We are much disappointed at being left out of the fighting to-day, but it's only natural. We are only half a battery, and have no reserve ammunition, actual or prospective, for some time.
I have struck my last match. I have now to rely on cordite, which, however, only acts as a spill. You get a rifle cartridge (there are plenty to be got, the infantry seem to drop them about by hundreds), wrench out the bullet and wad, and find the cordite in long slender threads like vermicelli. You dip this in another man's lighted pipe, when it flares up, and you can light your own.
In the evening Williams and I made a fire, and cooked our cabbage in our Kaffir pot, a round iron one on three legs, putting in meat and some (looted) vinegar. How good it was! It was the first fresh green food we had eaten since leaving England, and it is what one misses most. Two escaped prisoners of the Canadian Mounted Infantry came to our fire, and we had a most interesting chat with them till very late. They spoke highly of the way they had been treated. In food they always fared just as the Boers did, and were under no needlessly irksome restrictions. They said that in this sort of warfare the Boers could always give us points. They laugh at our feeble scouting a mile or two ahead, while their own men are ranging round in twos and threes, often fifteen miles from their commando, and at night venturing right up to our camps. In speed of movement, too, they can beat us; in spite of their heavy bullock transport they can travel at least a third quicker than we. Their discipline was good enough for its purpose. A man would obey a direct order whatever it was. They only wanted a stiffening of our own class of military discipline to make them invulnerable. They sang hymns every night in groups round their fires, "but are hypocrites." (On this point, however, my informants differed a little.) They said the leader of this force was Prinsloo, and that we had not been fighting De Wet at all. It seems there are two De Wets, Piet and Christian. There was a rumour yesterday that Piet had been captured near Kroonstadt, though Christian seems to be the important one. But the whole thing is distracting, like constructing history out of myths and legends.
July 29.—Sunday.—Church parade at eleven. It is reported, and is probably true, that the whole Boer force has surrendered. If so we have missed little or nothing. About twenty prisoners came in in the morning, quaint, rough people, shambling along on diminutive ponies. In the afternoon Williams went foraging for the officers, and I visited our Scotch friends, the donors of the cabbage, who were very kind, and asked me in. The married son had just come in from Basutoland, where he had been hiding, a great red, strapping giant, with his wife and babies by him. He had originally been given a passport to allow him to remain neutral, but later they had tried to make him fight, so he ran away, and had been with a missionary over the border, whose house he repaired. It was pleasant to see this joyful home-coming.
Rations to-day, one biscuit and a pound of flour. How to cook it? Some went to houses, some made dough-nuts (with deadly properties, I believe). No fat and no baking-powder. Fortunately, Williams brought back from his expedition, besides fowls, etc., for the officers, some bread and, king of luxuries, a big pot of marmalade, which he bought from a pretty little Boer girl, the temporary mistress of a fine farm. Her father, she proudly explained, was away fighting us, "as was his duty." Williams was quite sentimental over this episode. The Canadians came round to our fire again, and we had another long talk. They said there were very few Transvaalers in this army. The Free Staters hate them. The remains we found in the gun-emplacement at Slabbert's Nek were those of Lieutenant Muller, a German artillerist. The Boers always had plenty of our harness, stores, ammunition, etc.
July 30.—After stables Williams and I went foraging in the town and secured scones, a fowl (for a shilling), another cabbage, and best of all, some change, a commodity for which one has to scheme and plot. We managed it by first getting into a store and buying towels, spoons, note-books, etc., up to ten shillings, and then cajoling and bluffing a ten-shilling bit out of the unwilling store-keeper. This was changed by the lady who sold us the fowl, an Englishwoman. On our return there was harness-cleaning, interrupted by a sudden order to move, but only to shift camp about a mile. This is always annoying, because at halts you always collect things such as fuel and meal and pots, which are impossible to carry with you. Of course this is no matter, if regular marching and fighting are on hand, but just for shifting camp it is a nuisance. However, much may be done by determination. I induced the Collar-maker to take our flour on his waggon; marmalade, meal, etc., were hastily decanted into small tins, and stuffed into wallets, and just before starting Williams furtively tossed the fuel-sack into a buck-waggon, and hitched up the Kaffir pot somewhere underneath. I strung a jug on my saddle, which, what with feed-bags (contents by no means confined to oats), and muzzles, with meat and things in them, is rather Christmas-tree-like. We marched through the town, and to the base of a kopje about a mile away, where preparations for a big camp had been made. It is confirmed that the Boers have surrendered en masse, and they are to be brought here.
After we had unharnessed, I got leave to go back to town and send a joint telegram home from a dozen of us. The battery has a telegraphic address at home from which wires are forwarded to our relations. The charge for soldiers is only 2s. a word, so a dozen of us can say "quite well" to our relations for about 2s. 8d. The official at the office said the wire was now open, but that he had no change. However, he produced 5s. when I gave him £2. It was a little short, but the change was valuable. He said that to pass the censor it must be signed by an officer, so I had to look for one. After some dusty tramping, I found a captain of the Staffords, saluted, and made my request. We were, I suppose, about equal in social station, but I suddenly—I don't know why—felt what a gulf the service put between us. He was sleek and clean, and talking about the hour of his dinner to another one, just as if he were at a club. I was dirty, unshaven, out at knees, and was carrying half a sack of fuel—a mission like this has to serve subsidiary purposes—and felt like an abject rag-and-bone-picking ruffian. He took the paper, signed it, and went on about his confounded dinner. However, I expect mine rivalled his for once in a way, for when I got back one of the "boys" (nigger drivers) had cooked our chicken and cabbage, and we ate it, followed by scones and marmalade, and, to wind up with, black coffee, made from some rye coffee given us by one of our Canadian prisoner friends. I had met one of them near the telegraph office, and visited his quarters. Rye makes remarkably good strong coffee, with a pleasant burnt taste in it. The camp had filled up a bit, the Manchesters, Staffords and 2nd Field Battery, of Rundle's division, having come in. We also played with flour and fat over our fire, and made some chupatties. The Captain had sent a foraging party out to secure fat at any price. Quite a warm night. A deep furrow passed near my harness, and I had a most comfortable bed in it.
July 31.—The first batch of 250 prisoners have come in, and are herded near. They are of all ages from sixty to fifteen, dressed in all varieties of rough plain clothes, with some ominous exceptions in the shape of a khaki tunic, a service overcoat, etc. Some seemed depressed, some jocular, the boys quite careless. All were lusty and well fed. Close by were their ponies, tiny little rats of things, dead-tired and very thin. Their saddles were mostly very old, with canvas or leather saddle-bags, containing cups, etc. I saw also one or two horses with our regimental brands on them. Some had bright-coloured rugs on them, and all the men had the same, which lent vivid colour to the otherwise sombre throng.
We watered and grazed near an outlying picket, and saw many prisoners coming in in twos and threes, and giving up their rifles. What will they do with them? They are nominally rebels since the 15th of June; but I doubt if a tenth of them ever heard of Roberts's proclamation. Communications are few in this big, wild country; and their leaders systematically deceive them. Besides, to call the country conquered when Bloemfontein was taken, is absurd. The real fighting had not begun then, and whole districts such as this were unaffected. It seems to me that morally, if not legally, these people are fair-and-square civilized belligerents, who have fought honestly for their homes, and treated our prisoners humanely. Deportation over-sea and confiscation of farms seem hard measures, and I hope more lenience will be shown.
In the evening Doctor Moon, of the Hampshire Yeomanry, a great friend of Williams, turned up, and had supper with us. We had no fatted calf to kill; but fortunately could show a tolerable menu, including beef and marmalade.