ere a
detachment of a battalion and the mountain battery would be kept ready
to occupy and entrench itself at Van Reenen's Pass. These proposals
were approved for execution on an emergency "so far as the exigencies
of the occasion may admit."[56]

[Footnote 56: W.O. letter, September 3rd, 1897.]

[Sidenote: Natal defence--Sir W. Butler, /99.]

Sir W. Butler's report of 12th June, 1899, adopted practically the
same plan of defence. To a suggestion as to a possible occupation of
Laing's Nek,[57] General Butler had replied that he did not think the
immediate possession of that place of great importance and that its
occupation by a weak force would be a dangerous operation. The regular
troops in Natal had at this date been only reinforced by one more
battalion, and consisted of but two cavalry regiments, one brigade
division field artillery, one mountain battery, and three infantry
battalions. To these must be added the Natal Police, a corps about 400
strong, admirably trained as mounted infantry, and nearly 2,000
Colonial Volunteers of the best type.

[Footnote 57: W.O. letter, February 23rd, 1899.]

[Sidenote: Protest of Natal Government, July /99.]

The communication of this scheme of defence to the Natal Ministry in
July, 1899, led them to prefer an urgent request that sufficient
reinforcements should be sent out to defend the whole colony. In the
long telegraphic despatch addressed on 6th September, 1899, by the
Governor, Sir Walter Hely-Hutchinson, to the Colonial Office, it was
urged that: "In the opinion of the Ministers, such a catastrophe as
the seizure of Laing's Nek, and the destruction of the northern
portion of the railway ... would have a most demoralising effect on
the natives and the loyal Europeans in the colony, and would afford
great encouragement to the Boers and their sympathisers." The
announcement from home of the early despatch of reinforcements from
India which was received by Sir W. Hely-Hutchinson in reply to this
telegram, did not, in the opinion of Sir F. Forestier-Walker, or of
Major-General Sir W. Penn Symons, who had succeeded General Cox in the
local command of Natal, justify a deviation from the scheme of
defence put forward by their predecessors. Apart from the difficulty
of a water supply for a force occupying Laing's Nek, it was felt that
such a forward position would be strategically unsafe, and would
impose on the troops in Natal a task beyond their powers. On