Kop or a Magersfontein, but never a shout or any other of the ordinary
methods of expressing joy. The foreigners in the army frequently were
beside themselves with joy after victories, but the Boers looked stolidly
on and never took any part in the demonstrations.




CHAPTER IV

THE ARMY ORGANISATION


When the Boer goes on a lion-hunting expedition he must be thoroughly
acquainted with the game country; he must be experienced in the use of the
rifle, and he must know how to protect himself against the attacks of the
enemy. When he is thus equipped and he abandons lion-hunting for the more
strenuous life of war the Boer is a formidable enemy, for he has combined
in him the qualities of a general as well as the powers of a private
soldier. In lion-hunting the harm of having too many men in authority is
not so fatal to the success of the expedition as it is in real warfare,
where the enemy may have less generals but a larger force of men who will
obey their commands. All the successes of the Boer army were the result of
the fact that every burgher was a general, and to the same cause may be
attributed almost every defeat. Whenever this army of generals combined
and agreed to do a certain work it was successful, but it was unsuccessful
whenever the generals disagreed. If the opportunity had given birth to a
man who would have been accepted as general of the generals--a man was
needed who could introduce discipline and training into the rudimentary
military system of the country--the chances of the Boer success would have