he Free State joining hands with the
Transvaal--to stand or fall with it--was ridiculed as a monstrous
proposition. England had no quarrel with the Free Staters, and they were
not such "thundering fools" as to pick one with England, or to be
influenced by shibboleths bearing on the relative thicknesses of blood
and water. When, however, we learned how very much mistaken folks may
be, the "villainy" of President Steyn was--rather overstated, and the
continued independence of his country pronounced an impossibility.

This was all very well; but it involved some inconsistency, in that we
had veered round to the belief that the Transvaal would never have faced
the music _alone_, and without the aid of the neighbouring State! That
is to say: war was certain from the beginning; the Free Staters were
equally certain to be neutral; but since they were not neutral,
responsibility for the war was theirs, and theirs _only_. Perhaps it
was; but how was the view to be reconciled with our previous
positiveness to the contrary? As a fact, few were conscious of any
weakness in their way of laying down the law, and _they_ (tacitly)
admitted their fallibility.

On Monday the enemy betrayed signs of activity in the building of a
redoubt opposite the Premier Mine. This was disappointing; it looked as
if the purpose was to place a gun in the redoubt--to shy shells at the
Premier. A special edition of the _Diamond Fields' Advertiser_ lent
colour to the assumption. The Boers, the special stated, had a gun fixed
up at Mafeking, and had actually trained it on that town. The shells, we
were assured, had not burst; but (flying) they could hit a man in the
head, we thought. Whence they (the Boers) got the gun was a puzzle to
not a few; and how they managed to make it "speak" was beyond the
comprehension of others. "They might have another gun," these people
exclaimed in horror! They might indeed; the question soon ceased to be
one of speculation, for when a body of the Light Horse attempted to
cross the Free State border, the boom of "another gun" was unmistakably
real. Shell after shell was burled at the Light Horse; none of them were
hit, and not having bothered bringing artillery with them, they were
unable to retaliate.

Later in the day an express rider made his way through the Boer lines.
The most interesting news he was able to impart was summed up in the
Proclamation he carried in his pocket. It bore reference to the
prohibition by the