he long whips going like pistol-shots. The
whole thing suggests more a national migration than the march of an
army. And ever on the horizon hang new clouds of dust, and on distant
slopes the scattered advance guards of new columns dribble into view. I
fancy the Huns or the Goths, in one of their vast tribal invasions, may
have moved like this. Or you might liken us to the dusty pilgrims on
some great caravan route with Pretoria for our Mecca.

We crossed the Vaal at Lindiquies Drift, being now on the west flank,
and met the Boers the day before yesterday two miles from here on the
West Rand. The fight was a sharp one. They were in a strong position on
some ridges, not steep, but with good cover among stones and rocks. We
came at them from the west, having made a circuit. Our advance was
hidden by the rolling of the ground, but the enemy guessed it, and sent
a few shells at a venture, which came screaming along and buried
themselves in the ground without doing much damage that I could see
beyond knocking a Cape cart to pieces. By 2 P.M. we had crawled up the
valley side and got several batteries of artillery where they could
shell the Boer position. The two great "cow-guns," so called from the
long teams of oxen that drag them, were hauled up the slope. The enemy
got an inkling of our intention now, and his shells began to fall more
adjacent. Then our fire began. It was difficult to see clearly. The dry
grass of the veldt, which is always catching fire, was burning between
us and the Boers; long lines of low smouldering fire, eating their way
slowly along, and sending volumes of smoke drifting downward, obscuring
the view. Half the ground was all black and charred where the fire had
been; the rest white, dry grass. The Boer position was only about two
miles from our ridge; a long shallow hollow of bare ground, without bush
or rock, or any sort of cover on it, except a few anthills, separating
us from them. Our field-batteries opened, and then the great five-inch
cow-guns roared out. We ourselves were close to these with Hamilton (we
are acting as his bodyguard), and with the other officers I crept up to
the ridge and lay among the stones watching the whole show. After a shot
or two all our guns got the range, a mere stone's throw for the great
five-inchers. Their shrapnel burst along the rise, and we could see the
hail of bullets after each explosion dusting the ground along the top
where the Boers lay. The enemy answere