The covenant - James A. Michener [432]
That night he met with his veldkornets. 'I am sorely worried. Commandos were born to move, we should be galloping south.' When no one spoke, tears came to his eyes. 'I can see us roaring into Durban. Taking the port. Throwing the English back into the sea.' Still no one spoke. 'Once we let them land, they'll be like bulldogs. They'll never let go.' The Venloo men knew he was right, but they had their orders and there was nothing they could say, and again tears trickled down his beard. 'We sit here tonight, losing the war.'
Then came exhilarating news which assured the Boers that victory was still within their grasp: Boers on all the other fronts had won stunning victories, which encouraged De Groot to urge once more a dash to the sea that would end the war. This time permission was granted, but he was forestalled by precisely what he had feared: thousands of English troops had sailed into Durban harbor and were already entraining for the north. This mighty force would quickly lift the siege of Ladysmith and go on to destroy the Boers.
The preponderance of power would rapidly become so overwhelming five, sometimes ten well-armed professional soldiers against one fighting Boer, ten heavy guns to onethat the Anglo-Boer War should have ended well before Christmas. In this opinion all the foreign military experts concurred.
It was the custom in these years for any army in the field to invite uniformed observers from friendly nations to march with it, observe its performance, and report to their own headquarters the quality of this army's fighting men. German officers rode with the Boers, and French and Russian and some South Americans, while the same nations sent other officers to report on the English.
At the end of 1899 these cautious experts concluded that despite initial Boer victories, the English on the Natal front would rather quickly lift the siege of Ladysmith and then, in an orderly fashion, bring in so many troops through Durban that victory was assured. But in early 1900, after an opportunity to assess the remarkable general London had dispatched to do the job, they became confused.
Said the German observer in his cable to Berlin: 'With this man the English will be lucky to win in four years.'
But the French major wired in code to Paris: 'He's the type who gives the enemy much trouble, the traditional English bulldog who holds on with every muscle in his body.'
Wrote the Russian: 'If this man is what the English War Office considers a general, I suggest you terminate our proposals for a military treaty with England.'
But the American reported: 'Do not underestimate him. He's the type of general who holds the British Empire together. The Boers will defeat him six times in a row, then realize with dismay that he has won the seventh, and final, battle.'
Sir Redvers Buller, scion of the noble family that had given King Henry VIII two of his queens, Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, was sixty years old, something over two hundred and forty pounds in weight, and chairbound at headquarters for the past eleven years. His appointment as commander-in-chief of the English effort in South Africa had been bitterly opposed by one faction in the War Office and the cabinet, somewhat tepidly supported by another faction that wanted a no-nonsense man in the field. He himself, when he heard of his impending selection, wanted to avoid it, judging himself to be inadequate, for he had never commanded a full army, but in the end he had accepted on the sensible grounds cited by many another man called to assume major responsibilities: 'I'm as good as any of the others.'
Prior to embarking on his great adventure, he had the bad luck to make an observation which would haunt him: 'I doubt I shall have to do much fighting against the Boers in the field. My only fear is that everything may be ended before I get there.'
But as his ship neared Cape Town, a passing vessel moved close, and without stopping, hung out a huge blackboard with alarming news about the confusion on the Natal front, so that when Buller