the squadron.  Its retreat was covered by a very pretty movement of the main body and by salvos of shrapnel from our field batteries, with the naval guns chiming in.  Then the reconnoitring force slowly withdrew across the plain towards Junction Hill, still under a rifle fire heavier even than we had to face on the slopes of Elandslaagte, though not so well directed.  Several saddles, however, were emptied, bringing our losses in this affair up to five killed and seventeen wounded.  Of these considerably more than half were 18th Hussars, whose ranks have been seriously thinned since they marched to Dundee less than eight weeks ago.

In camps and town everybody is elated to-day.  Casting aside the sombre garb that was suitable to retirement, ladies have come forth clad in raiment that is festively bright to go a-shopping, as if there were no such things as shells to disturb them, and no cares greater than feminine frivolities.  If the siege were at an end, and peace within sight, we could hardly be more joyously animated, and all because two hundred gallant fellows, led by a dashing General, have shown how Boer positions may be captured at night, and Boer siege guns silenced for ever with small loss.

Sir George White ordered special parades for the afternoon of all volunteers, guides, Irregular Horse, and Frontier Police Force who had taken part in the attack on Gun Hill.  Each corps had its own appointed place for the ceremony, and Sir George visited them in turn to congratulate them on their brilliant achievement.  For the guides, who are attached as scouts, interpreters, and field orderlies to the Intelligence Staff, the General had special words of praise.  Without their valuable aid the enterprise might have been doomed to failure, and he expressed high appreciation of their gallantry, not less than of the skill they had shown in guiding a column over difficult ground when there was not light enough to make a single landmark visible except the sky-line of Gun Hill.  To the Imperial Light Horse he paid an equally flattering tribute.  As the men of three companies were drawn up in line to receive him, “Puffing Billy” tried to put a spoke in their wheel by sending a shell very near one flank, and the line was accordingly broken into close column with a short front, so that it be hidden by house and trees from sight of the gunners on Bulwaan.  At that moment Sir George White, with General Sir Archibald Hunter, General Brocklehurst, and a number of staff officers, rode to the ground, and were received by a general salute, to which the presence of two or three wounded men with arms in blood-stained slings gave emphasis, as they had no rifles wherewith to shoulder and present.