rs continued to bombard the captured ridge,
and also maintained a harassing long-range musketry fire. A great gun
firing a hundred-pound 6-in. shell came into action from the top of
Doornkloof, throwing its huge projectiles on Vaal Krantz and about the
bivouacs generally; one of them exploded within a few yards of Sir
Redvers Buller. Two Vickers-Maxims from either side of the Boer position
fired at brief intervals, and other guns burst shrapnel effectively from
very long range on the solitary brigade which held Vaal Krantz. To this
bombardment the Field Artillery and the naval guns--seventy-two pieces
in all, both big and little--made a noisy but futile response. The
infantry of Lyttelton's Brigade, however, endured patiently throughout
the day, in spite of the galling cross-fire and severe losses. At about
four in the afternoon the Boers made a sudden attack on the hill,
creeping to within short range, and then opened a quick fire. The
Vickers-Maxim guns supported this vigorously. The pickets at the western
end of the hill were driven back with loss, and for a few minutes it
appeared that the hill would be retaken. But General Lyttelton ordered
half a battalion of the Durham Light Infantry, supported by the King's
Royal Rifles, to clear the hill, and these fine troops, led by Colonel
Fitzgerald, rose up from their shelters and, giving three rousing
cheers--the thin, distant sound of which came back to the anxious,
watching army--swept the Boers back at the point of the bayonet. Colonel
Fitzgerald was, however, severely wounded.

While these things were passing a new pontoon bridge was being
constructed at a bend of the Tugela immediately under the Vaal Krantz
ridge, and by five o'clock this was finished. Nothing else was done
during the day, but at nightfall Lyttelton's Brigade was relieved by
Hildyard's, which marched across the new pontoon (No. 4) under a
desultory shell fire from an extreme range. Lyttelton's Brigade returned
under cover of darkness to a bivouac underneath the Zwartkop guns.
Their losses in the two days' operations had been 225 officers and men.

General Hildyard, with whom was Prince Christian Victor, spent the night
in improving the defences of the hill and in building new traverses and
head cover. At midnight the Boers made a fresh effort to regain the
position, and the sudden roar of musketry awakened the sleeping army.
The attack, however, was easily repulsed. At daybreak the shelling began
ag