The squadron of Imperial Light Horse and the Natal Carabineers now advanced slowly along the ridge, clearing it of the enemy, slaying and retrieving one field cornet and two burghers, and capturing ten horses.  Half-way along the Queen’s, the right battalion of Hildyard’s attack, which, having made a smaller detour, had now rushed the top, came into line and supported the dismounted men.  The rest of the Cavalry descended into the plain on the other side of the ridge, outflanking and even threatening the retreat of its defenders, so that in the end the Boers, who were very weak in numbers, were hunted off the ridge altogether, and Cingolo was ours.  Cingolo and Monte Cristo are joined together by a neck of ground from which both heights rise steeply.  On either side of Monte Cristo and Cingolo long spurs run at right angles to the main hill.

By the operations of the 17th the Boer line had been twisted off Cingolo, and turned back along the subsidiary spurs of Monte Cristo, and the British forces had placed themselves diagonally across the left of the Boer position thus: 

[Illustration:  Plan of position at Monte Cristo.]

The advantages of this situation were to be enjoyed on the morrow.

Finding our further advance barred by the turned-back position the enemy had adopted, and which we could only attack frontally, the Cavalry threw out a line of outposts which were soon engaged in a long-range rifle duel, and prepared to bivouac for the night.  Cingolo Ridge was meanwhile strongly occupied by the Infantry, whose line ran from its highest peak slantwise across the valley of the Gomba Stream to Hussar Hill, where it found its pivot in Barton’s Brigade and the Artillery.  The Boers, who were much disconcerted by the change in the situation, showed themselves ostentatiously on the turned-back ridge of their position as if to make themselves appear in great strength, and derisively hoisted white flags on their guns.  The Colonial and American troopers (for in the South African Light Horse we have a great many Americans, and one even who served under Sheridan) made some exceedingly good practice at the extreme ranges.  So the afternoon passed, and the night came in comparative quiet.

At dawn the artillery began on both sides, and we were ourselves awakened by Creusot shells bursting in our bivouac.  The enemy’s fire was chiefly directed on the company of the Queen’s which was holding the top of Cingolo, and only the good cover which the great rocks afforded prevented serious losses.  As it was several men were injured.  But we knew that we held the best cards; and so did the Boers.  At eight o’clock Hildyard’s Brigade advanced against the peak of the Monte Cristo ridge which lay beyond the neck.  The West Yorks led, the Queen’s and East Surrey supported.  The musketry swelled into a constant crackle like the noise of a good fire roaring up the chimney, but, in spite of more than a hundred casualties, the advance