ristic of the enemy; he would give them
credit until he was convinced to the contrary that they wished to fight
fair and square. Addressing the Scots Guards, the General said that they
had acted as he expected his old battalion would.

The troops rested well on the night of the 27th, and on the following
day proceeded towards Modder River, where the General was aware that the
passage of the river would involve a bloody fight. By this time General
Pole-Carew had taken command of the 9th Brigade, in place of General
Featherstonhaugh, who was wounded.

THE BATTLE OF MODDER RIVER

This battle, to use Lord Methuen's words, was one of the hardest and
most trying fights in the annals of the British army. He might also have
truly said that it was one of the most gloriously-fought engagements
that has been known in modern warfare. On reconnoitring the enemy's
position, the Boers were found to be strongly entrenched and concealed
behind a fringe of furze and foliage and in front of trees in the
neighbourhood of Modder River. From native sources it was learnt that
the river and the Riet River were fordable anywhere--a statement which
was afterwards found to be entirely false. The enemy was discovered on
the east of the village to be in strong force and aggressive. His
trenches commanded the plain for a distance of 1600 yards, and there was
no means of outflanking him, as the Modder River was in flood.

The word Modder means muddy, and this term was appreciated in its full
significance when our parched troops came to make acquaintance with it.
But there are times and seasons when even ochreous water becomes clear
as crystal to the fevered imagination, and before this day of days was
over--in the sweltering, merciless sun, with the thermometer at 110
degrees in the shade--men felt as though they would stake their whole
chance of existence for one half-bottle of the reviving fluid. But this
is a digression. The horror of that day's thirst had barely set in at
the time treated of--4 to 8 A.M. At that hour there was no suspicion
that the enemy, strong in numbers, would continue to fight, and be
strengthened by some 8000 more Dutchmen. He appeared to be retiring, and
there were no signs that the village would be held. But at 8.10 a fierce
roar of guns multifarious declared that the river was fringed by the
enemy, and that he was well and skilfully concealed.

Parallel to the river on the north side the Boers h