A BOER LAAGER
Eleven miles north-west of Orangefontein, and an almost equal
distance from Springbokfontein, a party of Boers were laagered. They
were Free Staters, with a sprinkling of Hollanders and renegade
Britons--the latter, few in number, having at one time served with
the English colours, and owing to their misdeeds, had deserted or
been drummed out of the British army.
Nearly all were in rags, for that ubiquitous cavalry leader, General
French, had not allowed them a minute's rest, but had hurried and
harried them hither and thither, until the majority of the burghers
had grown sick and tired of the guerilla warfare, and wished for the
end to come.
Their portable possessions--and indeed the latter could not be
otherwise than portable--were stowed away in a few light Cape carts.
Ammunition was scarce, and had to be husbanded with the greatest
care, while food could only be procured with much difficulty from the
scattered farmsteads among the mountains of the Langeberg Range.
A Boer of immense stature, holding in his right hand a formidable
sjambok, was leaning against the wheel of one of the carts. He was a
magnificent specimen of physical manhood, and the privations that for
two long years he had uncomplainingly endured had only served to
increase his tremendous muscular strength.
His bronzed and deeply marked features showed a strength of will and
determination rare even in that race of obstinate men, the Boers of
South Africa.
An immense beard swept his breast, the hair composing it being
streaked with gray. When Christian Uys first shouldered his rifle on
the outbreak of hostilities he was, comparatively speaking, a young
man, but under the sombre folds of the flag of war he had grown
prematurely aged and gray.
A young burgher passing with a led horse, with a limping gait,
arrested his attention, and awoke him from the train of gloomy
reveries he was indulging in.
"Ah, Van Donnop," said the commandant, "I wish to speak to you. What
is the matter with your horse?"
The burgher whom he addressed was a sprightly young fellow of
nineteen, strongly made, and as agile as the springbok he had hunted
from youth upwards.
"It is lame, Commandant," answered the youth. "One of its pasterns
is split. I do not think it will be able to travel farther. And my
favourite horse, too. I am very sorry, for it has been mine since it
was a foal."
"I too am sorry, Piet," said the officer in a sympathising tone of
voice. "We are greatly in need of horses."
The commandant stooped down and examined the horse's hoofs, after
which he looked up and remarked in a grave tone of voice, "A bad
case, Piet. The poor brute must be killed."
A crimson flush surged up into the face of the young burgher, and he
exclaimed excitedly, "Do not ask me to kill her, Commandant! She was
my mother's gift to me when I was sixteen. I am hoping to leave her
at my father's farm and obtain another mount in her place."
A look of pity crept into the commandant's face as he gazed at the
boy.
"Ah, I forgot, Van Donnop," said the Boer leader; "you are now in
your native parts. How long have you served in my commando?"
The young burgher thought for a moment, and then answered, "From
three months before we beat the rooineks at Koorn Spruit, near the
Waterworks. Let me see, that is now going on for two years. You
will allow me to keep the mare, Commandant?" Van Donnop asked
beseechingly.
"But how will you travel?" asked Uys.
"I am fleet of foot, and do not mind the hardship," pleaded the lad.
"If I may only keep my horse, I shall be happy. She is part of
myself;" and Piet's voice faltered as he went on, "She who gave me
the mare is dead."
Piet stroked the finely arched neck of the mare, and the gentle
creature rubbed its tawny muzzle against the young burgher's cheek.
"We shall see," said the commandant at last. "By the way, you and
your brother Jan know this countryside well. If we are to reach Port
Nolloth, we must have more mounts. Do you know any likely place
where we can replenish our stock of horses?"
"There is one farm where many horses are kept--at least there used to
be, when I was at home."
"And where is that?" asked the commandant. "To whom does the farm
belong?"
"To a settler named Lovat," answered Piet.
"One of our race?" interrogated the commandant.
"He is opposed to us," replied Piet; "his name is a foreign one. He
is a Scotch settler who breeds many horses and ostriches."
"Has he helped the rooineks?" queried Uys, and a frown passed over
his face.
"He does not sympathise with us, Commandant," answered Piet, "but I
do not think he has favoured one side or the other. I believe he is
entirely taken up with looking after his ostriches."
"And you can guide us to this farm?" asked the commandant. "Possibly
he may have some spare nags."
Piet Van Donnop evidently did not like the suggested commission, and
the commandant, noting this, went on: "We must have some mounts,
Piet, or the rooineks will catch us. If that happens, I'm afraid our
fate will be a sorry one. A regiment of Lancers--the men who cut up
the Transvaalers at Elandslaagte--as well as several troops of New
Zealanders are on our track, and without fresh horses we shall stand
an almost sure chance of capture."
