only some 20,000 English regulars in South
Africa at the time; and to these the feat of rolling back the
overwhelming forces of the burghers in Natal, the protection of our
northern towns in Cape Colony, and the garrisoning of Mafeking and
Kimberley was a practical impossibility. Yet, with the dogged pluck and
determination for which their predecessors had ever been known, that
small army had done wonders already.

By October 6th, when war seemed so inevitable, 10,000 additional troops
were ordered to be despatched forthwith to South Africa; and since the
case was an urgent one, the regiments in India, which are always kept on
a war footing, were mainly drawn upon.

But to transport men, guns, horses, and ammunition from India to Africa,
or across the 6000 miles of heaving water which intervene between
England and Cape Colony, is no small matter. Indeed it is a gigantic
undertaking. Transports have to be chartered and specially prepared;
food, forage for the horses, arms, medicines, tents, clothing, and a
thousand-and-one more items, all of great importance, have to be
conveyed, and cannot be prepared in a minute. But in spite of all
difficulties the 10,000 troops were soon afloat and _en route_ for the
scene of the war.

Contrast for a moment these almost insurmountable difficulties with
those of the Boer nation with whom we were contending. For them the
only items which called for special transport were guns and ammunition.
For the burghers a train journey of some twenty hours, or a long march
on horseback of, at the most, 200 miles, brought them to the borders,
and all need, for the time being, of a commissariat train was obviated
by the fact that each and every man carried on his own person, or
attached to his saddle, sufficient ammunition and food to last him
several days.

But the fact that the Orange Free State had thrown in its lot with the
Transvaal Republic called for bigger forces, and on October 7th, the day
following the order for the above 10,000 troops, the Home Government
gave instructions for the calling up of 25,000 of our Reserves, and the
mobilisation of an army corps and of one cavalry division. Parliament
was also summoned specially to meet on October 17th.

Ten days were given for the Reserves to present themselves, and these
ten days may be easily described as a time of intense anxiety to the
nation.

The old days of lifelong service in the army had disappeared, and now
young men wh