Outsiders may argue about this or that general, and analyse
his tactics, and never very likely get much nearer the truth (for there
is a monstrous lot of luck one way or the other in all manoeuvres, and
the ones often succeed that didn't ought to, and _vice versa_); but once
you are under a man, you don't need to argue; you know. We all know that
Ian Hamilton, with his pleasant well-bred manner, and the mutilated hand
dangling as he rides, is the best man we have had over us yet, and we
would all do great things to show our devotion.
The Diamond Hill action was one of those great big affairs which it
would be impossible to explain without a plan of the country and a lot
of little flags. Our attack from extreme left to right was spread over a
frontage of, I daresay, twenty miles. The idea was for the mounted
troops to turn the enemy's flanks and let in the infantry in front. Ian
Hamilton had to deal with the Boer left flank, French with the right. Of
course we saw and heard nothing of French, who might as well have been
fighting in another planet, so far as we knew. Our difficulty here, as
on some former occasions, was to find the limit of their flanks. The
more we stretch out, the more they stretch out. They have the advantage
of being all mounted, while the bulk of our force is infantry, massed
inertly in the middle; and also from the lofty position they occupy they
can command a bird's-eye view of the wide valley across which we are
advancing, and perceive the disposition of our forces, and in what
strength we are threatening the various points of defence, while their
forces are quite concealed from us.
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