m, besides his brevet of
lieutenant-colonel, two clasps. He was forty-four years of age, and was
gazetted to the lieutenant-colonelcy of his regiment in July 1899.

[12] Augustus John Henry Beaumont Paulet, Marquis of Winchester, Premier
Marquis of England and the fifteenth bearer of the title, was born in
1858, and succeeded his father in 1887. Educated at Eton, he entered the
Coldstream Guards in 1879, was lieutenant in 1881, captain in 1890, and
received his majority in April 1897. He served in the expedition to the
Soudan in 1885 as aide-de-camp to Sir John M'Neill, and was present in the
engagements at Hasheen and the Tofreck Zereba, and at the destruction of
Tamai, receiving the medal with two clasps and Khedive's star. He went out
to the Cape with his regiment in the _Gascon_, arriving there just a month
ago. It was only on the previous Saturday that his appointment as second
in command of the regiment was notified, the vacancy having been caused by
the death of Lieutenant-Colonel Stopford at the battle of Belmont. Lord
Winchester was the hereditary bearer of the Cap of Maintenance--a cap of
dignity carried before the Sovereigns of England at their coronation. He
was a D.L. for the county of Southampton, was unmarried, and is succeeded
by his brother, Lord Henry William Montagu Paulet, formerly a lieutenant
of the 3rd Battalion Hampshire Regiment, who has just attained his 37th
year.

CHAPTER VI

CHIEVELEY CAMP

Deeply to be deplored, yet generally recognised, was the fact that so
far, no decisive defeat had been inflicted on the Boers. We had fought
gloriously, sometimes successfully; great men and brave had written
their names in blood on the roll of heroes and had passed away, but
nothing decisive had been done. It was true that the enemy had been
routed time after time, but he had got away without chastisement, and in
most cases with his guns. The main reason for his safe flight was our
lack of cavalry, and also the fact, that such horses as we had were not
of the same nimble build as those--inferior, yet smart--which were
possessed by the Boers. These, thoroughly acclimatised and also educated
to the curious nature of the boulder-strewn country, were able to career
into space before our heavier chargers could get even with them.

Lord Methuen had fought three glorious battles successfully, and a
fourth, equally glorious though productive