One thing that added to the panic was that none, at least among the men and junior officers, knew anything at all about the trench.  They thought they were going to storm the hill.  So that things were so contrived that the bewilderment of a surprise should be added to the terrors of the volley.  You will scarcely believe this perhaps.  I have just come from having tea with the Argyle and Sutherland.  Of the eight or ten officers there, not one had heard of the trench.  Here, by the river, I have talked to a score of Highlanders, and not one had heard of it either.  They “didn’t know what the hell was up” when the volley came.  We could scarcely have provided all the elements of a panic more carefully.

Nothing of note followed during the day.  Airlie fended off a Boer flanking move on our right, and the Coldstreams backed up the Highlanders a bit, but practically only the Highland Brigade was in it.  It was a disaster to that Brigade only, and consequently the rest of the army does not feel itself defeated, and is not in any way discouraged.  Some people suggest now that we in our turn may be attacked, and that the enemy may try and retake the river position from which we shifted him a fortnight ago.  It is reported that they have got up heavy reinforcements from Natal, and some long-range guns that will reach our camp from the hill.  All kinds of rumours are afloat, mostly to the effect that the Boers are circling round behind us, via Douglas on the west and Jacobsdal on the east, and mean cutting our communications.  However, as I have long since found out, a camp is a hot-bed of lies.  Nothing positive is known, for every one is kept in careful ignorance of everything that is going on.  The idea is that the British soldier can only do himself justice when the chance of taking anything like an intelligent interest in his work is altogether denied him.  The consequence is he is driven to supply the deficiency out of his own imagination.  Ladysmith has already been taken and relieved at least a dozen times, and Mafeking almost as often.  To-day Buller is on his way to Pretoria; to-morrow the Boer army will be marching on Cape Town.

As for our own little army, we have been digging ourselves in here, and are perfectly secure, and I daresay we shall be able to keep open the line all right.  As to relieving Kimberley, that is another thing.  Cronje evidently doesn’t think we can, for he has just sent us in a message offering us twenty-four hours to clear out in.  He is a bit of a wag is old Cronje.

LETTER VII

RECONNAISSANCE

BIVOUAC ON THE MODDER,

January 15, 1900.

At Modder River camp the dust lies thick and heavy.  Every breeze that blows lifts clouds of it, that hang in the air like a dense London fog, and mark the site of the camp miles and miles away.  The river, more muddy than ever, moves languidly in its deep channel.  There is a Boer laager some miles above the camp, the scourings of which—­horrid thought!—­are constantly brought down to us.  The soldiers eye the infected current askance and call it Boervril.  Its effect is seen in the sickness that is steadily increasing.