merely a worn track over the open veldt, distinguishable only by the
ruts and mud. Close on the left were high and shapely hills, like Welsh
mountains, but on the right the country was more open. A Mr. Malcolm's
farm stood in the middle of a waving plain, with a few fields, aloe
hedges, and poplars. The kraal of his Kaffir labourers was near it, and
about a mile away the plain ended in a low ridge of rocky "kopjes,"
which ran to join the mountainous ground on the left at a kind of "nek"
or low pass over which the railway runs. Beyond that low ridge lay
Elands Laagte, an important railway station with a few collieries close
by, a store, a hotel, and some houses.

The Boers had occupied it two days before, had captured a train there,
and torn up the rail in two places, making a number of prisoners and
seizing 100 head of cattle and quantities of other private stores and
the luggage going to Dundee. Early in the morning we had gone out with
four companies of the Manchesters in an armoured train with an ordinary
train behind it, a battery of Natal Field Artillery, and the Imperial
Light Horse under Colonel Scott Chisholme, to reconnoitre with a view to
repairing the line. They seized the station and released a number of
prisoners, but were compelled to withdraw by three heavy Nordenfeldt
guns, which the Boers had posted on a hill about 2,500 yards beyond the
station. At half-past ten they had reached the point I describe, and
were very slowly coming back towards Ladysmith, the trains moving
backwards, and the cavalry walking on each side the line. The point is
called Modder's Spruit, from some early Dutchman, and there is a little
station there, the first out from Ladysmith town. At that moment
another train was seen coming up with the 1st Devons, and within an hour
a fourth arrived with five companies of the Gordons. The 42nd Field
Battery then came, and the 21st later; the 5th Lancers with a few 5th
Dragoon Guards, and a large contingent of Natal mounted volunteers. That