row embankment. Then across a level field
of veldt, and they commence to ascend a slight depression, which is
just behind a shouldering billow of veldt. It is hard work for the
artillery horses over this ground, but it is fine the way they tug and
strain at their work. The officers urge the men to hurry forward.
Already a gun is heard from the Boers. They have opened fire. Two
wheelers of an artillery waggon drop down, apparently dead, from
exhaustion.

I had just been watching their heavy sweating sides and foam-streaming
mouths before they collapsed. Already two spare horses are being
brought round to replace them as we hurry forward.

Now, all of a sudden, things become lively, and do not slacken again
until the finish. No sooner have the first of the cavalry appeared
than the Dutch guns open fire. R-r-r-r rip--a shell drops amongst the
artillery and cavalry just ahead of us. The cavalry wheel and spread
themselves into more open order none too soon, as now the shells come
fast. The Boers have got the range exactly. Bang bursts a shell
amongst the Imperial Light Horse near me. A shell bursts quite close,
and a piece drops between Bennett Burleigh and me. The life, vigour,
and swing of movement of these few minutes when we first came under
fire was magnificent, the cavalry wheeling and circling, infantry
deploying, the rattle of the artillery waggons, the cracking of the
drivers' whips on the backs of the straining, struggling horses, the
rending sound of the shells in the air like the tearing of a great
canvas mainsail; the loud report when a shell exploded, or the dull
thud when they simply buried themselves in the veldt.

How lucky for us so few of them exploded! There would have been
terrible damage done, especially by the first few shots, when the
cavalry and artillery were massed together. It was now for a while an
artillery duel, but the Devons were quietly getting forward for the
front attack. The cavalry had swung out on the extreme right flank,
and the Manchesters and Gordons were going on to the ridge to take
them on their right flank there, while the Devons went up the face.

The Boers changed their artillery fire from time to time; first it was
at our artillery and cavalry, then into the Devons as they advanced or
as they lay down in the last field of veldt, waiting for the final
charge; and then they sent a few shells into a body of cavalry that
was on our extreme left. The very last shot they fired