A Broad Arid Plain,
Swelling Into Stony Hills, Surrounded Them On Every Side.
Here and
there in the extreme distance, mounted figures moved over the vast
expanse - Boer scouts who marked in amazement the advance of this
great array.
Once or twice these men gathered together, and a
sputter of rifle fire broke out upon our left flank, but the great
tide swept on and carried them with it. Often in this desolate land
the herds of mottled springbok and of grey rekbok could be seen
sweeping over the plain, or stopping with that curiosity upon which
the hunter trades, to stare at the unwonted spectacle.
So all day they rode, hussars, dragoons, and lancers, over the
withered veld, until men and horses drooped with the heat and the
exertion. A front of nearly two miles was kept, the regiments
moving two abreast in open order; and the sight of this magnificent
cloud of horsemen sweeping over the great barren plain was a
glorious one. The veld had caught fire upon the right, and a black
cloud of smoke with a lurid heart to it covered the flank. The beat
of the sun from above and the swelter of dust from below were
overpowering. Gun horses fell in the traces and died of pure
exhaustion. The men, parched and silent, but cheerful, strained
their eyes to pierce the continual mirage which played over the
horizon, and to catch the first glimpse of the Modder. At last, as
the sun began to slope down to the west, a thin line of green was
discerned, the bushes which skirt the banks of that ill-favoured
stream.
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