"You will not harm Mr. Lovat or his family?" asked Piet.
A smile played for a moment on the commandant's stern features, then
he said, "Not at all, Piet. Why should we? I'm afraid your heart is
concerned in the matter. But of course we must have what we require,
and very few questions asked into the bargain."
"I will guide you, then," said the young burgher. "I may keep my
horse, Commandant?"
"We shall see in the morning, boy," was the only reply vouchsafed by
the Boer leader; and Piet moved on, leading his lame horse.
Taking out an immense pipe from one of his pockets, Christian Uys
filled it with leaf tobacco, lit up, and began to smoke.
The commandant was evidently in a tender mood, for his thoughts were
in distant Winburg, where his wife and the children left to him were
being sheltered in a concentration camp, created by his arch-enemies,
the British.
His was a strange compound of human nature. At times generous and
kind, at others he was fierce, implacable, and relentless. Like his
famous leader, General Joubert, at the outset he had realised that
the struggle in which his country had engaged was a hopeless one, but
with the obstinacy characteristic of his race, when once his hand was
put to the plough, there was no turning back.
Christian Uys had already lost three sons in the war. His youngest,
a boy of fifteen, and the flower of the commandant's family, had been
shot in the stomach at Senekal. The brave boy hid his wound and
continued on the march, although a trail of blood marked the path
along which he rode, until he fell exhausted from his saddle, and
with his dying breath, and a look of intense love in his eyes, said,
"Father, I can fight no more, I am done." These were the brave lad's
last words, and like others on both sides, yielded up his spirit for
the cause in which he thought he was righteously fighting.
An older brother had been with the fierce Cronje in the honeycombed
banks of the Modder, amidst the brown sulphurous smoke of bursting
lyddite shells, and while bringing water for a wounded comrade from
the polluted stream, had been struck squarely in the chest by a
Lee-Enfield bullet, and had fallen on his face, never to rise again.
The last to die was the oldest boy of the family. A delicate youth
at the best, he had gone on commando with his father when the
vierkeleur was first hoisted in the field. For several months he had
fought and roughed it with the rest, until foul enteric seized him,
and the ranks of the Boer army knew him no more. He found a last
resting-place in a shallow grave on the veldt, not many miles from
his birthplace.
Christian Uys woke up from his reverie and took a stroll round the
laager. Here was Jan Steen, once a well-to-do jeweller of Winburg,
who before war broke out was always immaculately dressed, with ample
starched shirt front and bejewelled fingers; there Van Sterck, the
learned medico of the same town. Neither had had a change of raiment
for months, and both looked correspondingly miserable. Yonder stood
Louis Bredon, the dandy of Harrismith, now a veritable scarecrow in
trousers made of sacking on which the address of a large milling
concern in Johannesburg was branded in staring black letters.
Bredon, like the rest of the commando, was weary of the daily
trekking, discomfort, and misery incidental to warfare, and his mind
was wandering back to the time when he used to walk down the shady
side of Harrismith's main street, the cynosure of the belles of the
Free State town.
"You look discontented, Bredon," said Uys. "I am afraid you are like
most of my burghers. We cannot give in now, after we have endured so
much. There has not been sufficient fighting of late to keep up your
martial spirit. We want horses, Bredon, and they must be obtained,
if we are to reach Port Nolloth. Otherwise we had better surrender."
"I have no objection, Commandant," replied Bredon somewhat brusquely.
"I've had enough of the war. We ought never to have been drawn into
it."
"You speak like a patriot," observed Uys sarcastically. "I undergo
the same hardships as other burghers. You have suffered nothing as
yet. In what respect have you endured more than the rest of us?"
Bredon hung down his head in a sheepish manner and remained silent.
"I am finding a cure for your melancholy and dissatisfaction, Bredon.
I am detaching a portion of the commando for the duty of securing a
fresh supply of horses. Van Donnop is acting as guide to the
farmstead of a settler named Lovat. You will form one of the
commandeering party;" and Uys passed on.
"To think," muttered the commandant, "fellows such as Bredon were the
most eager at the outset, and now they begin to whine when a little
hardship has to be borne! My poor Christian, Louis, and Wilhelm were
formed of different stuff."
Christian Uys came up to a man who was busily engaged in cleaning his
Mauser. The burgher laid down his rifle as the commandant approached.
"Eloff," began Uys, "I want you to pick a dozen good men of the
commando. Before morning I must have half a score of horses. Piet
Van Donnop knows a farm where they can be obtained, and will guide
you to it."
Paul Eloff was a man built in the same herculean mould as his leader,
Christian Uys, and he looked at the commandant keenly.
