It was
disheartening to remember that all this large stretch of country
had from April to November been as peaceful and almost as
prosperous as Kent or Yorkshire. Now the intrusion of the guerilla
bands, and the pressure put by them upon the farmers, had raised
the whole country once again, and the work of pacification had to
be set about once more, with harsher measures than before. A
continuous barrier of barbed-wire fencing had been erected from
Bloemfontein to the Basuto border, a distance of eighty miles, and
this was now strongly held by British posts. From the south Bruce
Hamilton, Hickman, Thorneycroft, and Haig swept upwards, stripping
the country as they went in the same way that French had done in
the Eastern Transvaal, while Pilcher's column waited to the north
of the barbed-wire barrier. It was known that Fourie, with a
considerable commando, was lurking in this district, but he and his
men slipped at night between the British columns and escaped.
Pilcher, Bethune, and Byng were able, however, to send in 200
prisoners and very great numbers of cattle.
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