telegraph lines, with the rest of the British Army in South Africa. It is
from there that we draw all our supplies of fodder and ammunition. It is
from there we should draw all our additional force if we needed
reinforcements in case of a general assault by the enemy upon our position
at Slingersfontein, and it is from there that we should be strengthened
should we decide to make a forward move on the Boers' position. Therefore
it behoved us to keep that line of communication intact, no matter what the
cost. All these things were as well known to the Boer leader as to us, and
that is why they were as keen to get the position as we were, and why we
are keen to stop them from accomplishing their object.

It was for the purpose of ascertaining just what the enemy intended to do,
and how many men they had to do it with, that Major Ethoran ordered out the
West Australian Mounted Infantry, consisting of about 75 men, under Captain
Moor, an Imperial soldier in the pay of the West Australian Government, and
a small body of Inniskilling Dragoons and Lancers, with a section of the
Royal Horse Artillery and two guns. The men moved out of Slingersfontein on
Tuesday about midday, and at once proceeded towards a farmhouse located
right under the very jowl of an ugly-looking kopje.

This farm was known as Pottsberg, and was well known as a regular haunt of
the most daring and dangerous rebels in the whole district. The farm
consisted of the usual white stone farmhouse of five or six rooms, a small
orchard, surrounded by rough stone walls from three feet six to four feet
in height, and about two feet thick, a small cluster of native huts, and a
kraal for cattle, made of rough, heavy stones, topped by cakes of sun-baked
manure, stored by the farmers for fuel. Some little distance from the back
of the farmhouse a stout stone wall ran down from the kopjes on to the
plain. This wall was between four and five feet in height and half a yard
across in its weakest place--an ugly barricade in itself--behind which a