During this proceeding French had been distracting the enemy by a demonstration to the south-east of Colesburg.  Consequently the shells from nowhere began to pour into their laager during breakfast (January 12) with devastating results.  The laager was instantly abandoned, and a second, two thousand yards farther off, suffered the same fate.  When Butcher had finally been able to get a second 15-pounder up the hill, the Boers were compelled to shift every camp they possessed into sheltered positions.

Most of these exploits show the resource and the daring which mark French’s tactics.  But his caution is no less remarkable.  One instance of it will suffice.  Shortly after the Coles Kop incident, it was discovered that the Boers had left open a portion of the road from Colesberg, where it goes through a narrow pass known as Plessis Poort.  Immediately French planned its capture.  One detachment was sent to occupy Bastard’s Nek, another defile to the west of Plessis Poort.  Covered by a cross-fire from the artillery, the infantry were to move forward and seize the road.  In order to divert the Boers’ attention from these matters, a demonstration was ordered along the whole British line.  Advancing carefully the infantry met with little opposition, a fact which made French suspicious.  As the silence continued he abruptly ordered the “Retire.”  The moment that his men obeyed, a fierce fire broke out from the enemy, who were present in force.  French’s caution was justified.

[Page Heading:  MASTERS OF TACTICS]

During all this time the rival fronts had been gradually stretching out, in the constant effort to parry outflanking movements, until they reached the extraordinary length of fifty miles.  Yet at the utmost neither general could throw more than ten thousand men into the field!  During the last days of French’s command, the fighting had become more a matter of outpost skirmishes than anything else.  The Boer generals, who now included De Wet and Delarey, were entirely taken up with the effort to out-manoeuvre the irrepressible French.

It was here that French first mastered the new problem of modern warfare—­the extended front.  The ability of the rival generals gradually gave the campaign the resemblance of a Mukden or a Mons in miniature.  That the British force was not entirely out-manoeuvred by such masters of tactics as Delarey and De Wet says something for French’s extraordinary mastery of a new method of warfare in something like six weeks’ time.

Herein lies French’s peculiar genius.  Although he knows all the methods of all the schoolmen, he is capable as one soldier expressed it, “of making his own tactics brand new on the spot.”  To that fact one may attribute his consistent superiority to the Boer.  Where even Kitchener and Roberts doubted, French invariably did the right thing.  During the following fortnight he had more brilliant opportunities of demonstrating his unique abilities.