Sunday brought a dreary repet.i.tion of a siege Sunday"s monotony. The situation had been discussed threadbare, and there was little else to converse about. The dust outdoors was blinding, and the people for the most part dozed over books. That was the cardinal mercy vouchsafed us; we had books to read, and never were they so ravenously devoured.
Reading was much in vogue; it was a siege innovation--a very good one, too. Persons who had never hitherto believed in the pleasure to be derived from books were disillusioned, and driven, as it were, to cultivate a taste for literature--as men in gaol often are. It may therefore be set down as portion of the good resulting from evil, this teaching of people to value mental nourishment. The importance of the physical variety was only too well understood.
On Monday many sh.e.l.ls fell into the west end of the town. Our West End was not like London"s; there were few houses in it, and they were unoccupied. Mafeking, it was said, had driven back the besiegers, and, it was added, had "possibly" been relieved from the north ("possibly"
was thought distinctly good). It may have been so; but we did not believe it. There had all along been a great deal of chopping and changing anent the position of the Mafeking garrison. We were at one time told that Mafeking "fell" before our Siege began. We could, and always did, take a more dispa.s.sionate view of Baden-Powell"s plight than we could or would take of our own.
Tuesday morning brought the "signal sound of strife"; no day brought any more. The belching of the guns sounded nearer than on the Monday, but that was small consolation, for it had sounded near and afar off alternately for many days. There is a modernised game of blind man"s buff in which the blind one is set to find a hidden ping-pong ball, and is aided in the search by a _fugue_ played on the piano. The nearer she (or he) approaches the object of her (or his) search the louder grows the music (the _fugue_) and _vice versa_. It seemed to us that Methuen not only knew the game but was pa.s.sionately fond of it. It was our privilege in the afternoon to behold the twinkling of a balloon. It being broad daylight the stars were not visible. Still, sceptical wiseacres refused to come outside to see the sight; they guessed it was "the sun." A variety of colours were to be seen about the balloon; the sceptics said it was a rainbow. But there was no mistaking it in the light of day; the thing was really a balloon. The rumour-monger seized his opportunity and circulated all over the city that portion of the Column were visible, or had halted, rather, at Kraalkop, where they ought to be visible. Kraalkop accordingly was watched intently for eight and forty hours, but no sign of a human presence rewarded the vigil. The Boers, meanwhile, evinced no signs of scenting danger from any quarter, and with their usual nonchalance kept leisurely shying sh.e.l.ls at Kimberley. These missiles were intended probably for the redoubts, as they fell mainly on the outskirts of the town. They exploded on the hard roads, and suggested plenty of melancholy speculation as to the precise number of them that would be needed to double up for ever the entire population. Fever continued to play havoc with both natives and Europeans. The Siege was growing warm, insufferably warm, and the weather that nature gave us was in all conscience hot enough. In our fourteenth week of hunger and thirst matters were as bad as they could be--until the meat Directorate proceeded scientifically to confound the fallacy in their own peculiar way.
The half and half regulation had been in operation some days--a few eating all they got--others only half of it--more again touching no meat at all lest they should (horrible thought!) mistake one half for the other. This state of things did not satisfy the Authorities, and they proceeded to push the horse--practically down our throats. The feelings of the civilised citizens of the Diamond City can be better imagined than described when they read in the daily _bulletin_ at the Washington Market that they would get--not _all_ horse indeed, but, in the words of the song, "it was near it." It was decreed that our ration should henceforth consist of four-fifths horse-flesh and one-fifth meat proper.
This reduced our allowance of solid (familiar) food to less than one ounce, or in other words to the dimensions of a small cake of tobacco _minus_ several pipefuls! It may well be doubted whether Gilbert has ever conceived anything so quaint. I will not dwell on its whimsical side, nor on the feelings its realism stirred in the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of the suffering mult.i.tude. In effect it caused a serious secession from the ranks of the party who had abstained altogether from horseflesh. For when it came to a choice between no meat at all on the one side, and Boer bread and porridge _exclusively_ on the other, it occurred to the seceders that even horse blood is thicker than water; so they pa.s.sed under the yoke of hippophagy with perfect composure. Still the party that suffered this defection lost neither _prestige_ nor numerical strength, for the four-fifths" standard made vegetarians of many who had tolerated--while it lasted--the principle of equal rights, or two ounces of each animal. A transposition of parties occurred. But none abstained from opening the floodgates of their wrath on the authors of the latest _menu_. The authors" apologists, for--tell it not in Gath!--they had apologists still, argued that there were restaurants in Paris where cooked horse was a speciality. But special pleading so palpable only aggravated the prevailing resentment to the dish. There were a great many customs in Paris equally foreign to our, shall I say, Imperial ways; together with a plethora of scientific _chefs_ who could metamorphose anything--rats as well as horses. There were revolutionaries in France in sufficient numbers to make traffic in gruesome dietary pay; and plenty of fodder, besides, with which to "fatten" beasts. All this gammon respecting Continental precedent and taste was beside the question; it only invited gratuitous vituperation of the French nation. An ugly feature of the traffic was suggested by the fact that horses were dying from sheer starvation. The Sanitary Authorities had become experts in the use of the revolvers with which they expedited the demise of the poor beasts. Everybody has doubtless known of the repulsion one feels against partaking of the flesh of a cow that dies a _natural_ death. All of us, perhaps, have unconsciously relished it at one time or another, when butchers were above suspicion.
