To return. When the storming party had reached the fort, they broke up into three. One hundred and fifty of them attacked the fort and seized it, together with the Colonel and twenty-three men of the Protectorate Regiment, who, mistaking them in the dusk of the early dawn for friends, had not fired. When they found out their mistake, it was too late. Regarding Colonel Hore's lamentable position and his surrender, the correspondent of the _Times_, who had the ill luck as a man and the good luck as a journalist to get taken prisoner, said: "Commandant Eloff demanded the unconditional surrender of the twenty-three men who were established at the fort, an order which, had Colonel Hore refused, implied that every man with him would be shot. The exigencies of the situation had thus suddenly thrown upon the shoulders of this very gallant officer an almost overwhelming responsibility. It was impossible to withdraw to the town. Such a movement would have meant retirement over 700 yards of open, level ground without a particle of cover, and with a force of 300 of the enemy immediately in the rear. For a moment Colonel Hore had considered, but realising that escape was impossible, that indeed the Boers were all round him, he ordered the surrender, accepting the responsibility of such an act in the hope of saving the lives of the men who were with him. But the situation imperatively demanded this action in consequence of events over which he had no control. It was, perhaps, a moment as pathetic and great as any in his career, which, honourable and distinguished as it has been, has brought to him some six medals. The surrender was effected at 5.25 A.M., and the news of such a catastrophe did not tend to relieve the gravity of the situation. With the Boers in the fort and in occupation of the stadt, it was necessary so to arrange our operations that any junction between the stadt and the fort would be impossible. At the same time we were compelled to prevent those Boers who were in the stadt from cutting their way through to the main body of the enemy. The situation was indeed complex, and throughout the remainder of the day the skirmishing in the stadt and the repulse of the feints of the enemy's main body, delivered in different directions against the outposts, were altogether apart from the siege which we were conducting within our own investment. From the town very heavy rifle fire was directed upon the fort, which the Boers in that quarter returned with spirit and determination. But the position in the stadt had become acute, since behind our outposts and our inner chain of forts, which are situated upon its exterior border, were a rollicking, roving band of 400 Boers, who for the time being were indulging in pillage and destruction wherever it was possible." [Illustration: LIEUT.-GENERAL SIR FREDERICK CARRINGTON, K.C.M.G. Photo by Elliot & Fry, London]