"It was a cruel fight," he said. "We had ambushed a lot of the British troops—the Worcesters, I think, they called them. They could neither advance nor retire; we had penned them in like sheep, and our field cornet, Van Leyden, was beseeching them to throw down their rifles to save being slaughtered, for they had no chance. Just then we saw about a hundred Australians come bounding over the rocks in the gully behind us. There were two great big men in front cheering them on. We turned and gave them a volley, but it did not stop them. They rushed over everything, firing as they came, not wildly, but as men who know the use of a rifle, with the quick, sharp, upward jerk to the shoulder, the rapid sight, and then the shot. They knocked over a lot of our men, but we had a splendid position. They had to expose themselves to get to us, and we shot them as they came at us. They were rushing to the rescue of the English. It was splendid, but it was madness. On they came, and we lay behind the boulders, and our rifles snapped and snapped again at pistol range, but we did not stop those wild men until they charged right into a little basin which was fringed around all its edges by rocks covered with bushes. Our men lay there as thick as locusts, and the Australians were fairly trapped. They were far worse off than the Worcesters, up high in the ravine.
"Our field cornet gave the order to cease firing, and called on them to throw down their rifles or die. Then one of the big officers—a, great, rough-looking man, with a voice like a bull—roared out, 'Forward Australia!—no surrender!' Those were the last words he ever uttered, for a man on my right put a bullet clean between his eyes, and he fell forward dead. We found later that his name was Major Eddy, of the Victorian Rifles. He was as brave as a lion, but a Mauser bullet will stop the bravest. His men dashed at the rocks like wolves; it was awful to see them. They smashed at our heads with clubbed rifles, or thrust their rifles up against us through the rocks and fired. One after another their leaders fell. The second big man went down early, but he was not killed. He was shot through the groin, but not dangerously. His name was Captain McInnerny. There was another one, a little man named Lieutenant Roberts; he was shot through the heart. Some of the others I forget. The men would not throw down their rifles; they fought like furies. One man I saw climb right on to the rocky ledge where Big Jan Albrecht was stationed. Just as he got there a bullet took him, and he staggered and dropped his rifle. Big Jan jumped forward to catch him before he toppled over the ledge, but the Australian struck Jan in the mouth with his clenched fist, and fell over into the ravine below and was killed.
"We killed and wounded an awful lot of them, but some got away; they fought their way out. I saw a long row of their dead and wounded laid out on the slope of a farmhouse that evening—they were all young men, fine big fellows. I could have cried to look at them lying so cold and still. They had been so brave in the morning, so strong; but in the evening, a few little hours, they were dead, and we had not hated them, nor they us. Yes, I could have cried as I thought of the women who would wait for them in Australia. Yes, I could have shed tears, though they had wounded me, but then I thought of my father, and of the mother, and little Yacoba on the farm, who would wait in vain for him, and then I could feel sorry for those, the wives and children of the dead men, no longer."
LIFE IN THE BOER CAMPS.
HEADQUARTERS, ORANGE RIVER COLONY.
It is an article of faith with many people that a Boer commando is a mere mob, that its leaders exercise no control over men in laager or on the field, and that punishment for crimes is a thing unknown. But this is far from being the case. It is quite true that a Boer soldier does not know how to click his heels together, turn his toes to an acute angle, stiffen his back, and salute every time an officer runs against him. He could not properly perform any of the very simplest military evolutions common to all European soldiers if his immortal welfare depended upon it. That is why he is such a failure as an attacking agent. Still, in spite of these things, the Boer on commando has to submit to very rigid laws. The penalty for outrage, or attempted outrage, on a woman is instant death on conviction, no matter what the woman's nationality may be. For sleeping on sentry duty the punishment is unique; it is a punishment born of long dwelling in the wilderness. It is of such a nature that no man who has once undergone it is calculated ever to forget. When a clear case is made out against a burgher by trial before his commandant the whole commando in laager is summoned to witness the criminal's reward. He is taken out beyond the lines to a spot where the sun shines in all its unprotected fierceness. He is led to an ant-hill full of busy, wicked, little crawlers; the top of the ant-hill is cut off with a spade, leaving a honeycombed surface for the sleepy one to stand upon (not much fear of him sleeping whilst he is there). He is ordered to mount the hill and stand with feet close together. His rifle is placed in his hands, the butt resting between his toes, the muzzle clasped in both hands. Two men are then told off to watch him. They are picked men, noted for their stern, unyielding sense of duty and love for the cause they fight for.
