In the Ranks of the C.I.V. Part 9

_September 15._--_Sat.u.r.day._--My foot is well, at any rate for moderate use, and I am to go out on Monday. What I should like, would be to rejoin at once, but unfortunately one has first to go through the intermediate stages of the Convalescent camp, and the Rest camp, where "details" collect, to be forwarded to their regiments. I don't look forward to being a detail at all. Henry's foot is much better, and he is to go out on Monday too. He is still rather lame, though. It has been most delightful having him here.

The evenings are deliciously cool, and you can sit outside in pyjamas till 8.30, when you are turned in. We sat out for long last night, talking over plans. A staff officer has twice been in here, and seemed much amused by us two brothers having fore-gathered. I asked him about Paget's brigade, and he seemed to think they were still at or near Waterval.

_September 16._--_Sunday._--We went to church in the evening; a tent pleasantly filled up, a Sister at the harmonium, hymns, a few prayers, the Psalms, and a short sermon; a strange parti-coloured congregation we were, in pyjamas, slippers and blue coats, some on crutches; Sisters in their bright uniforms. Chairs were scarce, and Henry and I sat on the floor. It was dark before the end, and in the dim light of two candles at the harmonium we looked a motley throng.

Both bound for the Convalescent camp tomorrow.

_September 17._--_Monday._--What we actually did to-day, seeing the commandant, regaining our kit, drawing new kit, might have been done in half an hour; but we took from nine till three doing it, most of which time we were standing waiting. However, about three we found ourselves in a covered cart with five others and our kits, bound for the Convalescent camp. We had said good-bye to the Sisters and our mates. Old Daddy, I am glad to say, had "worked it," as they say, and was radiant, having been marked up for home. No more of "that there veldt" for him. Jock had already been sent out and given a post as hospital orderly, and was now spreading the fame of the Highland Brigade in new fields. We both felt, on the whole, that we had been looked after very well in a very good hospital.

The mules jolted us across the valley, and landed us at a big block of tents, and we took places in one; mother earth again. Tea, the milkless variety again, at 4.30, and then we went to Henry's old tent in the General Hospital, which adjoins this camp, and talked to a friend of his there, a man in the Rifle Brigade, with a bad splintered knee. He was shot about the same time as Henry in a fine charge made by his battalion, which I remember reading about.

Both much depressed to-night; the atmosphere of this camp is like a convict settlement. The food and arrangements are all right, but n.o.body knows any one else; all are casual details from every possible regiment and volunteer corps in the Empire. Nearly all are "fed up;"

nearly all want to get home. A vein of bitter pessimism runs through all conversations; there is a general air of languor and depression.

Fatigues are the only occupation. I should go melancholy mad here, if I stayed; but I shall apply to return to the Battery. Even then there is another stage--the Rest camp--to be gone through. We sat up late this night outside the lines, talking of this strange coincidence of our meeting, and trying to plan future ones. He feels the same about this place, but is still too lame to rejoin his corps.

_September 18._--We washed in a stream some distance off, and then had breakfast. Then general parade. There must be some two or three hundred of us, and a wretched, slipshod lot we looked. A voice said, "Those who want to rejoin their regiments, two paces to the front." A few accepted the invitation. I gave in my name, and was told to parade again at two, with kit packed. The next moment we were being split up into fatigue parties. Fatigues are always a nuisance, but I don't mind them under my own folk, with a definite necessary job to be done. A fatigue under strange masters and with strange mates is very irksome, especially when, as in this case, there is little really to be done, but they don't want to leave you idle. This was a typical case. I and a dozen others slouched off under a corporal, who showed us to a sergeant, who gave us to a sergeant-major, who pointed to a line of tents (Langman's Hospital), and bade us clean up the lines. To the ordinary eye there was nothing to clean up, but to the trained eye there were some minute fragments of paper and cigarette ends. Now the great thing in a fatigue of this kind is: (1) To make it last. No good hurrying, as fresh futilities will be devised for you. (2) To appear to be doing something at all costs. (3) To escape un.o.btrusively at the first opportunity. There are some past-masters in the theory and practice of fatigues who will disregard No. 1, and carry on No. 2 till the golden moment when, with inspired audacity, they achieve No. 3, and vanish from the scene. This requires genius. The less confident ploddingly fulfil Nos. 1 and 2, and don't attempt No. 3. Well, we loitered up and down, and collected a few handfuls, and when we had eked out the job to the uttermost, stood together in a listless knot and waited. "What shall we do?" we asked the corporal. "Do any ---- thing," he despairingly cried, "but do some ---- thing!" By this time the sergeant-major too was at his wits' end as he looked round his spotless lines. But you can't easily baffle a sergeant-major. There was a pump, with a big tub by it, to catch the waste, I suppose. The artistic possibilities of these simple objects flashed across him. In his mind's eye he saw this prosaic tub sublimed into a romantic pool, and girdled by a rockery, in whose mossy crannies errant trickles of water might lose themselves, and perhaps fertilize exotic flora yet unborn. At this moment I espied a wheelbarrow in the distance, and went for it with that purposeful briskness, which may sometimes be used in fatigues of this sort to disguise your real intentions. For it is of the greatest importance in a fatigue to have an implement; it is the outward symbol of labour; if observation falls on you, you can wipe your brow and lean on it; you can even use it for a few minutes if necessary. Without some stage property of this sort only a consummate actor can seem to be busy. Well, I got to the barrow just in time. There were two; a Grenadier Guardsman got the other, and amid envious looks we wheeled them off towards a heap of rubble in the offing, "conveniently low." Then, with a simultaneous sigh of relief, we mechanically produced our pipes and tobacco, found comfortable seats against the pile of rubble, and had a good chat, lazily watching the genesis of the naiad's grotto in the distance. When we had had a good smoke, and fought our battles over again, we got up and saw signs that the fatigue was guttering out; so we put a few stones in each of the barrows, and, well content, journeyed back to the scene of operations, and laid our stones round the base of the tub, more because we knew nowhere else to lay them than for any other reason, for the sergeant-major had apparently forgotten his grandiose designs in other schemes, and had disappeared. The fatigue party was thinning.

