This advantage would have been lost once more by any considerable actions. I decided gradually to evacuate the region, in spite of its extraordinary fertility, and slip through the ring in which the enemy columns were enclosing me in the fertile district of the Malema river. My idea was that a small part of my troops should hold off these enemy columns and keep them so busy that they would think they were involved in a serious affair, and attack my rearguard properly. In coming to this decision, good service was done me by the orders of the English commander which had fallen into our hands. He had no intention of being “foxed” by us a second time, as he had been at Koriwa, and had therefore arranged that whenever contact was established with us at any point, several detachments should immediately execute a flank march round us at a distance of five or six English miles. I told General Edwards about this later on, and he was extraordinarily amused that this had given me an intimation of his intentions, and enabled me to take my counter-measures against them. It was obvious that if I only echeloned my troops deeply enough the enemy’s enveloping detachments would be placed in the greatest peril. They would find themselves sandwiched between my detachments and in this way could be taken by surprise in the flank or rear by my troops echeloned further back. Unfortunately the execution of this plan was only imperfect. In the very thick bush, however carefully one watched camp fires and the dust, there were too few indications to follow a column properly and it was very difficult for a column to keep its direction. In addition there were a number of factors that threw out one’s calculations, factors such as dense bush, marshes and water-courses. In spite of all these obstacles, we succeeded every now and then in taking one of the hostile enveloping columns by surprise and bringing it under fire. The inevitable difficulties of moving separate columns in the thick bush were even greater on the English side than on the German. When a collision occurred there was often a complete mix-up in which neither friend nor foe knew whom he had before him. On one occasion Lieutenant von Ruckteschell’s detachment, which had been nearest to the enemy, fell back on some of our troops which had been echeloned further back. In so doing it came across a reconnoitring party in the bush, at a distance of about thirty paces. This patrol was recognized as an enemy. The machine guns were brought into position under the nose of the enemy and without any interference on his part, and the patrol, which had taken our men for English, was fired on lustily at point-blank range and put to flight in a second.