The Dupuyer acantha. [volume] (Dupuyer, Mont.) 1894-1904, 1900-06-07
Nature and Art Have Made 1t So-In Condition to Withstand
d Long Sie9e-lts Fortifcohons.

The most important place in South
Africa at present is Pretoria, the cap
ital of the Transvaal, where Dom Paul
has made the most elaborate prepare
tions to withstand a siege and where
the Beers may be relied upon to make
a most stubborn resistance. The place
is defended by nature and art as few
other towns in the world, and has e
described by some military writer's as
being impregnable. On three sides of
Pretoria the mountain ranges rise to
elevations of 1000 and 1000 feet above
the streets of the city, which itself is
$500 feet above sealevel, but LOO feet
lower than the site of johannesburg,
to the south. On the fourth side-the
south and facing the approach from
johannesburg - the range f1attens
away to a vast level plateau, treeless,
desolate, exposed at every point to the
sweep of any guns that may command
it. The town is 1880 miles from Cape
map it seems as easy of approach as
a prairie village in Nebraska. But the
map topographer fails to present the
lofty, barren hills that face the south
ern plateau, the PERCEPTIONS banks of
Aapies river, the narrow gorges-so
Eew in number-the innumerable
"spion" or lookout kopjes that seem
literally to leap from the bosom of
the plain and sullenly, silently oppose
access to the capital city. The civil
engineers who laid out the railway
IRON johannesburg to Pretoria found
such problems of grade and mountain
resistance offered them that the road
finally was forced to enter the city\on
a line resembling the curves and twists
of a great boa constructor.
You look up to the mountain fronts
as your train struggles to find it's way
into Pretoria, and wherever the eye
rests there appears to be the lines of
a tort, a redoubt, the front of masked
batteries or the domes of boom-proof
rifle and cannon pits. To the north,
east, west and south these engirdle the
city. They command the few-very few
narrow entrances to Pretoria. They
watch like great dogs the dusty, sun
rotted veldt over which any English
troops coming from the south must
pass. They blink at the one railroad
to johannesburg and the one to Lou
renco Marques. Their location has been
with purpose. Capt. Schiel, now an
English prisoner, constructed, the one
at Daspoort from plans obtained in
Berlin. He brought special assistants
from Berlin to aid him in the work.
Amsterdam engineers built others of
the defenses. After them came French
engineers, and then those of Italy, SO
that the completed structures repre-
sent the genius of four nations.
There are sever of these forts, and
in external appearance they look alike.
They have masonry faces, with earth
work which covers their fronts to a
great depth. In this they conform
with plans and suggestions to be found
in M. Bloch's much-studied work, "The
Future of War; Pile upon pile oil
sand bags are stacked up wherever
shells from the enemy might strike
There are many hidden recesses, Sc
cret passages, complete telephone con
nections-not only with each other, blu
WITH the government buildings in Pre-
to.!a. Searchlights are mounted il
eaxA structure so as to command thu
surrounding country at night. Thu
mt gaines are underground, and are
reported to be mined. Report has it
also, that the nea approaches arr
mined and that the electrical construc
ton is such that considerable portion.
of an enemy's army might be blow.
into eternity before surrender came
For food, in the event of siege, en,,r
mos quantities of maize have teel