re
in Basutoland. They play an important part in our programme, for it is
against that huge barrier that we are pressing the Boers. There are some
rounded, turf-clad hills, but most are rocky. Sharp points and stony
ridges rise up with jagged and clear-cut outlines into the sky, with
gorges and valleys retreating in between, full of deep blue shade, and
often horizontal bands of strata, showing like regularly built courses
of white masonry along the flanks of the mountains. It is very fine,
though gaunt, bare, and untenanted. We have had nothing but level veldt
to march on for weeks past, and the change to the eye is a pleasant one.
Nevertheless, it is a bad country for our business. To us mountain
ranges are not fine scenery, but strong positions; and rocks and crags
are not grand and picturesque, but merely good cover. We always serve
out extra-ammunition when we come to a pretty bit of scenery.

The present position is this: We have got the Boers, a big lot of them,
at any rate, into a very broken and mountainous country, a country
which, though it suits their tactics and is strong for defence, is
nevertheless very difficult to get out of. The way south is barred by
the Basutoland border. They dare not cross that or they would have the
hordes of Basutos, who are already buzzing and humming like a
half-roused hive, on to them. The other passes Hunter occupies in this
way: Rundle comes up from the south-west to Fouriesberg through Commando
Nek. Paget and Clements march south towards the same point through
Slabbert's Nek. A little farther east Hunter himself forces Retiefs
Nek, while farther east still Bruce-Hamilton, helped by Macdonald, is to
hold Naawpoort Nek and block the Golden Gate road. The western columns,
_i.e._ Rundle's, Clement's, Paget's, and Hunter's, are to force a
simultaneous entrance into the Fouriesberg valley, and having got the
enemy's force jammed against the Basuto border, to force it to turn
eastward up the rugged Caledon valley, the only two exits to which are,
we hope, by this time held by Bruce-Hamilton and Macdonald. This we have
now done. Now it only remains to see whether these eastern exits have
been successfully occupied by our columns or not.

[Illustration: PLAN TO ILLUSTRATE PRINSLOO'S SURRENDER]

From the moment of leaving Bethlehem, at which place we remained nearly
a fortnight while the General placed his columns, we entered among the
hills and fighting was continuous. Our passage