acking the enemy. It was plain that this large force,
commanded by young Cronje, had moved across from Fourteen Streams with
the object of harrying us and perhaps retaking Boshof; and for a few
days there was practically no force at Fourteen Streams. Now if Lord
Methuen could have sent out a light column westward from Boshof to the
rear of the laager, and also held the enemy in front with the remainder
of his force, he might with good fortune have bagged the whole Boer
force, which he knew from my information to be weak in guns. I know he
was urged to do it; I know he wanted to do it; I know what the chance of
a sensational success meant to a man whose successes had hitherto been
unexciting and his one failure a spectacle; and I admired him for not
running the risk. It would have been so easy to yield to the urgency of
his staff and Intelligence Department, and success was almost certainly
assured; but Lord Methuen, who has been foolishly accused of all kinds
of rashness, chose in this case to read in that "almost" an assurance
that he was not justified in taking the risk. He had no Horse Artillery;
and the rapid and secret march to the rear of the laager might have been
impossible with field-guns. So he decided at any rate; and decisions
like these are among not the least important victories of a campaign.

Since the Boers were in the neighbourhood, and might at any moment make
an attack, Major Pollock and I were anxious not to leave Boshof until it
became absolutely necessary. We had a secret agent watching our
interests at Kimberley in the person of a staff officer whose name I
suppose I had better not mention; thus we witnessed, without misgiving,
the sudden and hurried flight of all the other correspondents from
Boshof, mystery written on their faces. Thus we spent two more peaceful
days riding in the shady lanes and lying on the sunburnt kopjes,
sweeping the horizon with the telescopes of Lord Chesham and his
pleasant crew; thus we received a telegram from Kimberley advising us to
"come here and attend to the business yourselves"; thus we rode away and
closed what will remain in my memory as the pleasantest chapter in the
campaign.

The diary that follows was written during the march of the Relief
Column--not always under the most favourable circumstances. The
imperfections of a document of this kind are so closely bound up with
its only merit that I have decided to leave it exactly as it was
written, and not to