He retired, therefore,
holding grimly on to his prisoners, and got back with small loss to
the place from which he started. It was a dashing piece of bluff,
and, when taken with the Douglas exploit, leads one to hope that
Pilcher may have a chance of showing what he can do with larger
means at his disposal. Finding that the enemy was following him in
force, he pushed on the same night for Thabanchu. His horsemen must
have covered between fifty and sixty miles in the twenty-four
hours.
Apparently the effect of Pilcher's exploit was to halt the march of
those commandos which had been seen trekking to the north-west, and
to cause them to swing round upon Thabanchu. Broadwood, a young
cavalry commander who had won a name in Egypt, considered that his
position was unnecessarily exposed and fell back upon Bloemfontein.
He halted on the first night near the waterworks, halfway upon his
journey.
The Boers are great masters in the ambuscade. Never has any race
shown such aptitude for this form of warfare - a legacy from a long
succession of contests with cunning savages.
