of the artillery ridge after ridge was carried, but before evening De Wet with supreme skill had got his convoy across, and had broken away, first to the eastward and then to the north.  On the 9th Methuen was in touch with him again, and the two savage little armies, Methuen worrying at the haunch, and De Wet snapping back over his shoulder, swept northward over the huge plains.  Wherever there was ridge or kopje the Boer riflemen staved off the eager pursuers.  Where the ground lay flat and clear the British guns thundered onwards and fired into the lines of wagons.  Mile after mile the running fight was sustained, but the other British columns, Broadwood’s men and Kitchener’s men, had for some reason not come up.  Methuen alone was numerically inferior to the men he was chasing, but he held on with admirable energy and spirit.  The Boers were hustled off the kopjes from which they tried to cover their rear.  Twenty men of the Yorkshire Yeomanry carried one hill with the bayonet, though only twelve of them were left to reach the top.

De Wet trekked onwards during the night of the 9th, shedding wagons and stores as he went.  He was able to replace some of his exhausted beasts from the farmhouses which he passed.  Methuen on the morning of the 10th struck away to the west, sending messages back to Broadwood and Kitchener in the rear that they should bear to the east, and so nurse the Boer column between them.  At the same time he sent on a messenger, who unfortunately never arrived, to warn Smith-Dorrien at Bank Station to throw himself across De Wet’s path.  On the 11th it was realised that De Wet had succeeded, in spite of great exertions upon the part of Smith-Dorrien’s infantry, in crossing the railway line, and that he had left all his pursuers to the south of him.  But across his front lay the Magaliesberg range.  There are only three passes, the Magato Pass, Olifant’s Nek, and Commando Nek.  It was understood that all three were held by British troops.  It was obvious, therefore, that if Methuen could advance in such a way as to cut De Wet off from slipping through to the west he would be unable to get away.  Broadwood and Kitchener would be behind him, and Pretoria, with the main British army, to the east.

Methuen continued to act with great energy and judgment.  At three A.M. on the 12th be started from Fredericstadt, and by 5 P.M. on Tuesday he had done eighty miles in sixty hours.  The force which accompanied him was all mounted, 1200 of the Colonial Division (1st Brabant’s, Cape Mounted Rifles, Kaffrarian Rifles, and Border Horse), and the Yeomanry with ten guns.  Douglas with the infantry was to follow behind, and these brave fellows covered sixty-six miles in seventy-six hours in their eagerness to be in time.  No men could have made greater efforts than did those of Methuen, for there was not one who did not appreciate the importance of the issue and long to come to close quarters with the wily leader who had baffled us so long.