at perfect peace here. Not a man of this force except the ordinary
patrols moved on the night when we are reported to have made that
strenuous but futile effort to break through the enemy's lines, and not
a shot was fired on our side. The Boers must have been startled at their
own shadows or at the movements of a subaltern's patrol which they
magnified into an army, and having beat the big drum they perhaps tried
to justify themselves by sending that cock-and-bull story to Pretoria.

To-night our troops are out for exercise, marching through the streets,
and singing or whistling merrily as they march. If the Boers get word of
this they may have another scare. The daily bombardment is now so much a
matter of course that one hardly makes a note of it unless some casualty
brings home to us the fact that nobody is safe while shells fly about.

_December 7._--During a heavy cannonade in which our naval batteries
engaged Gun Hill and Bulwaan from six o'clock until ten this morning,
women and children were walking about the streets quite unconcerned.
Hundreds of shells have already fallen in the town, and there are some
zealous statisticians who compile charts showing exactly where each
shell struck and the direction from which it was fired, but the majority
of us do not concern ourselves much about any that burst beyond a radius
of fifty yards from our own camps or houses, and so many fall harmless
that we seldom ask whether anybody has been hit, and it sometimes
happens therefore that one does not hear of serious casualties except by
accident. It comes rather as a surprise to find that our losses since
the siege began, thirty-six days ago, amount to thirteen killed and one
hundred and forty-eight wounded. A battle might have been won at less
cost.

This evening the 6-inch Creusot on Gun Hill was very active, directing