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On foul water and bully beef he tramped through a land of plenty. Lord Roberts's eight days' halt was spent in consolidating the general military situation. We have already shown how Buller had crept upwards to the Natal Border. On the west Methuen reached Hoopstad and Hunter Christiana, settling the country and collecting arms as they went.

In the evening, I am told, the General received a signal from Buller: "Have taken hill. Fight went well." No one thought or talked of anything but the prospect of near relief. Hearing an unhappy case of an officer's widow left destitute, Colonel Knox, commanding the Divisional Troops, has offered twelve bottles of whisky for auction to-morrow, and hopes to make £100 by the sale.

There were provisions calculated to last for two months, and no one doubted that long before that time General Buller would arrive to their rescue. So confident had the military authorities been, that not only had no defensive works been thrown up, but they had omitted to send the women and children, and the men unfitted to give active assistance, to the rear.

In announcing the appointment, the War Office explained that Buller was superseded because it was advisable to relieve him of responsibility for the operations outside Natal, which he could not effectively control from his detached position on the right flank.

All Chris's party had come out, and those who had not before seen the view waited there for a couple of hours, ate some refreshment they had brought with them, discussed the difficulties that lay in the way of farther advance, and the probable point against which General Buller would next direct his attack. "Hullo!" Chris exclaimed suddenly, "that pontoon train is not coming back to camp.

It was skilfully carried out, and Buller was once more ferrying his men across the Tugela, having for the third time failed to reach Ladysmith.

So I went and bowled to him for an hour, and the result was that he called a house meeting, and I was put into the eleven." "You will be in the school eleven next year, you see." "I don't know," replied Buller; "it depends on how I get on, you know. I might make a regular mull of it." "Bosh! not you; you have gone on improving too steadily for that," said Penryhn confidently.

"Well, I have heard my father say that some very clever chap has said that it is `an infinite capacity for taking pains, and if that's true, by Jove, you must be a genius, Tom!" And they both burst out laughing at the notion, and went in and changed their flannels. And Buller lit his candle and mugged at a German exercise till the supper-bell rang.

Having realised "the Bull's" faults, should he not make allowance for them, seeing that his virtues so outnumbered his failings? He was certainly intolerant of any other opinions but his own; but then so was Ferrers, whom Gordon worshipped on the other side of idolatry. The pity was that Ferrers was intolerant of the things he hated, while Buller was intolerant of the things he admired.

The impetuous and childish letters and telegrams sent out by the diamond men induced Buller, who said afterwards that "although I had every confidence in Colonel Kekewich's military capacity I did not trust the other powers within the city," to send Lord Methuen northwards on November 10 with instructions to help Kimberley by removing unnecessary non-combatants and natives, and "to let the people understand that you have not come to undertake its defence, but to afford it better means of maintaining its defence."