which furnished sufficient clayey water to allow the sobbing gun-teams
and transport animals to moisten their mouths. Water for the men there
was little, except the pittance which they were allowed to draw from
the regimental water-carts. Neither was there shade from the merciless
sun. The six inches of spare Karoo bush, though it served as a nibble
for the less fastidious of animals, was useless either as bed or
shade; other vegetable growth there was none within sight. Men crawled
under waggons and water-carts if they were fortunate enough to find
themselves near them, or, unrolling their blankets, extended them as
an awning, and burrowed underneath. The oppression of that still heat!
Fifty yards away the atmosphere became a simmering mirage; the
outposts lost all semblance of nature's form, and stood out
exaggerated in the middle distance as great blurs of brown and black.
But it is only a passing inconvenience. In an hour or two the strength
of that great, fiery, pitiless sun will be on the wane: if it were
otherwise, then, indeed, would the Karoo be a desert. So you doze--it
is too hot to sleep--and thank Fortune that you have not to march
during the furnace hours of the day. And as you doze, parched and
sweating, a little blue-grey lizard pops out from beneath the cart
beside you, and, climbing gingerly up the stem of a solitary
karoo-bush, surveys you with great, thoughtful, unblinking eyes. He is
a complacent little beast, of wonderful skin and marking; and if it
were not for the palpitation of his white waistcoat, it had been
difficult to say he lived. You wonder if he too feels the heat. You
think he does; for he opens his pink maw and sways his sprig of
heather, to make for himself that breeze in the still air for which
you are panting. You close your eyes, and smile to think that such a
little thing as a karoo-blended lizard can interest you. A sound
catches your ear: it is the upbraiding note of the bustard. Again and
again you hear it. A covey of these birds must have been raised. As
the clatter of their cry dies away, you distinguish the muffled
strokes of a galloping horse. This is significant. No man in his
senses would gallop in this heat unless his mission was serious.
Nearer and nearer comes the horseman. You hate to move, though you
hear the rapid breathing of the horse and the complaints of chafing
leather.
"Where is headquarters?" demands a voice in authority.
Your dream and rest is over; for are you not the general's flunkey?
You jump to your feet.
"Where have you come from?"
_Orderly_ (_as he hands in a written message_). "From the officer
commanding the advance-guard." The message runs: "Patrol on left front
reports large force of Boers, estimated 500 strong, to be behind the
rise three miles to the right of the solitary flat-topped kopje on our
left front. Patrol has fallen back upon me."
This information is laid before the brigadier, who is half asleep
under the mess-cart.
_Brigadier._ "How far is the flat kopje from us?"
_Intelligence Officer._ "About four miles, sir."
_B._ "Intervening country?"
_I. O._ "Flat as a polo-ground, sir."
_B._ "Oh, send out a troop to get touch with them. I'll bet it's only
a flock of ostriches or a mirage. Tell the troop not to get
compromised if they should find Boers in greater strength than
themselves. Hold another troop and the pom-pom in readiness to
support, if there should be anything. But it's not reasonable that
there should be 500 Boers so near us at this hour. It is too late for
our Houwater friends, and too early for ole man Christian.[30]"
_I. O._ "Very good, sir."...
Almost immediately upon the despatch of the troop, the main body of
the co-operating command marched up to the clay pools. The two
generals met to discuss the situation. The meeting of generals in the
field nearly always lends itself to the picturesque. We know that it
is a favourite theme for the artist's brush. And even in this
utilitarian age, when the genius of man has shorn war of much of the
panoply with which the calling of arms is associated in peace, there
is something attractive in the sight of the communion of great
soldiers in the field. The glory of war is not all cock-feathers and
steel scabbards. In fact, the brilliant colours which blend so well
with the pasture-green and brick-red of Europe would offend the eye if
grouped upon the russet veldt--would seem as incongruous as a flamingo
perching upon a hay-rick. It is an interesting picture. The two
generals standing together a little apart from their staffs, which
mingle in friendly intercourse. The lines of dismounted orderlies
holding the horses from which the officers have just dismounted. The
senior general is a tall spare man, just overlapping the prime of
life. It is more than the powdered dust that makes his moustaches
appear so fair. He is a man careful of his personal appearance. From
head to foot his uniform of modest brown fits him as would a glove--to
borrow from the sayings of a fair cousin across the Atlantic,--the fit
of everything is so perfect that it looks as if he had been melted and
poured molten into a khaki casing. The sombre dirt colour is relieved
by the scarlet and gold upon his peaked cap and collar, and the long
string of kaleidoscopic ribbons on his breast which tells of many
tented fields--and maybe as many "fields of cloth-of-gold," for it
does not take war alone now to decorate the breast, or to bind
spur-straps across the instep of a knight. The brigadier stands in
contrast to his senior. He is as tall a man, more commanding in
carriage, but of very different temperament and gait. It is no studied
negligence which has arranged the careless inconsistency of his dress.