But when it was a question of a horse--well, I will not conjure up the horror of the situation. The horses used for food were all _slaughtered_; but the suspicion existed that they might not have been, and to lay the bogey in minds governing old-fashioned stomachs was not easy. These old Whigs argued that the meat we ate was "dead" meat, from "dead" animals (which was indisputable). All this apart, however, it was manifest even to the devil-may-care fellows who are usually satisfied with _enough_ of a thing, that the horses were "too thin." The Authorities kept inviting owners to sell their beasts for "slaughtering purposes"; good prices were offered for "fat horses." Advertis.e.m.e.nts (in huge capitals) to this effect disfigured our newspaper for a long while, and though we did not regard it as such it was a nice piece of humour. The "fat" horses were all too few for fighting, and were reserved for fighting. The artfulness of "slaughtering purposes" can be appreciated accordingly.
Wednesday was interesting, Colonel Chamier having persuaded Kekewich to let him off on a little expedition. He took with him a small battery of guns, a picked force of mounted men (on "fat" horses), and wended his way towards Alexandersfontein. On the journey he divided his force and left half of it with a Maxim at a Mr. Fenn"s farm. The jolly Boers had evidently, and not unnaturally, a.s.sumed that they had cured us of our weakness for meanderings. An attack was the last thing they looked for, and Chamier got well within range of the great camp un.o.bserved. And then the battle began. The enemy, taken by surprise, suffered much in their efforts to regain their trenches. In the meantime a large party of Boers from a neighbouring arc of the circle that encompa.s.sed Kimberley were endeavouring to cut off Chamier"s retreat. But it was with tactics of this sort that the men at Fenn"s were instructed to deal; and they did deal with them, effectually. Unconscious of hidden danger, the unsuspecting Boers in the course of their operations drew near to the farm. And it was then, and not till then, that into their midst came a shower of bullets that spoiled their plans. In the _melee_ a Boer horse (a plump one) was triumphantly captured and preserved for dissection.
The men shortly afterwards returned to town, having learnt all that they wanted to learn, and inflicted more damage than they had hoped to inflict. They were bombarded on the journey home, but their casualities were nil.
On their entrance into Kimberley they met an enthusiastic baker (with his breadcart), who was not in a position to confer V.C."s all round; but he bombarded each member of the force with something quite as precious, namely, a loaf of bread. The "regulation" allowance was only a paltry fourteen ounces, which the lightest of Light Hors.e.m.e.n was capable of demolishing for breakfast. The generous baker--Martial Law and proclamations notwithstanding--could not resist the opportunity of throwing the beam of a good deed on this naughty world; and when he found he had not sufficient loaves to go round, so far from regretting his quixotic rashness, he galloped back to his bakehouse for more. It was a graceful act--reckless, heroic--and the recipients of the dough were not lacking in grat.i.tude. But, alas! the _Commissariat_ were; they bristled with anger! How dare a baker be generous in the teeth of the penalties attached to kindness and such weaknesses. How dare he flout so outrageously the canons of Martial Law. Who was Czar! Was Kekewich king!
Was Caesar (_Imperial_ Caesar) dead and turned to--flour! The offence was unprecedented in its heinousness. Threats of prosecution followed; but the offending baker apologised; and though the more rigid of our disciplinarians, given their way, would have roasted him in his own oven, the flexible ones deemed shooting too good for him, and accepted his apology by way of compromise.
But Wednesday will be remembered for more than a sortie, and the baker"s rebellion that ensued. On that day was formally established our celebrated "Soup Kitchen." Among the sheaves of suggestive letters to the Editor, for the better management, economy, and distribution of supplies, the epistles relating to the need of a soup department had attracted most attention. The idea was not a bad one; it was practicable, and had much to commend it. But still the feeling of the people was that so long as they were allowed an _unmixed_ ration of the roast beef of old England or young Australia (same Empire) it was preferable that they should be permitted to make their own soup--a poor thing, perhaps; but their own.
