POSTMEN OF THE WAR.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXI, Issue 44, 21 February 1900, Page 2

POSTMEN OF THE WAR.

The ingenuity which war correspondents at the beleaguered centres display in getting- despatches through the Boer lines is remarkable. The Kaffir runner is of course the chief medium, but as he is in the 'habit of telling his tale to suit his audience it is not safe to trust him with verbal messages, and it is somewhat hard to conceal even so much as a quill upon the person of a. next to naked black. The Boers search all they fall across most thoroughly, and to show how closely watched Ladysmith is only one Kaffir out of a dozen sent out with despatches is reckoned on to get through the enemy's lines. One Kaffir boy, who was captured with an important despatch, was searched by four men in succession. The uniform he wore being " nothing much before and rather less than half o' that behind " was soon proved guiltless of concealing the despatch, so the darkey's head was combed, measures were taken to see that his stomach was not the post-box, and for four days he was kept under observation. Then* he was allowed to go. He delivered his message all the same, for the quill in which it reposed was snugly discerned in one of his capacious nostrils! Another boy, mounted, was captured bj- the Boers. He professed to have stolen the horse, which the enemy at once confiscated, one volubly condemned the English, showing scars which, he said, were the result of flogging received at the hands of the soldierj-. He, however, was searched thoroughly, but the only article found upon him was an old day pipe full of half-charred tobacco. That his captors kindly returned before releasing him. The message was under the tobacco" in a screwed-up ball of tissuepaper.

A young Scotsman volunteered to take a message from Mafeking and succeeded in getting a feAv miles from Kurumam before he was caught by a Boer patrol. He Avas searched, but nothing beyond a clasp-knife, a pipe and baccy pouch, a small package of saaidAviehes, and a couple of hardboiled eggs. were found upon him. He generously divided the sandwiches with'- his captors, and Avolf VI one of the eggs himself, reserving the other, ■as he said, for later on. He was such a charming felloAv and showed so little disposition to be quit of .the Boers that their suspicions Avere quite dispelled, and finally they gave him a little tobacco and let him go. The hard-boiled egg retained by him contained ai full report of the condition of affairs in Mafeking. Several messages have been sent out of Ladysmith in lumps of wood thrown into the river and by miniature balloons, but the Kaffir runner is still the chief postman.