eminences of the northern heel, facing Rietfontein Hill, where the
Creusot gun, known as "Long Tom," is mounted behind earthworks at a
range of 6800 yards, which is well within compass of the _Powerful's_
12-pounders and at least 3000 yards less than the extreme distance at
which shells from her 4.7-inch quick-firing guns would be effective.

Positions for field batteries are prepared at other points round the
wide sweep, but only to be occupied as occasion may arise, and therefore
one does not care at present to locate them more precisely. The enemy,
having heavy artillery of various calibre mounted on Bulwaan, is able to
enfilade certain posts held by our infantry pickets on the heels of the
horse-shoe, but there are folds among the rocky kopjes where men can lie
comparatively screened from shells, which at that distance give timely
notice of their coming, as sound travels rather faster than the
projectiles do at the end of their flight.

We have outposts on Intombi or Maiden's Castle, which forms the
horse-shoe's southern heel, others stretching westward thence to a gap
in the toe of the shoe, through which a wood runs nearly due west until
it branches off to the Drakensberg Passes in one direction and
Maritzburg in the other, and pickets on the north-western and northern
heights, with a detached post at Observation Hill, an elongated kopje
outside the general defences, overlooking a wide valley of mimosa scrub
towards Rietfontein, which is the enemy's main stronghold, commanding
as it does the railways to Van Reenan's Pass in the west, and to
Newcastle in the north. Except for a distance of two miles from
Ladysmith, therefore, both these railways are in the hands of the Boers,
who can use them as uninterrupted lines of communication with the Orange
Free State and the Transvaal respectively. That they were being so used
to some purpose we had reason for believing, during the two peaceful