Our next step was to see how crossing the river was carried out by the
cavalry. From information received we presented ourselves at a certain
spot on the river at a little before ten one morning. The official
attachés had received notice that a brigade of cavalry would swim the
river at this point at ten o'clock, and at ten o'clock their special
train was due to arrive there.
We were there, fortunately, half an hour beforehand, and we saw the
whole brigade come down to the river and file across a fairly deep
ford, where the horses got wet to some extent, but they did not swim.
On the far bank a few men were left behind. These, as it turned out,
were all the men and horses who could actually swim well, and as the
train arrived and the attachés disembarked on to the bank they found
the major part of the brigade already arrived, dripping wet, and the
remainder just swimming over at that moment.
Of course in their reports they stated that they had seen the whole
brigade swimming over. But this is how reports very often get about
which are not strictly true.