Thus closed the long and dreadful week.  Over-wrought women and children emerged from their sodden refuges to court a long-deferred rest, if they might, for after the events of the night anything might happen.  Who was to tell what the morning might not show?

CHAPTER XVIII

Week ending 17th February, 1900

We awoke on Sunday morning with fears of what had happened during the night.  It transpired, however, to our infinite relief, that most of the shells had fallen on the soft earth of the Public Gardens.  One poor soldier had his leg completely severed from his body, while the escapes of his nonchalant bed-fellows were hairbreadth.  A house was set on fire and reduced to ashes.  Another missile entered the hospital, but did no great harm beyond rudely extinguishing a lighted lamp.  A lady who resided in a house close by went as near to the borders of eternity as was possible without crossing them.  She was seated on a folding-chair, and had momentarily altered her position to find a bunch of keys required by her servant when right through the spot on which she would have been still reclining but for the timely intervention of the girl a huge projectile came crashing.  The shock was fearful, and though, the missile failed to burst both women had an escape from death unprecedented in its narrowness.  A native was seriously injured; and, finally, it was ascertained that a Malay canteen had been invaded, the sequel to which was the destruction of an army of—­empty bottles!  There was a negative satisfaction in the fact that they were empty which the hapless Malay was not venal enough to appreciate.

In the houses, the streets, the camps, the all-engrossing topics of discourse were the terrors of the week so dramatically closed when churchyards yawned on Saturday.  Excited groups were talking everywhere, and questions of hunger and thirst, supremely acute, were subordinated to the more urgent public importance of the new situation, its dangers, and its gravity.  The feeling grew, the belief gained strength that the weight of the Siege cross was being officially minimised.  The outside world, Lord Roberts included, knew nothing of its actual heaviness.  This revelation was tangible and distinct.  The gun story narrated by our newspaper only too clearly exemplified the meagre information sent out concerning the public larder, the public health, the parlous pass altogether to which the public had been reduced.  No confidence could be reposed in the men at the helm; in pilots who betrayed unwillingness to steer for harbour; who preferred recklessly to exploit their valour for the sake of a selfish notoriety.  To these haughty, arbitrary men, accidentally armed with authority, was attributed much that was avoidable.  Their conduct stirred our invective powers to rich depths of condemnation.  Not that from this candid declamation we expected good to flow; it only served as a salve for our tortured dignity.