A Waltz for Matilda
“You may have read that we held onto Elands River. I tell you it was a rum do: by the end of the first day half the horses and cattle were dead — saw thirty of the poor blighters killed with just one shell — and we thought we were for it too. You’ve never seen so many men dig in so fast.
After four days old de la Rey, the Boer commander, sent us word he’d let us Australians through with safe conduct if we’d surrender. Lieut. Colonel Horse sent back: ‘If you want the supplies we are guarding, you... had better come and get them.’ He is a good egg, and no mistake, a white man through and through.
We kept expecting the Brits to come and relieve us. But they marched them up the hill and marched them down again, as the nursery song goes — neither hide nor hair of them did we see.
De la Rey offered us terms again. We sent back: ‘If de la Rey wants our camp, why does he not come and take it? We will bepleased to meet him and his men, and promise them a great reception at the end of a toasting fork.MoreLess
After four days old de la Rey, the Boer commander, sent us word he’d let us Australians through with safe conduct if we’d surrender. Lieut. Colonel Horse sent back: ‘If you want the supplies we are guarding, you... had better come and get them.’ He is a good egg, and no mistake, a white man through and through.
We kept expecting the Brits to come and relieve us. But they marched them up the hill and marched them down again, as the nursery song goes — neither hide nor hair of them did we see.
De la Rey offered us terms again. We sent back: ‘If de la Rey wants our camp, why does he not come and take it? We will bepleased to meet him and his men, and promise them a great reception at the end of a toasting fork.MoreLess
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