orps has not yet left
England.

The average length of a transport's voyage from the United Kingdom to
Cape Town, as determined from 162 records, was 22-1/6 days. The first,
with Hildyard's brigade, accomplished it {p.107} in 20 days, arriving
November 9; the last of the four took 25 days, coming in on the 14th.
With them, and their one predecessor, 6,000 additional troops were at
the latter date--five weeks after the Boers' ultimatum became
operative--landed at the far base of operations, yet 500 miles by
railroad from the front. Kimberley and Mafeking were then already
invested, and the bombardment at both places begun. The British troops
had evacuated Stormberg Junction November 3, falling back to the
southward toward Sterkstrom and Queenstown; thus abandoning railroad
communication between East London, one of the sea bases, and the
western theatre of war toward Naauwport and De Aar. Naauwport had also
been quitted at about the same time, but the Boer grasp in that
central quarter was never as firm as it was to the eastward and
westward. General French was early established with his cavalry at
Hanover Road, midway on the line from Naauwport to De Aar, and his
activity, skilfully directed against the flanks of the enemy, imparted
to the latter a nervousness which the frontal attacks on the eastern
{p.108} line failed to produce. Naauwport was reoccupied by the
British November 19, and De Aar was never by them abandoned; but the
Boers on the 25th of November blew up a bridge on the line from
Naauwport _via_ Middelburg and Rosmead to Port Elizabeth, thereby
momentarily cutting out the line from this sea base also, as their
advance upon Stormberg had eliminated East London. They made also
strenuous efforts, at many points, to destroy the main road from
Kimberley south to Orange River, blowing up culverts and bridges, but
the damage effected was afterward found to be less than had been
expected, owing to the clumsiness of their methods; a fact which
probably indicates that their cause was supported mainly by a rural
population, and that few mechanics--townsfolk--were in their ranks.

There seems to have been no serious attempt to interrupt
communications south of the Orange River, important though it was to
do so. The British Corps, to the command of which Lord Methuen was
assigned, assembled at the Orange River Bridge without opposition or
difficulty, its concentration being effected {p.109} on the 19th of
November. Th