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numbered as much as forty thousand all told. Indeed, no one who took the best available statistics of the population of the Republics and of the 'disloyal' districts in the Colony could reach a higher figure. In view of this, is there not an exquisite humour in the appeal made by the Dean of Canterbury in a send-off sermon addressed to the East Kent Yeomanry, rounding off an eloquent period by quoting Macaulay's famous lines: –
And how can man die better
Than facing fearful odds,
For the ashes of his fathers
And the temples of his gods?
The psychological puzzle is a most interesting one. Here is a people, the great majority of whom know quite well that our forces are vastly superior in numbers to the Boers (their indignation at the insolence of the ultimatum being based chiefly on the smallness of the people), that our soldiers are mostly professionals, theirs amateurs; that our control of the material resources which ultimately decide a war are incomparably greater; and yet they are capable of feeling the same sort of mental elation when the tide of victory turns towards us as if we had successfully engaged France