earnt
that Cronje had definitely abandoned the whole Magersfontein position,
that this was the tail of his force going through, and that consequently
there was nothing to be feared from a rear attack. Chester Master wrote
a hasty despatch to this effect to Kitchener and gave it to me, after
which I had a most amusing ride through our lines from the extreme left
to the extreme right, where Kitchener was. First by our batteries,
thundering and smoking (the enemy only had one gun in action that I saw,
but I must say it did very well, feeling for the range with two short
shots, and after that getting well into our guns every time), and then
on through the Mounted Infantry, who kept on charging and retiring,
until finally after three miles' ride I came to the far right, where
Kitchener and the big naval gun sat together in state on the top of a
small kopje strewn with black shining rocks. Here I gave in my despatch,
"From Captain Chester Master, left front, sir," and the best military
salute I have yet mastered (inclined to go into fits of laughter at the
absurdity of the whole thing all the time), and the great man, with his
sullen eye, sitting among his black rocks all alone, reads it and asks
me a question or two, and vouchsafes to tell me that the information is
"very important," which I suppose meant that he had not been certain
whether he was in contact with the middle or extreme tail of the enemy's
force. Various officers of the staff come up and I tell them all I know.
I am very hungry and parched with thirst, but I know I shall get nothing
out of these fellows. However, my luck holds. Under some thorn-trees
below I spy the flat hats of the sailors, and under the lee of an
ammunition waggon hard by a group of officers. All is well. Five minutes
later I am pledging them in a whisky and sparklet, and sitting down to
such a breakfast as I have not tasted for weeks. God bless all sailors,
say I!

Orders meantime come thick and fast from the grim watcher on the rocks
above, and troop after troop of Mounted Infantry go scouring away to the
attack. It is a running fight. Kopje after kopje, as the Boers push on,
breaks into fire and is left extinct behind. But still they keep their
flank unbroken and their convoy intact. For the hundredth time I admire
their dogged courage under these, the most trying of all circumstances,
the protection of a slow retreat.

So it goes on through the day, and I have great fun galloping about