The corporal said what may be freely translated as "disappear quietly," and we made off to our camp, where I found Henry, who had doctor's leave to be excused fatigues, being lame.

CHAPTER XII.

A DETAIL.

_September 18, continued._--At two we paraded again with our kits, and about a dozen of us marched off to the Rest camp, which is the next stage. Everything was very hurried, but Henry had just time to tell me that he was ordered to Bloemfontein, when I had to start. We said good-bye, and I don't suppose will meet again till London. The Rest camp was about four miles off, on the other side of Pretoria. Arrived very hot and dusty. Waited some time, and then was told that I must go to the Artillery Barracks, another two miles in quite a different direction. I might just as well have gone there direct. However, I was lucky enough to get a lift for my kit and myself most of the way, and landed about 5.30 at a collection of big, red-brick buildings outside the town, was handed from person to person for some time, and finally found a resting-place on the floor of a huge bare room in a sort of a tin outbuilding, where some 150 R.A. men of all batteries were sitting or lying on their kit round the walls and down the centre; like lost souls, I pictured them, sitting round one of Dante's purgatorial retreats. I felt exactly like going to school again for the first time, though, of course, I soon found them all very friendly. I learned that there was no food to be got till to-morrow, but I foraged about till I found a sort of canteen-tent, where they sold buns, and, having some tea of my own, got water boiled over a friendly fire, and now feel happier; but I fervently hope I shall get back to the Battery soon. When I heard last from Williams, they had returned to Waterval after some hard forced marching.

_September 19._--Loafed away last evening somehow. A wan electric light half lit the room after dark; the souls "twittered" like Homer's in dejected knots. "Fatigues all day, and a pa.s.s into town once a week," seem to be the prospect. Reveille to-day at six. At parade, after breakfast, I was told off to act as an office orderly to Captain Davies, the Inspector of Ordnance, an all-day job, but otherwise with possibilities in it, I judged. Found the office, swept it out, and dusted and tidied things. Parlour-maid's work is nearly new to me (I have only cleaned windows before, in barracks at St. John's Wood), and I found myself trying to remember what I used to see Mary doing in the flat. I fancy my predecessor must have been a "slattern," for everything was thick with dust. I wish the Captain would leave his matches behind; there is not a match to be got in Pretoria now for the ordinary mortal. I'm afraid there are no perquisites in this situation. Also I wish he would get a waste-paper basket. I have made a humane resolve never to be without one myself, at home. Captain rode up about 9.30; I tied up his pony, and then sat on a stone step outside, feeling rather like a corner-boy trying to pick up a job.

Found a friendly collar-maker in a room near. He also is a "detail,"

or "excess number," but a philosopher withal. He told me that from his observation I had a "soft job."--Nothing happened, so I have adjourned to some tarpaulins in the back yard. A shout of "Ord'ly" from the office interrupted me, and I was sent with a blue letter to the Chief Ordnance Officer in a camp about a mile away. Again to the same place in the afternoon, and one or two other little errands, but between whiles I had plenty of time to write. The Captain rode off about five, and I somehow got attached to the collar-maker, who was extremely friendly, and we spent the evening together. Looked in at a S.C.A.

tent, and found a service going on. The Chaplain of the Bushmen was speaking.

