ail well up, for they had hoisted a
red rag at the masthead. True, this was not the national flag,
probably only a mere handkerchief, but it was not white. The day wore
on with intermittent shelling and sniping, and we all felt that the
enemy must have by now guessed our weakness, and were saving
themselves for another night attack, relying upon our being tired out.
We did our best to snatch a little sleep by turns during the day, and
I did all I could to keep the spirits of the little force up by saying
that relief could not be very far off. But it was with a gloomy
desperation at best that we saw the day wear on and morning turn into
afternoon.

The Boer guns had not been firing for some two hours, and the silence
was just beginning to get irritating and mysterious, when the booming
of guns in the distance aroused us to the highest pitch of excitement.
We were saved! We could not say what guns these were--they might be
British or Boer--but, any way, it proved the neighborhood of another
force. All faces lighted up, for somehow the welcome sound at once
drew the tired feeling out of us.

In order to prevent any chance of the fresh force missing our
whereabouts, I collected a few men and at once started to fire some
good old British volleys into the scrub, "Ready--present--fire," which
were not to be mistaken. Shortly afterwards we heard musketry in the
distance, and saw a cloud of dust to the northeast. We were relieved!

* * * * *

Our total losses were 11 killed and 15 wounded; but we had held the
drift, and so enabled a victory to be won. I need not here touch upon
the well-known and far-reaching results of the holding of Duffer's
Drift, of the prevention thereby of Boer guns, ammunition, and
reinforcements reaching one of their sorely pressed forces at a
critical moment, and the ensuing victory gained by our side. It is
now, of course, all public knowledge that this was the turning-point
in the war, though we, the humble instruments, did not know what vital
results hung upon our action.

That evening the relieving force halted at the drift, and, after
burying the dead, we spent some time examining the lairs of the Boer
snipers, the men collecting bits of shell and cartridge-cases as
mementoes--only to be thrown away at once. We found some 25 dead and
partially buried Boers, to whom we gave burial.

That night I did not trek, but lay down (in my own breeches and
spotted waistco