_October 31._--If the action on Rietfontein, or Pepworth's Farm ridges,
a week ago was the great score for us that official reports represent,
in that it checkmated all possible efforts of the Boers to intercept
Brigadier-General Yule's column on its march from Dundee, there can be
no doubt that the tables were turned upon us effectually yesterday. Not
only did our attempt to beat one of the enemy's columns in detail, and
capture the heavy Creusot guns that had been harassing us, fail through
misdirection, but when attacked in turn by Boer reinforcements, our
troops were untimely ordered to abandon a position that they had held
for four hours without serious loss, and this gave moral, if not
material victory to the enemy. Successful in every fight up to that
point, we are now in the humiliating position of finding ourselves
practically invested by a Boer force that will not attack except by
artillery fire at long range, and whose leader has the power
temporarily, at any rate, to choose the fighting ground that suits Boer
tactics best if we decide to take the offensive. Not only so, but our
little army here has suffered a great disaster in the loss of two
gallant regiments, one of which had only ten days earlier gained for
itself proud distinction by being first to crown the heights of Talana,
near Dundee, where British infantry proved worthy of its most glorious
traditions. As a purely defensive measure, if nothing more, the fight of
yesterday was forced upon us. Like some other operations in this brief
but eventful campaign, it came too late, but, whether timely or not,
a battle was inevitable unless we meant to sit down tamely and be
battered at.

Yesterday morning, long before daybreak, our force was on the move,
intent upon outflanking positions which the Boers held two days earlier.
Colonel Grimwood, with one brigade consisting of the 1st and 2nd King's