invisible, a fact born witness to by Captain Congreve, V.C., in his account of the first reverse at the Tugela.  Now of course when you can’t see your enemy you can’t very well hit him, so when we clear our minds of fairy-stories about Lyddite and the universal destruction wrought by concussion, it seems highly probable that there is much more truth in the Boers’ returns of their casualties than has been believed at home.  Take, e.g., the lurid account sent by one of our correspondents about the awful effects of our shell fire upon General Cronje’s laager.  We were told in graphic language of every space in the laager being torn and rent by the deadly fire of more than fifty field guns, of the trenches being enfiladed and the green fumes of Lyddite rising up from the doomed camp.  Cronje emerges with a casualty roll of 170 men, and the only inconvenience from our bombardment experienced by the ladies was the slight abrasion of a young woman’s forefinger!

The fact that so many of our Generals have been struck by bullets during the campaign would seem to corroborate what I have heard on good authority, viz., that some of the best shots in the Transvaal forces have been told off for long range shooting, and the picking off of our leaders.  One of these fancy shots—­a German—­was captured in Natal and told an officer that he was glad to be a prisoner, as he heartily disliked the task imposed upon him.  Some little distance north of the Modder bridge is a small white house.  Within this was found a Boer lying on a table stone-dead, with a shrapnel bullet in his skull.  His Mauser, still clutched in his stiffened hands, lay on a tripod rest in front of him and the muzzle pointed through a vertical slit made in the masonry of the cottage.  Every house in the neighbourhood was more or less injured by shrapnel, and one of them was the scene of a sanguinary conflict which was utterly misrepresented by one of the Cape papers.  The misrepresentation was to the effect that at the battle of Modder River the house in question was occupied by a number of Boer wounded from Belmont and Graspan in charge of several attendants.  It was alleged that two of the attendants deliberately fired upon our troops, who forthwith entered the house and bayoneted every occupant, wounded and unwounded alike, the bodies being afterwards weighted, with stones and thrown into the river.  This terrible story spread like wildfire through the Colony, and Lord Methuen despatched an official denial of the alleged circumstances to Capetown.  The Boer General never, as far as I am aware, brought any such charge against our troops, but as it undoubtedly gained considerable credence in the Colony it is perhaps worth while to mention the real facts of the case.  The house in question was occupied as an outpost by thirty-six Boers, who fired upon some companies of British troops.  About a dozen of our men, chiefly Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders with a lieutenant of the Fifth Fusiliers—­for