reinforcements presently reached the hill.

In long, thin lines of yellow they ran across the plateau to the crest,
hoping to drive the Boers back the way they had come. As it approached
the line grew thinner and thinner, until there was nothing of it left.
And so on, for hour after hour, the yellow lines of gallant men flung
themselves into the open, only to fall beneath the raging fire poured
upon them from the sternly held mountain crest.

Down the hill our wounded dribbled, thirsty men, pale men, men covered
with blood and weeping with rage. How grim must be the fire they have
just passed through! One man is brought down lying across a horse. His
face hangs in strips, shattered by a dum-dum bullet. Thank goodness,
some of ours are using buckshot to-day!

A Boer mounts on a waggon.

"Who will take in ammunition?"

No response.

I turn to my chief. "Do you advise me to try?"

"I cannot; you must decide for yourself."

Throwing a sack of cartridges over my horse's back, I set off. No sooner
in the open, than whizz, whizz, went the bullets past my ear. The pony
stopped, confused. I struck the spurs into his flanks, and on we flew,
the rapid motion, the novelty of the affair, and the continual whistle
of the bullets producing in me a peculiar feeling of exaltation.