TWENTY AGAINST FOUR HUNDRED.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume III, Issue 17, 10 July 1900, Page 3

TWENTY AGAINST FOUR HUNDRED.

Hare istPstory, related ttf, a correspondent in B^^l^g^ot^/gmllknii deed of 4heffWfslu Auatr&lfahii. '^£& -tula; is,perhap| not »Bfcnotly^optte^

word to press onward and cut them, to pieces. Our big guns had been grandly handled, and our rifle fire had told its tale. We saw the British falling back from the kopjes they had held, and we thought that there was nothing between us and victory ; but there was, and we found it out before ,we were many minutes older.- There was one big kopje that was the verj key to the position. Our spies had told us that this was held by an Australian iorce. We looked at ibvery anxiously, for it was a hard position to take, but even as we watched we saw that nearly all the Australians were leaving it. They, too, were falling back with the British troop 3. If we once got that kopjo, there was nothing on earth could stop us. We laughed when we saw that only about twenty Australians had been left to guard the kopje. There were about four hundred of us, all pioked men, and when the commandant called to ua to go anl take the kopje, we sprang up eagerly, and dashed down over some hills, meaning to cross the gully, and.oharge the kopje where those twenty men wer* waiting for us. But we did not, know the Australians — then. We know them now. Scarcely had we risen to our feet when they loosed their rifles ; on us, and not a shot was wasted. They did j nos fire as regular soldiers nearly always do, volley after volley, straight in front of them, but «very one picked his man, and shot to kill. They firod like lightning, too, never dwelling on the trigger, yet never wildly wasting lead, pud all around us our best and boldest dropped, until we dared not face them. We dropped to cover, and tried to pick them off, but they were cool and watchful, throwing j no chance away. We tried to crawl from rock to rock to hem them in, but they, holding their fire until our burghers moved, plugged us with lead, uutii we dared not stir a step ahead, and all the time the British troops, with all their convoy, were slowly, bat safely, falling back through the kopjes, where we hoped to hem them in. We gnawed our beards and cursed those fellows who play bd our game as we , thought no living man could play it. j We could not face their fir©. Te move upright to cross a dozen yards meaut certain death, and many a Boer wife was widowed, ana many a child left fatherless by those silent men who held the heights above us. They did not oheer aa we came onward; They, did not play wild music ; they only clung close as alimbuag weeds to the rooks, and shot "as we never saw men shoot before, and hope never to se» men shoot again. Then we got ready to sweep the hills with guns, but our commandant, admiring those brave few who would not budge before us in spite of our numbers, sent an officer to them to ask them to surrender, promising -them all the honours of war. But they sent u s Word to come and take thera if vre could. And -'then our officer asked them times if they would hold up their hands, and at the time a grim sergeant rose and answered him, '< Aye, we will hold up our hands ; but when -.we do, by God, you'll find a bayonet in 'em ! Go back and tell your tomiftai^lant ' that Australia has come to^stayj," , And there they stayed, and fought us^ hour by hour, holding us back, when but' for them victory would have been with us. They held the hill till all their men were safe, and then, dashing down the other side, they jumped into th«ir saddles aud mado off, carrying then? wounded with them. . They were but twenty man, and we four hundred.