Everywhere is the spectacle of orderly bustle. The summits of the hills are crowned with earthworks, brown lines of trenches traverse the valley, block houses command the entrances of the bridge. These are the signs of the times, encompassed in an unremitting rapidity of execution. Colonel Kincaid rides from point to point, throwing advice here, praise there, and expressing general satisfaction over the labours of his men, as the scheme of defences runs to its conclusion. Out across the plain, upon Reservoir Hill, the sappers are constructing an entrenched position under the direction of Captain Mills, R.A., and especially designed to protect the water supply. Roads have been cut across the rear face of the hill, a breastwork of stones and earth encircles the Reservoir, and gun emplacements flank either extremity. It is a pretty work, carefully conceived, skilfully constructed, commanding the portion of the camp, and sweeping the approaches to the bridge. From the top of Reservoir Hill, no great eminence, the surrounding country is easily inspected, and the more one scans and studies the peculiarities of its formation, the more one becomes impressed with the fact that it presents the gravest obstacles to the British principles of military operations. A well-equipped and mobile force will hold the hills for eternity--but God help the troops who are launched against these awful kopjes which create the strength of such positions. The officers commanding these detached units along this border have received instructions to prepare extensive lines of fortifications round their bases, and at De Aar, as at Orange River and elsewhere, these commands have been complied with, until now the positions need only the service of some good artillery to be made impregnable. When cables be at the disposal of a possible enemy, it is as well to be reticent upon the cardinal weaknesses within our lines, but already there are signs of the extreme haste with which the troops have been despatched to the front. No unit would appear to be complete, despite the months of warning in which there has been ample opportunity to prepare. Everything is rushed through at the last, and although urgent orders be issued to make ready against attack, no artillery is available for the purpose. Everything is obscured in idle talk or deferred by empty promise, and the authorities appear to be continuing a policy which gives to the Boers some justification of their hopes of success. The Imperial authorities, in relying so much upon the moral effect of their artillery, appear to forget that the better it is, the more important the results it achieves; the more important the position to be defended, the better it should be. The Boers lose nothing by possessing modern weapons of defence. But with a wing only of the King's Own Light Infantry to occupy De Aar, and four companies of the Loyal Lancashires to hold Orange River, the need of strong artillery support is manifest.