healed. The abandoned colonist, the shamed soldier, the 'cowardly
Englishman,' the white flag, the 'How about Majuba?'--all gone for ever.
At last--'the Boers defeated.' Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!

So Sir Penn Symons is killed! Well, no one would have laid down his life
more gladly in such a cause. Twenty years ago the merest chance saved
him from the massacre at Isandhlwana, and Death promoted him in an
afternoon from subaltern to senior captain. Thenceforward his rise was
rapid. He commanded the First Division of the Tirah Expeditionary Force
among the mountains with prudent skill. His brigades had no misfortunes:
his rearguards came safely into camp. In the spring of 1898, when the
army lay around Fort Jumrood, looking forward to a fresh campaign, I
used often to meet him. Everyone talked of Symons, of his energy, of his
jokes, of his enthusiasm. It was Symons who had built a racecourse on
the stony plain; who had organised the Jumrood Spring Meeting; who won
the principal event himself, to the delight of the private soldiers,
with whom he was intensely popular; who, moreover, was to be first and
foremost if the war with the tribes broke out again; and who was
entrusted with much of the negotiations with their _jirgas_. Dinner with
Symons in the mud tower of Jumrood Fort was an experience. The memory
of many tales of sport and war remains. At the end the General would
drink the old Peninsular toasts: 'Our Men,' 'Our Women,' 'Our Religion,'
'Our Swords,' 'Ourselves,' 'Sweethearts and Wives,' and 'Absent
Friends'--one for every night in the week. The night when I dined the
toast was 'Our Men.' May the State in her necessities find others like
him!