It is but the mind speaking through the person. He wears nothing that
has cost a tailor a minute's thought to shape. His staff cap is set
askew; his badges of staff distinction have obviously been sewn into
position by some unskilled craftsman--probably his soldier servant.
His tunic tells its own story of two years' campaigning in the rough;
while the Mauser pistol strapped to the nut-brown belt which Wilkinson
designed to carry a sword, speaks eloquently of the wearer's
appreciation of the latter weapon as part of a general officer's
service equipment. But as you look at the two--the one dandy and
smart, the other rough and workmanlike--you can feel the personality
of the junior, while the senior means no more to you than a clothier's
model. This may not convey much to the average layman. But
men--illiterate, uncultured, fighting men--see and appreciate all
this, and it means much to them. Know, therefore, that there is no
keener judge of human character and human mind than the cherub of the
gutter. It is from these gutter-snipe, grown into men, that the
fighting ranks of the great British army are filled.
The generals were discussing the situation, as far as their respective
staffs could discern from their speech and attitude, amicably enough,
though the brigadier was pressing some point. In reality he had
renewed his protest against his senior's decision of the morning, and
was endeavouring to influence him into a change of policy and plan.
But the stern usage of the service decrees that the public convenience
should be ordered by the man whose name ranges first upon the Army
List schedule, and that the junior should press his arguments in
deferential rather than aggressive language. But by dint of argument,
and some short reference to the senior members of the staff, a
compromise was arrived at in order to meet the wishes of the
brigadier.
_General._ "I tell you that I don't like it; neither do I see any
object in the move. After the handling which he has had from Plumer,
Prieska can be the only line open to De Wet."
_Brigadier._ "But all my information is in an opposite direction, sir.
It distinctly----"
_G._ "I don't think that your information is worth much. What can that
boy know about it? He has been gulled by all the old wives' fables on
the line of march."
_B._ "Well, sir, leaving De Wet out of the question--I have been
promised a convoy at Strydenburg, and I have yet to pick up my
brigade. A squadron of the 21st Dragoon Guards and the whole of the
Mount Nelson Light Horse, which Plumer has not assimilated, is now
straining every nerve to catch me up."
_G._ "When do you meet your convoy, and how far behind you are your
details?"
(Now the brigadier had invented the convoy on the spur of the moment.
It was true that he had been promised a convoy, but that promise had
not indicated Strydenburg as the rendezvous. But seeing that he had
scored a point he turned at once to the Intelligence officer.)
_B._ "When is our convoy due at Strydenburg?"
_Intelligence Officer._ "Possibly to-morrow evening, sir. The day
after to-morrow at the latest." (Luckily the Intelligence officer had
been following the conversation, and the answer came glibly enough.)
_G._ "H'm, that places another complexion upon it. But it is suicidal,
reckless, to allow convoys to meander about the veldt in this
inconsequent manner. What about your details?"
(The brigadier having struck a "lead," had wasted no time in figuring
out his estimates.)
_B._ "Well, sir, I would suggest that you let me halt here for to-day.
My details are just one day behind me now. They will catch me up
to-morrow. In the meantime I will send a strong patrol--a
reconnaissance rather--into Strydenburg, starting this afternoon, pick
up the convoy, after which I will join you at any point you may
select. I shall then be a useful fighting body; now I am only a gun
escort!"
_G._ "Yes, yes; it would be dangerous for either you or your details
to be wandering about in this disturbed country alone. _I_ agree with
you, Colonel; but you must allow that in view of the present
circumstances it would be inadvisable for us to be caught in detail."
One cannot blind oneself to the fact that all this is very childish.
But then the man who undertakes life in the army must be prepared to
be a schoolboy to the end of his service. It ill becomes a brigadier
or any officer wearing his Majesty's uniform--as the expression
goes--to practise small deceits even to bring about a situation
calculated to be for the public convenience. Yet what other course was
open to the brigadier! For reasons which are evident from his
conversation, his senior had determined not to recognise him as an
independent force, but to hug him until all danger real or imaginary
was past. It is the trammels of discipline such as this that breaks
the hearts of the stalwarts in our service, and racks the national
war-chest to the bottom. Can you blame the brigadier, alive to the
pressing exigency of the situation, when, having exhausted the
man-to-man arguments of common reason, he descended to the practice of
a subterfuge to defeat the purpose of a man whose only object appeared
to be to satisfy his own personal peace of mind? Yet we doubt if the
senior was conscious of the futility of his direction. He had one
object in view. He was possessed with the single desire to avoid
disaster. In its limited sense his action was laudable enough; but
what would the owner of a racehorse say to the jockey who, after
having ridden a sound horse in a race, volunteered the information
that he had never extended his mount out of consideration for its
sinews? The care of the jockey is parallel to that of fifty per cent
of the men who have led columns in this war--except that there has
been no judge in the box to balance the merits of each case. The judge
has been far away in Pretoria, and the jockey has furnished his own
estimate of the running....
