ween him and the assassin. His victims never see him, and in the
ordinary course he incurs no personal danger. I believe such cases to
have been very rare, but if the soldiers have occasionally shot such a
man without reference to the officers, can it be said that it was an
inexcusable action, or even that it was outside the strict rules of
warfare?

I find in the 'Gazette de Lausanne' a returned Swiss soldier named
Pache, who had fought for the Boers, expresses his amazement at the way
in which the British troops after their losses in the storming of a
position gave quarter to those who had inflicted those losses upon them.

'Only once,' he says, 'at the fight at Tabaksberg, have I seen the
Boers hold on to their position to the very end. At the last rush of the
enemy they opened a fruitless magazine fire, and then threw down their
rifles and lifted their hands, imploring quarter from those whom they
had been firing at at short range. I was astounded at the clemency of
the soldiers, who allowed them to live. For my part I should have put
them to death.'

Of prisoners after capture there is hardly need to speak. There is a
universal consensus of opinion from all, British or foreign, who have
had an opportunity of forming an opinion, that the prisoners have been
treated with humanity and generosity. The same report has come from
Green Point, St. Helena, Bermuda, Ceylon, Ahmednager, and all other
camps. An outcry was raised when Ahmednager in India was chosen for a
prison station, and it was asserted, with that recklessness with which
so many other charges have been hurled against the authorities, that it
was a hot-bed of disease. Experience has shown that there was no grain
of truth in these statements, and the camp has been a very healthy one.
As it remains the only one which has ever been subjected to harsh
criticism, it may be of use to append the conclusions of Mr. Jesse
Collings during a visit to it last month:

'The Boer officers said, speaking for ourselves and men, we have nothing
at all to complain of. As prisoners of war we could not be better
treated, and Major Dickenson' (this they wished specially to be
inserted), 'is as kind and considerate as it is possible to be.'

Some sensational statements were also made in America as to the
condition of the Bermuda Camps, but a newspaper investigation has shown
that there is no charge to be brought against them.

Mr. John J. O'Rorke writes to the 'New York Times