e Transvaal and the remainder
by the Orange Free State, the latter drawing a further 5,000 from the
stores of the sister Republic. These, with approximately 50,000
Martini-Henry and other rifles known to have been in the arsenals and
in possession of the burghers before the commencement of hostilities,
made up over 100,000 serviceable weapons at the disposal of the two
countries.[68] Ammunition was ample, though, again, it is idle to
discuss actual figures. Neither the stock in the magazines, nor that
in the possession of the farmers, was for certain known to any man.
The most moderate of the Republican officials in a position to form a
credible estimate placed it at seventy millions of rounds; it was more
probably nearer one hundred millions. The Boer farmer, still uncertain
of security in the outlying solitudes of the veld, still unaccustomed
to it in the more frequented districts, never wasted ammunition even
though a use for it seemed remote. He hoarded it as other men hoard
gold; for deeply rooted in him was the thought, sown in the perilous
days of the past, that cartridges, with which to preserve the lives of
himself and his family, might at any moment become of more value than
gold pieces, which could only give to life the comfort he somewhat
despised. Thus the arsenals of the larger towns were not the only, or
even the chief, repositories of small-arm ammunition. Every farm was a
magazine; lonely caves hid packets and boxes of cartridges; they lay
covered beneath the roots of many a solitary tree, beneath conspicuous
stones, often beneath the surface of the bare veld itself. Whatever
were the actual amounts of arms and ammunition at the disposal of the
Republican riflemen, it was plain they were not only adequate but
extravagant. There was significance in the excess. The Boers possessed
sufficient munitions of war to arm and equip 30,000 or 40,000 men over
and above their own greatest available strength. It will be seen in
due course for whose hands this over-plus was designed.

[Footnote 68: The following is a fairly accurate estimate in
detail:--

Mausers 53,375
Martini-Henry 35,875
Westley-Richards 9,780
Guedes 6,049
Lee-Metfords 2,850
Krag-Joergensen 200
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108,129

Besides the a