went a lovely purler
with me this morning, turning a somersault and finishing by laying
across my right leg. It was some time before I could get help, and then
only a man came and sat on the brute's head to keep him down. I was
grasping his two hind hoofs, which were within a few inches of my face,
and preventing them from "pushing it in." At length, the doctor and his
orderly galloped up, and the latter, dismounting, grasped the horse's
tail, and pulled him off far enough for me to free my leg. Apart from
rather a bad back, I am all serene.

Our friend, "Nobby of the Borders," visited us last night. I don't think
that is his real name, and am not anxious to know. To us he is, and
always will be, "Nobby." He was tired, having been on the kopjes for the
best part of the day, but interesting as ever.

"Art thou weary, art thou langwidge?"

he quoted after a reflective expectoration, which just missed my right
foot. "That's a hymn, ain't it?" he queried with the air of a man of
knowledge. We replied in the affirmative, and then, curious to hear his
religious convictions, asked him about them. "Yes, I believe in
religion," said Nobby, "I was confirmed and converted or whatever it is,
some time ago. And I tell you, since I've been out 'ere in this war I've
felt certain about Gawd. Spion Kop and Pieter's 'Ill made yer think, I
can tell yer." And then waxing wrath about certain of his comrades, he
inveighed thus: "And yet there's some ---- ---- fellers in the reg'ment
'oo will ---- ---- say there ain't a Gawd. But those ---- ---- ----
beggars are always ---- ---- arguing about every ---- thing." If Mr.
Burdett-Coutts wants any corroboration in respect to his exposure of the
inner working of certain military hospitals, let him apply to Private
"Nobby" of the Borderers. He was an enteric patient at No. 1 Field
Hospital, Modderspruit, and the tales he tells of his own uncared-for
sufferings, and the even worse ones of comrades, show, alas, that the
hospital can, and does often contain, as well as kind, self-sacrificing,
skilful doctors, doctors and medical orderlies who are brutal, selfish,
and absolutely callous. He speaks well of the nurses, I am glad to say.

"THE ROUGHS" LEAVE US FOR PRETORIA.

NOOITGEDACHT,
(A little beyond Hekpoort).

Wednesday, October 17th, 1900. Late last night our friends the Roughs
(72nd I.Y.) received the orde