er towards Naawpoort Nek.

It was a moment of infinite expectation. Bets were laid on the amount of
our bag. The general impression was that we should get some of them, but
that the main body would, somehow or other, escape. We had so often
toiled and taken nothing, that this sudden miraculous draught quite
flabbergasted us. And what must have been the feelings of the poor
Boers? They tried Naawpoort Nek: no exit. They knocked at the Golden
Gate: it was locked. Then back they turned and met Hunter sauntering up
the valley, and we gave them the time of day with our cow-guns, and told
them how glad we were to see them. "Fancy meeting you, of all people in
the world!" And so they chucked it. It was a complete checkmate.

The surrender occupied the next three days; our total bag 4100, I am
told. I wish you could have been there. It was a memorable sight among
those uninhabited and lonely mountains. The heights of Basutoland, ridge
behind ridge, to right of us; the tops snow streaked; groups of excited
Basutos riding about in the plains, watching our movements; to left the
great mountain chain we had fought our way through; and in the midst
spread over the wide saddle-backed hill, that slopes away
north-eastward, and breaks up in a throng of sharp peaks and a jumble
of inaccessible-looking hills in the direction of the Golden Gate, is
drawn up the dirty, ragged, healthy, sun-scorched British army with
greasy rifles in its blackened hands, watching imperturbably and without
much interest, the parties of Boers, and waggons, and droves of cattle
as they come meandering in. Each Boer, as he rides up, hands over his
rifle, or more often flings it angrily on the ground, and the armourers
set to work, smashing them all across an anvil. Rather a waste of good
weapons it seemed, I must say. Many of the Boers were quite boys, about
fourteen or fifteen. They are much better looking than you would think
from the men. The men are big and well built, but they look, for the
most part, stupid and loutish, and when this is not so, their expression
is more often cunning than intelligent. The amount of hair about their
face, too, and their indifference to washing, does not improve their
appearance. However, in the boy stage, and before the dulness of their
surrounding has had time to tell, they are quite different, frank-faced
and manly, with clear skin, tall and well grown, like young larches. It
does seem strange that such mere children shou