Towards noon a disaster occurred, which has depressed the whole town. Two of the _Powerful's_ bluejackets have lately been making what they called a good thing by emptying unexploded Boer shells of their charges, so that the owners might display them with safety and pride when the siege is over. For this service they generally received 10s. each. It is only two days since they were in my cottage--chiselling out the melinite from a complete "Long Tom" shell which alighted in my old Scot's garden. I watched them accomplish that task safely, and this morning they set to work upon a similar shell by order of the Wesleyan minister, who wished to keep it in his window as a symbol of Christianity. One of the men was holding it between his knees, while the other was quietly chipping away, when suddenly it exploded. Fragments of one of the men strewed the minister's house--the other lay wondering upon the ground, but without his legs. Whilst I write he is still nominally alive, and keeps asking for his mate. One of his legs has been picked up near the Town Hall--about 150 yards away. [Illustration: SPECIMENS OF BOER SHELLS] A lesser disaster this morning befel Captain Jennings Bramley, of the 19th Hussars. Whilst on picket he felt something slide over his legs, and looking up he saw it was a snake over 5ft. long. The creature at once raised its head also, and deliberately spat in his face, filling both eyes with poison. That is the invariable defence of the "Spitting Snake" (_Rinkholz_ in Dutch, and _Mbamba Twan_ or child catcher in Zulu). The pain is agonising. The eye turns red and appears to run with blood, but after a day or two the poison passes off and sight returns. The snake is not otherwise poisonous, but apparently can count on success in its shots at men, leopards, or dogs. _January 23, 1900._ Soon after dawn our own guns along the northern defences from Tunnel Hill to King's Post woke me with an extraordinary din. They could not have made more noise about another general attack, but there was no rifle fire. Getting up very unwillingly at 4.30 a.m., I climbed up Junction Hill and looked up the Broad valley, but not a single Boer was in sight. The firing went on till about six, and then abruptly ceased. I heard afterwards that Buller had asked us to keep as many Boers here as possible. I suppose we expended about 200 rounds of our precious ammunition. A cool and cloudy sky made the heliograph useless, but in the night the clouds had served to reflect the brilliance of Buller's searchlight. So far the Boers have passed us all round in strategy, but in searchlights they are nowhere, though Bulwan makes a grand attempt. All day from King's Post or Waggon Hill I watched the Great Plain of Taba Nyama as usual. Now and then we could see the shells bursting, but the Boer camps have not moved.