To compare the relative bravery of the American soldier and Tommy Atkins is very difficult; there is a difference, but it is undoubtedly due to the training and not to the actual courage of the men. There could be no better or braver soldier desired than the British when he knows what to do and when he is properly led; but the trouble is that he has not been taught to think for himself, and the majority of his officers do not take the trouble to think for him. The consequence has been that the Boers took more prisoners than they could feed. There are instances, shamefully numerous, where a greatly superior force has surrendered to the Boers after very slight resistance. Howard C. Hillegas gives a number of cases, in his book on the Boer war, where from three to sixty men have been captured by one or two Boers, without firing a shot in defense. It is true that they were surprised in a mountainous or rocky place, where they could not tell how many of the enemy were opposed to them, but even this would not excuse a bloodless surrender. I know of one case where over seven hundred regular soldiers surrendered to a few more than a hundred burghers, after a loss of eight killed and twenty-three wounded, and with their belts half full of ammunition. They were not in the open, but were well covered, and in as good a position as were the Boers. General Methuen’s despatch to the War Office after one of his first engagements, in which he described it as “the bloodiest battle of the century,” after he had sustained a ridiculously small loss, shows that to the British mind losses are more disturbing than to the American.