Fortunately the accommodation was adequate, an additional building being erected for Kaffirs. But these for the most part preferred being treated and returning to their own abode. They appear nearly insensible to pain. To give a few instances, one native was shot with a Martini bullet through the lung; he roared with laughter when it was extracted, and will not part with it for anything, and is now all right. A Zulu wounded in the toe, on seeing a man’s temperature being taken, when given the thermometer, placed it between his toes, and on being told to put it in his mouth, said he was not hurt in the mouth, but in the foot. Another native was shot through the head with a Mauser and lived; so, indeed, did a railway volunteer, Nelson; the bullet went clean through his head, and he is well and out of hospital. But the natives, though suffering from horrible injuries, seem to regard them lightly. Most of the native wounded are by shells; they are very careless, but I fancy the numerous casualties are making them more cautious. The unfortunate man killed yesterday was a man named Footman, of the Protectorate Regiment, who was in a room singing a song, "Poor old Joe has gone to rest," to the accompaniment of a banjo, when the shell burst on him, and literally blew him to pieces--two more men were slightly injured, and a chaff-cutter knocked to pieces; but the remainder were providentially untouched. The worst of sniping is that it consumes such a lot of the ammunition which we may eventually require, though it certainly has a quietening effect upon the enemy’s artillery; but I cannot believe the Boers will abandon this place without one more serious attack, when they hear of the advance of our troops, and the remnants of other commandoes join them. They must have one tangible proof of success. So far, beyond doubt, the prolonged defence of Mafeking has resulted in the natives either keeping quiet or rising on our side, whereas had the Boers been successful in these parts, the natives must have perforce sided with them, as their emissaries had strained every nerve to induce them to do, prior to the war. I sincerely trust that the penalties of treason will be rigidly enforced, and that if not death, at least outlawry and confiscation will be inflicted on the Colonial Dutch who have risen, for no man has a right to a vote who has deliberately risen in British territory and fought against Her Majesty. The Transvaal is another matter, though they have raided our territory, burnt farms, and looted cattle and annexed British Bechuanaland--that is a matter for settlement by the Government and not for individuals to suffer. If the Boers are well thrashed, and they have fought well, the two nationalities will soon settle down together. But a Dutchman, or at least the lower classes (which correspond, after all, to poor whites of America with this difference, that they have a lot of black blood in them), cannot understand anything but a good licking.