WASTED ENERGIES
MAFEKING, _November 22nd, 1899_.
Within a few weeks of Major Godley's daybreak attack upon the western
laager, it was decided to repeat the experiment against the main
position of the Boers upon the east side. Had this but come off, from
the estimate of the men and guns engaged, the movement would have been
as important as any which have taken place. It had been arranged to
open a general fire upon the emplacement of the hundred-pound gun and
the advanced trenches of the Boer position a short time before sunset,
since the closing of day would make it impossible for the enemy, in
the absence of aiming-posts and clinometers, to train their artillery
upon the town. Now that the enemy have begun to sap Mafeking by a
system of advanced galleries, the military authorities here have been
waiting for them to come within a certain radius of the town so that
we might counter-gallery their position and enfilade their trenches.
From their entrenchment at the brickfields, rather more than fifteen
hundred yards from the town, Boer sharpshooters have been sniping the
town with comparative impunity. When this plan was first projected,
natives, under Corporal Currie, Cape Police, were sent up the
river-bed, which runs at this particular point within three hundred
yards of the Boer flank, to build a trench as near as possible to the
position of the snipers in the brickfields. With the successful
execution of this piece of work the first steps towards the
contemplated reconnaissance had been taken, since this new post, which
was constructed under cover of night, completely outflanked the
advance trenches of the Boers. When they began to fire upon the town
in the morning they were somewhat surprised at receiving a volley from
what appeared to be little more than a mud heap. Corporal Currie and
his natives drove back the Boers from their advanced post in the
brickfields to the first line of trenches in their position, and so
long as we retained the river-bed post the brickfields ceased to give
shelter to the Boer sharpshooters; moreover, when the Boers had been
effectually quieted in the brickfields a little more of the original
conception was carried out. Captain Lord Charles Bentinck and A
squadron and Captain Fitzclarence with the Hotchkiss detachment were
sent to support the native outposts, while a seven-pound gun under
Lieutenant Daniels moved into an emplacement in the river-bed. Major
Panzera took command of the gun which was to support the Maxim under
Major Goold Adams in the north-east corner of the town. In conjunction
with this, the extreme eastern flank of the town was defended by a
detachment of the Cape Police with a Maxim, and a supplementary force
of the same police, under Inspector Marsh, were entrenched across the
eastern front of the native location. Thus upon Monday night were the
plans arranged. Shortly before midnight Major Panzera, who has charge
of the artillery, gave me a courteous permission to accompany
Lieutenant Daniels to his emplacement in the river-bed, from which
point it was possible to move to our advanced trenches further up the
stream. Mafeking had gone to rest when the gun started, and although
the wheels were padded and every precaution taken to muffle the noise,
it seemed that at any moment, the town would have been aroused. In a
little the immediate precincts of Mafeking had been left behind, and
the challenge of the last sentry answered. As we moved down to the
river-bed the gun detachment hung upon the rear of the gun straining
to prevent the shake and rumble of its descent. Silently we crept on;
no murmur of human voices, no steel rang a "care-creating" clatter, no
rumble of tumbril or gun broke through the darkness to the sentries of
the enemy; in about an hour the gentle lapping of the river told us
that the journey was at an end, and as we crossed the stream and
reached the party working upon the emplacement there was much feeling
of relief that the enemy had not sounded the alarm. While Lieutenant
Daniels arranged the emplacement of the gun, he permitted me to try my
hand at superintending native labour. There were thirty of them, who,
commencing about midnight, were to have completed by daybreak, the
task upon which they were engaged. It reminded me of the days at
college when the house whips stood over the team urging them and
coaching them in their game. There was every necessity for speed, and
as the night was cold one made the most of the opportunity. The
working party was divided into those with picks and those with
shovels--the one breaking up the ground, the others heaping up the
earthwork. In addition to the natives who were digging there was a
small party filling sacks with sand which, when they had been filled,
were piled up around the rapidly-rising parapet of the gun. As they
worked they sang, droning a war-song which seemed to give zest to
their labours. As an experience it was rather fine to feel that even
in this perfunctory fashion one was attempting work of some
importance. About the scene there was the usual feature of the veldt
by night: there was the subdued murmur of the waters tumbling gently
over stones or causing stray groups of bullrushes to shiver; then from
the bank there spread the veldt, rising in soft-clad hillocks, or
falling in snug hollows, the green expanse tinted with the silvery
light of the moon. Beyond ourselves and our cordon of sentries there
should have been no one, although occasionally we thought that, just
above the skyline, lights played about the shadowy outline of the Boer
gun. But if they heard us they took no notice, and as dawn broke
across the east the finishing touches to the gun were quickly given.
