under
the steady control of Regular officers, the Volunteers are learning what
discipline means. The Cemetery was passed, the gorge of Bell's Spruit,
the series of impregnable defences built by the Liverpools and Devons
along the Helpmakaar road. At the end of those low hills the Devons were
found drawn up in support, or to cover retreat. General Hunter then took
command of the whole movement, and the march went on. Three-quarters of
a mile further the road enters rough and bushy ground, thinly covered
with stunted thorns and mimosa. It rises gradually to the foot of the
two great hills, Lombard's Kop and Bulwan, the road crossing the low
wooded nek between them. Lombard's Kop, which is the higher, lies in the
left. The kop itself rises to about 1,200 or 1,300 feet, in a
square-topped pyramid; but in front of it, forming part of the same
hill, stands a broad and widely-expanded base, perhaps not higher than
600 or 700 feet. It is called Little Bulwan by the natives and Gun Hill
by our troops. Near its centre on the sky-line the Boers placed the new
"Long Tom" 6 in. Creusot gun, throwing a 96lb. shell, as I described
before, and about 150 yards to the left was a howitzer generally
identified with "Silent Susan." Those are the two guns which for the
last fortnight have caused most damage to the troops and town. Their
capture was the object of the night's adventure.

Leaving two-thirds of-his force in the bush nearly half-way up the
slope, General Hunter took about 100 Light Horse, nearly 100 Carbineers
and Mounted Rifles, with ten sappers under Captain Fowke, and began the
main ascent. Major Henderson, of the Intelligence Department, acted as
guide, keeping the extreme left of the extended line pretty nearly under
the position of the big gun. So they advanced silently through the rocks
and bushes under the uncertain light of the moon, which was just
setting. It was two o'clock.

The Boer sentries must have been fast asleep. There was only one
challenge. An old man's voice from behind suddenly cried in Dutch:
"Halt! who goes there?" One of the Volunteers--a Carbineer--answered,
"Friend." "Hermann," cried the sentry. "Who's that? Wake up. It's the
Red-necks" (the Boer name for English). "Hold your row!" cried the
Carbineer, still in Dutch. "Don't you know your own friends?" The sentry
either ran away, or was satisfied, and the line crept on. The first part
of the slope is gentle, but the face of the hill rises steep with r