for it. When about 300 yards away,
the "brethren" stopped rather suspiciously. This was too much for
some man on the east side, who let fly, and the air was rent by the
rattle as we emptied our magazines, killing five of this special
scouting party and two from other groups further out on either side.
We continued to fire at the scouts as they galloped back, dropping two
more, and also at the column which was about a mile away, but afforded
a splendid target till it opened out.

In a very few moments our position was being shelled by three guns,
but with the only result, as far as we were concerned, of having one
man wounded by shell-fire, though the firing went on slowly till dark.
To be accurate, I should say the river was being shelled, our position
incidentally, for shells were bursting along the river for some half
mile. The Boers were evidently quite at sea as regards the extent of
our position and strength, and wasted many shells. We noticed much
galloping of men away to the east and west, out of range, and guessed
that these were parties who intended to strike the river at some
distance away, and gradually work along the bed, in order probably to
get into close range during the night.

We exchanged a few shots during the night along the river bed, and not
much was done on either side, though of course we were on the _qui
vive_ all the time; but it was not till near one in the morning that
Waschout Hill had an inning.

As I had hoped, the fact that we held the kraal had not been spotted
by the enemy, and a large body of them, crawling up the south side of
the hill in order to get a good fire on to us in the river, struck a
snag in the shape of a close-range volley from our detachment. As the
night was not very dark, in the panic following the first volley our
men were able (as I learnt afterwards) to stand right up and shoot at
the surprised burghers bolting down the hill. However, their panic did
not last long, to judge by the sound, for after the first volley from
our Lee-Metfords and the subsequent minute's independent firing, the
reports of our rifles were soon mingled with the softer reports of the
Mausers, and we shortly observed flashes on our side of Waschout Hill.
As these could not be our men, we knew the enemy were endeavoring to
surround the detachment. We knew the ranges fairly well, and though,
as we could not see our sights, the shooting was rather guesswork, we
soon put a stop to this manoeuvre