_September 20._--I got a pa.s.s and walked to Pretoria in the evening; saw the place by daylight, and was rather disillusioned. The good buildings and the best shops are in a very small compa.s.s, and are nothing much at the best, though the Palace of Justice and the Government buildings are tolerably dignified. All this part seems quite new. There is very little to be bought. Indeed, the wonder is that there is anything, for no trade supplies have come in since the war began. By way of testing prices, I took a cup of tea and some cake in a pleasant little shop; half a crown; worth it though, for the tea had fresh milk in it. Groceries seem un.o.btainable, but I made a valuable haul at a chemist's, in the shape of tea-tablets, which I think are the most useful things one can have out here. Matches can't be bought at all, but if you buy other things, and then are very polite, they will throw in a box for love; at least, a tobacconist did so for me. They used to be a shilling a box, but the authorities limited the price to a penny, a futile proceeding.

The charm of Pretoria lies in its outlying roads, with its cool little villas peeping out of green. The place is very quiet, and every one is in khaki.

_September 12._--Can't get sent to the Battery yet. Our tin room grows fuller. At night it is much too crowded, and is horribly stuffy; for the nights are very hot. But I am quite at home now, and enjoy the society, mixed though it is. I have literary arguments with a field-battery bombardier. We both rather pity one another, for he can't appreciate Thackeray and I can't understand Marie Corelli, whose works, with their deep spiritual meaning, he speaks of reverently. He hopes to educate me up to "Ardath," and I have offered him the reversion of "Esmond," which I bought yesterday.

Went down to town in the evening and visited the Irish Hospital, which has commandeered the Palace of Justice, and turned it to better uses than Kruger's venial judges ever put it to. The patients dwell "in marble halls," s.p.a.cious, lofty rooms. Had a pleasant chat with Dr.

Stokes. (The I.H. were shipmates of ours on the _Montfort_.) Also, to my great delight, found two men of our Battery there; it was a great treat to see familiar faces again. They said the Battery or part of it was at Waterval. I don't see why I shouldn't rejoin at once if they will only let me. I joined them in an excellent tea. They spoke most highly of the hospital. I had no pa.s.s to get back with, and didn't know the countersign, but I bluffed through all right.

_September 22._--No prospect of getting away, though I apply daily to rejoin. Sent down to Pretoria with a letter in the middle of the day, so took the opportunity of visiting the Soldiers' Home, where you can get mild drinks, read the papers, and write. Visited the Battery chaps again in the evening. I have grown quite reckless about the lack of a pa.s.s; "Orderly to Captain Davies," said in a very off-hand tone I found an excellent form of reply to sentries. I have an "Esmond," and am enjoying it for about the fiftieth time. It serves to pa.s.s away the late evenings. A great amus.e.m.e.nt in the barrack-room after dark is gambling. The amounts won and lost rather astonish me. Happily it is done in silence, with grim intensity. But I have only an inch of candle, and can't buy any more. Next me on the floor is a gunner of the 14th Battery, which lost its guns at Colenso. He has just given me a graphic account of that disastrous day, and how they fought the guns till ammunition failed and then sat (what was left of them) in a donga close behind, with no teams with which to get more ammunition or retire the guns. I have also had the story of Sanna's Post from a U Battery man who was captured there. He described how they were marching through a drift one morning, with no thought of Boers in their heads, when they suddenly attacked at close range, and were helpless. I may mention a thing that strikes me about all such stories (and one hears a good many out here) from soldiers who have been "given away" by bad leadership. There is criticism, jesting and satirical generally, but very little bitterness. Bravery is always admired, but it is so universal as to be taken for granted. The popularity of officers depends far more on the interest they show in the daily welfare of the men, in personal good-fellowship, in consideration for them in times of privation and exhaustion, when a physical strain which tells heavily on the man may tell lightly on the officers. It is a big subject and a delicate one, but rightly or wrongly, I have got the impression that more might be done in the army to lower the rigid caste-barrier which separates the ranks. No doubt it is inevitable and harmless at home, but in the b.l.o.o.d.y, toilsome business of war it is apt to have bad results. Of course is only part of the larger question of our general military system, deep-rooted as that is in our whole national life, and now placed, with all its defects and advantages, in vivid contrast with an almost exactly opposite system.

