owners had fled we were unable to pay for what we had. We were
obliged, therefore, to "borrow" all these things for the banquet
befitting to the occasion.

But General Buller had not quite finished with us yet. He marched on
Spion Kop, but with the exception of a feint attack nothing of
importance happened then. One day I went across the river with a
patrol to discover what the enemy was doing, when we suddenly came
across nine English spies, who fled as soon as they saw us. We
galloped after them, trying to cut them off from the main body, which
was at a little distance away from us, and would no doubt have
overtaken them, but, riding at a breakneck speed over a mountain
ridge, we found ourselves suddenly confronted with a strong English
mounted corps, apparently engaged in drilling. We were only 500 paces
away from them, and we jumped off our horses, and opened fire. But
there were only a dozen of us, and the enemy soon began sending us a
few shells, and prepared to attack us with their whole force. About a
hundred mounted men, with horses in the best of condition, set off to
pursue us.

We were obliged to ride back by the same path we had come by, which
was fortunate for us, as we knew the way and could ride through
crevices and dongas without any hesitation. In this way we soon gave
our pursuers the slip.

Buller's forces seemed at first to have the intention of forcing their
way through near Potgietersdrift, and they took possession of all the
"randts" on their side of the river, causing us to strengthen the
position on our side. We thus had to shift our commando again to
Potgietersdrift, where we soon had the enemy's Naval guns playing on
our positions. This continued day and night for a whole week.

It seemed as if General Buller were determined to annihilate all the
Boers with his lyddite shells, so as to enable the soldiers to walk at
their leisure to the release of Ladysmith. Certainly we suffered
considerably from lyddite fumes.

The British next made a feint attack near Potgietersdrift, advancing
with a great clamour till they had come within 2,000 paces of us,
where they occupied various "randts" and kopjes, always under cover of
their artillery. Once they came a little too close to our positions,
and we suddenly opened fire on them. The result was that their
ambulance waggons were seen to become very busy driving backwards and
forwards.

This "feint," however, was only made in order to divert our