must be dreaming, and
finding it difficult to believe that we were in such close contact with
home and friends. In less than ten minutes posters were out, and eager
groups were busy at the street-corners, discussing the news, scrappy
indeed, and terribly deficient in all details, but how welcome, after
all the vague native rumours we had had to distract us during the past
weeks! We were content then to wait any length of time, and our lives
varied very little as the weeks slipped by. The bombardment was resumed
with vigour, and the old monster gun cruised right round the town and
boomed destruction at us from no less than five different points of
vantage. When the shelling was very heavy, we used to say to ourselves,
"What a good thing they are using up their ammunition!" when again for a
few days it was slack, we were convinced our foes had had bad news. What
matter if our next information was that the Boers had been seen throwing
up their hats and giving vent to other visible expressions of delight:
we had passed a few peaceful hours.

Many casualties continued to take place; some were fatal and tragic, but
many and providential were the escapes recorded. Among the former, one
poor man was blown to bits while sitting eating his breakfast; but the
same day, when a shell landed in or near a house adjacent to my
bomb-proof, it merely took a cage containing a canary with it through
the window, while another fragment went into a dwelling across the
street, and made mince-meat of a sewing-machine and a new dress on which
a young lady had been busily engaged. She had risen from her pleasant
occupation but three minutes before. The coolness of the inhabitants, of
both sexes, was a source of constant surprise and admiration to me, and
women must always be proud to think that the wives and daughters of the
garrison were just as conspicuous by their pluck as the defenders
themselves. Often of a hot afternoon, when I was sitting in my
bomb-proof, from inclination as well as from prudence--for it was a far
cooler resort than the stuffy iron-roofed houses--while women and
children were walking about quite unconcernedly outside, I used to hear
the warning bell ring, followed by so much scuffling, screaming, and
giggling, in which were mingled jokes and loud laughter from the men,
that it made me smile as I listened; then, after the explosion, they
would emerge from any improvised shelter and go gaily on their way, and
the clang of t