The working of these patrols became more and more perfect. Knowledge of the desert improved, and in addition to patrols for destruction and intelligence work, we developed a system of fighting patrols. The latter, consisting of twenty to thirty Askari, or even more, and sometimes equipped with one or two machine-guns, went out to look for the enemy and inflict losses upon him. In the thick bush the combatants came upon each other at such close quarters and so unexpectedly, that our Askari sometimes literally jumped over their prone adversaries and so got behind them again. The influence of these expeditions on the self-reliance and enterprise of both Europeans and natives was so great that it would be difficult to find a force imbued with a better spirit. Some disadvantages were, however, unavoidable. In particular, our small supply of ammunition did not enable us to attain such a degree of marksmanship as to enable us, when we did get the enemy in an unfavourable situation, completely to destroy him. In technical matters we were also busy. Skilled artificers and armourers were constantly engaged with the factory engineers in the manufacture of suitable apparatus for blowing up the railways. Some of these appliances fired according as they were set, either at once, or after a certain number of wheels had passed over them. With the latter arrangement we hoped to destroy the engines, even if the English tried to protect them by pushing one or two trucks filled with sand in front of them. There was abundance of dynamite to be had on the plantations, but the demolition charges captured at Tanga were much more effective. We occasionally got German newspapers, but we had had no private mails for a long time. On the 12th February, 1915, I was sitting at dinner in the Railway Station at New Moshi, when I got a letter from Germany. It was from my sister, who wrote to say she had already repeatedly informed me of the death of my brother, who had been killed on the Western Front at Libramont on the 22nd August, 1914.