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-manœuvre 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-manœuvred 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.
FOOTNOTES:
[11] To those interested enough to pursue the subject further, I commend With French and his Cavalry in South Africa, by C.S. Goldman. (Macmillan & Co.)