The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1900-01-18
MAIL STORIES OF THE WAR.
Description of the Disaster to the
HighlandeFs and the Funeral
of Gen. WauchOpe.

Correspondence of the Associated Press
LONDON, Jan. 10.-Some of the most
brilliant work In the way OF descriptive
writing ever done by British correspond
ents has been appearing in the British
papers in the last few days:
The Daily News correspondent thus
writes OF the burial of Gen. Wauchope:
.sThree hundred yards to the rear of
the little township of Modder river, just
as the sun was sinking in a blaze of Afri-
can splendor, on the evening of Tuesday.
the 18th of December, long. shallow
grave lay exposed in the breast of the
yeldt. In the west the broad river,
fringed with trees, ran murmuringly; to
the eastward the heights, still held by the
enemy, scowled menacingly; north and
south the veldt undulated peacefully.
"A few PAGES to the northward of that
grave fifty dead Highlanders lay, dressed
as they had fallen on the field of battle.
They had followed their chief to the field.
and they were to follow him to the grave.
How grim and stern those men looked,
as they lay face upward to the sky, with
great hands clenched in the last death
agony. and brows still knitted with the
stern lust Of the strife In which they had
fallen The plaids, dear to every Highland
clan, were represented there, and as
looked, out of the distance came the sound
of the piper. 1t was the general coming
eyes of the enemy moved with slow and
solemn tread all that remained of the
Highland brigade. In front of them walk
ed the chaplain with barred head, dressed
In his robes of office Then came the
pipers with their pipes. sixteen in all. and
behind them, with arms reversed. moved
the fiiGh'anders, dressed in all of then
regalia of their regiments, and in their
midst the dead general, borne by four OF
his comrades.
''Out swelled the pipes to the strain of
the Flowers of the Forest until the
soldiers heads went back in naughty de-
fiance and eyes flashed through tears like
sunlight on steel; now singing to moan
ing wall, like a woman walling her first
born until the proud heads dropped for
ward till they rested on heaving chests
and tears rolled down the wan and Scared
faces and the choking sobs broke through
the solemn rhythm of the march of death.
Right up to the grave they marched, then
broke away in companies until the gem
eral lay in the shallow grave with a Scot
fish SQUARE of armed men around him. Only
the dead mans son and a small number of
his officers stood with the chaplain and
the pjpers while the solemn services of the
church were spoken.
"Thcn once again the piper pealed out
'Lochaber No More, which cut through the
stiffness like a cry of pain until one could
almost hear the widow In her highland
home moaning for the soldier she would
welcome back no more Then, as If
touched by the magic of one thought, the
soldiers turned their tear-damp eyes from
the stir form IN the shallow grave toward
the heights where Cronje. the lion Of
Africa, and his soldiers stood. Then every
cheek flushed crimson, and the strong
jaws set like steel and the veins on the
hands that .clasped the rifle handles
swelled almost to bursting with the fervor
of the grip. and that look from those
silent, armed men spoke more eioquently
than ever spoke the tongues Of orators
For on each frewninE face the spirit Of