ed; for a moment the whole Brigade seemed in
a double sense to have lost its head, and, in spite of the fierce and
terribly effective fire of our artillery, there followed, not indeed an
actual defeat, but none the less a grave disaster, involving further
delay in the relief of Kimberley and the loss of over 700 brave men
killed and wounded.

=War's Terrible Harvest.=

'The incoming of the wounded to the hospital camp was the most pitiful
sight my life has thus far brought me; but I scarce know which to admire
most--the patient endurance of the sufferers or the skilled devotion of
the army doctors, whose outspoken hatred of war was still more
intensified by the gruesome tasks assigned them.

'That night I slept on the floor of a captured Boer ambulance van,
fitted up as a physic shop with shelves fitted with bottles mostly
labelled poison. It was for me, even thus sheltered, a bitterly cold
night, much more for the scores of wounded who lay all night upon the
field of battle. Early next morning I buried two, the first-fruits of a
large harvest, and later on learned that among the killed was the
Marquis of Winchester, who a fortnight ago invited me to conduct the
funeral of his friend, Colonel Stopford. To-day I visited the two
graves side by side in the same war-wasted garden, and thought of the
tearful Christmas awaiting thousands in the mountains.'

=Mr. Robertson at Magersfontein.=

Add to this pathetic statement the following letter from the Rev. James
Robertson, read by Principal Story to the General Assembly of the Church
of Scotland on May 25, 1900. The letter was dated Bloemfontein, April
12:--

'I have already buried over 400 men, killed in action or who died
of wounds or disease; and our hospitals are full of enteric cases,
day by day swelling the total. It goes without saying that--at
Magersfontein especially, all alone, no one being allowed with
me--it was terribly trying work collecting, identifying, and
burying our dead, so many of whom were my own personal friends; but
I experienced more than I ever did before how the hour of one's
conscious weakness may become the hour of one's greatest strength.
Of General Wauchope I won't write further than to say that I was
beside him when he fell. I think he wished me to keep near him, but
I got knocked down, and in the dark and wild confusion I was borne
away, and did not see him again in life, t