The advent of a joint more accustomed to shafts than to skewers, however, was a horse of a different colour; so different, in fact, that all the virtues of a great common kitchen, the saving it would effect, and the good side of Collectivism generally, dawned simultaneously upon everybody by some magical inspiration. The advantages of a Soup-house were at once recognised, and the wisdom of such a creation was immediately acclaimed by a host of astute correspondents. The idea took root, germinated, "caught on," so to say, as the one and only panacea for our ills. So strongly was the scheme approved that arrangements for the flotation of a semi-philanthropic, semi-military company were settled forthwith. All the best names available (for reasons which will be more obvious in due time) were placed on the list of Directors. Mr.
Rhodes, the millionaire, would not lend his name for inscription on a _prospectus_ that was not _bona fide_; and such respected signatories as Mr. and Mrs. Maguire, Doctor Smartt (who also was "well," bedad), and other public personages of high character and probity were a good guarantee for the quality and purity of the State Soup; while the skill of Captain Tyson (who undertook the duties of honorary _chef_) was incontestable. All these names were easily procured. It was laid down with solemn emphasis, as a primary article of faith, that the soup was to be made from oxflesh, and nothing but oxflesh. The horse was to be banned! That was the cardinal condition of the success antic.i.p.ated for the venture; and the guarantees on this head were, in view of the _status_ of the guarantors, accepted unreservedly. Mr. Rhodes, indeed, went a step further than the rest; he guaranteed a contribution of vegetables from the De Beers garden; and the Colonel, not to be outdone, permitted the soup to be thickened with mealie meal. The allowance was to be at the rate of one pint per adult, at three-pence per pint. That the value given for the humble "tickey" was good the success of the scheme proved beyond contention. Hundreds of pints were disposed of--the Directors in person superintending the sale and wielding the ladles. The supply did not at first correspond with the demand; thousands who had a.s.sembled with their jugs were turned away disappointed. The great things expected from the Kitchen were realised; the excellence and the flavour of the broth surpa.s.sed expectations. The ordinary meat ticket sufficed, and its presentation at the Kitchen ent.i.tled the holder to as many pints of soup as (and in lieu of) the number of meat rations for which the ticket was good. The fame of the broth travelled far.
Egg-cup-fuls of the liquid were exultingly pa.s.sed round to the wary, suspicious ones; and these proud sceptics by extending to it the charity of their silence most eloquently admitted the groundlessness of their horsey apprehensions.
The visit of an envoy from the Boer camp aroused a good deal of curiosity. What did he want? The Colonel would never tell. But there was much sinister speculation abroad which, taken in conjunction with the unabating activity of the Boers, was the reverse of comforting. The unconditional surrender of the town had, it was whispered, been demanded in explicit terms, and with equal explicitness refused. The consequence of this refusal was the thought uppermost in every mind. The gentlemen outside were numerically stronger than ever, and more at ease, too. They had--if report ever spoke truly--intimated to the "Volunteer" camp, in some way not explained, that they had just returned from their Christmas holidays; that their absence accounted for the "quiet time" we had been enjoying; but that they would presently be giving us "beans." They certainly know how many make _five_; and their facetiousness in close proximity to a large British Column was beyond us.
There was yet another p.r.o.nouncement to complete the eventfulness of the day, and to cause a lull in the domestic warfare waged against the Colonel and his Ironsides. By dint of hard work day and night the great thirty-pound gun constructed by De Beers was finished at last. Big things were expected from it; the surprise and consternation it was likely to create was a pleasing reflection. The construction of such a piece of ordnance in the middle of a desert was considered something to be proud of, and that reflected credit on the genius of Mr. Labram, who had planned it. Long Cecil (as it was called), in all its pristine perfection, was submitted to the public gaze, and was at once the cynosure of all eyes. On Friday it was tested, with complete success.
The boom, at close quarters, was loud and alarming; and it required the despatch of a second sh.e.l.l to satisfy non-spectators that the gun had not been blown to pieces by the first. A few missiles were sent into the Intermediate Station, a couple of miles distant. Whether anyone was hurt did not transpire, but the moral effect produced was unmistakable. A panic appeared to ensue, and vehicles of all sorts were hurriedly requisitioned to enable the Boers to get away with their goods and chattels from the Intermediate to a more healthy station. Private letters were afterwards unearthed in which no attempt was made to conceal the alarm occasioned by this unexpected visitation.
But the new gun was only a diversion, while the stream of invective against horseflesh went on like the brook for ever. It is an ill wind that blows n.o.body good; the truth of this was well exemplified in the luck of the dogs. The poor animals looked shockingly thin and wasted, and had for a long time been unable to move about with their wonted agility in pursuit of locusts and mosquitoes. The mongrels that had any fight or vitality left in them would engage in a terrific struggle on the streets at night for the contents of the refuse buckets which our primitive sanitation laws permitted to obstruct the pathways until morning. It need hardly be said that there was not much in the way of crusts, sc.r.a.ps, or bones to appease canine hunger, and the resultant keenness of the compet.i.tion made the night extremely hideous. This snarling struggle for existence had gone on night after night to the supreme annoyance of martyrs who would fain have slept, and who urged (in letters to the Editor) the wholesale destruction of the snarlers as a work at once humane, essential, and congenial. This was in pre-horse food days, when the ox was paramount on our tables.
