Pretoria, like most South African towns, dozes in the lap of the hills, dozes tranquilly in a haven of generous nature, as dozed her Dutchmen in the midst of growing civilisation. The place from the distance is fair to the eye, poplar-groved, verdant, and picturesque, with the glimmer of red roofs cutting against the green, and veils of gauzy clouds, now grey, now purple, now azure, interlacing the hills and linking them with the sky. Its quaint, old, low-storeyed houses--in some cases thatched like bungalows--and its more modern tenements roofed with zinc, and bounded by pleasant rose-gardens tangled with flowers, seemed to the new-comers strangely suburban in contrast with the imposing Government buildings and shops which were soon alive with all the fluster of nineteenth-century money-getting. For the great entry made, the capital was swift to resume its everyday aspect, and trade grew even brisker than before. Famine prices reigned: though in some hotels where comforts were many, baths and sanitary arrangements were primitive. The Boers were busy "making hay while the sun shone," consequently living became twice as expensive as in England; and, what was worse, with the enormous and somewhat voracious army to be fed, supplies threatened at no very remote date to become exhausted. At first all things seemed to denote that the war was practically over, that nothing remained but to accept the surrender of the defeated Boers, and to settle quickly the administration of the conquered Republics. By degrees, however, disappointment set in--disappointment not unmixed with alarm. The redoubtable Christian de Wet had theories of his own; he put on his shoulders the mantle of the deposed Cronje, and set to work to show his generalship by destroying the railway in the south, cutting the telegraph wires, and generally harassing the lines of communication. Indeed, there was every appearance that the late investing forces might in their turn become invested in the capital. Postal and telegraphic communications were cut, supplies and reinforcements were menaced, and gradually the sunny outlook of conquest grew nebulous.