rain, of course, it has to go beneath one.  The great point is to keep your blankets as dry as you can, for, once wet with dew or rain, they remain wet, since we both start and arrive in the dark, and thus cannot count on drying them.  It is a good plan before turning in to see that the horses in the lines near you are securely tied up, as it is vexatious to be walked on in the night by a heavy artillery horse; also to have all your kit and belongings exactly where you can lay hands on them in the dark.  At reveille, which, by the way, takes the shape of a rude shake from the picket of the night (there is no trumpet used in campaigning), you shiver out of your nest, the Sergeant-Major’s whistle blows, and you at once feed your horses.  Then you pack your off-saddle, rolling the ground-sheet, blankets, and harness-sheet, with the muzzles, surcingle-pads, hay-nets, etc., and strapping the roll on the saddle.  Then you harness as fast as you can (generally helped by a gunner), make up two fresh feeds and tie them up in nose-bags on the saddle, and put on your belt, haversack, water-bottle, and other accoutrements.  In the middle of this there will be a cry of “D coffee up!” and you drop everything and run with the crowd for your life to get that precious fluid, and the porridge, if there is any.  You bolt them in thirty seconds, and run back to strap your mess-tin on your saddle, put the last touches to your harness, and hook in the team.  Of course we sleep in our cloaks, and wear them till about eight, when the sun gets strength.  Then we seize a chance to roll them at a halt, and strap them in front of the riding saddle.

To return to to-day.  It has been very inconclusive and unsatisfactory.  We have marched about twelve miles, I think, with some long halts, in one of which we unhooked and rode to a pool some distance off to water horses.  I have been fearfully sleepy all day.  Two guns of the 38th Battery have joined us, and we march as a six-gun battery under Major McMicking.  They have no officers fit for duty, and our Captain looks after them.  In the evening some shrapnel began bursting on a ridge ahead, and we went up and fired a bit; but I suppose the Boers decamped, for we soon after halted for the night.  It is said that the mythical Clements is now one march behind us, our scouts having met to-day, and that Bethlehem is three miles ahead, strongly held by De Wet.  Other mythical generals are in the air.  I am getting used to the state of blank ignorance in which we live.  Perfect sunset in a clear sky.  One of the charms of Africa is the long settled periods of pure unclouded sky, in which the sun rises and sets with no flaming splashes of vivid colours, but by gentle, imperceptible gradations of pure light, waning or waxing.  And as for rain, when it is once over it is thoroughly over (at this season, at any rate).  This night the darkness was soon lit up by a flaming farm.  All desperately hungry, when it was announced that an extra ration of raw meat was to be served out.  If I can’t cook it, shall I eat it raw?  To-morrow’s ration is a pound of fresh cooked meat, instead of the eternal Maconochie.  It was drawn to-night, and looked so good that I ate half of it at once, thus yielding to an oft-recurring temptation.  Orders for reveille at seven.  Great joy.