For A Few Days He Had Lost Touch, But His Arrangements
Were Such That He Must Recover It If The Boers Either Crossed The
Railroad Or Approached The River.
On December 2nd he had authentic
information that De Wet was crossing the Caledon, and in an instant
the British columns were all off at full cry once more, sweeping
over the country with a front of fifteen miles.
On the 3rd and 4th,
in spite of frightful weather, the two little armies of horsemen
struggled on, fetlock-deep in mud, with the rain lashing their
faces. At night without cover, drenched and bitterly cold, the
troopers threw themselves down on the sodden veld to snatch a few
hours' sleep before renewing the interminable pursuit. The drift
over the Caledon flowed deep and strong, but the Boer had passed
and the Briton must pass also. Thirty guns took to the water,
diving completely under the coffee-coloured surface, to reappear
glistening upon the southern bank. Everywhere there were signs of
the passage of the enemy. A litter of crippled or dying horses
marked their track, and a Krupp gun was found abandoned by the
drift. The Dewetsdorp prisoners, too, had been set loose, and began
to stumble and stagger back to their countrymen, their boots worn
off, and their putties wrapped round their bleeding feet. It is
painful to add that they had been treated with a personal violence
and a brutality in marked contrast to the elaborate hospitality
shown by the British Government to its involuntary guests.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 612 of 842
Words from 163770 to 164026
of 225456