But now all was changed, and every dog had his day indeed! The brutes--not knowing the difference--revelled in horseflesh. The people who could not look at it gave it _all_ to their dogs; while the most enthusiastic equine meat-eater invariably left a trifle behind him.
Canine gluttony was a source of much amus.e.m.e.nt, envy, or disgust (according to the individual temperament); and the ubiquitous cynic reminded one of a good time coming when the horse would be locally extinct and "fat dog" the daintiest of diets. The irony of it all was that there were still at Kenilworth some hundreds of oxen, in perpetual danger of being "sniped "; and the populace argued (not unreasonably) that to force on us irrational rations was in the circ.u.mstances a callous thing. There were doubtless considerations to palliate this procedure on the part of the Protector, but we would not see them. The cattle were there in sufficient numbers to feed us until relief arrived.
True, relief appeared to be remote, but our view was that (if a calamity were to be averted) it _must_ come within a month at the outside. And what a pretty _denouement_ it would be, we said, if, through thrusting "strange food" upon us until the Column came in, there were left a monster herd of jubilant bullocks to swell the chorus of welcome! And, if I mistake not, they did actually swell it. At any rate, General French was reported to have been highly indignant when informed of how much more useful than palatable the horse was, and to have ordered its exclusion from the abattoir forthwith. We had to continue vegetating on Siege rations for two weeks after the arrival of French; but from the first moment of his entry the nightmare of horseflesh troubled us no more.
Those dark days were not without their humours withal; and there was a piquancy in the very imperviousness of our risible faculties to their correct appreciation. a.s.ses and mules--it was said--were butchered in common with horses, and discussion was wont to be rife on the relative merits of the three animals in their new sphere of usefulness. The difficulty involved in distinguishing a steak of one from a steak of another was no small one; but donkey was reputed to taste sweeter than common horse--a questionable recommendation!--and the advocates of this theory were called cannibals. The mule had its backers, too; it was the gentler animal, they contended in sustainment of their preference. But all three beasts had acquired a fresh interest, notoriety, and dignity; and it was edifying to watch men, not noted for their sporting proclivities, eyeing an animal with the knowing look of a _connoisseur_ that seemed to say: "I wonder what he would taste like." Whether it was that, being so cheap he might be regarded "gift horse," or for some less occult reason, the points of a beast were never looked for in the mouth.
His age, for example, might strike a thinking person as an important factor to be remembered in the summing up of a horse"s fitness for the grill. But the people generally never thought of that, and were mainly influenced in their judgments by the spareness or fleshiness of the animal"s hindquarters. On Sat.u.r.day the atmosphere was thick with rumours of imminent trouble. The precise terms of the Boer ultimatum we did not know, but that an ultimatum had been received was not denied. We heard of a fifty-pound gun (bigger than ours!) being put into position on the Free State border--with a view to instilling in us the wisdom of recognising the inevitable. The less formidable instruments of torture nearer home were also being augmented. There was a feeling that events of an uncommon character were on the march. People talked of presentiments--one being that the Baralongs outside Kimberley were being armed to a.s.sist in our annihilation. The much debated topic anent the likelihood of the Sixth Division being sent to join Methuen was settled at last--to our chagrin. It had gone off at a tangent somewhere else.
Who knew that the Seventh Division would not follow suit? In any case, weeks had to pa.s.s before the Seventh (being still at sea) could get anywhere. Our prospects of speedy liberation were therefore none too excellent. The Empire was pa.s.sing through a crisis, and if Kekewich had had only the statesmanship to make known to us the truth, the plain unvarnished truth, we might have been less captious in our criticisms of things both local and Imperial. Even the new gun, in common with the times, was out of joint and undergoing repairs at the workshop.
Nutritious food of any sort was now a rarity in real earnest. Eggs were hard at a price per dozen that purchased a _gross_ in the not too cheap days of peace; while ducks and drakes, no bigger than crows, but worth their weight in diamonds, were too heavy for the patrons of paste. The military people had an extensive variety of precious birds stuffed away _in_ their own selected aviaries. They had also seized upon all the cigarettes in town. Now, this was held up as a well-grounded and specific grievance against the military. It was conceded that the sick and wounded had first claim on our humanity; and the chicken monopoly, had it stood alone, would not have invited criticism. But the cigarette appropriation was reckoned a scandal. There was an abundance of matches in the military stores--but nowhere else. The tobacconists were selling off, at quadrupled rates, quant.i.ties of ancient, nasty-smelling "safety-matches," which but yesterday, alas! they would have paid us to bury somewhere! Of course there were wide possibilities of economy in this direction--the one match often putting the kettles to boil in half a street. The waste in the matter of pipe-kindling had to be modified, and the mediaeval makeshift of flint and steel restored. The fierce rays of _Sol_, through the _media_ of our monocles, were also utilised to light cigars. What else on Sat.u.r.day? Yes, Mafeking, they said, was fighting on still; and Generals Buller and Warren had forded the Tugela, _en route_ to Ladysmith. That their plunge might stimulate Methuen to burn his boots and brave the turgid waters of the Modder, was the fervent wish of Kimberley at the end of fourteen weeks of irksome, emaciating duress.
