In accordance with English custom, many of the merchants have offices in the town, and live in little houses which give a gay and smiling aspect to the suburbs. We therefore took up a number of passengers who looked like men of business. In a few minutes we were in the town. We left the train at 8.30.
My permission to return to France was confirmed by the General commanding the garrison. I was almost a free man!
Vague rumours reached us from the front, always carefully doctored by the censor. Prinsloo was taken prisoner with several thousand men; but on the line to Lourenço Marques Botha was still defending himself vigorously. After the taking of Pretoria the Government, incarnating itself, so to speak, in the person of President Kruger, installed itself in a special train. There Oom Paul slept, received, ate, and lived. There the official printing-press was also set up, and the money that was circulated was minted there. As in the hurried departure from Pretoria it had not been possible to carry off a complete set of weights, the sovereigns issued were simple gold discs, quite plain, without image or inscription.
It was on this line, too, that the last great battles were fought, at Middelburg, Belfast, and Machadodorp, after which, renouncing all attempts at defence, the Boers began that guerilla campaign which De Wet had already successfully essayed.
In a few days our steamer sailed. It was not without a pang that we quitted the land we had hoped to see free, for which we had fought for seven months, and which had proved the grave of a venerated leader and of beloved friends.
An inexperienced writer, more expert with arms than with the pen, I do not know if I have described all these events in a manner sufficiently clear and coherent to convey a distinct impression. I shall therefore try to sum up on a few broad lines the ideas I have been able to form after the experiences I have recorded.
First of all, two great questions seem to present themselves: Why, in spite of all their qualities, have the Boers been beaten? Why are the English, with over 250,000 men, held in check by a handful of peasants?
These two questions are closely connected, for, though this seems a paradox, the chief cause of the defeat of the Boers is also the cause of their long resistance. I will explain.