“But our fellows have got stone walls to keep behind, and they ought by now to shoot as well as the Boers,” I said.
“That’s quite right, Mr Moray,” cried the Sergeant, angrily puffing at his pipe; “they ought to, but they don’t—not by a long way. Every time they use a cartridge there ought to be one Doppie disabled and sent to the rear. I keep on telling them this fort isn’t Purfleet Magazine nor Woolwich Arsenal; but it’s no good.”
“But, Sergeant,” cried Denham anxiously, “you don’t mean to say that we’re running out of cartridges?”
“But I do mean to say it, sir; and the time isn’t so very far off when we shall either have to hang out the white flag—”
“What!” cried Denham, dragging himself up into a sitting position. “Never!”
“Or,” continued the Sergeant emphatically, “make a sortie and give the beggars cold steel.”
“Ah! that sounds better,” cried Denham, dropping back upon his rough pillow. “That’s what we shall have to do.”
“Right, sir,” cried the Sergeant. “Cold steel’s the thing. I’ve always been a cavalry man, and I’ve seen a bit of service before I came into the Light Horse as drill-sergeant and general trainer. I’ve been through a good deal, and learned a good deal; and I tell you two young men that many a time in a fight I’ve felt wild sitting on horseback here, and trotting off there, dismounting to rest our horses; finding ourselves under fire again, and cantering off somewhere else—into a valley, behind a hill, or to the shelter of a wood, because our time hadn’t come—and the infantry working away all the while. I’m not going to run down the cavalry; they’re splendid in war when they can get their chance to come to close quarters. You see, we haven’t done much with our swords, for the Doppies won’t stand a charge. Where we’ve had them has been dismounted, as riflemen, and that’s what our trouble is now. We can’t get at the enemy; what we want is a regiment of foot with the bayonet. Just a steady advance under such cover as they could find, and then a sharp run in with a good old British cheer, and the Doppies would begin to run. Then we ought to be loosed at them, and every blessed Boer among them would make up his mind that it was quite time he went home to see how his crops are getting on.”
“Yes, Sergeant,” said Denham gravely; “that’s exactly the way to do it, and that’s what people at home are saying. But we’re shut up here, ammunition is failing, and we have no regiment of foot to give the brutes the cold steel and make them run; so what’s the best thing to do under the circumstances?”