"Before this began I was as good friends with my English neighbours as I was with my own people, and I see no reason for any change. They are not fighting us; it is we who are fighting them. I don't say that Steyn was wrong in joining our kinsmen across the Vaal; that is his business and that of the men we elected. Anyhow, we are bound by them; we and the Rooineks have got to shoot each other till one of us gives in. I am sure we shall all do our best to win. We have shown them that we can fight, and they have shown us that they can fight; but when it comes to shooting in cold blood I will have nothing to do with it. In the first place, because I call it murder; and in the second, because where the English have got one man sending them information from our side, we have got a thousand doing the same from theirs. We should be fools indeed if we were to set an example and take one life, for our action might entail the shooting of all our friends in the colonies." "There is a good deal in what you say, mynheer," one of the others agreed, "and I am sure you are right. For my part, when I see our shell bursting in there, I often say to myself, 'It is the women and children that are suffering from this.' Let us fire at their forts--though I don't see that that does much good--but leave the peaceful people alone; they won't give in because a few hundred women are killed. It does not seem as if we should take the town by force. At any rate, we have made no attempt to do so at present, and are not likely to. We shall starve them into surrender, and might just as well leave them alone till they have eaten their last crust. For my part, I think we ought to have made a rush and finished the business directly we got here. We should have lost a good many men, but that would have been the end of it. The end will come just the same, but we shall have killed many women and children and some soldiers, and we shall have lost in the long run as many as we should have done if we had attacked the place before they had time to build their forts and prepare for us." "I don't see the use of keeping up this fire myself, Isaak," the field cornet said; "but again, that is not my business, my orders are to hold this kopje, and I mean to do so. My heart aches whenever I see a shell burst in the middle of the town, but our commandant has got to account for that, not I. It is time now for the men on the hill to be relieved, and let the next two to go on guard duty get their rifles, and keep watch over this lad. I have no fear of his trying to escape; but you say he had another with him, for all that we know there may have been three or four, and they may try to crawl in and get him off."