charge of having fired on a Red Cross flag without warning. Meanwhile
other guns on Surprise Hill have been searching for the 18th Hussars in
their bivouac where Klip River runs through a deep ravine, and "Long
Tom" of Pepworth's has thrown a shell into Mrs. Davy's house, opposite
Captain Vallentin's, wounding its owner, who is the first woman hit,
though numbers of them, having got over their first panic, go about
their domestic duties all day as if there were no such thing as a
bombardment, and never think of taking shelter in a riverside cave now.
This shot brought upon "Long Tom" the vengeance of oar Naval Battery,
which must have battered him or his gunners severely.

All the afternoon Boer rifles have been dropping bullets into posts
held by the Rifle Brigade and Leicesters. Perhaps the men were showing
signs of being harassed when General Hunter visited them. With a laugh
he stood bolt upright on a rock, saying, "Now let us see whether these
Boers can shoot or not;" and there he remained in full view of them for
nearly a minute, while Mauser bullets hummed about him like a swarm of
wasps. Such an act may seem like senseless bravado, but those who know
Archibald Hunter well know that he had an object in giving this example
of coolness and pluck.

_November 24._--The Boers made a clever cattle-raid this morning. Twenty
spans of trek-oxen had been sent to graze on the veldt between our
outposts and Rifleman's Ridge in charge of Kaffir herd-boys. Slowly they
grazed towards better pasturage, nearer and nearer to the Boer lines,
from which shells in rapid succession were sent to burst just in rear of
the herds. Mounted infantry of the Leicesters attempted again and again,
to herd the cattle back, but they were met each time by heavy
rifle-fire, and at last two or three Boers dashing down the slope
rounded up herd after herd with the dexterity of expert "cow-boys." Thus