ven. Telegrams with
my description at great length were despatched along all the railways.
Three thousand photographs were printed. A warrant was issued for my
immediate arrest. Every train was strictly searched. Everyone was on the
watch. The worthy Boshof, who knew my face well, was hurried off to
Komati Poort to examine all and sundry people "with red hair" travelling
towards the frontier. The newspapers made so much of the affair that my
humble fortunes and my whereabouts were discussed in long columns of
print, and even in the crash of the war I became to the Boers a topic
all to myself. The rumours in part amused me. It was certain, said the
"Standard and Diggers' News," that I had escaped disguised as a woman.
The next day I was reported captured at Komati Poort dressed as a
Transvaal policeman. There was great delight at this, which was only
changed to doubt when other telegrams said that I had been arrested at
Brugsbank, at Middelburg, and at Bronkerspruit. But the captives proved
to be harmless people after all. Finally it was agreed that I had never
left Pretoria. I had--it appeared--changed clothes with a waiter, and
was now in hiding at the house of some British sympathiser in the
capital. On the strength of this all the houses of suspected persons
were searched from top to bottom, and these unfortunate people were, I
fear, put to a great deal of inconvenience. A special commission was
also appointed to investigate 'stringently' (a most hateful adjective in
such a connection) the causes 'which had rendered it possible for the
War Correspondent of the "Morning Post" to escape.'

The 'Volksstem' noticed as a significant fact that I had recently become
a subscriber to the State Library, and had selected Mill's essay 'On
Liberty.' It apparently desired to gravely deprecate prisoners having
access to such inflammatory literature. The idea will, perhaps, amuse
those who have read the work in question.

I find it very difficult in the face of the extraordinary efforts which
were made to recapture me, to believe that the Transvaal Government
seriously contemplated my release _before_ they knew I had escaped them.
Yet a telegram was swiftly despatched from Pretoria to all the
newspapers, setting forth the terms of a most admirable letter, in which
General Joubert explained the grounds which prompted him generously to
restore my liberty. I am inclined to think that the Boers hate being
beaten even in the smallest th