CHAPTER XV
_Week ending 27th January, 1900_
The whirligig of the enemy (time, not the Boer, not the "Law") had again carried us to the beginning of another week. The Sundays were now exceedingly dull, and on the particular Sabbath with which I am dealing little worthy of record came within the sphere of my observations. I shall therefore--in the absence of matter of graver import--take advantage of its Sunday silence to say a word or two about the _Diamond Fields" Advertiser_. The views of the besieged in regard to their local print had undergone a change. They had at one time been proud of their paper. It had formerly been conducted on well-defined principles; and it was its departure from these principles to the _status_ of an "Organ"
that preached, but which at the frown of a Draconic Colonel practised not its articles--it was this that brought down upon its head the wrath of the local democracy. The authorities had for a while permitted the paper to publish war-sc.r.a.ps; but whether it was due to a tendency on the Editor"s part to expand these allowances, the privilege was withdrawn and sc.r.a.ps were proscribed. Even the fiction in the columns of our journal was subjected to a rigid censorship; and when the Public had expected it to be voicing their protests against the Russian government of the day, the paper was virtually in Slavonic hands and controlled by the _Czar_ himself. Its eight large pages had been reduced to four small ones, which became better known as the "Official Gazette" of the district. But though we read in it garrison orders from time to time, the three-penny novelette of the town would have been a more fitting designation. It had once quoted from a London contemporary a statement to the effect that hundreds of lives had been thrown away at Magersfontein in an attempt to rescue Cecil Rhodes! Our "Organ" was then independent enough to retort that there was, besides Mr. Rhodes, the fate of thousands of British subjects to be considered. But now it was far otherwise; the independence of tone had vanished. Instead of dignified sarcasm, we were apologetically regaled with parallels of all the sieges in the world"s history--Troy, Plevna, Sebastopol, Paris, etc.--and calmly a.s.sured that our tribulations weighed lightly in the balance with what was suffered in the brave days of--"wooden"
horseflesh!
Still the journal, though it evoked the displeasure of its quondam admirers, doubtless acted for the best in a difficult situation; and there were many who might have overlooked the "parallels" were it not for the advertis.e.m.e.nts. For through the advertising columns we were perpetually being pressed by the merchants of the city to come in and buy everything that makes life worth living! All the dainties an aspirant to gout could wish for were, according to our "Official Gazette," to be had for the asking. At the hotels, "Highland Cream Whiskey" was for ever arriving; and "O.K." (another thistle!) kept "licking "em all" with monotonous invincibility. Iced beer was on tap; the champagne was sparkling; the wine needed no bush. The cheese was still alive (on paper). Cakes, hams, jams, biscuits, potted fish, flesh, and good red herring were, so to speak, all over the shops. This was the sort of pabulum our morning sheet supplied by way of breakfast for inward digestion, and there was an irony in the meal which its uniqueness did not help to make palatable. Absent-minded people still went shopping for luxuries gone but not forgotten; to provoke a premature "April fool" from the startled grocer, who was powerless to make real the chimeras that haunted the jungles of the shoppers"
imaginations. Even practical (new) women would sometimes think of Bovril, and rush off to buy it all up, only to find that it had been bought up long ago, and that not for nothing had so much money been expended in the booming of that bullock in a bottle! Our boarding-house tariffs were ridiculously low (the paper said) at seven or eight pounds per month; while the allurements of the boating and the creature comforts of Modder River, and the balminess of its breezes, were dangled before our eyes with aggressive cynicism. The shipping agents were most attentive to detail in regard to the departure of vessels from Cape ports--just as if the availability of aerial tugs, to convey us to the coast, went without saying. Such were the irritating features of our morning paper. Their humour was utterly lost on us; they only served to sharpen the unhappy appet.i.tes of all whose fatal misfortune was ability to read.
