The History of Lumsden's Horse. Various

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СКАЧАТЬ men, some forty-five or so in a cattle-truck, encumbered with heavy coats, rifles, and other baggage—a leaky roof, and no sides.

      This may be economical, as the Major said, but on a wet blustry night, when buckets of rain, mixed with soot from the engine, are falling, it is not a style of travelling that conduces to comfort. Then there is still another African style—namely, ten men with rifles, &c., in a third-class carriage meant to hold eight only. Both of these methods we sampled on our way up to Bloemfontein. And right glad I was when we had done with it, and took to the saddle. Some, however, confessed to having slept very well that first night in such strange circumstances, tired out as they were by hours of previous toil, though they woke next morning very cold, with nothing to eat but one loaf, which ten men divided between them.

      They had eyes for the picturesque as well as for the agricultural possibilities of a country where Nature does much and man apparently very little, except to stroll about watching the cattle graze and the crops grow, unless he happens to be a Kaffir, which makes all the difference. Chiefly, however, Lumsden’s Horse must have been struck by the barren, rocky kopjes that seemed to spring suddenly in the midst of fertility and rise range behind range, stretching away to the mountains, which looked so near that it was impossible for imagination to measure the breadth of intervening plains. As one of them wrote, acquaintance with this country for the first time ‘made us realise the fearful odds that Buller had to tackle’; and no doubt many other troopers went on fighting fanciful battles against a wily enemy who, driven from one position, would gallop off to occupy another kopje still more formidable, and so prolong that imaginary fight, while the train, like a British column, wound its slow way through tortuous defiles. Lumsden’s Horse, however, had eyes for other things also, as a candid chronicler admits in his simple narrative, which may now be allowed to run its uninterrupted course:

      At several stations on our way there was the usual crowd of ‘loyal’ ladies of mature age, and the still larger crowd of schoolgirls. The people seemed very glad to see us. There was a lot of cheering and waving of handkerchiefs and pleasant greetings at every station. They gave us cigarettes and cheroots, and some men were seen to be sporting bows of red, white, and blue when we left—little attentions from some fair hands in return perhaps for Lumsden’s badges, of which many shoulder-straps were by that time bereft.

      Early next morning saw us at Cathcart, where we stopped about two hours, and took the opportunity to water and feed our horses. There is a nice little inn here, and we went down in a body and indulged in delicious bread, butter, and milk. Oh, such a contrast to the same articles of diet in India! The weather at this time of the year is nearly perfect, the air being fine, dry, and invigorating; to the eye wearied by the flatness of the plains of India the undulating country, small hills and green valleys between, is very refreshing; but what strikes one, more especially in the Free State, which we marched through later, is the desolateness of the country, miles and miles of veldt dotted here and there with small houses. Cattle-farming seems to be the principal thing they go in for here, but the farmers say that, what with rinderpest and drought, it is very disheartening work. The cattle are very fine, and strike us especially coming from India, where one sees such miserable specimens. About midday we arrived at Queen’s Town, and were very much disgusted to hear that Lord Roberts had wired down that we were to detrain and go into camp, as he needed all the horse-waggons and cattle-trucks for carrying remounts (several thousands of which were collected at Queen’s Town) to troops at the front. The camp is situated about two miles from the railway station, but they have run a siding into it, so that the carriages containing ourselves and our horses were simply detached from the rest of the train and we were run into the camp. We did not take long in detraining and picketing our horses; the poor brutes were simply delighted to get on firm ground again, and when let loose indulged in all sorts of antics—rolling on the grass, kicking up their heels, and larking like colts, to show appreciation of their freedom. As our tents had not arrived yet, we were obliged to sleep out in the open; but, knowing this would be a matter of course sooner or later, we made no bones about it. Unfortunately it came on to rain at night, and this made things generally uncomfortable. The mufflers so kindly knitted for us by the ladies of Calcutta proved simply invaluable; with these, Balaclava caps, and greatcoats on, we made ourselves perfectly comfortable. There were about twelve men of the Army Service Corps stationed here, and, with the proverbial hospitality of Tommy Atkins, they very kindly supplied us with hot cocoa and coffee, and offered to put up as many as possible of us in their tents. We found several of the Queensland Mounted Volunteers encamped here, also a part of the Militia Battalion of the Cheshires awaiting marching orders like ourselves. Next day our tents arrived, and we were soon quite settled down, ten men in a tent—a bit of a squash, but all right when one gets accustomed to it.

      There they may be left for a time chuckling over the good story of a Militia regiment whose officers complained to Major Showers that they could not stand the language of which Lumsden’s Horse made such free and frequent use at ‘stables’ and other daily duties. Of course that language was only the mildest of mild Hindustani put into terms of endearment with certain genealogical references that sounded mysterious to the uninitiated.

CHAPTER V

       AN INTERLUDE—THE RESULTS OF SANNA’S POST

       Table of Contents

      At Maitland Camp and Queen’s Town the two companies of Lumsden’s Horse would probably have remained many weary weeks, eating their hearts out with the fever of impatience, but for circumstances which must necessarily be explained at some length in order to give a clear view of the general situation. With events leading up to that situation Lumsden’s Horse had nothing to do, but incidentally the crisis had a great deal to do with them as influencing their movements immediately afterwards. It will be remembered that Lord Roberts had found it necessary to halt at Bloemfontein a fortnight earlier, his victorious advance beyond that point being checked by the loss of a very valuable convoy which had fallen into the hands of the Boers at Waterval Drift. With characteristic cheerfulness he made light of a mishap that would have been regarded by many generals as almost disastrous in the circumstances, seeing that the convoy contained supplies without which no forward movement of troops beyond Bloemfontein would be possible pending the repair of railways and the opening up of communications with a secure base. In his despatches Lord Roberts makes but a passing reference to the Waterval Drift affair, as if it were of comparatively little importance, yet he knew perfectly well that its consequences would be a temporary paralysis of his whole force and heart-breaking delay at a time when energetic action might have brought the campaign to a decisive issue.

      The relief of Ladysmith, far from improving matters in this respect, had simply set free a number of Boer commandos, whose leaders, baulked in their ambitious schemes for the conquest of Natal, were burning with desire to achieve successes in the Orange Free State. From their point of view it was still possible to retrieve the disaster of Paardeberg, and they knew that a severe blow struck at the British lines of communication would bring them many adherents from Cape Colony who were only waiting for such an opportunity. It would also inevitably prolong the campaign by cutting off sources of supply, on which Lord Roberts was dependent; and it might even turn the scale in their favour by bringing about European intervention. To that hope they clung always, as their State documents and correspondence prove abundantly. Therefore it was of the first importance that they should assume the offensive before Lord Roberts could strengthen his lines of communication and bring up ample supplies to form an advanced base at Bloemfontein. If circumstances had permitted him to push on at once, the moral effect on enemies already disorganised and disheartened would have been enormous. As it was, his inaction revived the drooping Spirits of Boers who were previously on the point of accepting defeat as inevitable. They saw the inherent weakness of a force that could not move far in any direction until the means of feeding itself had been secured, and their thoughts turned at once to the possibility of frustrating that object by vigorous raids at every vulnerable point. In such an emergency the presence of men like Louis Botha and Christian De Wet was worth more than a thousand СКАЧАТЬ