It was said that General Kelly-Kenny once had a round up of all the idlers and others in Bloemfontein, and the story goes that quite a large number of soldiers were found in shops and hotels and bars, dressed in civilian clothes, and drawing good pay as shopmen and waiters. On Sunday the 4th of November we marched out of Ventersburg Road once more, at half-past six in the morning; it was a charming day, and our march led us alongside the railway the whole time. All the parties of Militia guarding the line had been relieved by men of the Coldstream Guards who were on their way down country, but had been stopped to relieve the Militia and to furnish one or two new defensive posts near Holfontein. I was sorry to see that the Guards had adopted the felt hat, which no doubt looks very nice and smart while it is new and retains its jaunty shape; but, after it has been out in the rain once or twice and the owner has slept in it on picket, the thing becomes a hideous shapeless object, a most unsoldierlike head covering, which, to be thoroughly appreciated at its worst, should be seen when worn in conjunction with a kilt and a khaki apron, as in the battalions of the Highland Brigade. On our way we passed close to the spot where the train had been destroyed at night when we were at Ventersburg Road: the débris was still lying about, although, of course, the trucks had been removed. Most of the contents of the train were Hospital and Ordnance stores, so the ground was littered with the burnt fragments of iron bedsteads and other hospital fittings, with camp kettles, canteens, water bottles, drums which had contained rifle oil and dubbin, and all sorts of other articles. No trace had been left, of course, of the bales of blankets, clothing and boots, or of any of the Supply Stores such as biscuit, beef, etc. Halting for the night at Geneva, we reached Kroonstad about half-past eleven on the 5th of November, and camped on our old spot below Gun Hill, where we remained no less than four days. Volunteers had been called for to serve on the Mounted Infantry, and sixty of our men sent in their names, showing that the spirit of enterprise and adventure had not been knocked out of them by the long marching and the hardships that they had undergone; they went off by train the same evening to Pretoria, where the new bodies of Mounted Infantry were being organised. All day on the 8th and 9th of November, troops, mostly mounted, had been coming in from the west, and on the latter date, to the great delight of everyone, eight of the enemy's guns were brought in and parked in the market square, together with a large number of prisoners, who were handed over to a guard of the troops in garrison. These were the outcome of a most successful surprise of a Boer commando carried out near Bothaville on the 6th of November.