Nasty stories had been told with reference to the reign of terror to be inaugurated on Monday. But they did not materialise; the rule of Martial Law--bad to beat--remained unbeatable. The _expected_ rarely happened, and peace was oftener than not the characteristic of the prophets"
red-letter-day. Such occasions gave us scope and opportunity to discuss the _Kabal_ that ran her Majesty"s writ, and to wonder whether it (the writ) should ever again be pacemaker to the people"s will. The spectacle of a number of Union Jacks floating on the breeze was the most startling incident of the day. What did the transformation mean? A wild conjecture seized us; it was a moment of unalloyed joy when the fond thought of Kimberley"s relief having been accomplished during the night flashed across our minds. But our jubilation was short-lived, for the Boers presently fired a salute with intent clearly to tatter rather than honour the Flag--in defence of which Long Cecil, tattered itself, was unable to play a part.
The echoes of a heavy cannonade were the feature of Tuesday. This led us to infer that the much-vaunted "siege train" (which was the talk of the city) had begun its work of devastation. The inspiration of itself would not have been the harbinger of consolation--we were long listening to sound and fury, meaning nothing--but we were quick to a.s.sociate it with the unfurling of the Flag, to put the two "straws" together--and sigh!
"The Column," our Gazette a.s.serted, "had made a most successful _reconnaissance_." But experience had taught us how to estimate a bald, non-committal statement of that kind. Our faith in the Column had been shaken; so much so that cynics hummed, with impunity, that the "little British army goes a long, long way." We dared to doubt the bellipotence of the Column. The wisdom of self-help was brought home to us at last.
We were fast learning to put not our trust in Columns, and to ponder the possibility, handicapped though we were, of hewing from within a way to freedom.
Meanwhile Long Cecil, successfully treated, was again in the arena. A few "compliments" were jerked at the Kamfers Dam Laager; the Boers were made to feel that they had a foeman to deal with worthy of their lead.
The success of the gun and the skill of him who made it were on every lip. The theme occasioned as much enthusiasm as could be expected from hearts saddened by disconsolation. And the man in the moon, too far distant to betray the grimness of his smile, looked silently on.
Favourable accounts of the progress of events in Natal conduced to the serenity of the evening. The night was so still and grand that it seemed almost a pity to seek refuge in repose; and when ultimately we did persuade ourselves to retire it was to dream of Long Cecil and his potentialities--a sanguine dream of self-reliance and ability to burst our bonds.
But, oh! what a change came over its spirit in the middle of the night; when startled from our slumbers by the hissing of sh.e.l.ls in the streets we awoke to a sense of what was real. In the blackness of the early morning it was hard to connect the booming of cannon with reality. The sh.e.l.ls were falling and bursting in rapid succession. It was the inauguration of a nerve-ordeal; the prelude to a terrible day; the beginning of a bombardment long-sustained and fierce.
Not for long did the guns blaze in vain. A young girl lay dead, struck down in the privacy of her bedroom. Sh.e.l.l after sh.e.l.l came whistling through the air, jeopardising the reason of scared women, in terror for the safety of their children. Men rushed about everywhere seeking shelter for their families. A gentleman walking in the Dutoitspan Road had his hat unroofed, and a young lad was prematurely put out at elbow by a piece of sh.e.l.l which pa.s.sed through the sleeve of his coat. Half a score of guns poured forth a heavy fusillade until eight o"clock, when a short interval for breakfast was conceded.
Fast and furious fell the instruments of destruction into every street and alley that throbbed with human life--smashing tables and delfware, ripping up floors, and spreading alarm abroad in the land. The Public Library was the recipient of a missile that played havoc with a h.o.a.ry tome. Public buildings and churches were peppered indiscriminately.
Saint Cyprian"s--ventilated before in the same accidental fashion--was holed again. All Saints" fared little better. The Catholic Cathedral was slightly damaged. Saint Augustine"s was. .h.i.t; and, judging by its battered walls, the Dutch Reformed Church went nearer to demolition than any other. No structure with any pretensions to size escaped. The Town Hall was subjected to a fierce a.s.sault; for into the Market Square, to the right and left of the hall, in front and in rear, the sh.e.l.ls fell in abundance. But the solid walls of the building were not tested, which was strange in view of its exposed position and the large area it covered. Inside, the busy officials were hard at work, pandering to the needs of the hungry throng who sought dispensations from starvation, and who dared not venture out again lest they should die hungry withal.
The Town Hall towered impregnable--impervious to the myriad battering-rams that yearned to lay it low. As if it had occurred to them that the chances rather favoured finding the Mayor at home, the Boer gunners subsequently launched through the roof of his store in Jones"
Street a shower of shrapnel which riddled the occupants of a compartment in the upper storey. The Mayor, fortunately, was not one of these; when the smoke cleared away it was found that the injured consisted of some handsome wax figures. At Beaconsfield a youth was struck, and another projectile went so near to putting a poor old woman, who lay upon a sick bed, beyond the borders of eternity that her feeble limbs were deprived of the couch"s solace. An Indian subject of the Queen had his bungalow shattered. Not even the hallowed sanctuary of the "Law"s" guardians was held sacred, for a missile telescoped a policeman"s helmet--which, happily, was off its head at the moment.
