four midday hours dear to the
oxen. The rest of the column came in at dusk. A warm night. Every
night in camp you may hear deep-throated choruses swelling up from the
prisoners' laager. The first time I heard it I was puzzled to know
what they were singing; the tune was strangely familiar, but I could
not fix it. It was not till the third night that I recognized the tune
of "O God, our help," but chanted so slowly as to be difficult to
catch, with long, luxurious rests on the high notes, and mighty,
booming crescendos. Coming from hundreds of voices, the effect was
sometimes very fine. At other times smaller groups sang independently,
and the result was a hideous noise. I wonder if the words correspond
to our tune. If so, every night these prisoners, who have staked and
lost all in a hopeless struggle, sing, "O God, our help in ages past."
This is faith indeed.

_August 6._--_Bank Holiday._--At 6.45 we started as advance-guard
again, and marched for five and a half hours, with only a halt or two
of a few minutes, to Senekal. The country gradually became flatter,
the kopjes fewer and lower, till at last it was a great stretch of
arid, dusty plain. It seemed quite strange to be driving on level
ground, after endless hills and precipitous drifts. We and Brabant's
Horse were advance guard, and clattered down in a pall of blinding
white dust into a substantial little tin-roofed town, many stores
open, and people walking about in peace (the ladies all in black).
Full of soldiers, of course, but still it was our first hint for
months of peace and civilization, and seemed home-like. One of the
first things I saw was a jar of Osborne biscuits in a window, and it
gave me a strange thrill! The convoy and prisoners follow this
evening. The column is miles long, as besides our own transport, there
are all the Boer waggons, long red ones, each with some prisoners on
it and a soldier. Also scores of Cape carts, with a fat farmer in
each. There was a wild rush for provisions in the town by our
orderlies and Brabant's. They got bread, and I bought some eggs and
jam on commission. After camping and unharnessing, I had a good wash
in the river, an orange-coloured puddle. I wonder how it is that by
some fatality there is always a dead quadruped, mule, horse, or
bullock, near our washing places. We don't mind them on the march;
they are dotted along every road in South Africa now, I should think;
but when making a refreshing toilette they