As has been pointed out already, General Buller's army was from the first insufficient--insufficient in numbers, and especially weak in artillery. In the opinion of most correspondents on the field--an opinion justified by the final success in February--there could be no chance of success unless Mount Hlangwane, upon the British right, were captured. In Boer hands this position gave an excellent sallying-point whence to direct counter attacks upon the British flank and line of communications. Judging by the measure of success which a small force of Colonials obtained in their assault upon this hill, it would have been possible with greater strength, which was available, to have carried it. General Barton's brigade, 3,500 strong, was hardly engaged in the battle, yet, when appealed to for assistance, the general refused to send it. Mr. Bennet Burleigh, who does not write hastily, considers that half a battalion put into the fight at this point might have turned the scale. With Hlangwane in British hands the Colenso lines would have become untenable for the Boers, and the enemy must have fallen back upon Pieters. But at Pieters, if they had fought in December, they would have had to face the great risk of the Ladysmith garrison breaking in upon their rear. For at that date Sir George White's army was capable of moving, and had its cavalry and artillery in fair condition. So that the capture of Hlangwane on December 15 might well have brought with it the immediate relief of Ladysmith. Again, it is curious that seemingly no one in the British Army was aware that the Boers had entrenched positions to the south of the Tugela. Yet their dispositions in the Modder River fight, which had occurred more than a fortnight previously, so that the Staff had had full time to acquaint itself with the details, should have led to the conclusion that it was at least probable there were such entrenchments to the south of the river. A third cause of the defeat was the utter untrustworthiness of the maps of the district, although Natal had for two generations been a British colony, and though a considerable British garrison had for years been stationed in Ladysmith. Next there were the actual mistakes of generals in the field. And here it should be remembered in extenuation that while the non-combatant of average intelligence, sitting in an armchair, can often point out after the event what ought to have been done, and what was done wrongly, such critics have not to face the storm and excitement of battle, in which men are only too apt to forget or neglect the teaching of history. It is a classical saying that the best general is he who makes the fewest mistakes, and the proverb is itself an admission that mistakes in war are inevitable. [Illustration: THE LATE GENERAL DE VILLEBOIS-MAREUIL