However honourable to generosity, it is certainly carrying self-abnegation to an indefensible extreme to leave the decision of attack or withdrawal, of movement by direct attack or by flanking--"by the left"--to a junior, when one's self is on the spot, in actual conversation. The action of Colonel Thorneycroft in withdrawing raises also the mooted question of when and how the assumption of responsibility in disobeying orders--express or implied, general or particular--is to be justified; a matter on which much unenlightened nonsense has lately been spoken and written in the United States. No general rule, {p.264} indeed, can be laid down, but this much may surely be re-affirmed--that the justification of so serious a step must ever rest, not on the officer's _opinion_ that he was doing right, but upon the fact, demonstrated to military judgment by the existing conditions, that he _was_ right. Colonel Thorneycroft's intentions were doubtless of the best; the writer cannot but believe that Lord Roberts's sentence will be endorsed by the professions, for the reasons he himself gives. After the withdrawal across Trichardt's Drift, a week was allowed for repose after the seven days' fighting just undergone. The attempt to reach Ladysmith was then renewed, taking the road by Potgieter's Drift to Brakfontein. It was decided first to get possession of Vaal Krantz, a height three or four miles east of Spion Kop, to the right of the road. The movement began on February 5th, under the immediate direction of Sir Redvers Buller. The same day Vaal Krantz was carried and occupied; but Buller was disappointed in the advantage he hoped from it. He reported that "it was necessary after seizing {p.265} Vaal Krantz to entrench it as the pivot of further operations, but I found after trying for two days that, owing to the nature of the ground, this was not practicable; it was also exposed to fire from heavy guns which fired from positions by which our artillery was dominated." As the projected advance depended upon the tenure of Vaal Krantz, and this could not be assured under the circumstances, the attempt had to be abandoned. On the evening of February 7 the British army again retired south of the Tugela, and thence returned to the camps at Chieveley, facing Colenso. In the operations about Spion Kop from January 17-24, the British losses were: killed, officers 27, men 245; wounded, officers 53, men 1,050; missing and prisoners, officers 7, men 351. Total, 87 officers, 1646 men. At Vaal Krantz, February 5-7, the losses were: killed, officers 2, men 23; wounded, officers 18, men 326; missing, men 5. Total, 20 officers, 354 men. CHAPTER VIII {p.266} THE RELIEF OF KIMBERLEY AND OF LADYSMITH, AND THE SURRENDER OF CRONJE