when a senior influence intervened and
kept the New Cavalry Brigade from falling upon Strydenburg. In the
present case the intervention was to be made by the elements, and even
then the energy and wit of the capable soldier who was in command
brought the brigade within an ace of a success which would have made
all concerned famous in the history of this war.

At four o'clock the advance-guard opened out on the plain north of
Luckhoff, and drew the fire of the observation post on the hills
through which the trail to Koffyfontein passes. There would have been
no necessity to caution the advance-guard to slowness; and the main
body just sauntered on, while commanding officers were asking
themselves whether the brigadier was mad or inebriate to plunge into a
night march of this character when his object was only to get to
Kimberley. The good ladies of Luckhoff watched the last of the
transport disappear over the nek into the darkness of gathering night,
and then sent their eight-year-old sons or Kaffirs to recall such of
their men-folk as lay hid in the neighbouring _caches_, while the
observation post sent a galloper to the next point, that the news
might be patented that the column had taken the Kimberley road. By
sundown the head of the column had made about six miles, and a halt
was called to allow the baggage to close up. As soon as it was
sufficiently dark the change in direction was made, and the head of
the column left the road and plunged into the trackless veldt, it
being estimated that a compass bearing due east would bring it by
daybreak within easy reach of the parallelogram of hills in which
Fauresmith and Jagersfontein lie. But the favour of Providence was
withdrawn: the night, which had been born in suffocating heat,
suddenly changed to piercing cold, and great zigzags of white
lightning, clutching at the heavens like the claws of some gigantic
dragon, heralded a tempest of unwonted fury. And presently it came
preceded by a blinding sandstorm, which told how much the burnt
surface of the prairie yearned for moisture. That night it drank its
fill, for when the flood-gates burst asunder a very deluge was loosed
upon the earth. The great storm voided its burden in such rivers of
water that in a moment, in spite of waterproof and oil-skin, every man
in the force was as drenched as if he had plunged into a stream. Nor
was it a passing downfall of temporary duration. It deluged in
unbroken stream for the best par