what an honour and distinction it
was to be thus selected to do their duty to their country and their
people, or by giving them money if no appeal to their generous
feelings would avail; sometimes by using strong language to the timid
ones, telling them it would have to be, whether they liked it or not.

Anyhow we got a hundred fine horses together at the cost of a good
many imprecations. The complainants may be divided into the following
categories:--

1st. Those who really believed they had some cause of complaint.

2nd. Those who did not feel inclined to part with anything without
receiving the full value in cash--whose patriotism began and ended
with money.

3rd. Those who had Anglophile tendencies and thought it an abomination
to part with anything to a commando (these were the worst to deal
with, for they wore a mask, and we often did not know whether we had
got hold of the Evil One's tail or an angel's pinions), and

4th. Those who were complaining without reason. These were, as a rule,
burghers who did not care to fight, and who remained at home under all
sorts of pretexts.

The complaints from females consisted of three classes:--

1st. The patriotic ones who did all they could--sensible ladies as
they were--to help us and to encourage our burghers, but who wanted
the things we had commandeered for their own use.

2nd. The women without any national sympathy--a tiresome species, who
forget their sex, and burst into vituperation if they could not get
their way; and

3rd. The women with English sympathies, carefully hidden behind a mask
of pro-Boer expressions.

The pity of it was that you could not see it written on their
foreheads which category they belonged to, and although one could soon
find out what their ideas were, one had to be careful in expressing a
decided opinion about them, as there was a risk of being prosecuted
for libel.

I myself always preferred an outspoken complaint. I could always cut
up roughly refer him to martial law, and gruffly answer, "It will have
to be like this, or you will have to do it!" And if that did not
satisfy him I had him sent away. But the most difficult case was when
the complaint was stammered under a copious flood of tears, although
not supported by any arguments worth listening to.

There were a good many foreign subjects at Pietersburg but they were
mostly British, and these persons, who also had some of their horses,
etc., commandeered, were a great