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Updated: June 4, 2025
The districts west and south-west of the capital were infested by energetic commandos which had thwarted all Baden-Powell's and Smith-Dorrien's efforts to suppress them, and Grobler was threatening Pretoria from the north.
A good instance of Baden-Powell's skill in "piecing things together" is given in the same excellent manual on scouting. He was scouting one day on an open grass plain in Matabeleland accompanied by a single native.
Baden-Powell's record as a Carthusian will, as we have seen, bear looking into, and though the old school may boast of more brilliant scholars and more world-wide names on its roll, I do not think it has ever sent into the world a more useful all-round man, a more intrepid soldier, a more upright gentleman, and a more loyal son.
When the sun was up the little body moved off towards the mountains, and after passing through much difficult country, parts of which were actually in the occupation of the enemy, they struck the spoor of the missing column, and to Baden-Powell's great joy found that the marks were quite fresh and leading outwards from the mountains showing that the missing men were safe.
Many a time has the novice, who went out as gaily and contemptuously as the fox-hunter, returned to his bungalow cut and gored on a stretcher. He who goes up against the wild boar must, in Baden-Powell's words, "have matured not only the 'pluck' which brings a man into a desperate situation, but that 'nerve' which enables him to carry the crisis to a successful issue."
I was therefore conveniently blind and deaf, and, begging my amiable young friend to submit Colonel Baden-Powell's suggestion to the Kriegsraad on the following morning, and to apprise me of the result, I wished him good-night, and went to bed once more on the wretched sofa, in anything but a hopeful frame of mind.
That nigger was shot immediately afterwards by one of Baden-Powell's men, who was riding to his help from behind. The other close shave will make the nervous turn cold to think of it. B.-P. had ridden to the help of two men kept at bay by a nigger under a tree, and when the nigger had been killed, he was standing for a moment under the tree, when something moving above him made him look up.
It is not our purpose to magnify Baden-Powell's defence, but it is necessary to caution you against the natural course of following his example and treating the Boer bombardment as a joke. It was no joke; and, if it had been, even the best of jokes pall when repeated through days and weeks and weary months.
General Snyman made a brief reply, the gist of which was, "Come out and fight." A British nobleman, who was captured by the Boers at the Moester's Hoek fight in the Free State in April, was the author of a large number of communications which were almost as mirthful as Colonel Baden-Powell's effort.
Baden-Powell's friends were amused during the early days of the siege of Mafeking by the complaint of some fellow in the town who had incurred the Colonel's wrath.
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