"Have the same hatred for the Boers before the war as you have now?"
"Yes."
"Why didn't you pick up a rifle and have a hand in the fighting?"
"I'm not a blessed 'Tommy,' sir! Do you take me for a d---- 'Tommy,' sir?"
"No; oh, no, I assure you I did nothing of the kind. But--er, have you been
in the hands of the Boers since the war started?"
"Yes, until our troops marched in here a day or two ago."
"H'm. Did they rob you?"
"No."
"Did they ill-treat you--knock you about, and that sort of thing?"
"No."
"Why do you hate them so bitterly, then?"
"Oh, I can't stand a cursed Boer at any price. Thinks he's as good as a
Britisher all the time, and puts on side; and he's a cursed tyrant in his
heart, and would rub us out if he could."
"Yes, the Boer thought himself as good a man as the Britishers he met out
this way," I replied, "and he backed his opinion with his life and his
rifle. Why didn't you do the same if you reckoned yourself a better man?"
"Why should I; don't we pay 'Tommy' to do that for us?"
"Perhaps we do; but, concerning those Boer laagers you have been telling us
about: where, when, and how did you see them; what was the name of the
place; who was the Boer general in command, or the field cornet, or
landdrost? I did not know the Boers gave British refugees the free run of
their war laagers, and I'm interested in the matter, being a scribe myself
and a man of peace. Just give me a few names and dates and facts, will
you?"
"No, I won't," he snarled. "You seem to doubt my word, you do, and I'm as
good a Britisher as you are any day, and you think you can come along and
pump information out of me for nothing; but I'm too fly for that--they
don't breed fools in Yorkshire."
"Well, sir, as it seems to suit your temper," I said as sweetly as I could,
"I'll make it a business proposition. I'll bet you fifty pounds to five you
have never put your head inside a Boer laager in war time in your life. If
you have, just name it and give me a few facts."
The B.R. rose wrathfully and muttered something about it being a d---- good
job for me that I was a wounded man and had one arm in a sling, or he'd
show me a heap of things in the fistic line which I should remember for the
rest of my life; but as I only laughed he slouched off, and now, when we
meet in the street, we pass without speaking. But I got his history, all
the same, from one of the Cape Police, who told me the beggar had refused
to join a volunteer regiment when the war broke out, and had remained the
whole time in a quiet little Boer village as a British refugee, and had not
seen the outside, let alone the inside, of a Boer fighting laager in all
his lying life. Yet such cravens at times help to make history--of a kind.
Possibly it may interest Englishmen--and women, too, for that matter--to
know what a fighting laager is like, and as I have seen half a dozen of
them from the enemies' side of the wall, a rough pen and ink sketch may not
be amiss. In war time the Boer never, under any circumstances, makes his
laager in the open country if there are any kopjes about. No matter how
secure he may fancy himself from attack, no matter if there is not a foe
within fifty miles of him, the Boer commander always pitches his laager in
a place of safety between two parallel lines of hills, so that no attack
can be made upon him, either front or rear, without giving him an immense
advantage over the attacking force, even if the enemy is ten times as
strong in numbers. By this means the Boers make their laagers almost
impregnable. If they have a choice of ground, they pick a narrow ravine, or
gully, with a line of hills front and rear, covered with small rocky
boulders and bushes. They drive their waggons along the ravine, and make a
sort of rude breastwork across the gully with the waggons. In between these
waggons the women are placed for safety, for it is a noticeable fact that
very large numbers of women have followed their husbands and fathers to the
war, not to act as viragoes, not to play the wanton, not to unsex
themselves, not to handle the rifle, but to nurse the wounded, to comfort
the dying, and to lay out the dead. I have heard them singing round the
camp fires in the starlight, but it was hymns that they sang, not ribald
songs. I have seen them kneeling by the side of men in the moonlight, not
in wantonness, but in mercy, and many a man who wears the British uniform
to-day can bear me witness that I speak the truth.
The Boer never, if he can help it, allows himself to be separated from his
horse; and these hardy little animals, mostly about fifteen hands high, and
very lightly framed, are picketed close to the spot where the rider
deposits his rifle and blankets. If they allow them to graze on the
hillsides during the day, they run a rope through the halter near the
horse's muzzle, and tie it close above the knee-joint of the near fore-leg.
By this means the horse can graze in comfort, but cannot move away at any
pace beyond a slow walk, and so are easily caught and saddled if required
in a hurry. The oxen and sheep to be used for slaughtering purposes are
driven up close to the camp; a waggon or two is drawn across the ravine
above and below them, and they cannot then stampede if frightened by
anything, unless they climb the rocky heights on either side of them, which
they have small chance of doing, as the Kaffir herdsmen sleep on the hills
above them. Having pitched his laager, the commander sends out his scouts;
some amble off on horseback at a pace they call a "tripple"--a gait which
all the Boers educate their nags to adopt. It is not exactly an amble, but
a cousin to it, marvellously easy to the rider, whilst it enables the nag
to get over a wonderful lot of ground without knocking up. It also allows
the horse to pick his way amongst rocky ground, and so save his legs, where
an English, Indian, or Australian horse would be apt to cripple himself in
very short order. As soon as the mounted scouts set off on their journey,
holding the reins carelessly in the left hand, their handy little Mauser
rifles in their right, swaying carelessly in the saddle after the fashion
of all bush-riders the world over, the foot scouts take up their positions
amongst the rocks and shrubs on the hills in front and rear of the laager.
