TEN MONTHS IN THE FIELD WITH THE BOERS

248 pages, frontispiece, folded map, faded pictorial orange cloth, corners bumped.

The Spectator, 16 February 1901: ‘The French officer who writes this book certainly does not love the British, but he hates the Boer. He makes a distinction, indeed, between the old Boer and the young Boer, and, to a certain extent, between the Government and the people. But he brings a heavy indictment for incapacity and corruption against the men who managed the war. He relates with considerable satisfaction the serious reverses that befell the British Army during the early part of the campaign, but he has no praise for the victors. He is justly severe on the want of resolution which kept the Boer forces " hypnotised," to use his phrase, before Ladysmith, Kimberley, and Mafeking. We cannot agree with him that if the Boers had taken a bolder line they would have achieved a complete triumph—it is not our way to play the passive part in "complete triumphs” — but that they lost much by their unwillingness or inability to attack is quite certain. The accounts which our author gives of the campaign are decidedly interesting. He was taken prisoner in July, and speaks handsomely of the treatment which he received. Perhaps the most notable point in his book is his low estimate of the Boers. There is an amusing story of a certain Mrs. D., who collected some money due to her for saddles by going to the Government offices, whip in hand. We admire her somewhat less when we are told that she had contracted to deliver five hundred at £10 each, that Boer troopers sold many of them to her for £4 or £5, and that these appeared again in the list. Our author has the usual French ignorance of history. Napoleon's grand army entered "every capital of Europe." He has forgotten London. He is sure that the victories of Jemappes, &c., would have repeated themselves if the Boers had only been willing to advance. Apparently he supposes that these victories were won over British troops.