they were able to turn round and attend to their own personal comfort,
to change their under-clothes and to sort their kits. The soldier man
on service loves to sort his kit. The very fact that he is able to
shake out his modest bag to the bottom spells "holiday," and in
latter-day trekking holidays for the men were rare. But even holidays
can bring their heart-burnings, and about the breakfast-hour a howl of
despair went up from the Horse Artillery lines. A casual stroll
through the ankle-deep heather to Freddy's quarters repaid those
sightseers who had energy enough to be interested in camp excitements.
The horse-gunner major had long felt annoyance at the turnout of his
Kaffir boys and teamsters. The predominant attribute of the Kaffir is
vanity, an attribute which he possesses in common with all savages and
most white men. The reason for this vanity we will not pursue, as we
have nothing to do with the ethics of masculine conceit: it is
sufficient for this history that it exists. Vanity has caused the
Kaffirs of South Africa to acquire about fifty per cent of the British
army tunics which have landed in that continent. Thomas Atkins, as a
rule, is not over-blessed with money, consequently he cannot resist
the temptation of the five golden sovereigns which the Kaffir is
prepared to give for any scarlet tunic which is not in the last stage
of decay. The transfer of uniform came to such a pitch that an army
order was issued on the subject. Not that an army order was sufficient
to stay the general traffic in British uniforms, but it furnished such
right-minded soldiers as the horse-gunner major with the "cue" which
they required. Freddy's Kaffirs had struck a new and green regiment,
and being themselves near the end of a six months' contract, they were
"full of money." Consequently at Britstown, where money had possessed
extra fascinations for the British soldier, the "boys" attached to the
battery had been able to lay in a very complete outfit in Line
regimentals. The halt gave Freddy his opportunity, and he had every
kit laid bare. The revelation was wonderful. There was not a driver or
_voor looper_ who had not his scarlet jerkin. Many, indeed, had two,
to say nothing of forage-caps, field-service caps, dragoon overalls,
and gunner slacks. The Kaffirs had at first looked upon the kit
inspection as a joke. But they lapsed into a puzzled silence when they
saw their belongings cast upon a common heap. Their great white eyes
grew bigger and bigger, and their repulsive lips wider and wider
apart, until, when the last bag had been ransacked, the torch was
applied to the pile of clothing. Then they realised the blasting of
all their hopes, and with one accord they gave vent to the despairing
yell which had attracted the attention of the camp. They became like
men possessed. Smiting themselves heavily upon the head with their
fists, they went through the paroxysms of negroid lamentation. One
could almost feel for them, great bronzed children that they are. They
had worked hard for months, shared the privations and dangers of war
with the white men, in order that they might return to their kraals
bedecked as they thought in all the glory of the white man's clothes.
To them the Utopia of life would have been their homecoming. The
admiration of chattering women, the acclamation of piccaninies, and
the hideous smile of their paramount chief as they humbly presented
him with a battered helmet in a semi-decayed state of pipe-clay
finish. But Freddy was no philanthropist when the honour of the
uniform which his family had worn for two centuries was at stake. And
he was right. The dignity of the King's uniform is precious before all
philanthropy: "These brutes in Gunner Uniform--never! They may keep
their kharki; but I will not have our uniform outraged in my battery,
whatever other people may think!"
The native question throughout the war has furnished an interesting
study. It cannot be claimed that, under the circumstances existing in
South Africa, good will result from this tremendous struggle for
existence and paramountcy between two white races. It must always be
remembered that South Africa will, similarly with India, be held by
the dominant white race with the sword. It is not for us to trace here
what troubles may be in store for the white races in the far future.
The situation in the present and near future appears unsatisfactory
enough. The untutored mind of the Ethiopian does not appreciate the
finer ethics of social intercourse and the equality of mankind.
