injured.  “Silent Susan,” otherwise “Bulwaan Sneak,” however, fired several shots, and the bombardment was kept up from Rifleman’s Ridge, Telegraph Hill, and a 12-pounder on Middle Hill, while Pom-Poms at two points barked frequently, but all this fuss and fury happily did no harm to anybody.  At night a brilliant beam, like the tail of a comet, appeared in the southern sky.  Presently the tail began to wag systematically, and experts were able to spell out the words of a cipher message.  It was General Buller talking to us across fifteen miles of hills, and the conversation, all on one side, was kept up until lowering clouds shut out the light.  We had no means of replying, but at eleven o’clock our guns fired two shots as a signal that the message had been seen and understood.

December 29.—­Yesterday and to-day the bombardment has been vigorous in spite of heavy rain, and directed mainly on houses in town.  Colonel Dartnell had a narrow escape on Friday, a shell bursting close to his tent in the Police Camp behind the Court-House.  Next morning one came into and through my old room at the Royal, completing its ruin.  To all this shooting the naval guns have replied effectively at intervals.  Ammunition for them is precious, and Captain Lambton’s gunners take care not to waste it on chance shots, as the Boer artillerymen do.  From five o’clock last evening until dawn this morning rain fell heavily.  The river rose four feet in one hour at midnight, flooding out the 18th Hussars, who are bivouacked by its banks, and carrying away the bridge that had been built by the Imperial Light Horse.  Many horses and mules were swept down-stream by the roaring torrent, and drowned before anybody could attempt to save them.

December 31.—­The old year closes in a quiet that is probably deceptive.  More Boers than we have seen for weeks past are gathered behind Bulwaan, many having returned from leave which Joubert is said to have granted them to visit their home, with a liberality that shows his confidence in our inactivity.  It has not been so quiet all day.  The Boers disregarded their customary Sabbath rule of refraining from hostilities unless provoked by some apparently menacing movement on our part.  There was nothing of that kind to incense them this morning, but their gunners, unable to resist the temptation offered by herds of cattle on Manchester Hill (as Caesar’s Camp is sometimes called), sent one shell from “Silent Susan” on to that ridge.  They missed their mark, however, and did not get another chance until the afternoon, when several “Sneakers” were aimed at the old camp, and one burst close to a group of officers who were exercising themselves and their ponies for a polo match.  This may have been meant as a rebuke to the Sabbath-breakers.  Boer riflemen were engaged at that time in the more reprehensible pastime of sniping our outposts at long range, and they kept this up until near sunset, as if engaged in the most laudable duty; but we have long since learned that the Boer judges his own conduct by one standard and ours by another.