These guards lie down in the veldt twenty-five yards away from the victim. They have their loaded Mausers with them, and their orders are, if the prisoner lifts a leg, to put a bullet into it; if he lifts an arm, a bullet goes into that defaulting member; if he jumps down from his perch altogether, the leaden messengers sent from both rifles will cancel all his earthly obligations. The sun shines down in savage mockery; it strikes upon the bare neck of the quivering wretch, who dare not lift a hand to shift his hat to cover the blistering skin. It strikes in his eyes and burns his lips until they swell and feel like bursting. The barrel of his rifle grows hotter and hotter, until his fingers feel as if glued to a gridiron. The very clothes upon his body burn the skin beneath. He feels desperate; he must shift one arm, for the anguish is intolerable. He makes an almost imperceptible movement of his shoulder, and glances towards his guards. The man on his right front lays his pipe quickly in the grass, and swiftly lifts his Mauser to his shoulder. The wretch on the ant-heap closes his eyes with a groan, and stands as still as a Japanese god carved out of jute-wood. The guard lays down his rifle and picks up his pipe.
The sun climbs higher and higher, until it gleams down straight into the ant-heap; the scorching heat penetrates into the unprotected cells, and enrages the dwellers inside. They swarm out full of fight, like an army lusting for battle. Their home has been ravished of the protection they had raised with half a lifetime of labour, and in their puny way they want vengeance. They find a foe on top, a man ready to their wrath. They crawl into his scorched boots, over his baked feet, guiltless of stockings; they charge up the legs, on which the trousers hang loosely, and as they charge they bite, because they are out for business, not for a picnic. The very stillness of their victim seems to enrage them. The first legion retires at full speed down into the ant-heap again. They have gone for recruits. In a few seconds up they come again, until the very top of the heap is alive with them. They climb one over another in their eagerness to get in their individual moiety of revenge. Down into the veldtschoon, up the bare, hairy legs, over the hips, round the waist, over the lean ribs, along the spine, under the arms, round the neck, over the whole man they go, as the Mongolian hordes will some day go over the Western world. And each one digs his tiny prongs into the smarting, burning, itching poor devil on top of their homestead. He shifts a leg the hundredth part of an inch. The guard on the left gives his bandolier a warning twist, and glances along the long brown barrel that nestles in the hollow of his left hand.
The commandant comes out of the circle of burghers, looks at the victim, sees that the eyes are bloodshot and protruding far beyond the normal position. He is not a hard man, but he knows that the culprit has endangered the lives and liberties of all. "You will remember this," he says sternly; "you will not again sleep when it is your turn to watch." "Never, so help me God!" gasps the prisoner. "Stand down, then; you are free." Quicker than a swallow's flight is the movement of the liberated man. He drops his rifle with a gasp of relief, tears every stitch of clothing from his body, throws the garments from him, and pelts his veldtschoon after them. Some sympathetic veteran, who has possibly, in earlier wars, been through the ordeal himself, runs up with a drink of blessed water. He does not drink it; he pours it down his burning throat, then sits on the grass, drawing his breath in long, sobbing sighs, all the more terrible because they are tearless. From head to heel he is covered with tiny red marks, just like a schoolboy who has had the measles; in three days there will not be a mark on him, but he won't forget them, all the same, not in thirty-three years, or three hundred and thirty-three, if he happens to have a memory of any kind at that period.