Another correspondent who was kept in camp by a slight ailment while his comrades were away on patrol or some more exciting expedition records how he got out kits and collected firewood, ‘a thing I never did before,’ and how when others of his section came back they lay by the dying embers to keep themselves warm and occasionally made the fire flicker up by throwing more wood on it, reckless of danger from snipers, who were always on the prowl. While the main body of Lumsden’s Horse were away on that dash for Waggon Bridge the Boers made a counter demonstration from Brandfort, supported by pom-poms, and got within a thousand yards of the Red House Farm, but did no damage beyond interfering with the domestic arrangements of a Regular regiment, whose officers, being too far from the point of attack to see what really happened, thought their position was being seriously threatened and wanted 28,000 rounds of ammunition brought up from Karree Siding for emergencies. The orderly corporal who sent that request on got jeered at as an alarmist, when nothing happened except a retirement of the Boers. The next day Lee Stewart, who had been left behind in hospital at Cape Town, rejoined, and got a cordial welcome from all his comrades when they marched back from their first little expedition. The section mess was enabled to regale him at dinner that night on ‘chicken cooked by N—— and beefsteaks,’ so that one hardly wonders to find in the next day’s record the melancholy note, ‘There little was to eat; sat round the cook-house—two tins on the open veldt—and talked.’ In his official report Colonel Lumsden sums up all this in a few brief sentences, having matters of more serious weight on his mind at the moment: Our departure for Spytfontein was delayed from 19th to 21st ult.—on which date we left Bloemfontein, halting at the Glen _en route_, arriving at Spytfontein midday on the 22nd ult. There I reported to Colonel Ross, who commands our corps, consisting of the following units, of which the approximate strength is given:[4] Lumsden’s Horse 240 Loch’s Horse (a squadron) 220 West Riding and Oxford L.I. Companies of 220 M.I. 8th Battalion M.I. 420 ____ Total 1,100