Four Months Besieged | Page 2

Hope, and Charity--Flash signals from the south--A new Creusot gun 69
CHAPTER VII
THE SORTIES OF DECEMBER
Retribution--Sir Archibald Hunter's bold scheme--A night attack-- Silently through the darkness--At the foot of Gun Hill--A broken ascent--"Wie kom dar?" "The English are on us!"--Major Henderson thrice wounded--Destroying "Leviathan"--Hussars suffer under fire--Rejoicings in town--Sir George White's address to the troops--Boer compliments--A raid for provender--A second sortie-- The Rifles' bold enterprise--An unwelcome light--Cutting the wires--Surprise Hill reached--The sentry's challenge--Rifles' charge with the bayonet--Boer howitzer destroyed--The return to camp--Cutting the way home--Serious losses 103
CHAPTER VIII
AFTER COLENSO
The Town-Guard called out--Echoes of Colenso--Heliograms from Buller--The Boers and Dingaan's Day--Disappointing news--Special correspondents summoned--Victims of the bombardment--Shaving under shell fire--Tea with Lord Ava--Boer humour: "Where is Buller?"--Sir George White's narrow escape--A disastrous shot-- Fiftieth day of the siege--Grave and gay--"What does England think of us?"--Stoical artillerymen--The moral courage of caution--How Doctor Stark was killed--Serious thoughts--Gordons at play--Boers watch the match--A story by the way--"My name is Viljoen"--How Major King won his liberty--A tribute to Boer hospitality--"We rely on your Generals"--General White and Schalk-Burger--A coward chastised--"Sticking it out" 128
CHAPTER IX
A CHRISTMAS UNDER SIEGE
Husbanding supplies--Colonel Ward's fine work--Our Christmas market--A scanty show--Some startling prices--A word to cynics-- The compounding of plum-puddings--The strict rules of temperance--Boer greetings "per shell"--A lady's narrow escape-- Correspondents provide sport--"Ginger" and the mules--The sick and wounded--Some kindly gifts--Christmas tree for the children-- Sir George White and the little ones--"When the war is over"--Some empty rumours--A fickle climate--Eight officers killed and wounded--More messages from Buller--Booming the old year out 155
CHAPTER X
THE GREAT ASSAULT
Why the Boers attacked--Interesting versions--A general surprise-- Joubert's promise--Boer tactics reconsidered--Erroneous estimates-- Under cover of night--A bare-footed advance--The Manchesters surprised--The fight on Waggon Hill--In praise of the Imperial Light Horse--A glorious band--The big guns speak--Lord Ava falls-- Gordons and Rifles to the rescue--A perilous position--The death of a hero--A momentary panic--Man to man--A gallant enemy--Burghers who fell fighting--The storming of C?sar's Camp--Shadowy forms in the darkness--An officer captured--"Maak Vecht!"--Abdy's guns in play--"Well done, gunners!"--Taking water to the wounded-- Dick-Cunyngham struck down--Some anxious moments--The Devons charge home--A day well won 180
CHAPTER XI
WATCHING FOR BULLER
Sir Redvers Buller's second attempt--A message from the Queen--Last sad farewells--Burial of Steevens and Lord Ava--At dead of night-- Relief army north of the Tugela--Water difficulties surmised--A look in at Bulwaan--Spion Kop from afar--What the watchers saw-- The Boers trekking--Buller withdraws--The "key" thrown away-- Good-bye to luxuries--Precautions against disease--"Chevril"--The damming of the Klip--Horseflesh unabashed--One touch of pathos-- Vague memories of home--Sweet music from the south--Buller tries again--Disillusionment--The last pipe of tobacco 209
CHAPTER XII
AFTER ONE HUNDRED DAYS
Boer p?an of victory--Rations cut down--Sausage without mystery-- The "helio" moves east--Sick and dying at Intombi--Famine prices at market--Laughter quits the camps--A kindly thing by the enemy-- Good news at last--Heroes in tatters--The distant tide of battle-- Pulse-like throb of rifles--Two sons for the Empire--British infantry on Monte Cristo--Boer ambulances moving north--"'Ave you 'eard the noos?"--Rations increased--Bulwaan strikes his tents-- "With a rifle and a red cross"--Buller "going strong"--Cronje's surrender--A sorry celebration--"A beaten army in full retreat"-- "Puffing Billy" dismantled--General Buller's message--belief at hand 224
CHAPTER XIII
RELIEF AT LAST
The beginning of the end--Buller's last advance--Heroic Inniskillings--The coming of Dundonald--A welcome at Klip River Drift--A weather-stained horseman--The Natal troopers--Cheers and tears--A grand old General--Sir George White's address-- "Thank God, we have kept the flag flying!"--"God save the Queen"-- Arrival of Buller--Looking backward--Within four days of starvation--Horseflesh a mere memory--Eight hundred sick and wounded--A word of tribute--Conclusion 237

ILLUSTRATIONS
Sir George Stewart White, V.C., G.C.S.I. (from a photograph by Window & Grove) Frontispiece The Royal Hotel, Ladysmith (showing the ruins of Mr. Pearse's bedroom wrecked by a shell from "Long Tom," 3rd Nov. 1899) _Face page 26_
A shell-proof resort (a culvert under a road used as a living place by day for civilians, who returned to their houses when the shelling ceased after sunset) 50
The British position at Ladysmith (looking north towards Rietfontein and the Newcastle Road) 96
The British position at Ladysmith (looking nearly due south) 128
The British position at Ladysmith (looking south-east) 162
The British position at Ladysmith (looking eastward) 202

PLANS
Sketch-map of positions round Ladysmith, Nov. 1899 _Face page 60_
Siege of Ladysmith, after two months of bombardment 175
The environs of Ladysmith 180
Military map of Ladysmith _End of vol._
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
The declaration of war--Sir George White and the defence of Natal--The force at Glencoe--Battle of Talana Hill--General Yule's retirement--Battle of Elandslaagte--Useless victories--Enemy's continued advance.
Before taking up the history of the siege proper it will be well here to pass briefly in review the events which led up to the isolation and investment of Ladysmith. When war was declared by the Government of the Transvaal in its despatch of the 9th October 1899, it found Her Majesty's Government in very great measure unprepared. A month earlier, however, reinforcements of 10,000 troops had been ordered to Natal from India and elsewhere, and the major part of these were already in the