Freedom to his reasoning means independence; to possess independence,
to the semi-savage, is a proof of power. The inherent vanity of the
aboriginal then finds scope, and the nation which cringed and quailed
under the sjambok of the Boer will be the first to rebel against the
equity of the Briton. And what have we done during these long months
of military occupation to counteract the evil effects of war. Nothing:
Briton-like we have selected to work upon exterior lines. We have
lived in the present, secure for the future. Who has attempted to
follow the train of thought which has been uppermost in the native
mind? Yet it would have been simple enough to have analysed their
minds. Will it not have been somewhat of this kind?--"The Boers were
few and the British were many. Yet it has taken the British months to
stamp out the Boers who were few. Moreover, we have done all the
scouting for the British--without us they themselves could have done
nothing. Also of what value are the British soldiers? They are paid
30s. a-month. We--and we are black men--are paid by the British £3 and
£4 a-month. Therefore we must be twice or three times as good as the
British soldiers! And look how the British treat us. How different to
the treatment we received at the hands of the Boers. The British must
be afraid of us!" And in the abstract this reasoning is sound. We do
treat the native as if we were afraid of him. We do treat him so that
he might justly compare himself favourably with the British soldier.
We take it for granted that this illiterate black son of the south
will know, as we do, all the troubles and standards of the labour
market: will discern the reason, which to us is obvious, of his
princely pay. But this is where our crass stupidity overtakes us. The
native does not arrive at his conclusions through the same channel of
thought as we do ourselves. How could he? And as we only use him to
suit our own convenience, and remain reckless of the interpretation
which he places upon our actions, we shall only have ourselves to
blame, when, having pandered to the inherent vanity of the black, we
suddenly find him at our throats. Not that we believe that the natives
are sufficiently advanced to render our hold in the country insecure.
But they have been pampered by us enough to make them imagine vain
things, and vain imaginings may result at no distant period in a
repetition of that rapine, pillage, and massacre of isolated white
settlements, which has ever furnished the saddest stones in the cairn
of our great Empire.
As the sun rose it brought news from the Prieska Road. The helio
twinkled out another message from the general: "Good water at
Rietvlei, four miles on. Move on to Rietvlei, form your brigade there,
and await orders from me." Almost at the same moment the helio from
the summit of Minie Kloof called us up. "Have brought along two
squadrons of the Mount Nelson Light Horse and a troop of the 21st
King's Dragoon Guards. Pushing on as fast as possible"--signed,
"Brigade-Major New Cavalry Brigade."
The brigadier appeared completely uninterested. He received the
information of his coming reinforcement and the general's latest
orders without comment, and having eaten his breakfast, returned to
his tent. For the time being the brigade had become a cipher. The only
really satisfied person in the camp seemed to be the Intelligence
officer, who saw in the arrival of the real brigade-major an end to
the multiform duties which had been thrust upon him. The brigade stood
fast, and presently, riding out of an almost opaque pillar of dust,
the brigade-major and his detached command came meandering into camp.
The arrival of the reinforcement moved the camp to interest. Much had
been heard of the Mount Nelson Light Horse, which had been specially
raised against Lord Kitchener's demand for more mounted men. The Mount
Nelson Light Horse rode into camp. The gunners, who had turned out _en
masse_ to welcome their comrades, just put their hands in their
breeches pockets and turned away with the single interjection, "Good
heavens!" The dragoons, who were younger soldiers and less versed in
veldt lore than the gunners, essayed a cheer. A fitful answer came
back from the dusty arrivals--it might have been compared with the
foreign cackle by which the clients of a Soho boarding-house give
voice to their admiration of the tune of the dinner-gong. The
brigadier came out of his tent and stood in the open, bareheaded and
in his shirt-sleeves. Soldier without ribbons--frank, open, and
gallant English gentleman. His expert eye ran down the ragged ranks
of his newly acquired legion. He had commanded Colonials during the
hardest fighting in Natal. The Dragoons might not be judges, but
nothing escaped his time-tested eye. He caught each detail, the
Semitic outline of half the profiles, the nervous saddlepoise of the
twice-attested Peruvian, the hang-dog look of the few true men among
the ranks, who shrank that a soldier should find them in their present
associations. The brigadier's moustache ill hid the working of his
mouth. Then the ludicrous setting of the scene appealed to his
light-hearted nature, and, laughing heartily, he turned to his staff
with the single comment, "Gadzooks! they conspire against the fame of
my fair name. There is only one place in the wide world that I can
lead that 'push' to, and its name is Stellenbosch!"
