contentment
that surprised me, but the perfection of their circumstances. They were
encamped on such a spot as people pay large sums for the privilege of
pitching tents upon; they were numerous enough to make themselves
independent of alien company; the sun was shining, the sea breeze
blowing; they had food and drink, and tobacco to smoke; where they
bathed an eight-oar gig from the _Powerful_ swung on the swell, not so
much to prevent escape as to render assistance to tired swimmers.

So our prisoners blinked in the sun and listened to the organ-note of
the surf, and brooded on the most beautiful picture I have ever seen:
masses of bare rock towering into the bright sky, and an endless pageant
of seas rolling grandly homeward from the south, from the infinite
purple and blue of the Indian Ocean, grounding at the edge of the green
lawn and showering snow upon the hot rocks.

VI

IN THE EDDIES OF A GREAT WHIRL

When I arrived at Modder River Camp, on February 17th, the guns were
being hauled back from the hills into camp, tents were being struck, and
waggon transport organised. The plain was a cloud of hot, whirling sand
that shrouded near objects as closely as a fog, but, instead of the damp
coldness of a fog, the plain was radiating heat that sent the
thermometer inside one's tent up to 135 degrees. The place that a few
days before had been resounding with artillery was now silent and (by
comparison) deserted; buck waggons took the place of gun carriages, and
the ambulance cart carried mails from home. One thought of Modder River
as being surely at "the front," but here was the place, here were the
troops, the guns, the hospitals, the sand-enveloped cemetery, and yet
one seemed to be no nearer than before to actual war. As for news, there
was less even than at Cape Town. A few telegrams, days old, fluttered
from the notice-board, and in at headquarters I found that we who had
been sixty hours on the journey from Cape Town were hailed as
newsbearers. There was a press censor, yet one could not send press
telegrams; headquarters had moved on to Jacobsdaal; telegrams must go
through headquarters, and the wire to Jacobsdaal was only to be used for
military purposes. This was something like a block, so Mr. Amery, of the
_Times_, and I, resolved to ride over to Jacobsdaal and see if we could
get any news.

[Illustration: MR. G. LENTHAL CHEATLE, F.R.C.S.

_Consulting Surgeon to Her Majesty's Forces in South Afr