At Zoutpans are the salt-mines, now at a standstill, as the company owning them have gone into liquidation, and the only house is that in which the manager, an Englishman, lives. A pool highly impregnated with salt was the only water near at hand, and on this men and horses had to do. The salt itself from these mines is only fit for cattle, as soda predominates in it. We had marched more or less in a circle. Next day we heard that De Wet had doubled back with 200 picked men to the Free State, leaving the rest of his force to join Grobler, who was then operating north of Pretoria. We were told that General Paget was coming up with a small force along the line of rail, and Baden-Powell, who had left Commando Nek, would advance parallel with and ten miles west of Paget, and that Ian Hamilton’s Division, then about twelve miles further west, was to co-operate with these two columns and keep Grobler from breaking back if possible. We were now in what is called the bushveldt—_i.e._, country covered with low scrubby bushes. These bushes form excellent screens for the enemy, and scouting, therefore, is ticklish work. ‘You dunno where you are,’ as they say. Water was a scarce article, too—in fact, it was about the driest country we had been in so far. Passing a place called Stinkwater, we reached Swartzkop late in the evening, and camped there for the night near a large settlement of the Barotse tribe. The Germans have a mission in these parts; their church is only a large mud hut, but the missionary in charge has a following of no fewer than 2,000. We were told that night that General Ian Hamilton was going with his Staff to Haaman’s Kraal, a railway station about fifteen miles east, coming back the same evening, and that Lumsden’s Horse were to act as his escort. This promised a nice break in the monotony of the everlasting march, march, march we had been having lately, so those of us who had fit horses were much elated, the unfortunate ones, who had not, being correspondingly downcast. As arranged, we started for Haaman’s Kraal at daybreak next day, and our advance scouts had got quite six miles out when we were ordered to turn back and return to camp. Trooper Philip Stanley writes of an incident that occurred at a farm near the German mission, and which may help to explain how some of the wonderful yarns we so often heard about De Wet’s capture commenced. [Illustration: _Photo: Bourne & Shepherd_ PHILIP STANLEY ]