Throughout the long day the infantry lay under the broiling sun, just as the remnants of the Highland Brigade were to endure it not very long after. The artillery engagement wore on, the heat passed, and as night came the British were gaining the advantage. All day they had been without food. At last, in the late afternoon, the North Lancashires managed to get across the river and take up a position on the extreme left, where they were joined by the Coldstreams and the Argyll and Sutherlands. The action was turning against the Boers. With this desperate little force on their flank, and the artillery shattering their guns on the front, they took advantage of the night to evacuate their trenches and retreat. It had indeed been a costly action, and might have been a humiliating defeat. What perhaps it was more than anything else was a proof of British bravery under the most dismal conditions.
Lord Methuen remained upon the Modder River until he was joined by the Highland Brigade, composed of the 2nd Seaforths, the Highland Light Infantry, the 1st Gordons fresh from Dargai, and the 2nd Black Watch, with whom was Major-General Andrew Wauchope. Wauchope had seen service in the Soudan, and was one of the best-beloved officers in the history of the Highland regiments.
A spectator has written: “Watching the arrival of the Highland Brigade, very magnificent they looked as they swung into camp, pipers strutting before them, kilts swish-swishing, all in perfect order and perfect step—the finest troops in the world.”
The Boers, having fallen back from the Modder River, halted at Magersfontein, a circle of hills which Cronje endeavoured—with what success we shall see—to render impregnable. It was the next step towards Kimberley, and on Saturday, December 9, Lord Methuen despatched one of the most critical and forlorn expeditions in our history, and the most tragic in the story of the Highland regiments.
_The Great Boer War_, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
CHAPTER XXV WITH THE HIGHLAND BRIGADE AT MAGERSFONTEIN (_December 11, 1899_)
I’ve heard them lilting at the ewe-milking, Lasses a’ lilting before dawn o’ day; But now they are moaning on ilka green loaning, The flowers o’ the forest are a’ wede away.