We slept that night by the side of the railway, tethering our horses to the wire fence that runs down it.  Rain fell heavily all night.  Most of us had no blankets, and we lay bundled up, shivering under our greatcoats on the sopping ground.  Unable to sleep well, I heard, just about or before dawn, a distant drumming, like the noise of rain on the window, but recognised immediately as distant rifle-fire.  Morning broke, cheerless and wet.  I asked if any one had heard firing during the night, but no one near me had.  Shivering and breakfastless, save for a morsel of biscuit and a sip of muddy water, we saddle our dripping horses and fall in.  A Tommy sitting in the ditch, the picture of misery; cold, and hungry, with the rain trickling from his sodden helmet on to his face; breaks into a hymn, of which the first verse runs:—­

    “There is a happy land
      Far, far away,
    Where they get ham and eggs
      Three times a day.”

I find myself dwelling on the words as we move off.  Can there be such a land?  Can there be so blessed a place?

We reach the ganger’s hut, and the light spreads and rests on the hills.  Immediately we are deafened by a shattering report close behind us, and starting round, find the long nose of Joey projecting almost over our heads, while the scream of the shell dies away in the distance as it speeds towards the Boer hill.  One of the naval officers gives me a first hint of the truth.  There has certainly been an attack, he says, but he fears unsuccessful.

We took the matter up, then, where we left off yesterday, all our batteries coming into action and shelling the hills most furiously.  The enemy replied with three guns only, but so well placed were they that we found it impossible to silence them.  While our fire was concentrated on to any one of them, it would remain silent, but, after a short interval, would always begin again, to the rage of our gunners.  There is especially a big gun of theirs in a fold of the hill just at the crest, between which and “Joey” exist terms of mortal defiance.  Nothing else it appears can touch either of them; so while the lesser cannonade rages in the middle, these two lordly creatures have a duel of their own and exchange the compliments of the season with great dignity and deliberation over the others’ heads.  It has gone all in favour of “Joey” while I was watching, the Boer gun being rather erratic and most of its shells falling short.  It made one good shot just in front of us, and it was really comic to see how “Joey,” who had been looking for other adversaries for the moment, came swinging round at the voice of his dearest foe.  The explosion of the big gun almost knocks one backwards, and I feel the sudden pressure on my ears of the concussion.