"We shall want more, Commandant," said Eloff; "a dozen will scarcely
suffice. Let me see," and the Boer began counting rapidly on his
fingers, after which he added, "Yes, quite a dozen, Commandant. The
spare led horses were taken as mounts yesterday. We must reach Port
Nolloth, or we shall be cut off by the rooineks."
"You will muster the burghers, then, Eloff," said Uys. "Bring them
round to the commissariat waggon within half an hour, and do not
forget Van Donnop. Although a boy, his heart is good."
"I will not fail, Commandant," replied Eloff, picking up his rifle
and recommencing the cleansing process.
In less than the stipulated time, Eloff with his picked burghers
stood before the commandant, each man at his horse's head.
Christian Uys called Eloff aside and whispered, "Do you think you are
sufficiently strong for the purpose in hand?"
"I should make the patrol fifty strong, Commandant," answered Eloff.
"You are remaining in laager, I suppose, until we return?"
"That is my intention, Eloff," answered Uys. "Van Donnop informed me
that the Kopje Farm--this Scotch settler's residence--is some eight
miles from here. You will keep a sharp look-out for the rooineks,
Eloff, and not be caught napping?"
A smile spread over Eloff's face as he answered, "When I am found
asleep, Commandant, I shall not return to tell the tale. We have got
to the end of our tether, and I am longing to have one more go at the
rooineks. After that, well--oblivion."
"It is a bad cause we have started on, Eloff," said Uys. "It is as
General Joubert foretold at the beginning, we are fighting in a lost
cause. How can we hope to stand against a mighty Power like England,
which has millions of gold and men without number? Bah! we were a
race of fools to be led by the nose. President Kruger, who commenced
the war, basely deserted us. But I must not speak of this. It is
horses we want, and horses we must have."
Paul Eloff quickly mustered the additional burghers required, and in
sections of fours the motley cavalcade trekked towards the Kopje Farm.
Eloff and Van Donnop rode at the head of the slender force, and the
former turning to the young Dutchman, said, "This is a rough country,
Van Donnop. You spent most of your life here?"
"Until I went on commando," answered Piet. "I shall be glad when I
can get back to my father's farm. Those were happy days, Eloff."
"You know the farmstead whither we are bound," inquired Eloff, "and
the people as well, I suppose?"
"Perfectly," answered Piet.
"And what about the owner? Is he a fighting man? Shall we have much
trouble?"
"Mr. Lovat is quiet enough," replied Piet. "He has a son named Jack,
a dare-devil sort of boy, who will show fight, I think, but possibly
he may be on commando with the rooineks."
"Any Kaffirs kept on the farm?" queried Eloff.
"There used to be many," answered Van Donnop. "I do not wish any
harshness to be used towards Mr. Lovat. He used to be very kind to
me before I went on commando. The horses will be paid for, I
suppose?"
Eloff laughed outright as he replied, "Van Donnop, I don't think a
single gold piece can be found in the pockets of the whole commando.
My instructions are to take what we require--as civilly, of course,
as possible. The account will be paid when the vierkeleur flies not
over the Transvaal and Orange Free State only, but over the whole of
the Cape. A receipt for the horses, of course, will be given."
The Boers, who had been travelling through a series of dongas, now
debouched into a fairly open country.
Eloff halted his men, and after looking ahead, turned to Van Donnop.
"You have a pair of field glasses, Van Donnop, allow me to look
through them."
Piet handed the glasses to Eloff, who placed them to his eyes.
"There is a farmhouse, Van Donnop, on a kopje some four miles ahead,"
said Eloff; "is it the home of this Mr. Lovat?"
"That is where Mr. Lovat used to live," replied Piet; "things have
changed much lately."
"A big place for a farmstead," observed Eloff. "This Mr. Lovat must
be rich."
"He is said to be fairly wealthy," answered Piet. "He was a nobleman
in his own country, so I have heard it said."
"And the house lower down the valley, to whom does that belong?"
queried Eloff. "Take the glasses, Van Donnop, then you will see what
I mean. Over there;" and the Boer pointed with his index finger in a
certain direction.
"That is Jagger's Farm," said Piet, after a glance through the
glasses. "No horses can be obtained there. The farm has not been
occupied for years."
"We will march straight on the place, Van Donnop, rest a while, and
then move on to--what is the name of the place, Piet?"
"The Kopje Farm," replied the young Dutchman. "Someone is driving a
Cape cart towards Jagger's Farm, Eloff."
"Right you are, Van Donnop. Give me the glasses again," said Eloff.
Eloff peered through the instrument for a moment, after which he
ordered half a dozen burghers to gallop rapidly towards Jagger's
Farm, in order to intercept the solitary passenger in the Cape cart,
while he and his remaining fellow-countrymen dismounted and awaited
events.