Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1900-01-18
HE SINGS OLD HUNDRED BEFORE
GOING TO BATTLE.
BOTH FAMINE AND FIRE
He Will Employ These Against the
: British If -Sharpshoot-
ers Using the Deadly Mannlicher
and Working Fearful Havoc Among
Enemy-Boers Never Lose Head.

There are no bands of music in the
boer armies. The farmer soldiers of
the two republics make or receive
charges in silence, their minds intent
upon aim and upon strategy. If it is
a charge, they advance in a scattered
and what seems to be a confused man
ner. Ia reality it is only the beers
natural order, in which they fight
best.
A retreat looks like rout, because
each man tries to save himself as
quickly as possible. A rout is almost
impossible, because the farmers do not
understand how to lose their heads"
They scatter, and when place of
safety has been reached come together
again, as if nothing had happened
While they have no martial music
in the ordinary sense. they have mar
tial music of the most impressive kind
in the extraordinary sense. Each
night before turning in" and each
morning before breakfast, and also
before going into battle, if there is
opportunity, the entire army, with
| Hundred. Each note is prolonged and
the effect is solemn and even awful,
so much of resolution, of stern and
relentless resolve do they put into
the singing.
The two strongest points about this
practically uniformed and strangely
organized boer army are both individu
ind IF %
at strategy and his individual ability
as sharpshooter.
The favorite topic of conversation
among the beers has always been
how best to meet the British when
| they come to destroy the republics,
how to fight the great defensive war
which every boer has felt sure would
| inevitably come. The plans that are
being carried out and will be carried
out are the result of years upon years
of study of the situation by the bur-
ghers of all ranks, consulting together
upon the stoOps of their matched
houses of evenings. The boer is a
natural strategist, willy, crafty, hard to
corner, quick to seize the slightest ad-
vantage, quick to see advantage when
even trained soldiers of other nations
would fail to see it.
1t is a mistake to suppose that the
beers have deteriorated in marksman-
ship. The English have got that i'm
preston from a superficial observa
ton of the beers of the large towns.
The villagers and farmers are as sure
Of shot as of old.
With a smooth-bore gun a boer shot
Sir George w Colley through the
head in the Majuba hill fight at 1,400
yards. With one of the new guns
General Symons was shot in the beers
new target-the stomach-at a far
longer range. I have seen girl
bring down a bird on the wing at 400
yards.
If Sir Redvers Butler shows himself
at 1000 yards, his fate is hardly doubt
full; for the special sharpshooters of
the beers are now armed with the
sporting Mannlicher, and they can,
with their knowledge of air currents,
hit small object almost every time
at 4,500 yards.
President Kruger has been buying
these arms in large quantities ever
since the Jameson raid and the practi-
cal failure of the British to punish the
raiders General Joubert took me into
a storehouse at Pretoria filled with
thousands of these rifles. isn't 1t
beauty?" he said picking up one of
them and patting it affectionately. "At
20 yards it will shoot through so
inches Of pine"
The Mannlicher bullet travels with a
velocity of 1000 feet a second. At
1000 yards it will pierce two inches of
solid ash and three inches of pine. At
1000 yards the bullet, if it does not
flatten, will bore a hole right through
bone without splitting. This rifle
has barrel 80 inches long and weighs
8 pounds. It's caliber is 80. 1t is hair
triggered, has a pistol grip, and the
boer carries it slung over his shoulder
by strap.
In the last two years the countrymen
have been putting away the old
smoothbore and providing themselves
with the Mauser and the Mannlicher.
For killing game they use bullet of
which the lead point is exposed, so
that it mushrooms" when it strikes.
On entering the bullet expands and
tears an ugly hole. If it strikes side
wise the effect is horrible.
General Joubert assured me that
these bullets would not be used against
the English, unless the latter employed
their barbarous dum-dum.
If the British try to go up into the
republics by way of Natal they must
traverse the Drakensburg mountains,
the only great range in south Africa.
The peaks of these mountains rise as
high as 1900 feet. The way through
the range is a tortuous course along
steep cliffs and above yawning preci
pices. Every few hundred yards there
is an impregnable position.
The evaporation of the lowlands con-
denses there and gives plenty Of water
for a force intrenched high among
the rocks. Forage, too, is plenty.
few men can hold out indefinitely, and
unless the British take heavy artil-
lery with them-a well-nigh impos-
sible feat-a few hundred men can al
most destroy great army.
Once the British gain the almost
level and almost open veldt over
which the two republics spread, the
beers have left two physical allies
famine and fire.
Water in south Africa is often as
precious as gold and sometimes in
fnitely more precious. Every year wit
naSSaS tarrihla drn1I CHI in some mart |