The Neihart herald. [volume] (Neihart, Mont.) 1890-1901, 1900-04-28
AT MODDER RIVER.
WHAT AN ENGLISHMAN SAYS
OF THE FIGHTING.
Knows That England VIII Win in Time
but at a Sacrifice SO Terrible That
1t VIII Practically BE a Defeat -
The Boer a Great Fighter. A

Writing of conditions in South AT
RIGA, an Englishman with Lord Meth
uen's forces at the Modder river, says:
The English have a hard row to hoe.
They will win, of course, but some as5-
full stupid things have been done. The
English army is the biggest social club
in the world, but the training of the
home forces does not make men suited
for the field; they have it all to learn
after they get there, and England never
had a war on her hands like this be-
fore. Fighting natives armed with
fintlocks and spears was a different
thing to an invisible foe armed with
Mausers.
AS l write, Lord Methuen's column is
resting and Tommy Atkins is taking
his rest as he takes his fighting-it is
all in the days work with him; he for
gets his troubles, he INDUCES in no re-
Prospect and he finds time for football.
Ihere was a spirited game last evening
between picked teams of two compa-
MES OF the Highland Light Infantry.
once away from the battlefield a mile
below, it does not look like war. To
the uninitiated there is no betrayal of
any feeling of suspense; there certain
ly is no evidence of or
anxiety, and yet we are in the midst of
the enemy's country. At Orange river
one was constantly reminded of the
state of thin orc NV +ho eirLf - 49,
wounded, and by the Boer prisoners
still under guard there. Though they
are mostly wounded, also, they sing
together in their tents psalms with a
strange cadence that shifts from the
major to the minor key-plaintive
songs with primitive music, sung by
their ancestors and handed down from
the centuries, with many other things
that go to make up the Boer character
of today.
Simple in some ways, complex in
others, the Boer is a study of undevel-
opment. But the wiseacres who prophe-
sled that he would quit after sustain
ing losses in a months fighting were
out in their reckoning. At present he
is very much alive. The day before
yesterday We could hear firing of heavy
artillery hat lasted for half an hour
probably the Boer S0~-pounder or the
Nordenfeldt gun banging away at Kim
berley some 20 miles away to the
northward.
Writing Of the fight at Modder river,
he continues: That the British officers
and men, rank and file, fought with
bravery unsurpassed by any troops
ever in the field need not be said. That
they found a force of eight thousand
men intrenched against them at a
place where they were informed they
might meet a few hundred is a fact
that must now be known. The Beers
had departed from their usual methods
of warfare, and, instead of occupying
the natural protection of a hillside or
kopje, they had thrown up trenches
on the banks of a river that flows
through an open plain. The trenches,
though hastily constructed Quilt after
s o'clock on Monday; the battle began
at 6:15 on Tuesday, were laid out with
very evident knowledge of military
skill. AS the British lines advanced
they found themselves confronted sud
denly by a sweeping fire from an en-
envy absolutely invisible. Many a man
under fire during the twelve or thir-
teen hours that the fight lasted can
say that he never saw a Boer. The
ground sloped very slightly to the bare,
abrupt bank of the southern side; on
the north the edge, slightly higher, was
fringed with trees, and for a long time
it was thought that these trees shell
tered the enemy, and at them the Eng
fish fire was directed. No troops ever
held their ground under more disad-
v~antageous circumstances; lying prone
for more han u hours under a broil-
ing sun that cooked the bare legs of
the Highlanders into blisters, with the
tepid water in their water bottles eX-
hausted long before noon, there was
no sign of panic or loss of morale. The
ground was hard as the floor of a brick
kiln, and covered with a grinding red
dust that the bullets kicked up into
little spiteful clouds. The shells did
not bury themselves, but actually
bounced from the surface.