Within ten minutes of our first viewing the enemy,
half a battery had got into action near our kopje, and was bombarding
the first hill along the enemy's flank.
Two or three of the Boer waggons, the last of the line, had been
abandoned when their retreat was first discovered. These we took
possession of, and with them two Dutchmen and some coloured boys, one of
whom had been driver to a field-cornet of Cronje's. From him we learnt
that Cronje had definitely abandoned the whole Magersfontein position,
that this was the tail of his force going through, and that consequently
there was nothing to be feared from a rear attack. Chester Master wrote
a hasty despatch to this effect to Kitchener and gave it to me, after
which I had a most amusing ride through our lines from the extreme left
to the extreme right, where Kitchener was. First by our batteries,
thundering and smoking (the enemy only had one gun in action that I saw,
but I must say it did very well, feeling for the range with two short
shots, and after that getting well into our guns every time), and then
on through the Mounted Infantry, who kept on charging and retiring,
until finally after three miles' ride I came to the far right, where
Kitchener and the big naval gun sat together in state on the top of a
small kopje strewn with black shining rocks. Here I gave in my despatch,
"From Captain Chester Master, left front, sir," and the best military
salute I have yet mastered (inclined to go into fits of laughter at the
absurdity of the whole thing all the time), and the great man, with his
sullen eye, sitting among his black rocks all alone, reads it and asks
me a question or two, and vouchsafes to tell me that the information is
"very important," which I suppose meant that he had not been certain
whether he was in contact with the middle or extreme tail of the enemy's
force.
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