But if the Mount Nelson Light Horse couldn't fight, they could talk.
They were full of second-hand blood. Had not a troop of theirs been
captured by De Wet, had not their men and officer witnessed De Wet's
cold-blooded outrage upon a British officer! All this was news to the
New Cavalry Brigade, and in view of a popular desire to lionise De
Wet, it will not be ill-advised to put the history of his action upon
record. We will not refer to the cruel murder of Morgenthal,
precedented in modern history by the murder of Macnaghten by Ackbar
Khan, or the pitiless treatment of the prisoners taken at Dewetsdorp
in December 1900. To us this one incident is sufficient. When De Wet
crossed to the south of the Orange River in the vicinity of Norval's
Pont the troops which Lyttelton set in operation against him from
Colesberg were too late to head him, and in the course of his
doubling--and De Wet broke back with considerable skill--he captured a
small proportion of his pursuers. These men having been pilfered of
much of their wearing apparel, including boots, could only with the
greatest difficulty keep pace with the rapid movements of their
captors. It must be remembered that the sleuth-hound, Plumer, was on
De Wet's trail, and the Boers had no time to waste if they were to
evade him. There came a time when the half-starved, almost naked, and
footsore prisoners could move no more. All the food that they had been
given was in live kind,--sheep that they had to kill, quarter, and
dress themselves. Cooking was out of the question, as the elements
were against them, even if they had possessed the necessary
appliances. Half-way through an exhausting march--flight would perhaps
better describe the nature of the movement--these wretched prisoners
lay down, and refused to move another foot. The threats and chiding of
their escort were in vain. Then some one rode forward and informed De
Wet. The guerilla captain galloped back to the tail of the column,
and, worked up into a paroxysm of rage, demanded the senior officer
amongst the British prisoners. A tall English gentleman stepped
forward.[31] In a moment the guerilla's arm was raised, and the cruel
sjambok of rhinoceros-hide fell across the Englishman's face, leaving
a great blue weal. The arm was raised for a second blow; but the
Englishman, prisoner though he was, and though his life hung in the
balance, closed with his brutal captor. Other Boers, doubtless feeling
the sting of the blow as keenly as the recipient, separated the pair
before the unarmed Englishman found the ruffian's throat. But the
blow had been struck,--an unarmed prisoner of officer rank had been
chastised, an act of savagery fit to rank with the cold-blooded murder
of an envoy. Yet the day will doubtless come when ignorant English
people will vie with each other to do honour to the man who struck the
miscreant blow. They will be persons ignorant of the feeling which
permeated the army in South Africa. As the news spread round the camp,
by common consent it was agreed that De Wet should never be handed up
alive if it fell to the lot of the New Cavalry Brigade to bring him to
his knees.
In obedience to the superior command, the whole brigade in the
afternoon sauntered on the four miles set down in the general's
message. The day had been a repetition of the one which had preceded
it--one of those burning karoo afternoons, which seem to sap the very
soul out of all things living. The feeling of dejection which pervaded
the staff seemed to have communicated itself to the whole column, and
the New Cavalry Brigade slunk rather than marched into camp. It was
not a cheerful camping-ground--a solitary farm-house of the poorest
construction, and two shallow, slimy pools of water were the only
attractions which it could claim. The men soberly fixed their
horse-lines, and rolled over to sweat out the trials of the heat until
sundown. The brigadier, who was still in his Achilles mood, retired to
his waggon. The new brigade-major, who was the only man with any
spirits left at all, busied himself with arranging for the
night-pickets and nursing the Mount Nelson Light Horse. But over a
bowl of tea, which the mess-servants arranged by four o'clock, the
brigadier seemed to revive; and he had just become approachable when
the colonel of the newly arrived contingent sauntered up to the
mess-waggon,--a big, rather ungainly man, who arrived with all the
self-assurance of one in authority.
