e Transvaal, and I to the
Heilbron commando. After a few days President Steyn came from the south
of the Free State, in order to meet the Transvaal Government at Vrede.
After this meeting had taken place he went off to a camp of his own,
for it was thought better that he should not remain with the commandos
any longer. I gave him fifty burghers, under the command of Commandant
Davel, to serve as a bodyguard.

I had but just returned from my meeting with General Botha when a
serious matter arose at Petrusburg, demanding my immediate presence
there. It was three hundred and sixty miles there and back, and the
journey promised to be anything but a pleasure trip--far less a safe
excursion--for me; but the country's interest requiring it, I started on
the 8th of April, although much fatigued by my inroad into Cape Colony.

My staff succeeded in capturing an outpost of sixteen men on the railway
line near Vredefort, the English losing one killed and two wounded.

I visited the commando at Vredefort, arranged everything at Petrusburg,
and started on my return journey on the 17th. I crossed the railway line
between Smaldeel and Ventersburg Road Station, and after paying
Commandant Hasebroek a short visit, I came back to the Heilbron
commando.

Our tactics of dividing our commandos, and thus keeping the English busy
in every part of the Free State, or, where they were too numerous for
us, of refusing to allow them to give us battle, so enraged them that
they no longer spared the farmhouses in the north and north-western
districts. Even in the south and south-west many of the houses were
wrecked, but the work of destruction was not carried out with the same
completeness as in the afore-mentioned districts. The enemy, moreover,
did not spare our cattle, but either drove them off or killed them for
food. As for our women-folk--any of them who fell into the hands of the
enemy were sent off to the concentration camps.

I have no space here, however, to write about the treatment of the
women; it is such a serious matter that it would require whole chapters
to deal with it adequately. Abler pens than mine will deal with it in
full detail. I will only remark here that the Boer women were shamefully
treated, and that if England wishes to efface the impression which these
cruelties have left upon the hearts of our people, she will have to act
as every great conquering race must act, if it is ever to be reconciled
with the nations it