My feelings on that day I can never forget! Those Englishmen who go by
the name of "Pro-Boers" are the best fitted to describe the anguish
which then overpowered me, for they stood up for justice even against
their own people. And this not because they were hostile to their
Government, or to the greatness of England's power, but only because
they were not without moral sense, because they could not stifle
conscience at the expense of justice, nor identify themselves with
iniquitous actions.

But the day will come--of this I am convinced--when not Pro-Boers only,
but all England will acknowledge our rights--the rights which we shall
then have earned by our quiet faithfulness and obedience. I cannot
believe that any father will look without pity on a child who comes to
him as a child should--obedient and submissive.

The 23rd of February, 1901, the forty-seventh anniversary of the Orange
Free States, had been a disastrous day for us indeed, but it was to end
in another miraculous escape, for in the darkness of that evening it
again happened that we were delivered from an apparently unavoidable
misfortune. As I have said already, the English were firing on my
rear-guard; at the same time my scouts came in to tell me that, just in
front of us, at a distance of not quite four miles, there was another
great army of the enemy. I had intended to march that night to the west
of Hopetown. But now if I went in that direction I should only run
straight on to this army. If we went to the left we could only advance
2,000 paces before being visible to the English on the kop close to
Hopetown, from where they could make known our movements by heliograph.
At our front, at our back, on our left, the outlook was hopeless; and to
the right lay the cruel river. Stand still we could not--the enemy were
upon us--it was impossible that anything could save us--no, not