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Show MAJUBA, ONLY BETTER. Full Facts About De Wet's Operations Opera-tions Now Leaking Out. Dublin Freeman: The full facts about De Wet's Christmas operations are only now leaking out gradually. A few newspaper messages have leaked through, and they give just the details de-tails that the public wanted concerning concern-ing the affair with Dartnell and the Light Horse, which was the preliminary prelimi-nary tn ;inrt nrcnarntlnn frr tho ni-. prise at Tweefontein. It appears that De Wet attacked Dartnell fiercely, the Boers making a grand charge across the open ground, "covered by the tire of the high velocity guns and of a pompom." The official message carefully care-fully concealed the fact that the Boers ha'd any guns. Not merely had De Wet guns, but he appears to have used them with effect, and Dartnell appears to have made no effort to follow him. The mystery about the Tweefontein guns is also cleared up. De Wet, it is now declared, carried them off. The London Lon-don Standard account of the exploit shows what a marvelous leader the Boer general is, and what wonderful and daring men he possesses. It was another Majubu, only better. The Boers climbed an almost precipitous cliff in their bare feet; they overpowered overpow-ered the pickets,- s'eized their guns and bayonets, and with thm charged the camp. The greatest indignation exists amongst the writers for the British press at this proceeding, the same British press which gleerully recorded the "sticking" of Boers as one of the pleasant relaxations of the Lancers during a Boer -.defeat in the earlier phases of the war. "British soldiers stabbed by Boers," is the amusing1 caption which appears in an English paper with reference to this marvelous military exploit. - It is, in fact, set forth as some kind of brutal murder for the Boers to seize British arms In fair fight and immediately turn them on their enemies. Had Dartnell seized De Wet's pom-pom and turned It on the Boers what glee thege snvouid have been amongst the Journalists, who have such a grievance against the Boers for actually using British bayonets after risking their lives to take them. The whole Tweefontein episode now, it appears, ap-pears, only lasted half an hour. The guns, ammunition, supplies, "and prac- ! ticany an tne unwounaea aritisn were taken prisoners, and the Light Horse arrived too late to take up the pursuit, a fact which, no doubt, they found very comforting and consoling, since De Wet is a very nasty customer to pursue. A significant passage In the Standard telegram relates that De Wet, after the affair 'with Dartnell, was reinforced by 1,700 men. This was in the center of a district which was supposed to be completely guarded by blockhouses. If,, the blockhouse system sys-tem was of any.;use a reinforcement of this kind would, of course, be impossible. impossi-ble. It appears extremely likely that the British are really besieged in the blockhouses. Whenever they venture ven-ture into the open they apparently fall into the hands of the enemy. It is only by making themselves practically prisoners pris-oners in wired-in shanties that they succeed in holding ground at all. The Standard telegrams just give us a glimpse behind the scenes. There is a wealth of detail in them in which the general's despatches are sadly lacking. But even these press messages had probably to pass the censor, and it is extremely likely that worse remains behind. |