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The Camp, Mafeking,

October 22nd, 1899.

There was some sign that the engagement of Saturday between the Protectorate troops and the Boer forces investing Mafeking would have been the precursor of a series of minor fights, which, if not of much importance in themselves, yet would have been of interest and encouraging to the command generally.

As it happens, however, the engagement of Saturday is the first, and, up to the present, the only action of any importance, of any interest whatsoever, that has been brought about between the two forces. General Cronje is evidently a man of some humanity, though it is perhaps possible that the motives which direct his present policy of exceeding gentleness towards the "Rooineken" that he be besieging in Mafeking, aims at procuring for himself, when the inevitable does come, terms perhaps not quite so extreme as would have been the case had the Boer commandant not conducted his operations in accordance with the articles of war.

During the progress of the Sunday following the engagement at Five Mile Bank, Commandant Cronje made a curiously sincere, but not altogether unhumorous demand for our unconditional surrender. Colonel Baden-Powell very properly felt he was unable to comply with any such demand, and with the exchange of notes of a courteous character this incident closed.

During Sunday the town put the finishing touches to the earthworks, lunettes, and to the gun emplacements, which will form a more or less complete chain of fortifications around the town. So much as possible, and so far as it lay within the knowledge and experience of the Base Commandant, Colonel Vyvyen, and Major Panzera, each distinct earthwork was made shell-proof.

From the outside the town looks as if a series of gigantic mounds had been suddenly created. At different points tiers of sandbags, several feet high, protect the more exposed places, and to these again has been added, as an exterior facing, banks of earth. Within such a position as I am now describing there is a deep trench, which is of that depth which enables a man standing upright to fire through loopholes between sacks of sand. Behind the trench is a low shelter of deals with an upper covering of sandbags, intending to serve the garrison of the fort as protection against shell fire.

To those points which are exposed to the more direct attack of the enemy, a Maxim has been detached or a seven-pounder emplaced. The Town Guard man these positions: the work of patrolling, of forming Cossack posts, of maintaining the outer lines of sentries, being undertaken by the Protectorate troops and the Bechuanaland Rifles.