All day long existence was made well-nigh unendurable. None knew the moment when an account of one"s individual stewardship might be demanded. It is in trials of this kind that mankind is most vividly impressed with the reality of being in life and death simultaneously.
That these trials surpa.s.sed any that had hitherto ruffled the noiseless tenor of our way was a truism. But coming at a moment when our nerves were sufficiently unstrung by the dearth of tonics, they were doubly enervating. Stomachal grievances were forgotten, and few ventured to desert the imaginary security of their homes to face the risks the redress of grievances would entail. Thus did the hours creep on until darkness with its interregnum of peace had fallen on the city.
But the interregnum was of brief duration, for, to our unspeakable horror, the bombardment was resumed at nine o"clock. If in the clear light of day the sh.e.l.ls were trying, what were they in the night! A ghost story well told in the daytime perturbs a superst.i.tious mind; but to feel queer at its recital in the night one need not necessarily be superst.i.tious at all. This new departure intensified the strain and went far to make faint many a heart that had until then remained stout. The guns were fired with longer intervals between the shots; the sh.e.l.ls did not follow on the top of one another as in the day; but one nocturnal projectile excited as much terror as did ten when the sun was shining.
Far into the night--for hours after midnight--the war was waged, and sleep denied the pleasure of steeping our "senses in forgetfulness." To sleep was nearly impossible, and at the first peep of dawn to recline on a bed at all was not easy, so fierce and sudden was the energy with which a dozen guns commenced to bark in chorus.
And with sad results. The men in the redoubts enjoyed comparative immunity from the dangers of the bombardment; it was mainly the women and children in the houses who had to bear the brunt of the a.s.saults. A lamentable instance of the pity of it was only too soon forthcoming. In the house of a Mr. Webster (who was in camp with his regiment, the Volunteers) his wife and children were at breakfast, when crash! through the roof came a sh.e.l.l on top of the tea-pot. The mother sustained fearful injuries, to which she subsequently succ.u.mbed. Her six-year-old child was also killed; her second son had his leg and arm broken; while her youngest child--a little girl--was badly bruised. The stricken family were removed to hospital amid a shower of sh.e.l.ls, which continued with unabashed fury to seek whom they slaughter. Nearly all our public buildings were hit, and the places of worship were again a mark for the vandal. Houses everywhere were damaged, and extraordinary indeed were the escapes of their distracted occupiers. No less gracious was the kindly fortune that shielded those whom duty, caprice, or foolhardiness brought into the streets. One family stuffed away in the ostensible security of a coal-hole vegetated there all day. They were grateful for their modern ark, but outraged nature disapproved and caused a sh.e.l.l to pierce it. n.o.body was hurt, remarkable to relate, and the frightened household ascended with alacrity to take their chances in a purer atmosphere. In every part of the town the sh.e.l.ls kept falling.
Beaconsfield appeared to be the most favoured hunting ground, for its _Sanatorium_ was not only a colossal structure but the home of the Colossus himself. Hundreds of sh.e.l.ls dropped in its vicinity, while the millionaire went round the city in a cart, to all outward seeming as little concerned as the most penurious of men. Some weeks before a grazier who had fallen into the hands of the Boers had been a.s.sured that it was Rhodes they wanted--not Kimberley. Such a revelation in the case of a personality less notable or less esteemed might have made things awkward for him.
Forty-five minutes were allowed for lunch--an interval which the Boers considered long enough for them--and no doubt for us, too, since they might fairly a.s.sume that we did not get much to eat. But on our side there was the trouble and delay involved in the getting of it. To jostle about in a crowd for an indefinite period of time for sake of a sc.r.a.p of flesh meat--and such meat! such flesh!--required rare ravenousness of appet.i.te; and the bursting of a sh.e.l.l in the midst of a surging ma.s.s of humanity was so certain to be attended by fatal results that it was only the very healthy who bothered battling for so little.
The forty-five minutes were of brief duration, and the a.s.sault was promptly renewed when the clock struck two. First came the boom; then the warning whistle; next the boom of a second gun almost before the bursting crash of the first sh.e.l.l had proclaimed its contact with _terra firma_. It was not the numbers of the killed (because they were marvellously few) that awed the people so much as the possibilities of the situation. The guns were fired at long range, and ten or fifteen seconds had to elapse ere anybody could be sure that his turn had not come. Had a closer range been feasible the bombardment might have been more destructive, but the suspense would have been less trying. The sh.e.l.ls fell thickly the whole afternoon. Never, hardly ever, was there a lull as the iron roofs of the houses continued to be fitted for service as rough observatories which enabled us to see balloons indeed. Several mourners attending a funeral on its way to the cemetery narrowly escaped dismemberment, by a missile which dropped behind the hea.r.s.e. The Fire Brigade were alert and ready for contingencies; the brigade station at the Munic.i.p.al compound was singled out for attack; and it looked as if the skill of the Boers in picking out and disabling the _Officers_ in the field extended to the town, for the Chief of the firemen was struck while standing on his own doorstep. He received a few ugly cuts, as also did two of his children.
