for," replied the dying officer. "Take some fellow you can save.'" And
so he, too, died like a hero.

The officer inside the besieged town and the private soldier outside
attempting to save him--are one in this, that they know how to die; and
England calls each 'hero'!

And so through blood and fire, over heaps of slain, General Sir Redvers
Duller passed into Ladysmith--passed in just in time; passed in to see
men with wan cheeks and sunken eyes--an army of skeletons; but passed in
to find the old flag still flying.

[Illustration: AMBULANCE WORK ON THE FIELD.]

Chapter XV

LADYSMITH

The defence of Ladysmith by Sir George White and his heroic band of
soldiers will rank as one of the finest feats in British history. It is
not for us to tell the story of the siege. Historians of the war will do
that. We need only remind our readers that from October 30, 1899, when
the bombardment began, to February 28, 1900, when General Buller's
advance guard marched into the town, our troops were closely
besieged--besieged so closely that the Boers thought there was no
possible chance of relief. 'Ladysmith will never be relieved,' said a
Boer to one of our chaplains. 'No troops in the world will ever be able
to get through Colenso to Ladysmith. It is absolutely impregnable.' But
they did, and one hardly knows which to admire most the dogged
persistence of General Buller and his men or the heroic defence, the
patient, confident waiting of the beleaguered troops.

='Thank God, We have Kept the Flag Flying.'=

It is, however, with the Ladysmith garrison we are concerned at the
present time. These men had but little of the excitement of battle to
stir their nerves and inspire them for fresh efforts. They had to fight
the sterner fight,--the fight with disease and famine. They watched
their comrades sicken and die--not one at a time, but by scores and
hundreds--but they held on and held out for Queen and country.

'While ever upon the topmost roof
Our banner of England blew.'

'Thank God, we have kept the flag flying!' said Sir George White, when
at last deliverance came. The words will become historic, and fathers
will tell their sons for long centuries to come how in Ladysmith, as at
Lucknow, English soldiers preferred rather to die than to surrender; and
how, surrounded as they were, they, for old England's sake, kept the
flag flying.

It remains for us to tell the story of Christian work in connection w