In this manner the frontier was kept fairly clear of enemy; especially in the neighbourhood of the camps. The grass was tall, and the bush, in places, very heavy, so that ambush and surprise encounters were not infrequent. On those occasions casualties were, sometimes, on both sides heavy; but usually it was the side which laid the ambush which scored most heavily. To illustrate this: on one occasion, on the 4th of September, 1915, at Maktau, a party of our M.I. was ambushed and rather badly cut up by the enemy. The casualties in killed were eleven Europeans and three Indians. During this encounter a young British officer named Dartnell won the V.C. for refusing to surrender to the enemy, and fighting right out to a finish against great odds. Ten days later this same enemy company was ambushed by our forces and completely routed, leaving thirty dead Askaris and one German officer on the battle-ground. On the whole it was this sort of ding-dong fighting all along, with the British forces holding the stronger hand. Patrols were constantly expectant of an engagement of some description, and many became very expert bushmen as months of this type of fighting went on. On the 19th June, 1915, four hundred of our unit found themselves detraining at Kisumu, on Lake Victoria Nyanza, after a long train journey which had lasted one day and one night. On the low shore of the lake edge they camped, near to the wharf and half-roofed freight sheds, while other detachments came in on the railway and joined the force. During the day, there were concentrated here, beside us, detachments of 29th Punjabis, King’s African Rifles, Loyal North Lancashires; and 28th Mountain Battery, with their array of fine looking Sepoys, and sturdy, well-groomed, well-fed mules. By noon on the following day, which was a Sunday, everyone had been packed on to the small lake steamship craft which lay at the wharf in readiness, and the expedition sailed thenceforth, out through the Kavirondo Gulf into the great lake. The ships had been filled to their utmost capacity, above deck and below, and it was a motley crowd that occupied every yard of deck space, while pack-mules and store cattle stood roped to the ship’s rails on the upper deck. Forward, each vessel had a gun mounted, and a space roped off and cleared for action. Thus we sailed from Kisumu to raid the town of Bukoba on the 22nd and 23rd June; a prosperous trade town within the German colony, on the south-west shores of the lake, which was the base of enemy activities against the Uganda Frontier in the vicinity of the Kagera River, and which contained a powerful wireless plant, by which the enemy were able to obtain, and send, important communications. All night, and all the next day, we sailed the great lake, Victoria Nyanza, and we had been some thirty hours on board when, at sundown on the second day, we drew near to the enemy’s territory and slowed down, awaiting the fall of darkness.