Brown earth was strewn upon the whitened patches of the bags which had
not been properly covered, the humidity of the fresh-turned soil
mingling with the fumes of working natives. For the night's work, as
we gathered our tools together, the best evidence of our labours was
the grim muzzle of the gun which leered through its embrasure. It
spoke defiance, and as the day which then was breaking, drew to its
close we should know whether its sense of might had been effectually
established. And so we returned to town talking upon the strength of
the emplacement and upon its strategic value. As we left the gun we
were alone, when suddenly, without a sound, the figure of the Colonel
was seen coming across the veldt. He passed us quickly, and as we
followed him we wondered what he knew, but before noon those who had
been informed of the contemplated attack had learned the news. As he
had crept up the lines he had passed detached parties of Boers
withdrawing from the extreme rear of their position. The explanation
was obvious, but he stayed until daybreak to make certain of his
ground, and by the light of early dawn the trenches which we were so
shortly to fire upon were found deserted. Thus do the spies work
within our camp, taking to the enemy news of everything which
happened, and thus does the Colonel circumvent them. However, if we
did not attack them with our guns, for the remainder of the day the
advanced squadrons in the river-bed justified their position by
keeping down the crew from the big gun. They poured in volleys at
1,400 yards, and, for the first time in the siege, no shells were
thrown. As they retired from their trenches, so they withdrew their
gun, and we had a day of peace.
But how wearily the time passes; moreover we are still enduring the
straits of a siege and the torments of a bombardment. For almost seven
weeks we have defied an enemy who encircle us upon every side, and who
has summoned to its aid, for the purposes of breaching our trivial
earthworks, the finest guns from their arsenal in Pretoria. The Boers
outnumber us in men and in artillery, and not a day has passed since
the siege began that they have not thrown shrapnel and common shell,
omitting minor projectiles, into the town. And still we live, with
just sufficient spirit to jeer across our ramparts at the enemy. They
Mauser us, and shell us; they cut our water off, and raid our cattle;
they make life hell, and they can do so, so long as it may please
them; but no one was ever so deluded if they think that by such means
Mafeking surrenders. From time to time we have given them a taste of
our quality, and if on occasion we have lost some few, it is a source
of melancholy satisfaction to know that their loss has been the
greater. It is not long since the Boers attempted to blow the town to
atoms through the agency of dynamite, though, _similia similibus
curantur_, they went to heaven prematurely by an undesirable
explosion. It was night, and the town was just about to rest, when it
was shaken to its foundations by a most deafening roar; sand and
stones, fragments of trees came down as hail from the skies, the whole
place being lighted with the lurid glow of blood-red flame. To the
north of Mafeking, and so close to the cemetery that it might have
been a pillar of fire coming to earth to claim its own, an immense arc
of fire and smoke was ejected out of the ground. After it there came
silence, broken here and there by the rattle of the _debris_ upon the
roofs of the houses, and by the shouts and shrieks of a town in the
confusion of a panic. That night those who slept had dreams of the day
of judgment, while those who lay awake were restless, quaking with an
insidious terror. In the morning the cause explained itself, since
barely half a mile up the line was an enormous rent in the ground, the
line itself being strewn and scattered with the rubbish of an
earthquake. The Boers, with much ingenuous enterprise, had despatched
upon a purely friendly mission a trolly load of dynamite;
unfortunately, where they had started their infernal machine the
declivity of the line had precipitated the truck backwards toward
their own camp, and having very foolishly lighted their time-fuse
before they had surmounted the crest of the rise, they had not the
courage to stop the progress of the somewhat novel engine of
destruction. Apparently it had rolled slowly downwards, tracking the
instigators of such a deed with very fatal persistence, until the
time-fuse met the charge, and powder and dynamite went off together.
