Battles of the nineteenth century . situation. He persisted in his belief that nolarge British force could or would go far fromthe railway, and that when the move for therelief of Kimberley came it would be by a frontalattack from Modder camp. This opinion seemsto have been strengthened by what he consideredto be MacDonalds failure to turn his riglit flankby way of Koodoosberg Drift. The dash ofFrenchs squadrons to the drifts of the Reit andModder he regarded as a mere cavalry raid thatcould be checked if any attempt were made topush on to Kimberley. He was unaware thatthree divisions of infan
Battles of the nineteenth century . situation. He persisted in his belief that nolarge British force could or would go far fromthe railway, and that when the move for therelief of Kimberley came it would be by a frontalattack from Modder camp. This opinion seemsto have been strengthened by what he consideredto be MacDonalds failure to turn his riglit flankby way of Koodoosberg Drift. The dash ofFrenchs squadrons to the drifts of the Reit andModder he regarded as a mere cavalry raid thatcould be checked if any attempt were made topush on to Kimberley. He was unaware thatthree divisions of infantry were moving up behindthe screen of cavalry. Villebois de Mareuil, theFrench colonel who was serving with the Boers,was in the Alagersfontein lines at the time. Whenthe news of Frenchs advance began to come in,his trained mind saw at once what it meant. Hewent to Cronje and told him that he was sureRoberts was carrying out an important move-ment to outflank him on the left and cut hiscommunications with the Free State. He there-. COLONEL ;Ols UKMAREUIL. fore urged that steps should at once be taken tomeet this danger. He suggested that the mainforce should be moved eastward to check theadvance across the Modder drifts. But havingso often beaten European generals, the Boerleaders were rather inclined to despise what theyconsidered the pedantry of the foreign scientificsoldiers. Cronje told Villebois de Mareuil thathe was unnecessarily alarmed. On thcFrenchmanurging his proposals, Cronje abruptly put an endto the conversation. Young man, he said, you cannot teach me how to fight. I waswinning battles when you were still at was not till late on the Thursday afternoon,wlien French had broken through on the south-cast of Kimberley and Tuckers guns wereshelling Jacobsdal, that Cronje atlast realised his danger. We shallsee that then, when a less re-sourceful leader would have givenup all as lost, he acted with skilland energy that almost savedhim. But on this same
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