Thus in a few short days had the British people been brought face to face with the tragic realities of war. The scales fell from all eyes; it was clear to every man that this was a struggle for life or death, a struggle in which defeat must mean the loss of South Africa and the shaking of the British Empire to its very foundations, and in which victory at the best could never regain for us what we had forfeited--our reputation before the world. Not yet did the nation know, or it might well have shivered, the hesitation, the doubts, the ignorance of the true meaning of events which marked its leading men. Not yet did it fully comprehend the grave defects which had characterised its army in the field. It had illusions still of which two more months of unsuccess were at last to deprive it; it had yet to learn how all precautions had been neglected; and blind animal courage substituted for skilful leading. [Illustration: TWO OF THE GUNS CAPTURED FROM DR. JAMESON, IN A FORT AT PRETORIA. The photograph is almost the only one which has been taken within any of these forts. Observe the loop-holed wall beyond the sheds.] [Illustration: [_Photo by Cribb._ A 6-IN. HOWITZER BATTERY. The first two guns are shown elevated to an angle of thirty-five degrees, which is the position in which they are usually fired.] [Sidenote: Crass ignorance of military affairs.] [Sidenote: DEC. 1899.] _"Nobody to Blame."_] Terrible, indeed, is the price which a nation must pay for neglecting the study of war. "Above all for empire and greatness," said our own immortal Bacon, "it importeth most that a nation do profess arms as their principal honour, study, and occupation." But the people had never troubled about such things; it was taught and it knew nothing of the conduct of war; its press gave space to the trivialities of sport, none to the serious business of arms; its Parliament emptied as if by magic when naval and military affairs were discussed; its Government and Cabinet were composed without exception of men ignorant of war. For generations attention had been riveted upon the question which of two parties was to govern, regardless of the consideration that there can be no country to rule unless there is an armed force prepared to overcome the enemies who may assail that country's existence. We had told one another that we were a great, a strong, an invincible people. We had come to believe--or the less instructed of us had come to believe--that an Englishman was far more than a match for any foreigner. We had been ruled by "majorities of politicians, without the knowledge requisite in the governors of a great empire, believing that every interest should be subordinated to their preservation of place." In the words of Lord Charles Beresford, in twenty years there had been but three men in the House of Commons who understood the problem of national defence.