Upon the morrow there was much sadness in the Boer camp, and much
silence.
Dynamite has played a not unimportant _role_ in the history of our
siege. Cronje has heard from native spies, and from his friends in our
camp, that Mafeking is set within a circle of dynamite mines, and he
has protested against its use in civilised warfare. Since then,
however, he has not only discharged dynamite by trolly loads into the
town, but he has threatened, in his vague and shadowy fashion, to send
to his capital for some dynamite guns. It would seem, then, that a
warm time is coming to Mafeking; the pity of it being that we are kept
so long and in such unnecessary suspense. If Cronje were the gallant
warrior whose dignity he assumes in addressing the garrison, he would
have either taken or abandoned Mafeking some weeks ago. As it is,
however, with occasional letters of regret for such untimely
procedure, he still elects to bombard an inoffensive and unoffending
township. The other morning, after the usual series of dull days, the
activity in the Boer camp suggested to us that the town was about to
be attacked. From the south-west the big Creusot opened fire at
intervals of twenty minutes, the intervening periods being pleasantly
filled in with Mauser and Martini fire and shells from two nine-pound
high-velocity Krupps. In a very short space of time the list of
fatalities included a native dog, a commissariat mule, and many
buildings. After such a bloodless bombardment the Boer legions
gallantly rode round to the east with the apparent intention of
attacking the town. Then we thought that, in that moment, our defence
would be justified, but he is wisest who determines what is to be the
nature of the Boer movement when that movement has taken place. Down
the serried lines of armed Dutchmen old Piet Cronje, as his friends
call him, or General Cronje, as a sycophantian Boer press describe
him, rode. He was a gallant sight--albeit we could only just see him
some two thousand yards distant. After a temporary and casual
inspection of his force, General Cronje turned his head towards
Mafeking, and waving violently one arm in the air, cantered with much
solemn apprehension towards our trenches. He had covered in this
desperate effort some thirty yards, when perhaps a natural
superstition caused him to turn his head. Was there a man dismayed in
the Boer lines? Not one; but nevertheless, they were not taking any
such manoeuvre just then. Cronje stopped and cantered back again,
seeming to hold an indaba with his petty officers. They gathered round
him, they talked to him, pointing towards their lines, and shouting at
one another; but there it ended. In a little while we saw a silent
figure, moody and taciturn, guarded by two orderlies, ride slowly
around from the east front to the headquarters of the executive on the
south-west. Thus Cronje failed, not through any fault of his, but
because the idle braggarts who form his army have not the spirit of
whipped curs. Since then Cronje has made no effort to storm Mafeking,
and it is very much to be doubted whether until the siege be raised
the attempt will be renewed.
One must sympathise a little with Cronje since he has not been able to
sustain in his attack upon Mafeking the high reputation which he
enjoys among his countrymen. Now that he has been recalled to Natal,
we here hope that he may be able to find some opportunity to
distinguish himself. His force without Mafeking is a raw, lawless body
of Western Boers, the majority of whom have followed him on his march.
We say Natal, but there is no very positive ground for believing that
it is in that direction that the new field of his activity lies. It
may be that he has gone South, and if such should happen to be the
case, it will not be long before he will come in contact with men who
will test his mettle to the utmost. There have been many rumours of
reinforcements: some people, addicted with a greater faculty of
imagination than power of veracity, have even seen the advanced
outposts of the relief, which, of course, is ridiculous. They mistake
some scattered party of Boers for advanced scouts. We do not think
that there is much real chance of the siege of Mafeking being raised
before the New Year, since such would be opposed to the stately and
insular procedure of the Imperial and Colonial War Offices. Hitherto
it has apparently ignored the claims of Mafeking. All conditions of
people here united in their efforts to secure some more or less
reliable armament from the Government, but the reason, above all
others, which made this impossible was that the Imperial authorities
at home, in their fatuity, could not bring themselves to believe that
the war, which South Africa knew to be imminent, would come to pass.
Nevertheless, in face of their neglect, we are snug in Mafeking,
although our artillery be hopeless; and since the war began we have
gradually added to our defences. After many days' bombardment a
breach was effected in one only of the town's earthworks. That was
very quickly repaired, so quickly indeed that before nightfall it had
already been restored.