they are marching too regularly for that.' 'Boers?' 'No,' said another;
'they are marching too regularly for Boers.' 'Who can they be?' 'I
know,' said a third; they are Colonials.' He was right. 'But wait a
minute,' said another; 'let us see if Caesar's Camp fires upon them.' But
no, Caesar's Camp kept on pounding away at Mount Bulwane as it had done
for months, only with more energy than usual. And then cheer upon cheer
broke from these poor emaciated wrecks in Intombi. Hand clasped hand,
and tears rained down all faces.

Back into the marquee into which he had been the morning rushed the
chaplain. 'Lads, I told you this morning! "_Suddenly_," lads,
"_suddenly_," they were to be turned back "_suddenly_." It is true; my
message was from God. Buller is here!' And then the dying roused
themselves and lived, and voices were uplifted in loud thanksgiving.

And so Lord Dundonald's Colonial troops marched into the town, to be
greeted as surely men were never greeted before; to be hailed as
saviours, as life-givers, as heroes. Watch them. They have only
twenty-four hours' rations with them, and they have had a hard, rough
time themselves, but they give it all away. How can they deny anything
to these living skeletons standing around!

And what did it mean in Ladysmith? It meant this--at Intombi, at any
rate. When Buller's guns sounded nearer, the poor fever-stricken
patients brightened up, and roused themselves with a fresh effort for
life. When the sound of his firing receded into the distance, they just
lay back and died. His entry into Ladysmith was life from the dead.

'=It was Time He Came=.'

It was time that he came. Food was at famine prices. Eggs sold at 48s.
per dozen, and one egg for 5s.; a 1/4-lb. tin of tobacco sold for 65s.;
chicken went for 17s. 6d. each; dripping, 1/4-lb. at 9s. 6d., and so on.
Chevril soup (horseflesh) became the greatest luxury, and was not at all
bad; while trek-oxen steak might be looked at and smelled, but to eat it
was almost impossible. One of the most pathetic, and at the same time
most comical, sights to be witnessed during the siege, was surely that
of one enthusiastic lover of the weed, who, unable to procure any of the
genuine article for himself, followed closely in the wake of an officer
in more fortunate circumstances, in order that at any rate he might get
the smell and have the precious smoke circle round his head.

It was time, we say, for Buller to come. Relief came no