ON AFTER
SANNASPOST]

The sound of firing had ceased, and the battle was concluded. Waggons with
Red Cross flags fluttering from the tall staffs above them, issued from
the mountains and rumbled through the valleys. Burghers dashed over the
field in search of the wounded and dying. Men who a few moments before
were straining every nerve to kill their fellow-beings became equally
energetic to preserve lives. Wounded soldiers and burghers were lifted out
of the grass and carried tenderly to the ambulance waggons. The dead were
placed side by side, and the same cloth covered the bodies of Boer and
Briton. Men with spades upturned the earth, and stood grimly by while a
man in black prayed over the bodies of those who died for their country.

Boer officers, with pencils and paper in their hands, sped over the
battlefield from a group of prisoners to a line of passing waggons, and
made calculations concerning the result of the day's battle. Three Boers
killed and nine wounded was one side of the account. On the credit sheet
were marked four hundred and eight British soldiers, seven cannon, one
hundred and fifty waggons, five hundred and fifty rifles, two thousand
horses and cattle, and vast stores of ammunition and provisions captured
during the day.

In among the north-eastern hills, where a farmer's daub-and-wattle cottage
stood, were the prisoners of war, chatting and joking with their captors.
The officers walked slowly back and forth, never raising their eyes from
the ground. Dejection was written on their faces. Near them were the
captured waggons, with groups of noisy soldiers climbing over them in
search of their luggage. On the ground others were playing cards and
matching coins. Young Boers walked amongst them and engaged them in
conversation. Near the farmhouse stood a tall Cape Colony Boer talking
with his former neighbour, who was a prisoner. Several Americans among the
captured disputed the merits of the war with a Yankee burgher, who had
readily distinguished his countrymen among the throng. Some one began to
whistle a popular tune, others joined, and soon almost every one was
participating. An officer gave the order for the prisoners to fall in
line, and shortly afterward the men in brown tramped forward, while the
burghers stepped aside and lined the path. A soldier commenced to sing
another popular song, British and Boer caught the refrain, and the noise
of tramping feet was drowned by the melody of the un