on, as a curiosity,
because of the many bullet holes in it. Once a bullet passed between
his coat and shirt along his stomach, the shock taking his breath
away. He was sure he had been mortally wounded, but could not stop to
find out, and the very recollection of it still caused him to
experience the sensation of coming into close contact with death.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 5: General Botha tells me that the hat which was returned to
him by Lord Kitchener had first belonged to his little son, Louis, who
had written his name in full, in blue pencil, on the inside of the
crown, and had given it, when he had no more use for it, to his little
native orderly.]

CHAPTER XXXV

MEMORIES BITTER-SWEET

The Captain's visit was not an unmixed joy. Some bitter revelations
were made, much pathos mixed with the humours of the situation and
tragic experiences related by all--but on these I shall merely touch,
as unavoidable and necessary for the completion of my story.

After the treachery of their own people and the arming of the natives,
nothing troubled the men so much as the fact that the fighting
burghers were, in some parts of the country, suffering from sore gums
and showing signs of scurvy, caused by an unchanging diet of meat and
mealies. The spies wanted to communicate this to some good,
trustworthy doctor and to get medicine for them to take out to the
commandos, but Mrs. van Warmelo told them that no medicine in the
world could cure that. What they wanted was a change of diet--fresh
milk, vegetables, fruit, and an abundant supply of lime-juice, etc.

Sending out lime-juice would be as absurd as impossible, for it would
be as a drop in the ocean of want--and as it was, the men were
handicapped by the two bottles of good French brandy which they were
taking out for medicinal purposes. These could not be thrown across
with the other parcels, but would have to be carried on their persons
as they wriggled through the barbed wires across the drift of the
Aapies River.

In some districts, where the destruction of farms had not yet been
completed, the commando found a sufficient supply of fresh fruit and
vegetables and were in no immediate danger of the dread disease, but
in the neighbourhood of the towns there was nothing more to be done in
the way of devastation, and the only fresh food they got was what they
took from the enemy. As an instance of the thoroughness of the system
of destruction, Naude related how