once issued.

The boys returned to the town and made their purchases, which were
carried down by two Kaffirs and stored in the waggons, which were
already in process of being loaded--two with boxes of ammunition, the
others with miscellaneous stores for the troops. They slept at an
hotel, and next morning at daybreak presented themselves at the yard.
The Kaffirs were already harnessing up the oxen, and in a quarter of an
hour the four waggons, with sixteen others, started for the Tugela.

It was now the middle of December. Early in the month commissioners had
been sent to Cetewayo with the terms decided upon by Sir Bartle Frere.
The first clauses of the document contained the settlement of the
disputed frontier, and fines were fixed to be paid by the chiefs whose
men had committed forays across the borders; it then went on to demand
that the whole of Cetewayo's army should at once be disbanded; freedom
of marriage was to be allowed, when the parties thereto were of age;
justice was to be impartially administered; missionaries to be allowed
to reside in the Zulu country; British residents to be appointed; all
disputes between Zulus and Europeans to be referred to the king and
resident; and no expulsion from Zulu territory was to be carried into
effect without the distinct approval of the resident.

It was intimated to the king that unless these terms were accepted by
the 11th of January the army would at once invade the country. Few men
expected that the Zulu king would tamely submit to conditions which
would deprive him of all the military power in which he delighted, and
would reduce him to a state of something like dependency upon the
British.

During the month of December General Thesiger, who commanded the British
forces in South Africa, made every effort to prepare for hostilities.
The regiments which were at the Cape were brought round by sea; a
brigade of seamen and marines was landed from the ships of war; several
corps of irregular horse were raised among the colonists; and regiments
of natives were enrolled. Before the date by which the king was to send
in his answer the troops were assembled along the frontier in the
following disposition:--

Number 1 Column.
(_Headquarters, Thring's Post, Lower Tugela_.)
Commandant.--Colonel C.K. Pearson, the Buffs.

Naval Brigade.--170 bluejackets and marines of
H.M.S. _Active_ (with one Gatling and two 7-pounder guns), under
Captain Campbell, R.N.