So the New Cavalry Brigade remained out-spanned by the mud-holes,
while the other column passed through it and bore away in search of
the Prieska Road. The rearguard of the moving force was brought up by
a Colonial corps, which had originally been raised in Natal by the
brigadier of the New Cavalry Brigade. Of course the _personnel_ in the
ranks had long since changed. Changed, be it said with regret, for the
worse. But there was still remaining a small percentage of the
original stock--stock that had been second to none. As the rearguard
passed through, a great burly corporal cantered to the packing-case
table at which the staff of the New Cavalry Brigade had just settled
down to lunch, shouting, "Say, where is the ole man?"
The brigadier rose with a smile.
_Corporal._ "I heard that you were here, sir, and I couldn't go by
without speaking. Lord, what a sight for sore eyes it is to see you
again!--if there were only more like you. (_Then extending his hand._)
Come, sir, put your hand right here--it is a good day's work to have
again shaken hands with a man." And then the corporal was off in a
cloud of dust. But it had been an interesting and instructive
incident. Without a doubt the man was Yankee; but he had served all
through the Natal campaign, from Willow Grange to Bergendal, and his
honest appreciation of his old chief almost brought tears to our eyes,
and was of more value than all the ribbon and tinsel that a crowned
head can bestow.
"That," said the brigadier, "is one of the finest men, amongst many
fine men, whom I have enlisted. I was recruiting for my 'push' down in
Durban. I used to go and get the fellows off the ships as they came
in. That fellow came over with a man who was running a cargo of mules.
I well remember when I broached the subject to him. His answer was
characteristic: 'Say, colonel, what do you want us for? Is it for a
straight scrapping with Boers, or is it to meander about as a town
garrison?' 'If you join me you shall be "scrapping" in a week from
to-day.' 'Will you give me your hand on that, colonel?' I acquiesced,
and straightway was able to enlist practically the whole ship's
company--and I never want to command a better lot. Did I ever tell you
about the Boer spies? Well, in the early days of recruiting in Natal
several Dutch agents were enlisted. They were paid by the Transvaal to
enlist in British corps. When we got to Mooi River one of these men
was discovered--recognised as an ex-Pretorian detective. That corporal
came to me and volunteered some advice. 'You prove him a spy, colonel,
and then turn him over to us: you won't have any more spies after
that.' I had the suspect up. There was not a shadow of doubt about his
identity, so I just said to the sergeant-major, 'This man is your
property--the fair name of the corps is in your keeping; there's a
convenient donga over there!' I never saw the man again, nor did I ask
what happened to him; but this I do know, that on the self-same
evening five men came to me and asked to be allowed to resign. They
came with faces as white as the coat of that mare over there. 'Yes,' I
said as I looked at them, 'you may go. You leave for the good of all
concerned, yourselves included.' And since that day I was never
troubled by the enlisting of Dutch agents."...
"The best laid schemes o' mice and men
Gang aft a-gley,"
and the dust of the column moving towards the Prieska Road was still
hanging over the horizon when a staff-officer came galloping back to
the New Cavalry Brigade. He brought written instructions to the
brigadier which nullified for ever the Strydenburg scheme. "The G.O.C.
directs the O.C. the New Cavalry Brigade to remain halted until he is
joined by such details as are following him along the Britstown Road.
As it is essential that the pass over Minie Kloof should be kept clear
pending the arrival of the aforementioned details, the G.O.C. directs
that the proposed reconnaissance to Strydenburg be abandoned, and the
troops which would have been used for the reconnaissance be sent to
hold Minie Kloof. As soon as the New Cavalry Brigade is complete, it
will follow with all speed upon the direct road to Prieska. Under no
circumstances are other arrangements to be made."
The occasion was not opportune for an expression of the brigadier's
feelings, but his silence was eloquent. There was no hope for it: it
was a written order from a senior, and we had no choice but to obey.
