some
time must elapse before a relieving column could advance; but as the
news came of the arrival of ship after ship, laden with troops from
England, confidence was felt that relief would arrive before the
exhaustion of the stock of provisions. The garrison on their part were
enabled to send to their friends accurate information of the state of
their stores, and the time which they would be able to hold out.

At length, on the 28th of March, the news arrived that the column would
advance upon the following day. The relieving force was attacked at
Gingihlovo, near the river Inyanzi, and there the Zulus were defeated
with great loss. With this relieving column was another Naval Brigade,
consisting of men of the _Shah_ and _Tenedos_. The _Shah_ was on her
way to England when, upon arriving at Saint Helena, the news of the
massacre at Isandhlwana reached her. Captain Bradshaw, who commanded,
at once determined to take upon himself the responsibility of returning
to Natal, where his arrival caused the liveliest satisfaction, as at
that time none of the reinforcements from England had reached the spot,
and strong fears were still felt of the invasion of the colony by the
Zulus. The Naval Brigade bore their part in the fight at Gingihlovo,
and were with the relieving force when it entered Ekowe. The garrison
of this place, small as they were, had been prepared upon the following
day to sally out to effect a diversion in favour of the column, should
it again be attacked in its advance to Ekowe.

The garrison was now relieved. Few of those who had formed part of it
were fit for further service. Ekowe was abandoned, and the Naval
Brigade returned to Natal. The brigade took part in the further advance
after the arrival of Sir Garnet Wolseley; but the defeat of the Zulus at
Ulundi occurring a few days after the start had been made, hostilities
ceased, and the Naval Brigade were not called upon for further
exertions.

CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT.

THE BOER WAR--1881.

Two years after the conclusion of the Zulu war, when the troops who had
been hurried from England to take part in that campaign had for the most
part returned, and the country was almost deserted of troops, the Boers,
saved by our arms from all danger of a native rising, longed again for
independence, and they determined to have it. They had, in fact, never
acquiesced in the act of annexation. At the time, the residents in the
towns had desired it for t