On the 8th of December a very brilliant operation took place at Lombard's Kop. General Hunter, with a hundred picked men of the Imperial Light Horse under Colonel Edwards (5th Dragoon Guards), and five hundred Natal Carabineers under Colonel Royston, started from Ladysmith camp about nine o'clock on the previous night. Four abreast they marched from the outpost and faded in the gloom. The march lay across a stony, rugged plain, through the scrub of mimosa bush and among dongas deep and shallow. Close on the heels of Major Henderson and several of the Corps of Guides the troops pressed on. About ten o'clock they reached the base of the hill under Lombard's Kop, and there took up a position. While still pitch dark--two o'clock in the morning--they began to advance on their perilous enterprise, climbing up steep and slippery slopes, and stumbling over boulders, and tripping on loosened stones. The stars blinked, the sky seemed slumbering in one vast dream of blue. Stealthily they moved with the footfalls of tigers stalking their prey. Not a word was spoken. Scarcely a breath drawn. Above, on the flat top of the hills, were the objects of British desire--the Boer guns. A 6-inch Creusot, throwing a 94-lb. shell, and a 4.7-inch howitzer, firing a 40-lb. shot. More anxious than sweetheart for the sight of his lady-love were these gallant fellows for the touch of these treasures. Up they went, each outracing the other, straining every nerve and muscle to gain the summit of the hill, to be first to handle the prize! At last, when about half the distance had been cleared, they were challenged by the picket. "Wie gaat daar?"--"Who goes there?" he sang out in alarm. It was a thrilling moment. To the challenge there could be but one reply. That reply they gave. Shots rang out in the darkness. There was now no more creeping. Tongues of flame darted from every side. The troops pushed forward in the grey mysterious gloom to the ping of bullets that whizzed in shoals swiftly past their ears. Major Henderson dropped. More bullets rained down. A Guide fell wounded by cycle bearing-balls shot from a rifle--so it was subsequently said. One gallant fellow after another threw up his arms dying or dead. But still the troops pressed on, Colonel Edwards in advance shouting them on to victory. "Fix bayonets," he called with a voice of thunder, knowing there were but four bayonets among the lot. "Give 'em cold steel," shouted some one else with delirious rapture, and the Carabineers and Light Horse, with scarce a bayonet to their name, cheered and charged! But the Boers delayed not to find out if there were steel or no steel. They fled in dismay, leaving behind them their cherished guns. So swift indeed was their flight, that hats, boots, letters, everything--were scattered to the winds.