t, to tell him to pass the word to retire, but he
touched a dead man; he turned to the left, only to touch another
corpse. One company was brought out of action by a lance-corporal.
Then the Boers arrived, and began making prisoners. One shouted to
Major Hicks for his revolver; he replied that he had not got one--it
was in his holsters on his dead horse--and stalked indignantly off the
battlefield, without another question being put to him.

Major Gordon, who was commanding one of the three companies of the 1st
Battalion, had been shot through the knee early in the day by a rifle
bullet. He lay for two hours or so momentarily expecting to be hit
again. After a time he noticed that as long as he lay still no bullets
came in his direction, but that the moment he attempted to move there
would be a vicious hiss and spurt of sand and dust close beside him.
In spite of this he managed to crawl through a pool of blood to a
neighbouring ant-heap, which offered some sort of protection, and into
which a bullet plunged just as he reached it. Here he remained till
the retirement, when, assisted by two sergeants of the regiment,
Keenan and Dillon, he managed to hobble away. Even then he noticed
that as long as they kept away from the troops who were still actively
engaged few bullets came their way, as though the Boers were purposely
not firing at the wounded.

The Boer heavy artillery pursued the retiring troops with shells,
which made a prodigious noise, and raised clouds of dust, but seldom
did any damage. Gradually a region of comparative peace was reached,
where the ground was not being continually struck by bullets, and only
an occasional shell fell. The extended lines of the 4th Brigade,
ordered to cover the retirement, came into view, and behind them the
men of the Irish Brigade collected again in companies and battalions.
Then, although the artillery was still roaring fiercely, and the
mausers rattled with tireless persistence, the brigade trudged back to
its former camping-ground, pitched tents, and began to cook dinners. A
prosaic but practical ending to an impossible attack.

But there was still one task to accomplish--the preparation of the
casualty list: The regiment had suffered heavily. Two officers,
Captain Bacon (1st Battalion) and Lieutenant Henry, had been killed,
and three, Major Gordon (1st Battalion), Captain Shewan, and
Lieutenant Macleod (1st Battalion), wounded. The total casualties were
219, of whom 52