Warren was now on the shelf, and took a house at Ramsgate, where he resided until his services were again required by his country, and he was appointed to the command of the 5th Division and embarked with it for South Africa on 25th November 1899. CHAPTER I THE BEGINNING OF THE WAR The last year of the nineteenth century opened at a period of intense gloom for the British nation. The war in South Africa had found us, as most wars do, quite unprepared. The little force in Natal, under Sir George White, had been speedily surrounded by the mobile Boers, its line of communication had been cut, and it was itself shut up in an unfavourable position for defence at Ladysmith, and blockaded by a Boer force. Large reinforcements were pouring into South Africa from England, and Sir Redvers Buller, who had arrived at Cape Town on 31st October to take supreme command, had gone to Natal. Here he made his first strategical mistake; and just as Sir George White, induced by political pressure, occupied positions in the extreme North of Natal, which he was not strong enough to hold, and had the consequences of this departure from sound strategy burnt into him by the siege of Ladysmith, so Sir Redvers Buller, moved by clamours for the relief of Ladysmith and Kimberley, divided his force, sending part under Lord Methuen to relieve Kimberley, and himself taking the remainder to relieve Ladysmith, and learned a similar lesson. Such inattention to the very elements of strategy might have speedily led to overwhelming disaster and to the triumph of the Boer States, and would undoubtedly have done so, had the Boers possessed a general worthy of the name. With what surprise and satisfaction would such a commander have observed the disposition of the British force in the North of Natal, with what rapidity would he have masked Sir George White’s division, and, crossing the Tugela, seized the railway at its mouth, and, by the capture of Durban, have held Natal in the hollow of his hand! But, although the generalship of the Boers was hopelessly timid, and they lost the opportunity of carrying all before them at the outset, and driving the British into the sea, the neglect of sound strategy on our side made itself seriously felt, and it was not until Lord Roberts, at a later date, having collected and organised a large force, moved steadily on his objective--the capital of the Orange Free State--that either Kimberley or Ladysmith was relieved.