Each scout has his rifle in his hand, his pipe in his teeth, his bandolier
full of cartridges over his shoulder, and his scanty blanket under his left
arm. No fear of his sleeping at his post. He is fighting for honour, not
for pay; for home, not for glory; and he knows that on his acuteness the
lives of all may depend. He knows that his comrades and the women trust
him, and he values the trust as dearly as British soldier ever did. No
matter how tired he may be, no matter how famished, the Boer sentinel is
never faithless to his orders.
When the scouts are out the laager is fixed for the night--not a very
exhaustive proceeding, as the Boers do not go in for luxuries of any kind.
Here a tarpaulin is stretched over a kind of temporary ridge pole, blankets
are tossed down on the hard earth, saddles are used for pillows, and the
couch is complete. A little way farther down the line a rude canvas screen
is thrown over the wheels of a waggon, and a family, or rather husband and
wife, make themselves at home under the waggon; whilst the single men
simply throw themselves at full length on the ground, wrap their one thin,
small blanket round them, and smoke and jest merrily enough, whilst the
Kaffirs light the fires and make the coffee. There is scarcely any timber
in this part of Africa, and the fuel used is the dried manure of cattle
pressed into slabs about fifteen inches long, eight inches wide, and three
inches thick. The smoke from the fires is very dense, and soon fills the
air with a pungent odour, which is not unpleasant in the open, but would be
simply intolerable in a building. The coffee is soon made, and the simple
meal begins; it consists of "rusks," a kind of bread baked until it becomes
crisp and hard, and plenty of steaming hot coffee. I never saw any people
so fond of this beverage as the Boers are. The Australian bushman and
digger loves tea, and can almost exist upon it; but these Boers cling to
coffee. They live, when out in laager, like Spartans, they dress anyhow,
sleep anyhow, and eat just rusks and precious little else. Talk about
"Tommy" and his hard times, why a private soldier at the front sleeps
better, dresses better, and eats better than a Boer general; yet never once
did I hear a Boer complain of hardships. After tea the Boers sit about and
clean their rifles; the women move from one little group to another,
chatting cheerfully, but I saw nothing in their conduct, or in the conduct
of any man towards one of them, that would cause the most chaste matron in
Great Britain to blush or droop her eyes. There is in the laager an utter
absence of what we term soldierly discipline; men moved about, went and
came in a free and easy fashion, just as I have seen them do a thousand
times in diggers' camps. There was no saluting of officers, no stiffness,
no starch anywhere. The general lounges about with hands in pockets and
pipe in mouth; no one pays him any special deference. He talks to the men,
the striplings, and the women, and they talk back to him in a manner which
seems strange to a Britisher familiar to the ways of military camps. After
the chatting, the pridikant, or parson, if there is one in the laager,
raises his hands, and all listen with reverent faces whilst the man of God
utters a few words in a solemn, earnest tone; then all kneel, and a prayer
floats up towards the skies, and a few moments later the whole camp is
wrapped in sleep, nothing is heard but the neighing of horses, the lowing
of cattle, the bleating of sheep, and the occasional barking of a dog.
There is no clatter of arms, no ringing of bugles, no deep-toned challenge
of sentries, no footfall of changing pickets.
At regular intervals men rise silently from the ranks of the sleepers, pick
up their rifles noiselessly, and silently, like ghosts, slip out into the
deep shadows of the kopjes, and other men, equally silent, glide in from
posts they have been guarding, and stretch themselves out to snatch slumber
whilst they may. At dawn the men toss their blankets aside, and spring up
ready dressed, and move amongst their horses; the Kaffirs attend to the
morning meal, the everlasting rusks and coffee are served up, horses are
saddled, cattle are yoked to waggons, and in the twinkling of an eye the
camp is broken up, and the irregular army is on the march again, with
scouts guarding every pass in front, scouts watching (themselves unseen) on
every height. They travel fast, because they travel light; they use very
little water, because they find it impossible to move it from place to
place. Many critics charge them with habits of personal uncleanliness. It
is true that in their laagers one does not see as much soap and water used
as in our camps, but this is possibly due to want of opportunity as much as
to want of inclination. In sanitary matters they are neglectful. I did not
see a single latrine in any of their laagers, nor do I think they are in
the habit of making them, and to this cause and to no other I attribute the
large amount of fever in their ranks. They do not seem to understand the
first principles of the laws of sanitation, and had this season been a wet,
instead of a peculiarly dry one, I venture to assert that typhoid fever
would have wrought far more havoc amongst them than our rifles.
I saw no literature in laager except Bibles. I witnessed no sports of any
kind, and the only sport I heard them talk about was horse-racing. I saw no
gambling, heard no blasphemy, noticed no quarrelling or bickering, and can
only say, from my slight acquaintance with life in Boer laager in war time,
that it may be rough, it may be irksome, it may not be so fastidiously
clean as a feather-bed soldier might like it, but I have been in many
tougher, rougher places, and never heard anyone cry about it.