to wherever their services might be needed most. The Kimberley Regiment
of Volunteers had turned out--to a man--for Active Service. War was
certain; its dogs, indeed, were already loosed. The Boers, by way of
preliminary, had been cutting telegraph wires, tearing up rails, blowing
up culverts, and had taken possession of an armoured train at Kraaipan.
Our defences were being strengthened on all sides. The enemy appeared to
be massing in the vicinity of Scholtz's Nek. Such was the condition of
things on the fourteenth of October (1899). Next day (Sunday) the siege
of Kimberley had begun.




THE SIEGE OF KIMBERLEY

ITS HUMOROUS AND SOCIAL SIDE




CHAPTER I

_Week ending 21st October, 1899_


The news relative to the tearing up of the railway line, and the cutting
of the telegraph wires at Spytfontein, spread fast and freely on Sunday
morning. Rather by good luck than good management there happened to be
an armoured train lying at the railway station, and into it, with a
promptitude that augured well for his popularity, the Colonel ordered a