that building, from which all haste was made to remove the helpless patients.  Most of them had been got out when the third shot came crashing into the largest ward, and from among the ruins one dead man and nine freshly wounded were taken.  Rifle fire quickened then about Observation Hill, and bullets flying overhead made many think that the Boers were coming on, but it all died away into silence without further casualties on our side.  At night the column southward flashes another long signal on the clouded sky, and Boer search-lights try to obliterate it by throwing their feeble rays across the beam that shines like a comet athwart the darkness above Tugela heights.

December 1.—­“Long Tom” of Pepworth’s Hill, which has not fired since “Lady Anne” silenced it days ago, is now reported to be cracked and useless, but the Boers are preparing emplacements for another heavy piece of ordnance on a flat-topped nether spur of Lombard’s Kop, where they have a persistently disagreeable 40-pounder already mounted.  We do nothing to prevent this increase of hostile artillery, but content ourselves with inventing new names for the batteries, so that the intelligence map may be kept up to date with fullest details.  This spur henceforth is to be known as Gun Hill, probably because the weapon already in position there has made itself conspicuously unpleasant by shelling the headquarters and intelligence offices.  From it three successive shells were fired this morning into or near the convent where Colonel Dick-Cunyngham, Major Riddell, and other convalescent wounded have their quarters.  Middle Hill gun only fired a few rounds to-day, and was promptly silenced by our “Great Twin Brethren,” the howitzers of Waggon Hill.

December 2.—­We are not left long in doubt as to the meaning of those new works on Gun Hill.  A Creusot 94-pounder has opened from there, shelling in rapid succession Sir George White’s headquarters camp, the Royal Artillery, and the Imperial Light Horse, who have their parade and playground pitted by marks of this fire.  People say that “Long Tom” has been shifted from Pepworth’s to the new position, but the shells, with their driving-bands grooved deep and sharp, tell another story.  It is a new gun, or little used, and probably fresh from Pretoria.  Its range is great, and gives easy command of the ravine in which our cavalry are bivouacked by the riverside.  One shell has already burst there, wounding a man of the 18th Hussars, but fortunately the enemy cannot see the result of this fire, the river for a mile in length being screened from his view by intervening hills.

December 4.—­One may skip Sunday when it is uneventful in its perfect peace, as yesterday was, and be deeply thankful for the rest that is given to us once a week when shells cease from troubling.  The weather has changed suddenly from brilliant sunshine and almost tropical heat to cloudy skies that send the temperature down to shivering point.  Few shells fell in the town this morning, when groups gathered at street corners discussing rumours of Lord Methuen’s victory on Modder River, which are now officially confirmed.  General Clery is also said to have defeated the Boers near Estcourt, but if so he did not get back the cattle they had looted, for we have watched them for hours driving great herds from southward up the roads that lead to Van Reenan’s Pass.