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This is the most fatal half-hour we have experienced since the siege began, but there was one lucky escape from a shell which burst in the guard tent among four men without hurting any of them. For the depression caused by these serious casualties there is some consolation in the rumour that "Long Tom" of Pepworth's has been knocked out for good and all.
"Long Tom" has done better in long-distance shooting, having thrown one shell nearly to Cæsar's Camp, and the range-finders make that out to be 11,500 yards from Pepworth's Hill, but these three shots to-day hold the record for range and accuracy combined. During the following three weeks the already wearisome progress of the siege was broken by no large event.
"Long Tom" of Pepworth's Hill, which has not fired since "Lady Anne" silenced it days ago, is now reported to be cracked and useless, but the Boers are preparing emplacements for another heavy piece of ordnance on a flat-topped nether spur of Lombard's Kop, where they have a persistently disagreeable 40-pounder already mounted.
Our batteries, aided by Captain Kinnaird-Smith's two Maxim-Nordenfelts, covered the retirement, but they could not put Surprise Hill out of action, or even attempt a reply to the redoubtable "Long Tom" of Pepworth's Hill, who on this occasion surpassed himself by throwing three shells in succession on the road by Range Post Gap from a distance that must be well over 9000 yards.
On this particular Sunday, while we were getting all the rest that a shell-worried garrison can reasonably expect, some of our enemies were labouring hard to mount a big gun on Surprise Hill, which rises from a series of stone-roughened kopjes where the Harrismith Railway winds nearly due west of Rietfontein or Pepworth's Hill, and about 4000 yards north of King's Post one of our most important defensive works.
But the black powder gave away their position in a moment, and from every side Pepworth's, Lombard's Nek, Bulwan came spouting inquirers to see who made that noise. The Lord Mayor's show was a fool to that display of infernal fireworks. The pompon added his bark, but he has never yet bitten anybody: him the Devons despise, and have christened with a coarse name.
In advance of General Brocklehurst's reconnoitring force one squadron of this regiment made straight for a position which the enemy was believed to hold in strength between Pepworth's and Surprise Hill. To do this they crossed near a deep cutting through which the Harrismith railway passes, and there came under a terribly heavy fire, against which even their hardihood was not proof.
People say that "Long Tom" has been shifted from Pepworth's to the new position, but the shells, with their driving-bands grooved deep and sharp, tell another story. It is a new gun, or little used, and probably fresh from Pretoria. Its range is great, and gives easy command of the ravine in which our cavalry are bivouacked by the riverside.
There were also one or two of their field-guns opposite the Manchesters on the flat-topped hill, one, I fancy, with Long Tom on Pepworth's Hill, and a few others on the northern part of Lombard's Kop and on Surprise Hill to the north-westward. Westward, on Telegraph Hill, was a gun which appeared to prey exclusively on cattle. I am afraid it was one of our own mountain guns turned cannibal.
Deserted Pepworth's was on the port-bow, Gun Hill, under Lombard's Kop, on the starboard, Bulwan abeam, Middle Hill astern, Surprise Hill on the port-quarter. Every outline was cut in adamant. The Helpmakaar Ridge, with its little black ants a-crawl on their hill, was crushed flat beneath us.
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