The native stadt covered altogether an area of at least a square mile, and was full of surprises in the shape of pretty peeps and rural scenery.  Little naked children used to play on the grass, pausing to stare open-eyed at the passer-by, and men and women sat contentedly gossiping in front of their huts.  The whole gave an impression of prosperity, of waving trees, green herbage, and running water, and was totally different to the usual African landscape.  To ride or drive through it on a Sunday was quite a rest, when there was no risk of one’s illusions being dispelled by abominable shells, whose many visible traces on the sward, in the shape of deep pear-shaped pits, were all the same in evidence.

Standing in a commanding position among the thatched houses of the picturesque native stadt was the Mission Church, of quaint shape, and built of red brick, the foundation of which had been laid by Sir Charles Warren in 1884.  One Sunday afternoon we attended service in this edifice, and were immensely struck with the devotion of the enormous congregation of men and women, who all followed the service attentively in their books.  The singing was most fervent, but the sermon a little tedious, as the clergyman preached in English, and his discourse had to be divided into short sentences, with a long pause between each, to enable the black interpreter at his side to translate what he said to his listeners, who simply hung on his words.

All the natives objected most strongly to partaking of horse soup, supplied by the kitchens, started by the C.O., as they declared it gave them the same sickness from which the horses in Africa suffered, and also that it caused their heads to swell.  The authorities were therefore compelled to devise some new food, and the resourceful genius of a Scotchman introduced a porridge called “sowens” to the Colonel’s notice.  This nutriment, said to be well known in the North of Scotland, was composed of the meal which still remained in the oat-husks after they had been ground for bread and discarded as useless.  It was slightly sour, but very wholesome, and enormously popular with the white and the black population, especially with the latter, who preferred it to any other food.

I must now mention the important item of supplies and how they were eked out.  The provisions sent to Mafeking by the Cape Government before the war were only sufficient to feed 400 men for a little over a fortnight.  At that time a statement was made, to reassure the inhabitants, that the Cape Ministry held themselves personally responsible for the security of the railway in the colony.  Providentially, the firm of Weil and Company had sent vast stores to their depot in the town on their own initiative.  This firm certainly did not lose financially by their foresight, but it is a fact that Mafeking without this supply could have made no resistance whatever.  There were 9,000 human beings to feed, of which 7,000 were natives and 2,000 white people.  It can therefore