General Elliot and his troops spent the early part of the new year in chases around Reitz after De Wet, but that skilful personage smartly evaded them. In spite of all efforts it was impossible to wedge him against either the Drakensberg or the Harrismith-Bethlehem blockhouses. Colonel de Lisle, at Kaffir Kop, to the west of Lindley and Bethlehem, kept an eye on Prinsloo, who threatened the safety of the blockhouses in course of construction. Colonel Byng's force was constantly engaged with parties of the enemy between Lindley and Reitz, while Colonel Rimington operated in the country south of Frankfort. (At Groothoop, on the 31st of January, he performed useful work by capturing a convoy and twenty-two prisoners, with their "effects.") Colonel Dawkins, with his own column and two regiments of Imperial Light Horse, joined Colonel Rawlinson (who had moved from Standerton after De Wet), and marched south on the left of Colonel Rimington's line of advance. On the 29th Colonel Rawlinson, with a portion of his force, doubled back from near Kaffirstad to Achalia (near the junction of Cornelis and Wilge Rivers), and at dawn on the 30th pounced on one of Mamie Botha's laagers. This night march and raid was a feat of remarkable endurance and dash, for the fighting force in the previous thirty-four hours had marched sixty-seven miles, the 2nd Battalion Mounted Infantry doing eighty-two miles in the same interval of time! The captures amounted to 11 prisoners, 120 horses, 2900 cattle, 20 waggons, and 25 carts. A BIG TRAP FOR DE WET