On the 19th of April the Creusot gun was withdrawn, and the inhabitants took heart. To vary their menu they now engaged in a locust haul, the result of which was to supply a third variant to the bill of fare. Lady Sarah Wilson, telegraphing to her friends, described her diet of horse sausages, minced mule, and curried locusts! The latter insects were reported to be tender as chicken and as tasty as prawn "almondised." The natives had a good meal, and visibly grew fat. On the following day a telegram was received from Lord Roberts requesting the garrison to hold out till the 18th of May. It was disappointing, none could deny, but they consoled themselves that a message showing they were marked down in the programme of "coming events" was better than nothing at all. Fortunately the food still held out. Water--pure water--was rare as Edelweiss, and liquor of other kind was unobtainable. Only money was what our friends on the Stock Exchange call "tight." The bank was closed to the general public, and her Majesty's presentment upon a coin was a prize to be cherished and clung to till--well, till the crack of doom should make the ever-promised and never-realised relief unnecessary. But the great food problem well-nigh exhausted all the energies of those concerned with it. Captain Ryan, D.A.A.G., sat daily in the interior of his bomb-proof office receiving a procession of persons who filed in to make their impossible demands, and deliberating on the curious fact that the stomach rules the world. The honour of the British Empire at that moment hung by a mere thread--it was a question of how slender a thread of nourishment could keep body and soul tacked together to represent the figure of an Englishman! Nevertheless Mafeking, like Kimberley, was bound to have its marriage bells. A Dutch bride, ignorant of English, was led to the altar by a private of the Bechuanaland Rifles, ignorant of Dutch. Philosophers predicted considerable felicity, as between them the couple had sufficient language for love-making and scarce sufficient for controversy. At this time Captain Ryan made a statement regarding the supplies of the town, which serves to show the pitch to which caution was carried:-- "The total number of white men is approximately 1150, of white women 400, and of white children 300. The coloured population consists of some 2000 men, 2000 women, and 3000 children.