reconnoitring towards Elandslaagte. The armoured
train--slate-colour plated engine, a slate-colour plated loopholed
cattle-truck before and behind, an open truck with a Maxim at the tail
of all--puffed along on his right. Elandslaagte is a little village and
railway station seventeen miles north-east of Ladysmith, where two days
before the Boers had blown up a culvert and captured a train. That cut
our direct communication with the force at Dundee. Moreover, it was
known that the Free State commandoes were massing to the north-west of
Ladysmith and the Transvaalers to attack Dundee again. On all grounds it
was desirable to smash the Elandslaagte lot while they were still weak
and alone.

The reconnaissance stole forward until it came in sight of the little
blue-roofed village and the little red tree-girt station. It was
occupied. The Natal battery unlimbered and opened fire. A round or
two--and then suddenly came a flash from a kopje two thousand yards
beyond the station on the right. The Boer guns! And the next thing was
the hissing shriek of a shell--and plump it dropped, just under one of
the Natal limbers. By luck it did not burst; but if the Boer ammunition
contractor was suspect, it was plain that the Boer artillerist could lay
a gun. Plump: plump: they came right into the battery; down went a
horse; over went an ammunition-waggon. At that range the Volunteers'
little old 7-pounders were pea-shooters; you might as well have spat at
the enemy. The guns limbered up and were off. Next came the vicious
_phutt!_ of a bursting shell not fifty yards from the armoured
train--and the armoured train was puffing back for its life. Everybody
went back half-a-dozen miles on the Ladysmith road to Modder Spruit
Station.

The men on reconnaissance duty retired, as is their business. They had
discovered that the enemy had guns and meant fighting. Lest he should
follow, they sent out from Ladysmith, about nine in the morning, half a
battalion apiece of the Devonshire and Manchester Regiments by train,
and the 42nd Field Battery, with a squadron of the 5th Dragoon Guards,
by road. They arrived, and there fell on us the common lot of
reconnaissances. We dismounted, loosened girths, ate tinned meat, and
wondered what we should do next. We were on a billow of veldt that
heaved across the valley: up it ran, road and rail; on the left rose
tiers of hills, in front a huge green hill blocked our view, with a
tangle of other hills crowdin