In a brisk encounter by a detachment of General C. Knox's force, 120 strong, with an overwhelming herd of Boers near Lindley, the British had the misfortune to lose three officers--Lieutenant-Colonel D. T. Laing, Lieutenants S. W. King and Vonschade--and fifteen men, while two officers--Lieutenants Sampson and Perrin--and twenty men were wounded. The facts were these. On the morning of the 3rd, the Commander-in-Chief's Body-guard, under Colonel Laing, were ordered to get in touch with the town of Reitz. In so doing, they found themselves assailed by Boers to right and to left of them--Boers carefully concealed in kopjes some 600 yards distant. The colonel fell, and an effort was made to retire, but the Dutchmen placed a wedge of some 500 of their number between the bodyguard and Colonel White's column. An appalling scene ensued. The British at bay fought ferociously, determining never to surrender, while young Bateson of the gallant number charged through the mass of Boers to inform Colonel White of the desperate drama that was going forward; but in spite of this noble effort, by the time reinforcements and guns appeared on the scene, the bodyguard was surrounded. Some even then refused to cease firing, but finally the Boer general threatened to shoot every man who continued, and they were eventually made prisoners. On the 5th, General Babington drove back from Naauwpoort, a place north of Potchefstroom, the commandos of Delarey and Steenkamp, and captured a prisoner in the form of Commandant Duprez. The Dutchmen had secured an excellent and almost impregnable position in the Witwatersrand, but when the mounted infantry of Babington at Naauwpoort and Gordon at Zandfontein launched themselves at the offensive strongholds, the enemy fled to the north-west, pursued for fifteen miles by the Imperial Light Horse, who had lost heavily through their gallantry in the affair. In the neighbourhood of the Delagoa line the Boers still buzzed, and on the night of the 7th, in a dense fog, which served as a curtain to their machinations, they simultaneously crept up to all the British posts--at Belfast, Wonderfontein, Nooitgedacht, Widfontein, and Pan. The movement was most astutely managed, and not till about 4 A.M., after ferocious firing, were the swarming Dutchmen driven off and dispersed. Captain Fosbery was killed and twenty of the men, and three officers and fifty-nine men were wounded. The Boers left twenty-four of their number on the field. On the 9th, Lieutenant Spedding, with sixty dashing men of the Royal Irish Rifles, proceeded by night from Ventersburg road, surprised the enemy at the romantically named kopje, Alleen, and returned plus three prisoners, 300 horses, and a quantity of cattle. A few days later the Victorians, under Captain Umpleby, made a fine haul of sixty fat cattle near Rustenburg, but unfortunately, starvation only made the Boers more daring and more rabid in their animosity.