The Roman Catholics have a convent with several nuns, which at the outbreak of the rebellion was taken possession of and strongly fortified. The nuns and lady superior were placed in a corner of one of the buildings. All the rest of the establishment was taken, and converted into a kind of barrack for the volunteers of Pretoria, formed into four companies, of which I unfortunately belonged to Number 4, where we had to do sentry night and day. Our bed was a waterproof sheet on the bare stone floors, and as the convent swarmed with fleas of all sizes, from the heavy dragoon down to the light infantry, there was no fear of a sentry sleeping on his post. Every second night my company was ordered to occupy the interior of the convent during the night; each volunteer was assigned his particular post in the various compartments and passages, placing a sentry at different points, the rest to sleep-- if the fleas would let them--fully armed, ready at a moment's notice to defend our position. My post was generally at the entrance-passage to the priests' quarters, which had been vacated by them, and on the bare stone floor I spread my waterproof sheet to get a little sleep; but the fleas, not one but millions, came down upon me in every quarter--poor things, they missed the nuns and the priests, for they were ravenous. Finding I should be sucked dry in a very short time, I took my rifle and sixty rounds of ball cartridge, made for the entrance, and passed the night on the door-sill, in about as happy a state of mind as a poor devil could be who had been marching up and down all day between the convent and the garrison. For fourteen days, from the 19th of December, 1880, to the 2nd of January, 1881, I had to put up with this sort of work, until I suffered so much from the excessive fatigue and want of sleep that I obtained three days' leave of absence, as I felt unequal to the work and required rest; but at the expiration of that time I became dangerously ill from the overstrain on my system, and got a medical certificate which relieved me of any further military duty in Number 4 Company, and from that date to the end of the rebellion I lived in my waggon.