During all this time we have been wandering like an army in a dream over
the unlimited surface of the veldt. The same programme is repeated day
by day. A little before dawn you hear through your blanket-folds the
first unwelcome "Saddle up," and the muttered curses in reply. You
unwind yourself with groans. A white-frost fog blots out everything at
fifty yards, and a white sugary frost encrusts the grass. These first
hours are piercingly cold, for it is now mid-winter with us. A cup of
water left overnight is frozen solid. You dress by simply drawing your
revolver-strap over your shoulder, and flinging your blanket round you,
make your way to where a couple of black boys are bending over the
beginnings of a fire, and to which several other blanketed and shivering
figures are converging with the same thought--_coffee_--in every mind.
Then the great army column that has curled itself up like a caterpillar
for the night begins slowly to uncurl. On the march our huge convoy
stretches out in line, waggon following waggon along the rude track, and
extending to a length of nearly ten miles. At night, of course, it
collects (parks is the proper word) at some selected spot where the
ground is favourable, and where in the shape of a sluit, river, or
farm-dam there is water. On the slopes and hills around infantry pickets
are set, while the convoy and main camp are massed in the hollow
beneath.
Pages:
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166