_Colonel_ (_looking round the group of officers at tea and singling
out the Brigade-Major, whom he knew_). "Which is the brigadier?"
_Brigadier_ (_who had totalled the new-comer's checks in one brief
glance_). "I am that unfortunate. What can I do for you?"
_C._ (_saluting casually_) "Glad to meet you, sir; I thought that I
would come round to introduce myself--especially as I have some bad
news!"
_B._ "A truly noble action, and one which is likely to ingratiate you
here. What is it?"
_C._ "Nothing more or less than my men and horses are dead-beat. They
will have to halt here at least two days before they will be fit to
move. I have----"
_B._ "My dear colonel, have some tea; or perhaps you would prefer some
whisky-and-sparklet? You bring me the best news that I have heard
to-day!"
_C._ "Thank you, sir; but I am serious about----"
_B._ "Of course, of course you are serious, and I should have been
delighted to have left you and your regiment here as long as you
pleased--the longer the better. Only I shall probably have orders to
move with my whole force before daybreak, and that being the case, I
am afraid that your 'robbers' will have to move too, 'dead-beat' or
not."
_C._ "But I assure you, sir----"
_B._ "There is no need to assure me of anything, colonel. I have
absolute confidence in your knowledge of the state of inefficiency
existing in your regiment. Only I will beg you to remember in future
that I am the judge as to the capabilities of movement of the units
composing this column. But let us discuss the prospects of peace, or
some other less abstruse subject than the Mount Nelson Light Horse. In
the meantime, colonel, just to emphasise what I have said, my
Intelligence officer has orders to go out to those farms over there to
see if he can get suitable guides. I have ordered him to take a troop
of your men. He will start in fifteen minutes. Won't you stay for your
drink?" (The lion of the slouch-hat persuasion was reduced to the
lamb; he saluted, and sidled away while the brigadier replenished his
tea-cup.)
_Brigade-Major._ "That is about his size, sir. He has been more
trouble to me in my march from Hanover Road than the whole of the
truck, ox-waggons included."
_B._ "I know them. I knew that man's character from the tilt of his
hat and the cut of his breeches. He will probably prove a good
swashbuckler if kept in his place. But he came up here to divide
authority with me, and only one man can command this crush, and only
one man is going to. These fellows, if you let them, always become
saucy as soon as they pin ostrich feathers into their hats. They are
welcome to the feathers, but they must drop the sauce. So cut along,
Mr Intelligence, and see that you get that troop up to time. I don't
mind if you lose it; but you must be back yourself sometime to-night.
I want a reliable guide to take me anywhere within a radius of twenty
miles, and all the information that you can incidentally pick up. If
we hang about here much longer, we shall find ourselves let in for a
night-attack, and a night-attack with a Town Guard crowd like my new
addition is to be avoided."
The Intelligence officer went off to find the Tiger and get his horse
saddled up. He had reverted to his legitimate duties at once, and was
not sorry that the brigadier had detailed him for this particular
duty, though he felt that his mission had been designed rather as a
lesson to the colonel of the Mount Nelson Light Horse than as a
necessary precaution for the safety of the camp. But it took the
troop a powerful long time to turn out, and when at last twenty men
were mounted, they looked for all the world as if they were a party of
criminals about to be driven to the scaffold. The Tiger whispered to
the Intelligence officer--"We shall have to go easy with these
fellows. If we were not here, they would march out of camp with both
hands above their heads. They are the class of men who will become
panic-stricken at a dust-devil, and surrender to the first
cock-ostrich they meet!"
This may have been an exaggeration. There were some good men in the
corps, men who had fought well in the earlier days of the campaign.
