The problem with which Lord Kitchener was confronted was a very
difficult one, and he has never shown more originality and audacity
than in the fashion in which he handled it. De la Rey's force was
scattered over a long tract of country, capable of rapidly
concentrating for a blow, but otherwise as intangible and elusive
as a phantom army. Were Lord Kitchener simply to launch ten
thousand horsemen at him, the result would be a weary ride over
illimitable plains without sight of a Boer, unless it were a
distant scout upon the extreme horizon. De la Rey and his men would
have slipped away to his northern hiding-places beyond the Marico
River. There was no solid obstacle here, as in the Orange River
Colony, against which the flying enemy could be rounded up. One
line of blockhouses there was, it is true--the one called the
Schoonspruit cordon, which flanked the De la Rey country. It
flanked it, however, upon the same side as that on which the troops
were assembled. If the troops were only on the other side, and De
la Rey was between them and the blockhouse line, then, indeed,
something might be done.
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