General White forced to fight--The order of battle--Leviathan-- The Boers reinforced--A retrograde movement--How Marsden met his death--Naval guns in action--A night of disaster--Who showed the white flag?--A truce declared--A humiliating position 5 CHAPTER III LADYSMITH INVESTED The exodus of the townsfolk--Communications threatened--Slim Piet Joubert--Espionage in the town--Neglected precautions--A truce that paid--British positions described--Big guns face to face--Boers hold the railways--French's reconnaissance--The General's flitting--A gauntlet of fire--An interrupted telegram-- Death of Lieutenant Egerton--"My cricketing days are over"--Under the enemy's guns--"A shell in my room"--Colonials in action--The sacrifice of valuable lives 15 CHAPTER IV EARLY DAYS OF THE SIEGE Moral effects of shell fire--General White appeals to Joubert-- The neutral camp--Attitude of civilians--Meeting at the Town Hall--A veteran's protest--Faith in the Union Jack--An impressive scene--Removal of sick and wounded--Through the Boer lines--How the posts were manned--Enemy mounting big guns--More about the spies--Boer war ethics--In an English garden--Throwing up defences--A gentlemanly monster--The Troglodytes--Humorous and pathetic--"Long Tom" and "Lady Anne"--Links in the chain of fire-- A round game of ordnance 30 CHAPTER V THE FIRST BOER ASSAULT Joubert's boast--The preliminaries of attack--Shells in the town-- A simultaneous advance--Observation Hill threatened--A wary enemy--A prompt repulse--Attack on Tunnel Hill--The colour-sergeant's last words--Manchesters under fire--Prone behind boulders--A Royal salute--The Prince of Wales's birthday--Stretching the Geneva Convention--The redoubtable Miss Maggie--The Boer Foreign Legion-- Renegade Irishmen--A signal failure 58 CHAPTER VI A MONTH UNDER SHELL FIRE The first siege-baby--An Irish-American deserter--A soldierly grumble--Boer cunning and Staff-College strategy--An ammunition difficulty--The tireless cavalry--A white flag incident--What the Boer Commandant understood--The Natal summer--Mere sound and fury--Boer Sabbatarianism--Naval guns at work--"Puffing Billy" of Bulwaan--Intrepid Boer gunners--The barking of "Pom-Poms"--Another reconnaissance--"Like scattered bands of Red Indians"--A futile endeavour--A night alarm--Recommended for the V.C.--A man of straw in khaki--The Boer search-light--Shelling of the hospital--General White protests--The first woman hit-- General Hunter's bravado--"Long Tom" knocked out--A gymkhana under fire--Faith, Hope, and Charity--Flash signals from the south--A new Creusot gun 69 CHAPTER VII THE SORTIES OF DECEMBER