The Siege of Kimberley Its Humorous and Social Side; Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902); Eighteen Weeks in Eighteen Chapters

We awoke on Sunday morning with fears of what had happened during the night. It transpired, however, to our infinite relief, that most of the shells had fallen on the soft earth...

The last day of the year and the distant thunder of artillery burst upon us simultaneously. That the peace of the Sabbath should be broken by music not exactly sacred (or melodi...

The whirligig of the enemy (time, not the Boer, not the "Law") had again carried us to the beginning of another week. The Sundays were now exceedingly dull, and on the particula...

It was an illustration of the people's enduring pluck, this dogged resolution of no surrender. Not that they felt conscious of any particular heroism; the thought of capitulatio...

The pen-ultimate Sunday of our captivity was notable for nothing but the average crop of rumours which had characterised every day of our Siege existence. The listlessness of th...

Christmas Eve--a memorable day in its own way--dawned in due course. It was not the siege alone, with its attendant inconveniences, that made it memorable. It was not that the s...

Everything was going from bad to worse, and though the tropical weather was not conducive to heartiness of appetite the dishes on our tables were distressing. To attempt to comp...

For such comfort as preserved fruit could shed over the soul was still ours. It was not classed as a "necessary," and the retailers being free to charge freely for it could sell...

The rumour-monger and the quidnunc--to whom only brief allusion has so far been made--had come to be regarded as distinct public nuisances. I have hitherto refrained from commen...

Three and three make six weeks. We were not yet free--not quite. Our period was doubled. The wary seers who "told us so" had triumphed; and they exploited their intuition for wh...

The pleasures of Sunday were on the wane. The outbreak of war had detracted little from its peace; but its dinners were--oh, so different! Sunday had formerly been in the main a...

The news relative to the tearing up of the railway line, and the cutting of the telegraph wires at Spytfontein, spread fast and freely on Sunday morning. Rather by good luck tha...

The commandeering of cattle was an industry now well established. It was a pleasing spectacle, on Sunday morning, to behold the results of the preceding night's operations as th...

The day of opportunity for reflection was with us again, and since so little occasion for action presented itself we talked about war in peace. The man in the street--omniscient...

The fierceness of the assault to which we had been exposed was the great subject of discussion, but it was not until the sluggish pendulum of Siege time had again swung round to...

Sunday again! the most popular day of the seven; pre-eminently so since the war began. The peace that marked an occasional week-day was the certain accompaniment of the Sunday....

The three weeks were over, and there was nothing to show that our inspirations in regard to the duration of the siege might yet prove to be substantially true. No immediate pros...

After a hard and anxious week, Sunday was indeed a day of rest. We enjoyed it because we felt instinctively that an enemy who sincerely believed that Providence was necessarily...

The famous Ultimatum had gone forth to the world. War had come at last. We, in Kimberley, were in for it--though happily unconscious of our destiny until it was revealed by the...