There was considerable elation in town at the non-success of the Boer as an artillerist, and the belief was entertained that his stock of ammunition would soon be blown to the winds. Nearly a hundred shells had been thrown at us, without angering or damaging anyone or anything save--a cook and his cooking-pot! The cook resided in a redoubt; his pot had had the lid broken, and worse still, the stew it covered driven through the bottom of the utensil, to be incinerated in the blaze beneath; and he vowed--well, the profanity entwined in his vow of vengeance will not admit of its publication. The whole bombardment was a grand joke. In the Law Courts, where the Criminal Sessions were being conducted in the ordinary way, the lawyers waxed witty. The witnesses responded. Even the prisoners laughed sorrowfully as each abortive boom rang out. It was a superb joke. The judge let fall some funny things and the jury smiled--without prejudice. His lordship said it was a novel experience for him, as indeed it was for all of us, who were to live and learn that--the last laugher laughs best. The results of the Colonel's mild and forbearing efforts to keep the natives in check were not satisfactory. The exuberance of the Kafirs knew no bounds; they continued to glory in intoxication, and to "do" the _breadth_ of the streets, like the gay Bohemians of more advanced civilisations. They did more; they defied authority, and varied their pleasures with occasional bouts of house-breaking and burglary. They appropriated such property as they could lay hands on in the sequestered houses of the West End, and played tug-of-war with mahogany that lacked the merit of being portable. An epidemic of looting prevailed--and fine sport it seemed to offer. But Colonel Kekewich did not think it a time for sport, and lost no time in ventilating his thoughts on the subject. Drastic measures were adopted to suppress the fun. Another proclamation adorned the dead walls--decreeing that native bars and canteens were to be closed altogether. To deal effectively with the hooligan school stern methods were necessary, and total prohibition was the initial step--a step highly lauded by the public in general, and by the _white_ topers of the city in particular. The coloured bibbers were thus suddenly reduced to water, and some twenty of them--caught red-handed in crime--were lashed and sent to prison for two years. One or two got off with a caution, and with instructions to preach to the locations on the heinousness of hooliganism, and of the power of Martial Law to hang "boys" for less than murder--as the next roost-robber would learn to his cost. No remarkable curiosity to be learned in the "Law" was afterwards manifested for some time.