But who knows whether by Christmas we shall not be glad even of a bit of old trek-ox?  Probably the Dutch hope to starve us out.  At intervals all morning they shelled the cattle near the racecourse, just for the sake of slaughter.  To-day also they tried their old game of sending gangs of refugee coolies into the town to devour the rations.  Happily, Sir George White turned at that, and sent out a polite note reminding the commandants that we live in a polite age.  So in the afternoon the Boers adopted more modern methods.  I had been sitting with Colonel Mellor and the other officers of the Liverpools, who live among the rocks close to my cottage, and they had been congratulating themselves on only losing two men by shell and one by enteric since Black Monday, when they helped to cover the retirement with such gallantry and composure.  I had scarcely mounted to ride back, when “Puffing Billy” and other guns threw shells right into the midst of the men and rocks and horses.  One private fell dead on the spot.  Three were mortally wounded.  One rolled over and over down the rocks.  Several others were badly hurt, and the bombardment became general all over our end of the town.

     November 25, 1899.

Almost a blank as far as fighting goes.  It is said that General Hunter went out under a flag of truce to protest against the firing upon the hospital.  There were no shells to speak of till late afternoon.  Among the usual rumours came one that Joubert had been wounded in the mouth at Colenso.  The Gordons held their sports near the Iron Bridge, sentries being posted to give the alarm if the Bulwan guns fired.  “Any more entries for the United Service mule race?  Are you ready?  Sentry, are you keeping your eye on that gun?” “Yes, sir.”  “Very well then, go!” And off the mules went, in any direction but the right, a soldier and a sailor trying vainly to stick on the bare back of each, whilst inextinguishable laughter arose among the gods.

     Sunday, November 26, 1899.

Another day of rest.  I heard a comment made on the subject by one of the Devons washing down by the river.  Its seriousness and the peculiar humour of the British soldier will excuse it.  “Why don’t they go on bombardin’ of us to-day?” said one. “’Cos it’s Sunday, and they’re singin’ ’ymns,” said another.  “Well,” said the first, “if they do start bombardin’ of us, there ain’t only one ‘ymn I’ll sing, an’ that’s ’Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me ‘ide myself in thee.’” It was spoken in the broadest Devon without a smile.  The British soldier is a class apart.  One of the privates in the Liverpools showed me a diary he is keeping of the war.  It is a colourless record of getting up, going to bed, sleeping in the rain with one blanket (a grievance he always mentions, though without complaint), of fighting, cutting brushwood, and building what he calls “sangers and travises.”  From first to last he makes but one comment, and that is:  “There is no peace for the wicked.”  The Boers were engaged in putting up a new 6 in. gun on the hills beyond Range Post, and the first number of the Ladysmith Lyre was published.