And where all this time, it may be asked, where was Long Cecil? Long Cecil had been doing its best, but with the odds so long as ten to one against, its best was a negligible quant.i.ty. It sent sh.e.l.l after sh.e.l.l in one direction, then in another, but the enemy heeded it not at all; and though it may have irritated the Boer a little and done all that one gun of its calibre could do, it did not mitigate the perils of the populace. That it had done its best was undeniable, but it sank in the public esteem for other reasons. It was reputed to have killed two women in the Boer camp with its "compliments." I cannot vouch for the truth of the story, but it was seized upon to intensify the growing aversion to the whilom bepraised product of Colonial enterprise. The report converted hostile head-shakes into voluble "I told you so"s," and swelled the feeble chorus that had prophesied ill of Long Cecil from the beginning.
Why did the Military insist on aggravating the enemy? This was our new shibboleth. We had, practically speaking, been left unmolested until Long Cecil sounded its timbrel. Hence the b.l.o.o.d.y sequel! Now, all this would have been in better taste had not those of us loudest in the gun"s condemnation been equally boastful anent the fear it was to put into the hearts of the Boers. They were to be taught that Long Cecil was a thing to conjure with. In fact, Long Cecil had accentuated what is known in vulgar parlance as the Jingo spirit. But it had failed to come up to expectations, and all that was left--the dregs of our chivalry--was gone; and perhaps the highest form of chivalry extant now-a-days is consistency. The forty-eight hours" bombardment had been threatened long ere Long Cecil emerged from the workshop in the panoply war. But it was enough for the nonce to have even an inanimate scape-goat with which to relieve our grief--in the absence of something mellow to _drown_ it in.
Firing ceased at six o"clock, and many families, waiving the discomforts of the trek, had already betaken themselves to the redoubts, away from the centre of a.s.sault. They remained there all night, needlessly, as it happened. Friday was not looked to with any particular pleasure; but apart from some deliberate attempts to snap-shot the _Sanatorium_ we had little to disturb us. The device of fixing the lens on the local library was next resorted to; a sh.e.l.l dropped on its doorstep, and Beaconsfield church had a like experience. One or two guns kept firing irregularly all day. A sh.e.l.l entered a kitchen and made a complete wreckage of its culinary appliances. Long Cecil, at this stage, made some excellent practice, upsetting presumably the kitchen at Kamfers Dam, as several women were among those who fluttered hither and thither for shelter.
Long Cecil was a surprise to the Boers; they had heard of the gun, and inclined to regard its existence as a myth. They had laughed at the visionary who had tried to piece it together; and there were not a few among ourselves who had shared their incredulity.
The proceedings of the previous two days had banished any timidity that had existed hitherto in the ranks of the town"s defenders. They were eager for a fight. The sweetness of revenge was appreciated in some measure, and those who might in other circ.u.mstances have shirked personal danger, or collapsed in its presence, had their nerves steeled for a fair and square encounter. Our defences were never tested; we were beginning to wish they were. A determined and persevering effort on the Boers" part might have made them masters of Kimberley. The victory, however, would have been of the _Phyrric_ order.
Sat.u.r.day came. The common trials of the great bombardment had lulled the food warfare, and the thoughts of all were directed to the provision of adequate protection for life and limb. The erection of forts and shelters was going on everywhere. The work had been inaugurated when the bombardment was at its height, and the muscular energy it brought into play was magnificent. The "boys" (natives) were kept at it like _Trojans_, under the personal supervision of their respective white chiefs; and the chiefs themselves, unaccustomed though they were to an implement less mighty than the pen, perspired beadily and willingly with the pick and shovel. Even the ladies, regardless of blisters and the snowy whiteness of their hands, revelled in the role of navvy. Hallowed little garden patches were ruthlessly excavated; converted into "dug-outs"--disagreeably suggestive of the grave--and these were covered over and hedged in with sacks of earth. The apartments thus improvised were excellent in their way, but somewhat damp and dismal. They were not strictly well ventilated, but the atmosphere without was so redolent of smoke and powder that sanitation had lost in importance. Moreover, one could always stick one"s head out of the burrow to inhale the outer air if it were considered fresher than what saluted the nostrils within. Of course these shelters did not offer so much security from danger as their occupiers fancied (I have already instanced how the recesses of a coal-hole had not been proof against invasion); but they were splinter proof. If husbands and fathers _did_ magnify the protection they afforded, their motives were kind.