Chieveley seemed so insignificant in contrast with its fame to those
who had followed the war on maps and in the newspapers, that one was
not sure he was on the right road until he saw from the car-window
the armored train still lying on the embankment, the graves beside
it, and the donga into which Winston Churchill pulled and carried the
wounded.
And as the train bumped and halted before the blue and white enamel
sign that marks Colenso station, the places which have made that spot
familiar and momentous fell into line like the buoys which mark the
entrance to a harbor.
We knew that the high bare ridge to the right must be Fort Wylie,
that the plain on the left was where Colonel Long had lost his
artillery, and three officers gained the Victoria Cross, and that the
swift, muddy stream, in which the iron railroad bridge lay humped and
sprawling, was the Tugela River.
Six hours before, at Frere Station, the station-master had awakened
us to say that Ladysmith would be relieved at any moment. This had
but just come over the wire. It was "official." Indeed, he added,
with local pride, that the village band was still awake and in
readiness to celebrate the imminent event.
