ith just sufficient difficulty to seem
plausibly brilliant, turns at the very moment of apparent victory into
hopeless disaster, entailing either destruction or retreat.

Into this tangle of obstacles the British forces were now about to
enter. Colenso, found to be evacuated on February 19, was occupied on
the 20th. A reconnaissance pushed across the bridge showed that the
kopjes about Fort Wylie, now rendered untenable by the loss of
Hlangwane, were but weakly held and their guns gone. On the morning of
February 21, the second day after the occupation of Hlangwane, a
pontoon bridge was thrown at a point between that hill and Colenso. By
midday of the 22nd nearly five brigades of infantry had crossed, and
immediately afterwards the advance began. That day and the two
following were marked by extremely severe fighting, attended with
alternate success and repulse, but the end was failure after very
heavy losses. The series of incidents is instructive as a military
lesson on warfare in an intricate mountain region; but to follow it
would require care and {p.297} attention, with elaborate maps, and
even so would possess sustained interest only for the professional
reader.

On the afternoon of February 20, Buller had telegraphed the fall of
Hlangwane, adding, "the enemy seem to be in full retreat, and are
apparently only holding a position which they occupy across the
Colenso-Ladysmith railway, where it is close to the angle of the
Tugela, with a weak rear-guard." The mention of the railroad shows
that this impression of retreat concerned the enemy west of the bend
and north of the river, but it proved to be entirely mistaken. On the
24th of February, it is true, the Boers packed their wagons and moved
them north of Ladysmith.[39] The fact testifies to the vigour of the
assault and their consequent anxiety; but in the evening of that same
day it had become apparent to the British that the resistance was
still so strong that they could not get through by the direction
taken, which, speaking generally, was that of the railroad. Sunday the
25th was passed in inaction, removing the wounded and {p.298} the
dead, and on Monday the whole force was withdrawn across the Tugela at
Colenso, to try another movement from further down stream, to the
north and east of Hlangwane, and again directed against the enemy's
left.

[Footnote 39: Bullet's telegram from Ladysmith,
March 2.]

This retreat,