rs feeding their horses on Manning's farm. The Boers have been
seen at a Dutch settlement this side Van Reenen's. Yesterday a section
of the Gordons on their arrival were sent up to look at them in an
armoured train. It is thought that war will be proclaimed to-day. That
has been thought every day for a fortnight past, and the land buzzes
with lies which may at any moment be true.

Half the Manchesters have just marched in to trumpet and drum. When I
think of those ragged camps of peasants just over the border the pomp
and circumstance seem all on one side.

_Friday, October 13, 1899._

So it has begun at last, for good or evil. Here we think it began
yesterday, just at the very moment when Sir George White arrived. Late
at night scouts brought news of masses of Boers crossing the Tintwa
Pass, and going into laager with their waggons only fifteen miles away
to the west. The men stood to their arms, and long before light we were
marching steadily forward along the Van Reenen road. First came the
Liverpools, then the three batteries of Field Artillery with a mountain
battery, then the Devons and the Gordons. The Manchesters acted as
rear-guard, and the Dublin Fusiliers, who were hurried down from Dundee
by train, came late, and then were hurried back again. The column took
all its stores and forage for five days in a train of waggons (horses,
mules, and oxen) about two miles long. When day broke we saw the great
mountains on the Basuto border, gleaming with snow like the Alps. Far in
front the cavalry--the 5th Lancers and 19th Hussars with the Natal
Volunteers--were sweeping over the patches of plain and struggling up
the hills in search of that reported laager. But not a Boer of it was to
be seen. At nine o'clock, having advanced eight or nine miles, the
whole column took up a strong position, with all its baggage and train
in faultless order, and went to sleep. About one we began to return, and
now just as the mail goes, we are all back again in camp for tea. And so
ends the first day of active hostilities.

[Illustration: GENERAL SIR GEORGE STEWART WHITE, V.C., G.C.I.E., G.C.B.,
G.C.S.I.]

CHAPTER III

THE FIRST WEEK'S WAR

LADYSMITH, _Thursday, October 19, 1899_.

It is a week to-day since the Boers of the Transvaal and Free State
began their combined invasion of Natal. So far all action has been on
their side. They have crept down the passes with their waggons and
half-organised bands of