cil was held at Van Reenen's Pass under
Commander-in-Chief Marthinus Prinsloo. As Commandant Steenekamp, owing
to his illness, was unable to be present, I attended the council in his
place. It was decided that a force of two thousand burghers, under
Commandant C.J. De Villiers, of Harrismith, as Vice-Vechtgeneraal,[7]
should go down into Natal, and that the remaining forces should guard
the passes on the Drakensberg.

Let me say, in parenthesis, that the laws of the Orange Free State make
no allusion to the post of Vechtgeneraal. But shortly before the war
began the Volksraad had given the President the power to appoint such an
officer. At the same session the President was allowed the veto on all
laws dealing with war.

As Commandant Steenekamp was still prevented by his health from going to
the front, I was ordered, as Vice-Commandant of the Heilbron commando,
to proceed with five hundred men to Natal.

It soon became apparent that we had been sent to Natal with the object
of cutting off the English who were stationed at Dundee and
Elandslaagte. We were to be aided in our task by the Transvaalers who
were coming from Volksrust and by a party of burghers from Vrede, all
under the command of General Roch.

We did not arrive in time to be successful in this plan. That there had
been some bungling was not open to question. Yet I am unable to assert
to whom our failure was due--whether to the Commandants of the South
African Republic, or to Commander-in-Chief Prinsloo, or to Vechtgeneraal
De Villiers. For then I was merely a Vice-Commandant, who had not to
_give_ orders, but to obey them. But whoever was to blame, it is
certainly true that when, early in the morning of the 23rd of October, I
cut the line near Dundee, I discovered that the English had retreated to
Ladysmith. It was General Yule who had led them, and he gained great
praise in British circles for the exploit.

If we had only reached our destination a little sooner we should have
cut off their retreating troops and given them a very warm time. But now
that they had joined their comrades at Ladysmith, we had to be prepared
for an attack from their combined forces, and that before the
Transvaalers, who were still at Dundee, could reinforce us.

The British did not keep us long in anxiety.

At eight o'clock the following morning--the 24th of October--they came
out of Ladysmith, and the battle of Modder Spruit[8] began. With the
sole exception of the skirm