Accordingly the first task of Sir Redvers Buller was to stem the flood
of Boer invasion in. Natal and to relieve Sir George White. For this
purpose he is none too strong with three out of the six infantry
brigades that make up the Army Corps. The remaining three brigades could
not carry out the original programme of sweeping through the Free State,
and meantime the Boers have overrun the great district between Colesberg
and Barkly East, between the Orange River and the Stormberg range.
General Gatacre with a weak brigade at Queenstown is watching this
invasion which as yet he seems hardly strong enough to repel. The rest
of the troops are required in the protection of the railways, of the
depôt of stores at De Aar, and the bridge at Orange River. But
Kimberley was invested and Mafeking in danger, and the effect of the
fall of either of them upon the Cape Dutch might be serious. Something
must be done. Accordingly Lord Methuen with two brigades set out towards
Kimberley. His task is both difficult and dangerous; he has not merely
to break the Boer resistance by sheer hard fighting, but to run the risk
that Boer forces from other quarters, perhaps from the army invading
Cape Colony, may be brought up in his rear, and that he may in this way
be turned, enveloped, and invested. The scattering of forces is due to
the initial error of sending too small a force to Natal, and of making
no provision for its reinforcement until after a six weeks' interval.
The consequence is that instead of our generals being able to attack the
Boers with the advantage of superior numbers, with the concomitant power
of combining flank and frontal attacks, and with the possibility of thus
making their victories decisive by enveloping tactics or by effective
pursuit, the British Army has to make attack after attack against
prepared fronts, which though they prove its valour can lead to no
decisive results, except at the cost of quite disproportionate losses.

It is possible, and indeed we all hope that the Boer forces, at first