurred to a party making the ascent of the Dame Blanche from Zermatt The rope which held the mountaineers together broke, and one Englishman and three Swiss guides were killed.

31. At Brussels the Chamber of Representatives rejected by 59 to 31 votes a motion for revising the constitution.

— Prince Hohenlohe addressed an edict to the chief presidents of the Prussian provinces, setting forth the duty of the Landrathe and other public officials io support the king's policy by their votes in the Diet. Twenty- two of those who had voted against the Rhine-Elbe Canal Bill were removed from their posts.

— General Figuereo, President of the Dominican Republic, resigned in favour of Jimenes, the leader of the revolutionary party.

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