y grub (we had none, having devoured our
biscuits and emergency rations about three hours before, for which we
were severely reprimanded by our captain, the Hon. T. A. B.), we
proceeded again. At last we reached a ridge, and halting there, we
beheld the Rand, and about six miles to our left, Johannesburg. A
railway station having been captured, with about a dozen engines and
rolling stock, the Army bivouacked for the night. We were in a field by
a farmhouse, where we bought some meat very cheaply, and had a good
supper, which would have been all the better had we had bread or even
the once but now no more despised biscuits to eat with it. The next day
we received orders to join the 7th Battalion I.Y., so saddled up, and
passing through Elsburg and the Rose Dip, Primrose, and other mines,
joined our new Battalion at Germiston. The 7th I.Y. Battalion is a West
Country one, being composed of the Devon, Dorset, and Somerset Yeomanry
and has seen some stiff service at Dewetsdorp. In the afternoon I had
the misfortune to go out with our troop officer and another man to find
our 4th troop, which had been left behind as baggage guard. Us did he
lose (oh, the Yeomanry officer!) and when it was dark, we set out to
find our company in the great camp the other side of Elsburg. What I
said about that officer as I stumbled over rocks, ant hills, and holes,
in these, my cooler moments, it would not become my dignity to record.
The next day, Thursday (my birthday) promised to be an eventful one, and
was. Johannesburg was to be attacked if it did not surrender by ten
o'clock. With well-cleaned rifles and tightly-girthed horses, we moved
out with our Battalion at nine o'clock to take up our position. Our duty
was to attack the waterworks, if there was any resistance. However, as
you know, the place capitulated; news was brought to us that the fort
had surrendered, and we at once rapidly trotted up to it to take
possession. Arrived outside, we were dismounted and marched into it, and
drawn up in line facing the flagstaff on the fort wall. Suddenly a
little ball was run up to the truck, a jerk and the Flag of England, the
dear old Union Jack, was flying on the walls of the Johannesburg Fort.
Then we cheered for our Queen, and again, when from somewhere a chromo
of Her Gracious Majesty was produced and held aloft. Roberts' Raid had
been successful. The Boer garrison seemed more relieved than depressed.
Indeed, the commandant's servant gave us