_September 23._--_Sunday._--Ammunition fatigue for most of us, while I attended as office-boy as usual, and was walking about with letters most of the day. There are farriers and wheelers also at work in this yard, so that one can always light one's pipe or make a cup of tea at the forge fire. Just outside are ranged a row of antiquated Boer guns of obsolete types; I expect they are the lot they used to show to our diplomatic representative when he asked vexatious questions about the "increasing armaments." I believe the Boers also left quant.i.ties of good stores here when Pretoria was abandoned. These are fine new barracks scarcely finished. They enclose a big quadrangle. Three or four batteries, horse and field, are quartered in them now. Tried to get to Pretoria after hours, but was stopped by a conscientious sentry, who wanted my pa.s.s. I wished to get to the station, with a vague idea of finding when there would be a train to Waterval, and then running away.

_September 24._--Worried the Sergeant-Major again, and was told that I might get away to-morrow. Meanwhile, I am getting deeper in the toils.

I was sitting on my tarpaulins writing, and feeling rather grateful for the "softness" of my job, when a shout of "Ord'ly!" sent me into the office. The Captain, who is a good-natured, pleasant chap, asked me if I could do clerk's work. I said I was a clerk at home, and thought I could. He said he thought I must find it irksome and lonely to be sitting outside, and I might just as well pa.s.s the time between errands in writing up ledgers inside. I was soon being initiated into Ordnance accounts, which are things of the most diabolical complexity.

Ordnance comprises practically everything; from a gun-carriage to a nail; from a tent, a waggon, a binocular, a blanket, a saddle, to an ounce of grease and all the thousand const.i.tuents which go to make up everything. These are tabulated in a book which is a nightmare of subsections, and makes you dizzy to peruse. But no human brain can tabulate Ordnance exhaustively, so half the book is blank columns, in which you for ever multiply new subsections, new atoms of Ordnance which n.o.body has thought of before. The task has a certain morbid fascination about it, which I believe would become a disease if you pursued it long enough, and leave you an a.n.a.lyticomaniac, or some such horror. Myriad bits of ordnance are continually pouring in and pouring out, and the object is to track them, and balance them, and pursue every elusive atom from start to finish. It may be expendible, like paint, or non-expendible, like an anvil. You feel despairingly that a pound of paint, born at Kimberley, and now at Mafeking, is disappearing somewhere and somehow; but you have to endow it with a fict.i.tious immortality. An anvil you feel safer about, but then you have to use it somewhere, and account for its surplus, if there is any. Any one with a turn for metaphysics would be at home in Ordnance; Aristotle would have revelled in it.

It has just struck me that 1s. 5d. a day for a charwoman, a messenger and an accountant, to say nothing of a metaphysician, all rolled into one, is low pay. In London you would have to give such a being at least a pound a week.

_September 25._--Ledgers, vouchers, errands, most of the day. Melting hot, with a hot wind. Good news from the Sergeant-major that he is putting in an application for a railway pa.s.s for me to Waterval, without waiting for the other formalities.

_September 26._--_Wednesday._--Hopes dashed to the ground. Commandant won't sign the application till some other officer does something or other, which there seems little chance of his doing.

CHAPTER XIII.

SOUTH AGAIN.

Ordered home--Back to the Battery--Good-bye to the horses--The charm of the veldt--Recent work of the Battery--Paget's farewell speech-- Hard-won curios--The last bivouac--Roberts's farewell--The southward train--De Wet?--Mirages--A glimpse of Piquetberg road--The _Aurania_-- Embarkation scenes--The last of Africa--A pleasant night.

September 27 was a red-letter day. News came that all the C.I.V. were going home on the following Monday. I was overwhelmed with congratulations in the barrack-room. I exercised the Captain's Argentine in the afternoon, and visited the station, where I learnt that the Battery had been wired for, and had arrived, but was camped somewhere outside.

On the next day I got another charwoman-clerk appointed, said good-bye to my R.A. friends and the Captain, who congratulated me too, and was free to find the Battery and rejoin. After some difficulty, I found them camped about four miles out, close to the C.I.V. Infantry. It was delightful to walk into the lines, and to see the old familiar scenes, and horses, and faces. Every one looked more weather-beaten and sunburnt, and the horses very s.h.a.ggy and hard-worked, but strong and fit. My mare had lost flesh, but was still in fine condition. The Argentine was lashing out at the others in the same old way. Tiny, the terrier, looked very weary and travel-stained after much forced marching, which she had loyally undergone to the last. Jacko had not turned a hair.

Williams turned up with "p.u.s.s.y" in a lather, having been hunting for me all round Pretoria. We ate bully-beef and biscuit together in the old style. I took my pair down to water for the last time, "for auld lang syne," and noticed that the mare's spine was not the comfortable seat it used to be.