But they were few and far between, and as events were to show, there
were not sufficient of the proper stamina to leaven the whole.
The farms which the brigadier had indicated were situated at the foot
of a spur of rocky excrescence which ploughed into the veldt from the
north of Minie Kloof. They were only five miles from the camp. But
that five miles proved too much for the escort. Whether it was
physical weakness or incipient mutiny it matters little. The men just
crawled along. So slow was the progress that the Intelligence officer,
afraid of being benighted, selected four of the better mounted from
the troop and pressed on to his objective, leaving the escort to
follow at such pace as they found convenient. The first farm lay in a
small kloof right against the hillside, and the approach was so masked
that the little party of scouts rode to within two hundred yards of
its whitewashed front without as they thought declaring themselves. A
rise in the ground and a hillock gave all the cover that the Tiger
deemed necessary, and he suggested that the four troopers should be
sent up a donga, which would enable them to climb the reverse of a
second hill which overlooked the farm, while he himself went forward,
covered by the rifle of the Intelligence officer from their present
position. To the first part of the scheme the Intelligence officer
agreed, but he reversed the order of the latter arrangement. Having
seen the troopers well on their way, he left the Tiger to cover the
advance, and rode leisurely himself towards the farm. It was a very
ordinary farm--not flush with the ground, but standing on a plinth of
brick like an Indian bungalow. A great solemn quietness reigned over
the whole kloof, not a living soul was visible, and the footfalls of
the horse sounded strangely exaggerated as the solitary rider
approached the verandah. Presently a dog stirred, trotted out into the
sunlight, and barked furiously. It disturbed the inmates of the house;
a girl hurriedly opened the upper swing-back of the door, looked out,
and then closed the door with a bang. This was suspicious, and the
Intelligence officer let his hand drop to the wooden case of the
Mauser pistol strapped to his holster; his thumb pressed the catch,
and he threw the pistol loose, keeping his hand upon its stock. Then
to his shout of "_Wie dar!_" the upper portion of the door was again
gingerly opened. The same face appeared, that of a round blue-eyed
Dutch girl. She turned her impassive gaze upon the visitor, who, by
way of opening the conversation, taxed his limited knowledge of the
vernacular so far as to ask for a little milk.
"Milk!" the girl answered in passable English. "Yes; I will get you
milk. Just wait!"
She seemed a long time finding the milk, and the Intelligence officer
began to feel the situation oppressive. He would have liked to have
turned his head to see if there were any sign of his troopers being in
position on the hill above him. But he had that indescribable feeling
which often inspires a man with the belief that his every movement is
being watched by unseen eyes. Those of you who have been
tiger-shooting on foot will readily appreciate the nature of this
sense. Yet, though he peered through the open door, his eyes could
discern no movement or his ears any incriminating sound. Presently the
girl returned with a glass of milk upon a tray. She opened the lower
half of the door, and came demurely to the edge of the verandah. The
Intelligence officer put out his hand to receive the glass, when in a
moment the girl lowered her elbow and soused the contents of the glass
full into his face.
"Hands up!" in stentorian tones from the doorway; and through a white
mist of milk, the Englishman had a vision of the business end of two
rifles pointed at him at short range, held by rough bearded customers,
and of a white-faced girl convulsed in laughter. The sobering effect
of the metal throat of a rifle a few inches removed from your breast
is considerable, and the Intelligence officer was a captured man. But
for a moment only. Something swished past his ear, and a great star
appeared in the white-washed plaster, just a foot above the Dutchmen's
heads. The Tiger had risen to the situation. The girl's laughter died
out, the two men ducked, and made instinctively for the cover of the
door. The Intelligence officer had an eighth of a second in which to
make up his mind. To have been truly sensational he should have
covered the Burghers with his Mauser; but he was more practical, and
by the time the men recovered their equanimity he was galloping as
fast as his pony could lay legs to the ground back to the hillock
where the Tiger was lying ensconced. Then he realised the extent of
the hornet's nest into which he had blundered. Rifles cracked to right
and left of him, like stock-whips in a cattle-run. But it is hard to
hit a moving body. Many who took part in the battle of Omdurman will
remember how a single Emir on a scarecrow of a horse galloped
unscathed along the whole length of the British division advancing
round the base of Jebel Surgham, though every man in the firing-line
did his best to bring him down. Similarly the Intelligence officer
braved the gauntlet, and reached temporary security round the base of
the Tiger's hillock without harm. There was no time to waste. The
Tiger was down to his horse and mounted almost before his officer
realised he was safe.
