When the column reached the hill and began to pitch their tents, the young soldiers of the 'new system' were sorely worn and weary—'pumped out,' as they phrased it. 'We may laugh at the old stiff stock and pipeclay school,' says a popular military writer, 'but it may be no laughing matter some day to find out that, together with the stock and pipeclay which could easily be spared, we have sacrificed the old solidity which army reformers should have 'grappled to their souls with hooks of steel,' and painfully was that want of hardihood and foresight shown in the tragedy that was acted on the Hill of Isandhlwana.
A long ridge, green and grassy, ran southward of the camp, and overlooked an extensive valley. Facing this ridge, and on the extreme left of the camp, were pitched the tents of the Natal Native Contingent. A space of three hundred yards intervened between this force and the next two regiments.
The British Infantry occupied the centre, and a little above their tents were those of Lord Chelmsford and the head-quarter staff. The mounted infantry and the artillery were on the right, lining the verge of the waggon track—road it could scarcely be called. The camp was therefore on a species of sloping plateau, overlooked by the crest of the hill, which rose in its rear, sheer as a wall of rock. The waggons of each corps were parked in its rear.
The camp looked lively and picturesque on the slope of the great green hill, the white tents in formal rows, with the red coats flitting in and out, and the smoke of fires ascending here and there, as the men proceeded to cook their rations.
Florian was detailed for out-piquet duty that night, for the Zulus were reported to be in force in the vicinity, and no one on that duty could close an eye or snatch a minute's repose. The circle of the outposts from the centre of the camp extended two thousand five hundred yards by day, lessened to one thousand four hundred by night, though the mounted videttes were further forward of course; but, by a most extraordinary oversight, no breastworks or other barriers were formed to protect the camp.
Before coming to the personal adventures of our friends in this story, we are compelled for a little space to follow that of the war.
Early on the morning of the following day, the mounted infantry and police, under Major Dartnell, proceeded to reconnoitre the mountainous ground in the direction of a fastness in the rocks known as Matyano's stronghold, while the Natal force, under Lonsdale, moved round the southern base of the Malakota Hill to examine the great dongas it overlooked.
Dartnell's party halted and bivouacked at some distance from the camp, to which he sent a note stating that he had a clear view over all the hills to the eastward, and the Zulus were clustering there in such numbers that he dared not attack them unless reinforced by three companies of the 24th next morning.
A force to aid him left the camp accordingly at daybreak, in light marching order, without knapsacks, greatcoats, or blankets, with one day's cooked provisions and seventy rounds per man; and with it went Lord Chelmsford.
These three detached parties so weakened the main body in camp that it consisted then of only thirty mounted infantry for videttes, eighty mounted volunteers and police, seventy men of the Royal Artillery, six companies of the 24th, including Hammersley's, and two of the Natal Native Contingent.