It is said by some that Christian de Wet is the best general that the
war produced from the ranks of our enemy. It is not our present
intention to debate upon this subject; but this much can be said with
confidence, that he has been the most fortunate of leaders. On every
occasion in which he has been hard pressed, when to all intents and
purposes he has found himself at the end of his tether, the pendulum
of fortune has favoured him in its swing. Often enough he has saved
his skin through the culpable stupidity of his pursuers. But even when
he has almost been cornered by the very best of leaders and men that
the British Empire can produce, the law of chances has stood by him. A
meddling contradictory telegram from headquarters, a thunderstorm or a
swollen river, has times without number saved the slippery commandant
at the eleventh hour. Take the present instance. It subsequently
proved that if the brigadier had, as he intended, moved upon
Strydenburg, and arrived there on the same day that he was directed by
his superior officer to stand fast and hold the Minie Kloof, he would
have arrived at his goal practically simultaneously with the guerilla
chieftain. The New Cavalry Brigade would have borne down upon the
little Karoo hamlet, fresh and in the full spirit of men new to war
and "spoiling for the fight"; men just sufficiently blooded in their
preliminary skirmish to have confidence both in themselves and in
their general, and--and this is the exasperating nature of the
story--while the British troopers would have ridden robustly into
battle, De Wet and his following were in no condition to receive them.
Unprepared for the arrival of fresh troops, spoiled of guns, train,
and ammunition, kicked and harried by the gallant Plumer's tenacity,
riddled and torn by Nanton's armoured trains, harassed by Heneker and
Crabbe, panting for rest, they would have been no match for
blood-seeking dragoons and a Horse Artillery battery that had been
studying range-finding in South Africa ever since the battle of
Magersfontein. All we can do is to shrug our shoulders and say, "The
pity of it!" while we pay the extra twopence in the income-tax which
our confidence in effete leaders, and disinclination to recognise, and
make soldiers recognise, that our army is a national institution, has
cost us.
It so happens that in war the rank and file know little of what is
taking place, and, one is inclined to add, care less. Consequently
those in the brigade who had no knowledge of the state of affairs
existing with regard to Strydenburg were delighted at the prospect of
a halt. At this period of the campaign halts were rare, and men looked
to them in much the same spirit as the average house-holder in England
looks to a spring cleaning, since, provided there is water, an "off
afternoon" will allow of a little of the cleanliness which hard
trekking renders impossible. The Dragoon Guards had not been long
enough in the country to feel the necessity of a thorough overhaul of
their linen. But the Horse gunners were old soldiers, and as soon as
the intended halt became common knowledge the men stripped the shirts
off their backs and indulged in the luxury of sand-baths where water
was not available. This may appear a simple operation, but those who
have campaigned long upon the veldt will know that a change of clothes
exposes not the least of "the horrors of war."
But, halted or moving, there is no cessation of trouble and anxiety
for the staff of any unit engaged in active service, and when the
brigadier issued his orders to meet the instructions of his superior
officer, his acting staff-officer discovered that the column was two
troops short. One troop had been missing ever since the first day out
from Richmond Road, the other had lost itself that morning in Minie
Kloof. This may sound absurd, but it is not an isolated incident; and
if we are to believe the evidence of those who marched with the "Grand
Army" into Bloemfontein, it was not a matter then of troops that were
missing, but fifty per cent of the whole army, and so badly missing
that it took the quartermaster-general's department a fortnight of
solid labour to definitely find them. The inexperienced youth could
get no help from his brigadier. Since the arrival of the message from
the main column that officer had not been approachable. But with the
aid of the good-natured gunner major and the opportune return of the
troop which had been detached in the morning, as the brigadier had
surmised, on a wild-goose chase after a mirage, it was possible to
apportion some sort of a force capable of holding a salient in Minie
Kloof without totally denuding the camp of adequate fighting strength.
But it is on occasions such as these, when isolated detachments are
scattered broadcast, that disaster is courted. Luckily it is only once
in a hundred times that the enemy has been in a position to accept the
free gifts offered to them.
FOOTNOTES:
[30] Christian de Wet
VIII.
STILL POTTERING.
To the delight of the men and disgust of the brigadier, day broke
without bringing any further orders to the New Cavalry Brigade. So it
remained halted in the great open prairie which fringes the Beer Vlei.
It may also be conjectured that De Wet and his following, as they were
stripping the adjacent little township of Strydenburg, learned with
satisfaction that the British columns, which lay round him like the
spokes of a wheel to the axle, were as immobile as usual--Plumer from
the force of circumstances, the others for the reasons set down in the
preceding chapter. But the cunning guerilla had no intention of
dallying at Strydenburg. It was not part of his strategy to spend two
consecutive days in any one spot unless bent upon the reduction of a
garrison. Even British column commanders at times have been known to
shake off their lethargy. He just remained in the town long enough to
replenish his quartermaster's stores department and to take over the
fresh ponies which Hertzog had collected for him, and then moved north
in three columns, trusting to pass between the spokes of the imaginary
wheel before Plumer had collected himself. Brand, with a thin hedge of
Free Staters and rebels, was left as a decoy to cover Strydenburg,
while the three columns made for Marks Drift in the loop of the Orange
River, south-west of Kimberley. And as De Wet put the first day's plan
of these movements into progress, the New Cavalry Brigade, by order,
remained halted, covering the entrance to the pass at Minie Kloof.