_Tiger._ "Come along, sir; it's been a near thing, but we have just
time if we gallop for it!"
_Intelligence Officer._ "But the flanking party; we must not desert
them!"
_T._ "We can do them no good. They must take their chance--for God's
sake, gallop, sir!"
The Tiger indeed spoke the truth; it was a near thing. They had not
placed a hundred yards between them and the hillock when dismounted
enemy were at the top, and the ground round the fugitives throwing up
little puffs of dust as the bullets struck.
Their luck was in, and after a perilous three minutes, they were clear
of immediate danger, as the popping of rifles from the rise in front
of them gave evidence that the officer in charge of the supporting
troop had risen to the occasion. If he had been a better soldier, he
might have lain low, and let the fugitives entice their pursuers after
them to their own destruction. But this had not occurred to the youth
who had recently changed the pestle and mortar of a chemist's
dispensary for the sword of a mounted infantry leader, and he did his
best, in a suitably excited manner.
The Tiger's story was interesting. "Just as you halted at the farm,
sir, I caught sight of the glint of a rifle on the top of the hill
which we had sent the troopers to occupy. As I knew that it could not
be our own men, I at once realised that we were in for it. They had
seen us coming. I knew that the troopers were lost men--the Boers
would let them blunder up the kopje, and when they arrived at the top,
utterly blown and useless, would disarm them without firing a shot.
Everything now depended upon the chance of my having escaped notice.
It was impossible to warn you without firing my rifle, so I looked
round to see if I was being stalked. I could see no one on my track,
so I just lay still and waited developments at the farmhouse. I saw
the girl throw the milk, and I then calculated that a shot placed
between you and the men would so disconcert them for the moment that
you could be able to get away.
"As soon as you turned, the fat was into the fire, and I found that
they were lying up for us all round. It was a mercy that they never
spotted me before I fired. I suppose they concluded that five went
with the flank scouts instead of four only. Anyhow, there must have
been quite thirty of them, and we now know that they are there."...
"Well, young feller!" said the brigadier when the Intelligence officer
reported himself, "what has all the shooting been about?"
He listened to the story, and remained thoughtful for a moment. Then
he handed the Intelligence officer a message, which ran as follows:--
"From De Wet Expert, Hopetown, to O.C. New Cavalry Brigade, Prieska or
vicinity.
"De Wet was at Strydenburg last night. Repeat to," &c.
_Brigadier._ "What do you think of that?"
_Intelligence Officer._ "We have lost a big thing. But may we not be
in the right position to-night? It seems to me that I must have run my
head right into them."
_B._ "I am afraid not. We have just touched up the 'red herring'; but,
great Scot! what a chance has been taken from me. Argue it out.
Balance the probabilities. This is what I make it. Hertzog joined De
Wet at Strydenburg last night. Hertzog joined him with the information
that three columns had moved out of Britstown, by way of Minie Kloof.
Three columns would be too much for De Wet in his dilapidated state;
so he has just thrown out a patrol to observe us, while he has struck
elsewhere. If he is still intent on going south, he will pass between
Britstown and De Aar. But I doubt if he tries the seaboard trick. If
I know him, he will double back along his original line. He is a sly
old fox. You may bet all you are worth that you blundered into his
observation patrol, and that we have lost the best chance of the whole
war simply through the idiosyncrasies of a stupid old man. I shall not
trouble about your friends any more to-night!"