in--thousands of independent
riflemen, thinking for themselves, possessed of beautiful weapons, led
with skill, living as they rode without commissariat or transport or
ammunition column, moving like the wind, and supported by iron
constitutions and a stern, hard Old Testament God who should surely
smite the Amalekites hip and thigh. And then, above the rain storm that
beat loudly on the corrugated iron, I heard the sound of a chaunt. The
Boers were singing their evening psalm, and the menacing notes--more
full of indignant war than love and mercy--struck a chill into my heart,
so that I thought after all that the war was unjust, that the Boers were
better men than we, that Heaven was against us, that Ladysmith,
Mafeking, and Kimberley would fall, that the Estcourt garrison would
perish, that foreign Powers would intervene, that we should lose South
Africa, and that would be the beginning of the end. So for the time I
despaired of the Empire, nor was it till the morning sun--all the
brighter after the rain storms, all the warmer after the chills--struck
in through the windows that things reassumed their true colours and
proportions.

CHAPTER IX

THROUGH THE DUTCH CAMPS

Pretoria: November 30, 1899.

The bitter wind of disappointment pierces even the cloak of sleep.
Moreover, the night was cold and the wet clothes chilled and stiffened
my limbs, provoking restless and satisfactory dreams. I was breakfasting
with President Kruger and General Joubert. 'Have some jam,' said the
President. 'Thanks,' I replied, 'I would rather have marmalade.' But
there was none. Their evident embarrassment communicated itself to me.
'Never mind,' I said, 'I'd just as soon have jam.' But the President was
deeply moved. 'No, no,' he cried; 'we are not barbarians. Whatever you
are entitled to you shall have, if I have to send to Johannesburg for
it.' So he got up to ring the bell, and with the clang I woke.

The first light of dawn was just peering in through the skylight of the
corrugated iron shed. The soldiers lay in a brown litter about the
floor, several snoring horribly. The meaning of it came home with a
slap. Imprisoned; not able to come and go at will; about to be dragged
off and put in some secluded place while others fought the great quarrel
to the end; out of it all--like a pawn taken early in the game and flung
aside into the box. I groaned with vexation, and, sitting up, aroused
Frankland, who shared my blanket. Then