it.

Although we always knew how things were going in the field, I do not
for a moment believe that the accounts of British reverses brought
unofficially in to town by the spies were always reliable, nor do I
sanction the reckless coming and going of irresponsible men. Alas, no!
too bitter have been the experiences of disastrous results brought
about by their thoughtlessness.

The van Warmelos were warned from the beginning against having
dealings with them if they really wished to be of service to their
people, to which warning they owed their safety and the privilege of
being able to help their countrymen till the end of the war. General
Emmet, as prisoner in the Rest Camp, also sent a warning, saying that
General Botha had instructed him to tell Mrs. van Warmelo that her
name was known on commando.

As time went on, Pretoria was being shut in more completely every day.
Blockhouses rose on every side; on the hills which lie around the
town searchlights played from commanding positions over many miles of
country, making darkest night as clear as noonday; barbed-wire fences
enclosed the entire capital, and outposts were on guard night and
day--with no avail!

The spies glided in and out like serpents in the night, and some idea
of the hardships and perils they went through in order to achieve
their purpose will be given in this true story of the great Boer war,
some idea of the dangers to which their assistants in town were
exposed, and the part played by women and girls in the scheme of
espionage.

I believe the events related here to be tame in comparison with some
of the risks incurred and heroism displayed by other Boer women all
over South Africa, but we must confine ourselves strictly to Hansie's
diary, as it was written from day to day, before time could obliterate
the smallest detail from her memory.

Hansie's diary with all the bitterness left out; Hansie's diary
without its sighs and tears, its ever-changing moods, and deep
emotions; Hansie's diary, shorn of all that makes it human, natural,
and real,--surely what is left of it must be tame and totally unworthy
of the original!

And yet it needs must be!

This book must be a calm, dispassionate review of the past, a
temperate recital of historical events as they took place, and, as
facts speak largely for themselves, I leave the details to be filled
in by the reader's imagination.

CHAPTER XV

THE FORMATION OF THE NATIONAL SCOUTS CORPS