New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1900-02-18

dav. Level downpour all the afternoon. and Lady
November 1S-F1ve civilians and two natives hit
by a shrapnel at the railway statohi rdll%aS
guard and a native died Languid sheHihg curing
November 17-During morning. IangG,d sh sInsr
Afternoon. raining; Ladysmith wanowing deeper
And h-h-ho,-makes a week OF IT, Re
lieve US. In Heavens name, good countrThen' VI
We died of dulness. -, j.. ,o ,,o,, enotbsr
dose Of the dull diary But haven't the heart. II
would weary you. and cannot say how horribly II
am sick Of it, Everybody is sick Of IT, They y
said the force which would open th h tine any d at
the 18th Now II is the 18th: the force they tell
has landed and ia somewhere on the line between
Maritzburg and Estcourt; but OF advance not
Butler they tell us one day. Is at Bloemfontein;
next day he is coming round TO Duroan' the next
The only thing certain is that whatever is hap
penng, out of IT, We know nothing OF the
outside; and of the inside there Is nothing 20 knoM
Weary stale. fat Improbable, the whole thing
At first to be 6esiegsd and m 6tsn w bn
weary, weary, weary bore. We do nothing put eau
and drink and sleep-just exist dismally. We have
forgotten when the siege began; and now we are
beginning not to care when II ends
1t viii go on just as now anguid hghting. languid
cessation for ever and ever We shall drop of one
A1 1t in the year 2Sss the Newzealander anti
quarian digging among the buried cities of Natal,
And he Will find a handful of Rip Van Wrinkle
Beers. with white boards down to their knees be,
ruin Inside. sheitering in holes he will find a few
decrepit creatures. very very old, the chdren
links with the past home to NeW-Zealand. But
they will be afraid the silence and security of
bardment, they will die of terror without It.
so be it. 1 shall not be there to see. But | shall
them among the ruins of Mulberry Grove, that:
after the excavations the unnumbered readers OF
"The Daily Mali may in the enlightened year 200
know what siege and bOmbardment were like.
RATHER AN ADVANTAGE.
Sometimes I think the siege would be just bad
without the bombardment.
In some ways IL would be even worse; for the
bombardment is something to notice and talk Of,
albeit languidly But the siege is an unredeemed
curse Sieges are out of date In the days OF Troy.
man; give years at d stretch to 1t all in
a lifes work; there was nothing else TO do. In the
a fast frigate arrived with the the next. a
man stu had leisure in his life for years siege
But to the OF 1Ss9-or, byr Lady. inclning
TO 1sO0-with five editions OF the evening papers
every day, siege is thousandfold a hardship
We make 1t a grievance nowadays if we day
behind the news-news that concerns us nothing
And here are with the enemy all round us,
splashing melnite among in most hours OF the
day, and for the best part OF month we have not
even had any definite news about the men for whom
We must wait TO get out of It, We walt and wonder,
first expectant, presently apathetc. and feel our
Furthermore. We are in prison. We know now
What Dartmoor feels like; The practised vagabond
smith ne sickens- in three hours
Beyond is the word-war and love: Clery march
little island under the north star But You sit here
to be idly shot at. You are of it, but not in it
self you are every bit good as dead-except that
dead men have no time TO mi in.
know now how monk without a vocation feels
know how fly in beer bottle feels
And with it all there are the melinite and the
shrapneL TO Re sure they give us the only pin
something novel to live in this town turned inside
out