The good news which had delighted and relieved everyone had reached him in the most dramatic and striking manner. When they left England Roberts had just begun his welcome advance, and the public anxiety was at its height. At Madeira there was an English cable to say that he was engaging Cronje, and that no news had arrived for three days. This was supplied, however, by the Spanish wire, which asserted with circumstantial details that the British had been heavily defeated and had fled south beyond the Orange River. With this to reflect on they had to sail. Imagine the doubts and fears that flourished in ten days of ignorance, idleness, and speculation. Imagine with what feelings they approached St. Helena. He told me that when the tug-boat came off no man dared hail them for news. Nor was it until the launch was alongside that a soldier cried out nervously, ’The war, the war: what’s happened there!’ and when they heard the answer, ’Cronje surrendered; Ladysmith relieved,’ he said that such a shout went up as he had never heard before, and I believed him. After twenty-four hours of breeze and tossing the good ship found herself in the roads at East London, and having by this time had quite enough of the sea I resolved to disembark forthwith. CHAPTER II EXIT GENERAL GATACRE Bethany: April 13. If you go to sleep when the train leaves East London, you should wake, all being well, to find yourself at Queenstown. Queenstown lies just beyond the high water-mark of war. The tide had flowed strong after Stormburg, and it looked as if Queenstown would be engulfed, at any rate for a time. But Fortune and General Gatacre protected it. Sterkstroom entrenched itself, and prepared for daily attacks. Molteno was actually shelled. Queenstown suffered none of the horrors of war except martial law, which it bore patiently rather than cheerfully. Nothing in the town impresses the traveller, but at the dining-room of the railway station there is a very little boy, about twelve years old, who, unaided, manages to serve, with extraordinary dispatch and a grand air, a whole score of passengers during the brief interval allowed for refreshments. Five months earlier I had passed along this line, hoping to get into Ladysmith before the door was shut, and had been struck by this busy child, who seemed a product of America rather than of Africa. Much had happened in the meantime, not so far from where he lived. But here he was still--the war had not interfered with him, Queenstown was beyond the limit.