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"I saw my brother soon after Cronje was captured at Paardeberg. I was ashore in Cape Town one evening taking a walk with the Second, just to get out of sight of the ship for an hour, when he pulls my sleeve and says he: "'I say, Chief, you remember that new mess-man you got in B. A.? That Lord? Well, ain't that him over there. You remember, don't you?
In a position covering less than a square mile of territory, hemmed in on all sides by an army almost as great as that which defeated Napoleon at Waterloo, surrounded by a chain of fire from carbines, rapid-fire guns and heavy cannon, the target of thousands of the vaporous lyddite shells, his trenches enfiladed by a continuous shower of lead, his men half dead from lack of food, and stiff from the effect of their narrow quarters in the trenches, General Cronje chose to fight and to risk complete disaster by leading his four thousand men against the forty thousand of the enemy.
On Tuesday the 27th, Commandant Cronje with four thousand men, the remains of his army, surrendered to Lord Roberts at Paardeberg; the same day, Sir Redvers Duller attacked and carried the Boer position near Pieters, in front of Ladysmith, and on Wednesday the 28th, Lord Dundonald with two mounted regiments, entered Ladysmith.
With a handful of men he has held at bay in a small and very exposed town as many as 6000 Boers, commanded at one time by the dogged and unscrupulous Cronje. And not only this.
At every post of vantage Cronje, with consummate generalship, had posted his artillery so that it would be almost impossible for our guns to silence them, whilst at the same time he could sweep the plains below should our infantry attempt to storm the heights at the point of the bayonet.
Then the colossus put forth his strength, and, blundering again, at last blundered into the semblance of victory. Cronje surrendered at Paardeberg, Ladysmith was relieved, and at the beginning of March Lord Roberts marched into Bloemfontein.
When P. Cronje appeared before Mafeking, Baden-Powell had a force of less than 1,200 men, none of whom were regular soldiers and less than half of whom were efficiently armed, with which to sustain the siege of an open town by 7,000 Boers.
In order to make the case quite clear, it is as well to state for the benefit of those who are not intimately acquainted with things in the Transvaal that this Mr. Cronjé, who is now the Superintendent-General of Natives, is the same Cronjé concerning whose action in regard to Jameson's surrender there was so much discussion.
When the report of Cronje's retreat from Magersfontein, which Lord Roberts received soon after he reached Jacobsdaal, was confirmed by a message from Kitchener, he ordered French, who at that time was engaged with the enemy some miles north of Kimberley and endeavouring to capture the Long Tom whose recent arrival from Ladysmith viâ Pretoria had scared the Kimberley civilians into a threat of surrender, to hurry eastward and endeavour to place himself between Cronje and Bloemfontein; but owing to a break in the field telegraph cable the message was delayed.
Now I meet the veteran Cronje a broken old man, captive like myself, far away from our homes and our country. Then and Now! Then we went abroad free and freedom-loving men, burning with patriotism. Our wives and our women-folk watched us go; full of sorrow and anxiety, but satisfied that we were going abroad in our country's cause. And Now!
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