Then the last "boot and saddle" went, and they were driven away with the guns and waggons to the station, and thence to the remount depot, to be drafted later into new batteries. Ninety-four horses were handed over, out of a hundred and fourteen originally brought from England, a most creditable record.

The camp looked very strange without the horses, and it was odder still to have no watering or grooming to do. In the evening, the change from barrack-room to veldt was most delightful. We made a fire and cooked tea in the old way, and talked and smoked under the soft night sky and crescent moon. Then what a comfortable bed afterwards!

Pure air to breathe, and plenty of room. I felt I had hardly realized before how pleasant the veldt life had been.

The Battery had done a great deal of hard work since I left; forced marches by night and day between Warmbad, Pynaar's River, Waterval, Hebron, Crocodile River, and Eland's River; generally with Paget, once under Colonel Plumer, and once under Hickman. They had shared in capturing several Boer laagers, and quant.i.ties of cattle. When they left the brigade, a commando under Erasmus was negotiating for a surrender, which was made a day or two later, as we afterwards heard.

Altogether, they had done very good work, though not a round was fired. I only wish I could have been with them.

One thing I deeply regret missing, and that was Paget's farewell speech to us, when all agree that he spoke with real and deep feeling.

One of our gunners took it down in shorthand, and here it is:--

"Major McMicking, Officers, non-commissioned officers, and men of the C.I.V. Battery,--

"Lord Roberts has decided to send you home, and I have come to say good-bye and to express my regret at having to part with you. We have been together now for some months, and have had rough times, but in its many engagements the C.I.V. Battery has always done its work well.

Before my promotion I commanded a battalion, and I know what a heart-breaking it is to lead gallant fellows up to a strong position unsupported by artillery; and I made up my mind that, if ever I had a separate command, I would never advance infantry without an artillery support. I was fortunate enough to have your Battery with me, and it is very gratifying to know that everything we attempted has been successful. Owing to the excellent practice made by your guns, you have the satisfaction of knowing that you have been the cause of great saving of lives to the Infantry, and at times the Cavalry. I am sorry to lose you, and I shall miss you very much. There is more hard work to be done; and you cannot realize what it is to me to lose a body of men whom I knew I could always rely upon. There are many episodes, some of which will remain a lasting memory to me. One in particular I might refer to, when, two days after leaving Lindley, two companies of Munster Fusiliers came unexpectedly under heavy rifle-fire at short range; your guns coming smartly into action, dispersed the enemy with a few well-directed shrapnel. It was one of the smartest pieces of work I have ever seen. On another occasion, outside Bethlehem (I forget the name of the place),[A] when in a rear-guard action with De Wet, you advanced under a heavy cross-fire of shrapnel, when you rendered splendid service, and saved Roberts' Horse by silencing two guns and smashing a third. On that day not a single life was lost on our side. On still another occasion, outside Bethlehem, under heavy sh.e.l.l-fire from five guns in a strong position, the steadiness with which your guns were served would have done credit to the finest troops in the Empire. There are other incidents that I might mention, but these three occur to me specially at the moment. You are returning home, to receive a hearty welcome, which you undoubtedly deserve, and I hope you will sometimes think of me, as I certainly shall of you; and now you can tell your friends what I think of you. I wish you a safe and pleasant voyage. Good-bye."

[Footnote A: Bultfontein.]

We shall also tell them what we thought of him. There was not a man of us but liked, admired, and trusted him--as I know did his whole brigade. And that he trusted us, is an honour we shall not forget.

It was good to be going home again; but I think every one felt half sorry that we were not to share in finishing the work before his brigade. The whole C.I.V. regiment was being sent home together; but the Infantry, of course, had done the bulk of their work when we began ours. It was curious that this was the first occasion on which the three arms of the C.I.V., Infantry, Mounted Infantry, and Artillery, had been united under one command.

We spent the next two days in preparations for departure, in sorting of harness, sifting and packing of kit, and great burnings of discarded rubbish.

On the first of October, Williams and I walked into Pretoria to do some business, and try and pick up some curios. We had an exhausting conflict with a crusty old Jew, with whom we bargained for scjamboks and k.n.o.bkerries. It was with great difficulty we got him to treat with us at all, or even show us his wares. He had been humbugged so often by khakis that he would not believe we were serious customers, and treated our advances with violence and disdain. We had to be conciliatory, as we wanted his wares, though we felt inclined to loot his shop, and leave him for dead. After some most extraordinary bargaining and after tempting him with solid, visible gold, we each secured a scjambok and a k.n.o.bkerry at exorbitant prices, and left him even then grumbling and growling.