Before the landing of the reinforcements, receiving news of the secret Boer conspiracy to invade the colony, General Sir Penn Symons, in command in Natal, decided to abandon the extreme north of the wedge, where lie the ill-omened battlefields of Laing's Nek, Majuba, and the Ingogo, and to place as large a force as he could spare at the small town of Dundee, 35 miles from Ladysmith and connected with it by railway. When the reinforcements from India arrived in the first week of October, and General White took over the command in Natal, this detachment was strengthened, and the main force established at Ladysmith. The Dundee force, under Symons, was 4,600 strong with 18 guns; the Ladysmith division, under White, numbered about 7,500 men with 24 guns. The latter was reinforced by Natal troops and volunteers in the first ten days of war, till on October 20 it may have reached 9,000. Meantime, this weak little army remained almost unconscious of the storm which was about to burst upon it, for the opinion generally held by British officers was that, owing to his bad transport and defective organisation, the enemy would not be able to move south for some weeks. [Illustration: GLENCOE. The railway on the left runs to Pretoria; that on the right to Dundee.] [Sidenote: OCT. 19, 20, 1899.] _The Campaign Opens._] The early days of the war in Natal encouraged this belief. On October 12 the Boers seized Laing's Nek and began crossing the Drakensberg in small parties. A few shots were exchanged between the scouts on either side, but there was no real fighting. No one fancied that Dundee was in any danger; on the 16th, a correspondent wrote from Ladysmith that the enemy was expected to remain inactive. Nor were any great precautions taken by General Symons. His officers reconnoitred from time to time; patrols and pickets were out; the main force lay in a valley dominated by lofty hills, some point on which he meant to occupy when the approach of the enemy made it necessary. As he could not know from what quarter the enemy would come, this central position was perhaps the best that could be assumed. There was little ammunition at Dundee, and the place was entirely dependent for most things, including supplies, upon its communications with Ladysmith. [Illustration: [_Photo by H. Nicholls._ NATAL CARBINEERS LEAVING LADYSMITH FOR THE FRONTIER.]