With the Second Contingent. LETTER FROM BUGLER R. GOLDSTONE.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume III, Issue 28, 4 August 1900, Page 3

With the Second Contingent. LETTER FROM BUGLER R. GOLDSTONE.

- The following are extracts from letters received from Bugler R. Goldstone from the front '.'— Pretoria, tFuoa. 8.

' Just a short" -let'tter t&fore'weleave on some miEnQw'h journey ! or other. We arrived here two days ago, after a very trying trip. We've had any am&unt of fighting. Jack and I fare through it all safe, althougli the chaps are going down e/very day with enteric. We ,lkve both got our horses still. , Most of the New Zealand horses are dead or abandoned ' on the^ road, and all but abou-t thirty of the first^ second and third contingents entered Pretoria on foot, in waggons or on Boer or Argentine remounts. I suppose you heard about Kumbley beiny shot in the stomach. We had some very hot work round Johannesburg, and were lucky to get oft' as well as we did. Poor Byrne was shot dead with a shell. The three contingents have been together since Kroonstadt. We've had about thirteen lights altogether, including three genera"! engagements. I've emptied my bandolier three times (300 rounds), and I fire three shots _ to Jack's one. . . . We know nothing of the w fourt'i and fifth contingents. I'd like very much to see Tom. I think the Avar is about over, but I don't know when we return " home. I don't knowwhether they are sending us today foraging or patrolling or after prisoners most likely. We've had some rough times lately, and have been reduced to two biscuits a day. Our Major has turned out a great fighting man, and is greatly respected now. We got paid £1 to-day — a great god-send. We are anxiously awaiting another mail. The latest letter from you was dated March Ist. We are right ahead of the trains, being in the extreme front of the fighting line. Braamfontein Rail way" Station, Johannesburg, June 18, 1900.

I write this from Johannesburg, where I am engaged as assistant clerk in the Railway Staff Officer's office at the Braaml'ontein railway station. I will tell you all aboui it. While we were at Pretoria, the authorities called for volunteers to act as " railway officials " till the end of the war, so I voiuuteerad, and was taken on at once in one of the chief offices, the omce of the Chief of the Bailway Staff, and am on under the following conditions : — I get my regimental pay, and from 8d to 2s a day extra, according to ability, and I can ieave for home when j the regiment leaves. I sleep in [ fclie office, have a black boy to cook and wash for me, aud in fact live more like an officer than a ! poor humble bugler. The raiLway system- here is for the present an i Imperial Military Railway, most of the German, Dutch, and Holland officials being turned out, and " experienced." men from the Army running the sliovv. I have a very good mate — a member of the C.I.V. (the City of London Imperial Volunteeis). There aie only two of us in the office. Jack was out at the front with half our troops when they called for volunteers, so he did not have a ehanc*. Johannesburg is everything it is cracked up to be., Everybody here is bent on making money. Soldiering and the war is only a secondary consideration. ( >