When near the bush veldt, we often used acorns for the same purpose, and the coffee was very good. At times, during peach season, we dried some peaches, charred them and had a really delicious drink. Sweet potatoes prepared in the same way make a nice beverage, too. So you see that, after all, we lived very well. Live on mush and fresh meat, as we did, and you will never be sick. We lived in this way for two long years, fighting all the time or trying to evade the English, and we lost but one man from sickness; this, too, in the face of the fact that we had nothing to protect us against the cold of winter, or the severe rain storms of summer. Of course many English convoys were taken, and many railway trains, too, but the Boers have good sense, and will not eat any canned stuff. They would destroy all such, and only take what they could comfortably carry on their horses. To every man's saddle you would see tied either a small tin bucket, or a coffee mill, and these constituted our complete cooking outfit. On this high veldt there is practically no wood. So for fuel we would go about the veldt and collect dry cow dung, just as they did in Texas, New Mexico and Arizona in the early days. Now, reader, you are sure to tell me that the English captured all our cattle, because you read it in the paper. Well, I confess they did; and let me tell you about it. When the war began, the number of cattle in the Transvaal and Free State together, was nearly 300,000. The English captured all these cattle, time and time again, and if you will take the trouble to look up their official reports, you will find that during the war they captured some 2,000,000 head from us, although we had less than 300,000 to begin with. Here is the explanation: the English would capture our cattle to-day, and make their report. Tomorrow, we would take the cattle back, but the English would make no report of it. They always reported the capture, but not the re-capture, and that is how they captured some 2,000,000 head of cattle. The cattle were captured and re-captured so often that they grew to know the khaki's uniform as well as the Boer's rags; so when they saw a man or two coming, if he or they wore khaki uniforms, they would at once start toward the railway line. If the men were recognized by their rags as Boers, they would all start for the high veldt, where the Boers always took them. The poor, patient and willing cattle had hard lives, and many and many miles they travelled during the war. At the end of it, the Boers still had nearly one-fifth the original number, and all were fat and in good eating condition.